James Arvanitakis
This is a (very) brief introduction to the work of Antonio Gramsci: who I think is an important and influential thinkers even 70-years after his key work. His insights have much to offer us in understanding the world and how to change it: especially if you are involved in education.
There is a great deal written about Gramsci – and it is not possible to do his work justice here, but here I provide an overview of some of his key concepts. Gramsci is considered a theorist from the Marxist tradition – though much of it saw him diverge from this school of thought as he moved to highlight areas Marxists ignored.
Gramsci was an Italian theorist who was set to jail for his revolutionary actions, and it in prison he wrote his famous work: The Prison Notebooks (in the 1930s). It was, as the title suggests, written in prison – and it is in prison he died.
The importance of Gramsci’s work is that he prompts us to question everything around us including what we consider to be ‘commonsense’ in our culture.
Culture and hegemony
Gramsci recognised that the diverse forms of national and international culture were never neutral or sperate from politics: culture, which often seems natural, is bound with power, control and leadership – and is also historical. Gramsci saw and important link between culture and politics – but this is not a simple or straightforward one.
(When I am referring to culture, I am talking about the routines, rituals and beliefs that dominate everyday life: see my previous blog for an in-depth discussion.)
Culture is often reproduced in a way that assists in maintaining the status quo by reflecting and reproducing the established power structures in a way that seems ‘normal’ and ‘natural’. That is, these structures seem to make commonsense and have always been that way. In this way, power structures are constantly reproduced and we consent to this even if they negatively affect us. This was a concept that Gramsci described as hegemony.
Gramsci explain then, that power was maintained, not just by the threat of violence and coercion, but also through ideology. This culture establishes commonsense values that reflect what suits those already in power – that is, the capitalists. These values are also picked up and accepted by the working class who support structures that negatively impact them rather than revolt.
Therefore, Gramsci saw control as much more sophisticated based on both force (coercion) and consent (hegemony). This was achieved through a complex series of cultural, political and ideological practices that cement society into a relative – though never complete – unity.
Gramsci also argued that the dominant cultural values of the ruling class were tied to Christianity: meaning that much of his attacks on the hegemonic culture are also aimed at religious norms and values that dominated Europe.
Hegemony was used by Gramsci to explain why capitalism was entrenched in western societies even if a majority of people were suffering.
Importantly, Gramsci’s theory of hegemony is linked to the capitalist state. The state is not to be understood in the narrow sense of the government but moves into the ‘private’ (non-state) sphere, including the economy.
Culture and power
Gramsci argues that we need to free ourselves of seeing culture as something that is made up of encyclopaedic knowledge, receptacles of empirical data and a mass on uncorrelated facts. Culture is not something that is external but internal to us: that is, it is about one’s ‘self’. In other words – and as I noted above – culture is historical, not natural.
That is, we can understand changes in political culture – and the power that we reflect through everyday practices (or hegemony) through historical reflection.
In the 1930s, Gramsci began looking at the concrete forms of cultural organisations – such as schools, churches, newspapers and so on – that keep ideological world in movement and examined how they function in practice. That is, how these institutions ensure power continues to support current structures. In other words, Gramsci felt that these institutions did not challenge power structures but, rather, supported them.
Changes to established power structures have only been proceeded by criticism and a spread of ideas to people who are at first resistant because they are dealing with their immediate circumstances. These people, because of their focus on their immediate circumstances do not get political (or have no solidarity).
We can think how today, many of us are too busy with uni, paying rent or mortgages to support protesters even if we agree with them!
One problem that Gramsci saw, which stopped change happening, was large gap between intellectual groups and the popular masses. One reason for this was that there is no single (or homogenous) conception of the type of change that we want: something that we still see today. The result is that the intellectual groups are scattered while real change can only happen through collective movements.
Confronting power – making change
The answer then, is for working class and other opposition groups to develop their own culture that would replace what is currently seen as natural or normal. For example, taxation benefits us through government services, but we have come to believe that it is a negative thing. This new cultural position should attract both the intellectuals and the oppressed.
For Gramsci, this raised the need for cultural-social unity through which brings together dispersed wills with heterogenous aims into a single objective. This would lead to a new social order that it would be produced and re-produced, bringing together institutions, social relations and ideas. This also highlights the importance of language that allows a single cultural chant.
Gramsci believed intellectuals have an important role in society. ‘Modern intellectuals’, Gramsci believed, did not just theorise, but were also organisers who built society and help produce hegemony by means of institutions such as education and the media.
It is here that Gramsci felt there was potential for change. Because he believed that each social class produces from its own ranks intellectuals 'organically'. The 'organic' intellectuals do not simply describe just social life, but rather articulate, through the language of culture, the feelings and experiences that the masses find it hard to.
Gramsci called on those intellectuals that came from the working classes to promote a kind of education that would challenge the status quo.
Ideology, popular beliefs and commonsense
Gramsci, when looking at the concept of commonsense, wanted to criticise how previous thinkers – including Marxists – neglected the area of consciousness
For Gramsci, ideas are real (or material) forces. This is, because consciousness is not just born but structured in certain ways to reflect the general organisation of society. This was not meant to be a ‘conspiracy’. Rather, to highlight how the way that ideas and philosophy come about are complex: are something that ultimately reflects power structures.
Gramsci argued that there are three ways that elites link together:
- Language,
- Commonsense, and
- Folklore (that is, a form of popular religion, opinions, ways of seeing things and superstition)
Commonsense was key for Gramsci as it is pervasive but unsystematic: that is, while it is the basis of popular experience, it does not represent a unified conception of the world as philosophy does. Here philosophy is an intellectual order, which neither religion nor common sense can be. There are various philosophies or conceptions of the world – and one makes a choice between them – the question is how is this made? The philosophy that we come to accept and live by is also a political action.
The social basis of these ideas is that we come to belong to a group that gives us social elements of thinking and acting. This gives us something to conform to. In this way, our personalities are composite.
Sources
Bottomore, T. (1992) The Dictionary of Marxist Thought, Blackwell Publishers,
Gramsci, A. (1971) Selections from the Prison Notebooks, International Publishers
Jay, M. (1986) Marxism and Totality: The Adventures of a Concept from Lukacs to Habermas, University of California Press
Boggs, C. (1984) The Two Revolutions: Gramsci and the Dilemmas of Western Marxism, South End Press
