Authority is a central issue for teachers and refers to the leadership relationship between teachers and pupils for the purpose of initiating learning. A review of the current state of research shows that the interplay between authority and social inequality has seldom been investigated to date. That is the starting point for the present ethnographic research project. It adopts a sociological and socio-philosophical perspective on the relevance of social background in negotiations of authority between pupils and teachers in inclusive primary schools in Germany. With respect to the developed concept of un/doing authority, it shows that the aspect of vulnerability is particularly important in these interactions. The study comes to the following conclusion: the mutual vulnerability of "good" pupils and teachers is recognised, whereas teachers' relationships with "bad" pupils show a mutual violation that can often be understood as a re-enactment of social inequalities and future educational exclusion.