This article discusses the contributions of Paulo Freire and the actuality of his thought for education, for overcoming naive consciousness, and for the action necessary to the constitution of subjects that act with and within history. In the first part, I discuss Paulo Freire's struggle for awakening the oppressed, taking education as one of the possible instruments for this mission. In the second part, I discuss the main theses of his work regarding the struggle for liberation and emancipation of disadvantaged classes, and finally, in the third part I discuss his criticism of the dual school. The article shows in the end that a democratic education cannot exist without a society that follows the same adjective
Paulo Freire; school education; democracy