The purpose of this article is to show that the political forces in the National Congress, in alliance with sectors in the Executive, rendered the conservative liberal thought hegemonic in the educational field. As a result, they built a strategy based on which they were able to approve, in December 1996, the Guideline and Base Law (GBL), which is generalist in nature, particularly with regard to professional education. This fact allowed the technical education reform to be regulated via Decree # 2.208/97, originating at the Executive, promoting, thus, the separation between general and specific education in this mode of teaching, undermining the single school concept that had been proposed in the original project, inspired in educators who are connected to the Marxist line of thought in the educational field.
single school; technical education; reforms; National Congress