Educational Experiences and Pathways to Social Mobility

Abstract

In chapter 3, I showed that extended occupational and economic transformations occurred in Greece after the Second World War. A similar picture was also painted in relation to Protopi (chapters 6 and 7). Given that education has been regarded as a, if not the, avenue par excellence of social mobility in most economically advanced European societies after the war (chapter 2) and large investment has been directed into it ever since, its exploration is important for understanding the wider mobility processes with which this study is concerned. Chapter 8 expands on the inter- and intragenerational mobility experiences of residents in Protopi and furnishes us with an understanding of the role that education has played in shaping and transforming careers, aspirations, pathways, and employment experiences across the three generations. The argument I put forward is that education has played a significant role in the social mobility careers of individuals, although the relationship between education and social mobility is much more complex than that.