This thesis discusses the relationship between work, education and social question in Brazil from the analysis of documents produced in the period 1930-2000 by industrial leaders and also by CNI (National Confederation of Industry), the most important collective intellect of the national bourgeoisie. It's based on theoreticalmethodological historical materialism, specifically studies of Gramsci on the state, social class and hegemony, emphasizing his analysis on the function of schools in capitalist societies; his criticism the vocational school and the defense of a "single school", a school of education general and humanistic, understood as the most advanced type of school in capitalist societies, and should be the object of those who are committed to true democracy. Examines the emergence of a fraction of the Brazilian ruling class, the industrialists, and their insertion into the political game after 1930, period of reorganization of the state in the face the crisis of hegemony of the agro-export oligarchy.Shows how the apparatus of hegemony created by the industrial bourgeoisie were used both for political and ideological control of the working class, and to interfere in social and labor laws. Advances analyzing the decades of 1950-1970, period that marks the subordinate integration of Brazil to monopoly capitalism, the reorientation of economic policy, the human capital theory and its impact on reforms in education and vocational training. Discusses the organic crisis of capitalism and its impact in Brazil (1980Brazil ( -2000; the political reforms aimed at restructuring of the state and the economy. Study the influence of neoliberalism in education policies, the emphasis on issues such as competitiveness, social responsibility and entrepreneurship, new strategies for finding the consensus of the social classes, so as not to show the crisis of hegemony experienced by capitalism in recent years. Finally, we emphasize the importance of knowing the contradictions generated by the capitalist system, because only then will we be able to reveal their political-ideological and to continue the "war of position" toward building a new society project