Gramsci's Political Thought: Hegemony, Consciousness, and the Revolutionary Process
Joseph V. Femia
Abstract
The unifying idea of Antonio Gramsci's famous Prison Notebooks is the concept of hegemony. In this study of these fragmentary writings this book elucidates the precise character of this concept, explores its basic philosophical assumptions, and sets out its implications for Gramsci's explanation of social stability and his vision of the revolutionary process. A number of prevalent and often contradictory myths are demolished, and, moreover, certain neglected aspects of his thought are stressed, including the predominant role he attributed to economic factors, the importance he gave to ‘contrad ... More
The unifying idea of Antonio Gramsci's famous Prison Notebooks is the concept of hegemony. In this study of these fragmentary writings this book elucidates the precise character of this concept, explores its basic philosophical assumptions, and sets out its implications for Gramsci's explanation of social stability and his vision of the revolutionary process. A number of prevalent and often contradictory myths are demolished, and, moreover, certain neglected aspects of his thought are stressed, including the predominant role he attributed to economic factors, the importance he gave to ‘contradictory consciousness’, and the close connection between his political thinking and his fundamental philosophical premises. The book concludes by critically examining Gramsci's novel solutions to three long-standing problems for Marxist theory: the reasons why the Western working class has not carried out its revolutionary mission; determining the appropriate strategy for a Marxist party working within an advanced capitalist framework; and what are the reasons behind the failure of existing socialist states in their task of liberation?
Keywords:
Antonio Gramsci,
Prison Notebooks,
hegemony,
social stability,
revolutionary process,
economic factors,
contradictory consciousness,
political thinking,
capitalist,
Marxist theory
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 1987 |
Print ISBN-13: 9780198275435 |
| Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: October 2011 |
DOI:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198275435.001.0001 |
