Tag: Antonio Gramsci
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Populism & Hegemony (series)
The broad political Left in the United States has been plagued for decades now with a culture of reaction, fragmentation, issue silo-ing, and a chasm between insiders and outsiders. Can the concepts of populism and hegemony help to explain these challenges? What insights might we gain through an exploration of these ideas? A series on…
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Activism vs. organizing | reflections on Gramsci pt.2
In his essay Voluntarism and Social Masses, Antonio Gramsci argues that “the actions and organizations of ‘volunteers’ must be distinguished from the actions and organisations of homogeneous social blocs, and judged by different criteria.” He defines these “volunteers” as “those who have detached themselves from the mass by arbitrary individual initiative…” His language of volunteers…
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reflections on Gramsci (series)
I’ve been thinking a lot about the concept of hegemony, and reading Antonio Gramsci. I’ll be posting a few reflections as I go. This is the landing page for this series. You can bookmark it and check back for new posts, which I’ll be linking to from this page. “Spontaneity” and social change Activism vs.…
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“Spontaneity” and social change | reflections on Gramsci pt.1
I’ve been thinking a lot about the concept of hegemony, and reading Antonio Gramsci. I’ll be posting a few reflections as I go. Years ago, I remember growing wary of tendencies (within activist groups I was part of) to exaggerate and glorify supposedly “spontaneous” elements of activism and protest. Some group members often recounted protests…
Jonathan Matthew Smucker 