ABSTRACT
The symbolic pillars of modern Western societies might be argued to consist of two main components: knowledge and work. The power struggles around these constitutives have shaped the structures of modern nation states and their institutions. Even more, those same elements, the shifting notions of knowledge and work, have also for their part featured modern worldviews and individual mentalities. In this process, the executive and mediating role of education and schooling in general has proved indispensable and, in particular, the curriculum as the centerpiece of educational activity has played a major role at societal as well as individual levels. The revolution Descartes engendered in his synoptic views of the Galilean Nuova Scienzia, together with his critique of scholastic thinking, meant a drastic change in cognitive attitudes, which did not leave society at large untouched. The decline of religious authority to the advantage of human reason spread to the most diverse spheres of human action.
