As propounded by Karl Max and his associates who observed the society as characterised by conflicts and coercion between two major social classes.
The social classes are as a result of those who own means of production and those who exploited to produce in the system of means of production. By means of production they refer to land ,capital,building/machinery and other equipments.
The owners of means of production are known as 'bourgeosies'(haves) who also fall in the ruling elite . And the have nots or working class known as the 'proletariate'.Who exploited their labour exchanged with unfair low wages.
Hence these two major social classes enter into relationaships of production to produce their needs and wants. Unfortunately because of exploitative nature of the relationship resulted into conflicts and struggles which evidenced by work stoppages,strike,demostration or stay away at the working group demands fair compensation and good working conditions.
Thus how Marxism theory of conflict perspective developed from skewed relations necessitated by social struggles between these major two groups. He (Marxist)argued to Durkheim a functionalist propounder who ruled out the struggle of social institutions as these institutions work in harmony for production with each other and the changes are gradual in the social dynamism.Infact Marxist insists that the changes in the society are caused by conflicts between the poorly remunerated working class against the ever profitable and rich capitalists who restrict resources to the workers to remain poor. In this view the workers shall fight for their rights and the changes will be radical or revolutionary.
The conflicts is essential to correct the social injustice perpetuated by the haves who use coercive power and manipulative authority to hold the labelling tendencies and suppress the have nots against upheavals ,nevertheless the change is inevitable and very rapid.
According to Marxist perspective Education designed by the capitalists to provide more manpower for their industries and is a training area to operate sophisticated machinery.In his view Marxist probes Education as:
Whose culture?
Whose norms and values does an Education system serve?
Bourdieu in Bannet and Lecompte (1990) says,the major role of Education system is cultural reproduction ,this doesn't involve the transmission of the culture of the society as a whole.The school curriculum is a deliberate selection from the culture of ruling class(dominant )thus it serves their interests. Majority of children from the dominant class tend to experience academic success because of their familarity with the content of the curriculum.
In contrasts children from the working class backgrounds who are alien to the content of this Education system, majority of them failed academically ,since success favours the dominant group in the job market the existing inequalities are perpetuated.
And Bowels and Gintis talk of social reproduction ,that's the school prepare children for their place in the world of work. In other words the Education functions to legitimise and justify the status-quo . Therefore the school serves interests of the dominant group.
The Educational implications in the social system is a direct consequence of the nature of its economic system. Education teaches the value of the ruling dominant class according to their culture of supremacy to be perpetuated.
The curriculum implementers (teachers) need to base up for curriculum changes and innovations because changes are disliking and inevitable which calls for curricular and educational policies to be adoptive.For example the technological advancement demands the use of Intermediate Communication Technology (ICT) which may make it impossible to persist with traditional way of education system.
Moreover Marxst's criticism based on haves and have nots stand on the economic foundation (Infrustructure) and super structure of non economic institutions . But the conflict can arise from other areas besides economy ,for example power ,status etc.
* Please also note that the social developments are not always influenced by the economic base.
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