School expansion: Reality and pseudo-reality of equal educational opportunity

The paper deals with the results of critical-theoretical analysis of the global context of the school expansion: general growth of educational structure of population, credentals' inflation, and growing importance of education in the process of allocation of the individuals on the job market, as the one of the major tendencies in European societies after World War II. Reality and pseudo-reality of equal opportunities have been evaluated on the different levels of; entrance into educational system, diversification of the schooling process, and societal valorization of 'diploma'. Concepts of segregation of democracy and cascade concurrency have been used in answering the question why the importance of ascribed ('heritaged') attributes have grown which consequently undermined the legitimation basis of modern democratic societies - equal opportunity for all.