''Hegemony and Socialist Strategy: Towards a Radical Democratic Politics'' is a 1985 work of

political theory Political philosophy or political theory is the philosophical study of government, addressing questions about the nature, scope, and legitimacy of public agents and institutions and the relationships between them. Its topics include politics, ...

in the post-Marxist tradition by

Ernesto Laclau Ernesto Laclau (; 6 October 1935 – 13 April 2014) was an Argentine political theorist and philosopher. He is often described as an 'inventor' of post-Marxist political theory. He is well known for his collaborations with his long-term partner ...

and

Chantal Mouffe Chantal Mouffe (; born 17 June 1943) is a Belgian political theorist, formerly teaching at University of Westminster. She is best known for her contribution to the development—jointly with Ernesto Laclau, with whom she co-authored her most f ...

. Developing several sharp divergences from the tenets of canonical Marxist thought, the authors begin by tracing historically varied

discursive Discursive is an adjective from the word discourse and may refer specifically to: * Discursive complex, a methodological device in psychoanalysis * Discursive democracy, any system of political decisions based on some tradeoff of consensus decision ...

constitutions of

class Class or The Class may refer to: Common uses not otherwise categorized * Class (biology), a taxonomic rank * Class (knowledge representation), a collection of individuals or objects * Class (philosophy), an analytical concept used differently ...

, political identity, and social self-understanding, and then tie these to the contemporary importance of

hegemony Hegemony (, , ) is the political, economic, and military predominance of one State (polity), state over other states. In Ancient Greece (8th BC – AD 6th ), hegemony denoted the politico-military dominance of the ''hegemon'' city-state over oth ...

as a destabilized

analytic Generally speaking, analytic (from el, ἀναλυτικός, ''analytikos'') refers to the "having the ability to analyze" or "division into elements or principles". Analytic or analytical can also have the following meanings: Chemistry * ...

which avoids the traps of various procedures Mouffe and Laclau feel constitute a foundational flaw in Marxist thought: essentializations of class identity, the use of ''a priori'' interpretative paradigms with respect to history and contextualization, the privileging of the base/superstructure binary above other explicative models.

Organization

The book is divided into four chapters (~50 pages each). The first two chapters deal with conceptual developments in the manner of an

intellectual history Intellectual history (also the history of ideas) is the study of the history of human thought and of intellectuals, people who conceptualize, discuss, write about, and concern themselves with ideas. The investigative premise of intellectual hist ...

, albeit with much more of an eye to disputation and intervention than traditional intellectual history employs. Specifically, Chapter 1 discusses the work of

Rosa Luxemburg Rosa Luxemburg (; ; pl, Róża Luksemburg or ; 5 March 1871 – 15 January 1919) was a Polish and naturalised-German revolutionary socialism, revolutionary socialist, Marxism, Marxist philosopher and anti-war movement, anti-war activist. Succ ...

Karl Kautsky Karl Johann Kautsky (; ; 16 October 1854 – 17 October 1938) was a Czech-Austrian philosopher, journalist, and Marxist theorist. Kautsky was one of the most authoritative promulgators of orthodox Marxism after the death of Friedrich Engels ...

Eduard Bernstein Eduard Bernstein (; 6 January 1850 – 18 December 1932) was a German social democratic Marxist theorist and politician. A member of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD), Bernstein had held close association to Karl Marx and Friedr ...

, and

Georges Sorel Georges Eugène Sorel (; ; 2 November 1847 – 29 August 1922) was a French social thinker, political theorist, historian, and later journalist. He has inspired theories and movements grouped under the name of Sorelianism. His social and ...

(among other texts by major thinkers in the Marxist tradition). Chapter 2's discussion of Gramsci's conception of

cultural hegemony In Marxist philosophy, cultural hegemony is the dominance of a culturally diverse society by the ruling class who manipulate the culture of that society—the beliefs and explanations, perceptions, values, and mores—so that the worldview o ...

is followed by Chapter 3's more politicized development of Laclau and Mouffe's own arguments regarding hegemony's character and constitution. Finally, the fourth chapter argues for the relevance of hegemony as an

for the understanding and governance of contemporary politics, political engagement, and self-understanding on the

Left Left may refer to: Music * ''Left'' (Hope of the States album), 2006 * ''Left'' (Monkey House album), 2016 * "Left", a song by Nickelback from the album '' Curb'', 1996 Direction * Left (direction), the relative direction opposite of right * ...

Reception

''Hegemony and Socialist Strategy'' was greeted with positive reviews and has become a reference point in its field; for example, Marxist philosopher

Slavoj Žižek Slavoj Žižek (, ; ; born 21 March 1949) is a Slovenian philosopher, cultural theorist and public intellectual. He is international director of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities at the University of London, visiting professor at New ...

cited ''Hegemony and Socialist Strategy'' as a work having influenced his book, '' The Sublime Object of Ideology''. Furthermore, its resolutely "post-Marxist" self-definition marks it as one of the first major texts associated with this disciplinary development. A new edition was published in 2001, which included a preface by the authors in which they reaffirmed their commitment to the arguments made in 1985. The concept had a great influence on the theory of social movements and post-colonial research and marked the emergence of

post-Marxism Post-Marxism is a trend in political philosophy and social theory which deconstructs Karl Marx's writings and Marxism itself, bypassing orthodox Marxism. The term "post-Marxism" first appeared in Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe's theoretical ...

in the social sciences. The work also inspired the political movements Podemos and ''

La France insoumise La France Insoumise (FI or LFI; ; "France Unbowed") is a left-wing populist political party in France, launched in 2016 by Jean-Luc Mélenchon, then a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) and former co-president of the Left Party (PG). It aims ...

''.

Norman Geras Norman Geras (; 25 August 1943 – 18 October 2013) was a political theorist and Professor Emeritus of Politics at the University of Manchester. He contributed to an analysis of the works of Karl Marx in his book '' Marx and Human Nature'' and ...

, in a ''New Left Review'' article titled "Post-Marxism?", lambasted Laclau and Mouffe for what he regarded as shallow

obscurantism In philosophy, the terms obscurantism and obscurationism describe the anti-intellectual practices of deliberately presenting information in an abstruse and imprecise manner that limits further inquiry and understanding of a subject. There are two ...

grounded on basic misunderstandings of both Marx and Marxism. After Laclau's and Mouffe's response to Geras' paper (in "Post-Marxism without apologies"), Geras doubled down with "Ex-Marxism Without Substance: Being A Real Reply to Laclau and Mouffe" in which he further criticised the post-Marxist turn.

References

Bibliography

* ''Smith, Anna Marie.'' Laclau and Mouffe: The Radical Democratic Imaginary. — London: Routledge, 1998. * ''Howarth, David.'' Discourse. — Milton Keynes: Open University Press, 2000. * ''Philips, Louise, Jorgensen, Marianne.'' Discourse Analysis as Theory and Method. — London: Sage, 2002. * ''Howarth, David, Aletta Norval and Yannis Stavrakakis (eds).'' Discourse Theory and Political Analysis. — Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2002. * ''Critchley, Simon and Oliver Marchart (eds).'' Laclau: A Critical Reader. — London: Routledge, 2004. * ''Breckman, Warren.'' Adventures of the Symbolic: Postmarxism and Radical Democracy. — New York: Columbia University Press, 2013. * ''Howarth, David and Jacob Torfing (eds).'' Discourse Theory in European Politics. — Houndmills: Palgrave, 2005. * ''Torfing, Jacob.'' New Theories of Discourse: Laclau, Mouffe, Žižek. — Oxford: Blackwell, 1999. * ''Jacobs, Thomas.'' The Dislocated Universe of Laclau and Mouffe: An Introduction to Post-Structuralist Discourse Theory — Critical Review 30(3-4), 2018. {{DEFAULTSORT:Hegemony And Socialist Strategy 1985 non-fiction books Philosophy books Books about cultural hegemony Books by Ernesto Laclau Books by Chantal Mouffe Collaborative non-fiction books Works about Marxism