I will begin by outlining Gramsci's origins and upbringings, which are relevant to his later life as a theoretician, and then continue to examine his work on superstructures, and contrast it with the Marxist orthodoxy. I will place this in a socio-historical context of 19th and 20th century Italy which influenced Gramsci immensely and also that of the later 20th century when his ideas gained currency outside of Italy.
Gramsci was born in Sardinia in 1891, on the periphery of the Italian state. His family were poor, and he received sporadic education, and was later granted a scholarship to study Modern Philosophy in Turin[3]. His initial political thought “..was more of a Sardinian nationalist than a socialist[4]”. His concern for the plight of the Sardinian poor, amongst whom he could count himself, was the basis for this nationalist outlook, and this concern for the plight of the poor would lead him to who ever supported this oppressed section of Italian Society[5].
Gramsci studied in Turin on a scholarship and became involved in the socialist movement. He started out as a journalist and political commentator, writing for the Socialist Party (PSI) and later being involved in the organisation as a leading member. In the 'Bienno Rosso' a two year period of increased worker militancy and agitation Gramsci was notable for his involvement in the factory councils movement. The failure of that movement prompted Gramsci, and others, to being the formation of a communist party following the lead of the Bolsheviks. This organisation was repressed by the fascist government of Mussolini and he was imprisoned in 1926 till his death in 1937.
This youthful nationalist's philosophical and political ideas gradually matured as he studied on the mainland. As a student of Modern Philosophy Gramsci was exposed to the works of the great philosophers of the day, both Italian and Foreign, and this exposure broadened his horizons from that of a provincial nationalist to a Marxist. The notable Italian philosopher, Benedetto Croce “whose philosophical thinking and historical analysis had a strong impact on the theoretical development of most Marxists (as well as non-Marxists) of Gramsci's generation[6]” had a strong influence on Gramsci. It was through Croce that Gramsci moved away from the strict materialism that governed orthodox Marxism[7]. Joll goes so far to say that “it is as if a perpetual dialogue between Croce and Lenin was being conducted in his mind.[8]” It is this progression and synthesis of ideas that makes Gramsci such an important Marxist thinker for “such views (strict materialism) practically the norm in many Marxist circles at the time. In Italy they were very common, having mingled with the local positivist tradition...[9]” This rejection of strict materialism is fundamental to his development of ideas relating to social superstructures.
According to orthodox Marxist interpretation of socio-economic relations the root of everything is the mode of production. This is not only applied to modern capitalism but to older systems, from the Roman Empire[10] to Ancient Egypt[11]. The feudal organisation of the middle ages in Europe lead was predicated on the economic obligations of peasant to lord, and of lord to king.
The economic 'base' is the only relevant component of society, so that everything stems from this base; culture, laws, religion, language and any other aspect of society have no other root than the economic system. This interpretation then being based on observable phenomena has the same objective validity as natural sciences, thus it is scientific[12]. This reduces humanity to a little more than a reaction to the economic system, limiting the role of human agency and free-will[13]. The simplification of these ideas prompted the work of several Marxists as Gramsci was not alone in his progression from this crude materialism[14] [15]. Korsch for example states: “...Lenin's materialist philosophy, which forms the ideological basis of this theory(outside forces leading the proletariat), cannot constitute the revolutionary proletarian philosophy that will answer the needs of today.[16]”
Despite his being part of a reaction to the prevailing orthodoxy, though isolated from the contemporary debates of Marxist philosophy, Gramsci's thought was the most significant. This is in part due to going further than any other contemporary Marxist thinker in adding a social and cultural framework to understand social and economic relations. His influence extends beyond that of Marxist theory and informs cultural theory and even right-wing thinking[17]. He was isolated from the currents of intellectual discourse in the fascist jails he spent much of his later life and in so doing Gramsci developed his theories alone, in fragmentary bursts as his health and jailers would allow[18]. These hardships: his isolation, imprisonment from 1926 to 1937 and his poor health did not stop Gramsci developing his theories, and in doing so alone he demonstrated his immense intellect and wide ranging thought.
Gramsci's 'Superstructuralism' starts with his assertion that the superstructures of society had a reciprocal relationship with the economic base, and that through this mutual influence could affect and even change the economic base. The role of law, culture, language, religion and tradition were given a validity by Gramsci that was denied by Marxist orthodoxy. This extension is key in his ideas concerning hegemony, and his consideration of them informs his conception of an advanced capitalist society.
The bourgeois control of society and the modes of production stems from their control and influence in these superstructures. This domination is an active process and struggle, one which creates and maintains, and in turn is buttressed by 'civil society'. Bourgeois control maintains the threat of force, but the ruling class's control is so pervasive and ingrained in social norms and values to the extent that “when the state trembled a sturdy structure of civil society was at once revealed. The state was only an outer ditch, behind which there stood a powerful system of fortresses and earthworks[19]”. In this Gramsci is giving the bourgeois control of society a cultural aspect dependent on their hegemony, something which is entirely beyond the scope of strict materialism.
Italy during the 19th and 20th centuries was an ideal example of these processes[20]. According to Gramsci's theory to take power a social group needs to exercise hegemonic control[21], which is exactly what he sees in what he called “the Moderates[22]”, who later became the Liberal Party and were founded by Cavour. This contrasts with the Action Party of Mazzini[23] who “did not specifically base itself specifically on any historical class[24]” and gradually merged into the parliamentary left.
The authority of foreign power in Italy of Austria was based on coercive power rather than hegemonic control, as demonstrated by the “Quadrilatero” which was an area contained by four great Austrian fortresses. Italian nationalism had been developing since the Napoleonic years, and was not related to economic conditions, in that the North and South of Italy despite their economic disparity and political disunity were party to the growing nationalism. This shows the point that Gramsci makes regarding the interrelation of base and superstructure: nationalism emerged despite the differences in the base structures in Italy. The development of Italian nationalism was then parallel to the development of an Italian elite; the unification of Italy was not led by an economic class, but by a state, Piedmont[25]. The “state” is a part of the superstructure and yet through it Italy was united into one economic unit and nation.
Gramsci notes that in Russia the autocracy of the Tsar diminished and arrested the development of civil society, to maintain the exclusivity of autocratic power and privilege[26]. The stresses and strains of the first world war diminished the prestige of the regime and it's ability to use force to maintain its power. With no 'civil society' to defend the extant social structure the Bolsheviks were able to defeat the reactionary forces militarily. In an advanced capitalist country the existence of a 'civil society' necessitates a different strategy to combat the bourgeois control; in this analysis Gramsci explains the apparent contradiction of Marxist predictions of proletarian revolutions[27].
The origins of this analysis lie in the 'Bienno Rosso' in the year immediately following the first world war, which was part of the revolutionary upsurge experienced in Europe at the time. It was felt that ”there was the widespread perception on both the political left and right that a return to the old order was not possible[28].” During this period of ferment the workers of Italy challenged their exploitation, but were unable to turn their actions into power.
The rise in worker activity, and it's failure, led to a reaction which was the emergence of the Fascists, who objected to the perceived weaknesses of the liberal state and the left wing orientation of the working classes. These targets struck a chord with the middle classes and elements of the bourgeoisie who supported the endeavours of the fascists. The working classes despite their actions did not have hegemonic control of society, rather it was the petty bourgeoisie and the middle classes who were represented by the fascists that acted as the hegemonic force, and took control of society.
Following the analysis of the origins of Italian unification as being the result of state action, it follows that the civil society in Italy was weak. This can be seen in the capitulation of the establishment in the face of the fascist march on Rome. This too can be applied to Germany, which was also created through the actions of a nation, in this case Prussia and which was also linked through linguistic and cultural ties[29], and in which “fascist” government was accepted by the elite as a response to crisis[30]. Britian and France too faced poweful workers movements and economic crises, but in these states the elite kept it's nerve and maintained control and hegemony. Britain and France emerged as coherent nation states in the feudal age, where as Italy and Germany were modern constructs: constructs that had weak civil societies and so collapsed in the face of concerted counter hegemonic activity.
That Gramsci is the Marxist the theoretician of 'Superstructures' is by no means a universal statement. While perhaps true in the Anglophone countries, in those countries where German is the dominant language that role is filled by the Frankfurt school, as exemplified by Habermaas[31] et all. The reasons for this discrepancy is in part linguistic, but is also linked to the accidents of history. Gramsci was translated into English in 1971 and this coincided with the rise of the New Left, which took up his ideas as they explain the failures of both 1968 and the Left in the advanced capitalist nations, but also the issues of culture and gender. Had Gramsci been translated earlier or not at all he would have remained merely an Italian Communist (a prominent and important one, but one for the historians of the Italian Left only).
Gramsci's is however the Marxist theoretician of the 'superstructures' in the English speaking world, and as such his work has had a profound influence on many fields beyond that of Marxist philosophy from cultural studies to sociology. His rethinking of the relationship between base and superstructure and his ideas relating to hegemony have been validated by many historical events, such as the USSR which can be attributed to a collapse in hegemony for the Communist Party. Gramsci's ideas on hegemony are now used by right-wing political parties in their quest for power[32], a use which demonstrates the wide applicability of the concept. Gramsci's thought today has relevance where other early 20th century Marxists have none, so that Korsch or Pannekoek for example do not widely inform cultural and political debate[33] where Gramscian thought does. His ideas on the relationship between the base and superstructure, and the reciprocal relationship between them are now seemingly proved through many examples completely disproving Marxist orthodoxy. The absence of interest from Islamic countries that are capitalist shows the power religion can exert over economic structure and organisation.
His upbringing and education in Italy played a formative role in his politics, but so too did practical experience of socialist journalism, worker activism and political party organisation. He was no armchair theoretician and his legacy is tangible in the form of the Communist Refoundation Party in Italy[34], and the Democratic Party[35] which can also trace a lineage to the PCI. His time in fascist jail and the late translation of his work into English meant his writings only emerged some time after his death, so that they appeared modern and fresh when they are a product of the inter-war years. This accident of history propelled Gramsci to intellectual celebrity, as the New Left saw the depth and value of his contributions to Marxism. His prescience and vision are startling to this day and when compared to the dull rhetoric that passes for ideology in the far left today he seems all the more relevant.
Bibliography
Richard Bellamy and Darrow Schecter, Gramsci and the Italian State
(Manchester:Manchester University Press:1993)
Carl Bloggs, Gramsci's Marxism (Southampton, Pluto Press:1980)
N.I. Bukharin, Historical Materialism - a System of Sociology, 1921
John Fonte, Why There Is A Culture War: Gramsci and Tocqueville in America from http://www.orthodoxytoday.org/articles/FonteCultureWar.shtml
Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks of..., edited and translated by Quintin Hoare and Geoffrey Nowell Smith (International Publishers, New York:1971)
Jürgen Habermas, Theory of Communicative Action, trans. Thomas McCarthy, (Boston: Beacon Press, 1984)
James Joll, Gramsci (Glasgow, Fontana Paperbacks:1976)
Karl Korsch, The Present State of the Problem of Marxism and Philosophy: An Anti-critique, from http://libcom.org/library/present-state-korsch
Rob van Kranenburg, Whose Gramsci? Right-wing Gramscism from http://www.internationalgramscisociety.org/igsn/articles/a09_5.shtml
Paul Ransome, Antonio Gramsci – A New Introduction
(Hemel Hempstead:Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1992)
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[1]Richard Bellamy and Darrow Schecter, Gramsci and the Italian State page 112
[2]From SpecterZine Website accessed at 16:21 on 16/10/2009 http://www.spectrezine.org/reviews/laclaumouffe.htm
[3]Paul Ransome, Antonio Gramsci – A New Introduction (Hemel Hempstead:Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1992) page 60
[4]Gramsci and the Italian State – Richard Bellamy and Darrow Schecter page 3
[5]Paul Ransome, Antonio Gramsci – A New Introduction (Hemel Hempstead:Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1992) page 60 and 61
[6]Carl Bloggs, Gramsci's Marxism (Southampton, Pluto Press:1980) page 21
[7]James Joll, Gramsci (Glasgow, Fontana Paperbacks:1976) page 23
[8]Ibid page 76
[9]Richard Bellamy and Darrow Schecter, Gramsci and the Italian State, page 85
[10]The 'Antique Mode of Production' – humans are directly owned by others as slaves to provide labour
[11]The 'Asiatic Mode of Production' This is a controversial theory that holds the state in ancient societies played a significant role in economic matters. An elite based on a large urban capital dominate the small villages that are the majority of the population, creaming off surplus value for their own use, creating large monuments eg pyramids, ziggurats to justify their power.
[12]“If we regard the phenomena of nature which surround us, as well as those of social life, we shall observe that these phenomena by no means constitute a confused mass in which nothing may be distinguished or understood or predicted. On the other hand, we may everywhere ascertain, by attentive observation, a certain regularity in these phenomena.”
from N.I. Bukharin: Historical Materialism - a System of Sociology, 1921 – accessed at 14.07 on 06/10/2009 from http://www.marxists.org/archive/bukharin/works/1921/histmat/1.htm#a
[13]“In the social production of their existence, men inevitably enter Into definite relations, which are independent of their will, namely [the] relations of production appropriate to a given stage in the development of their material forces of production. The totality of these relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real foundation, on which arises a legal and political superstructure, and to which correspond definite forms of consciousness. The mode of production of material life conditions the general process of social, political, and intellectual life. It is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence, but their social existence that determines their consciousness.” From the Preface to K. Marx, A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy, Progress Publishers, Moscow, 1977, with some notes by R. Rojas. Accessed from Marxist Internet Archive at http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1859/critique-pol-economy/preface.htm accessed on 16/02/2010 at 15:53
[14]Carl Bloggs, Gramsci's Marxism (Southampton, Pluto Press:1980) page 11
[15]Karl Korsch and György Lukács are two other notable thinkers in this category. Yet they remain tied to a social and economic basis for their thought, whereas Gramsci develops a theory which is broader in conception and more elegant in it's designs for praxis.
[16]Karl Korsch, The Present State of the Problem of Marxism and Philosophy: An Anti-critique from http://libcom.org/library/present-state-korsch accessed at 13.13 on the 06/10/2009
[17]This article show this and frames it in the context of 'culture wars in the USA. John Fonte, Why There Is A Culture War: Gramsci and Tocqueville in America. http://www.orthodoxytoday.org/articles/FonteCultureWar.shtml accessed at 01:03 0n 15/03/2010
[18]James Joll, Gramsci (Glasgow, Fontana Paperbacks:1976) page 73
[19]Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks of..., edited and translated by Quintin Hoare and Geoffrey Nowell Smith (International Publishers, New York:1971) page 238
[20]Gramsci wrote about Italian history extensively and his writings on the issue were part of the framework of his ideas. See pages 52 – 120 in Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks of..., edited and translated by Quintin Hoare and Geoffrey Nowell Smith (International Publishers, New York:1971)
[21]“It seems clear from the policies of the Moderates that there can, and indeed must, be hegemonic activity even before the rise to power, and that one should count only on the material force which power gives to exercise in order to exercise an effective leadership.” Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks of..., edited and translated by Quintin Hoare and Geoffrey Nowell Smith (International Publishers, New York:1971) page 59
[22]The proto-right of pre-risorgimento Italian poltics, Described in Note 6 on page 57 from Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks of..., edited and translated by Quintin Hoare and Geoffrey Nowell Smith (International Publishers, New York:1971)
[23]A republican group of Italians, who later joined the left. Note 7 page 57 from Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks of..., edited and translated by Quintin Hoare and Geoffrey Nowell Smith (International Publishers, New York:1971)
[24]Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks of..., edited and translated by Quintin Hoare and Geoffrey Nowell Smith (International Publishers, New York:1971) page 57
[25]Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks of..., edited and translated by Quintin Hoare and Geoffrey Nowell Smith (International Publishers, New York:1971) pages 104 and 105
[26]“In Russia the Stare was everything, civil society was primordial and gelatinous” Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks of..., edited and translated by Quintin Hoare and Geoffrey Nowell Smith (International Publishers, New York:1971) page 238
[27]Revolution was meant to occur in advanced capitalist states such as Great Britain and Germany, yet it occurred in the agrarian, non-proletarian states of Tsarist Russia and Nationalist China. Yet Russia and China had weak, barely extant Civil Societies and thus were open to military defeat, whereas Great Britain for example had strong Civil Society which prevented the growth and limited the power of revolutionary movements.
[28]Richard Bellamy and Darrow Schecter, Gramsci and the Italian State, page 28
[29]There was an economic factor in German unity, the customs union of Zollverein, but it did not cover most of Germany till 1866
[30]Italy in response to the Bienno Rosso and in Germany to the Great Depression of the 1930s.
[31]As exemplified in “The Theory of Communicative Action”, a and “The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere”. The former is an exploration of rationality as linguistic, and the consequences thereof. From Jürgen Habermas, Theory of Communicative Action, trans. Thomas McCarthy, (Boston: Beacon Press, 1984)
The latter developed 'Media Studies' almost single-handedly. From an article by Todd Gitlin, professor of journalism and sociology at Columbia University http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,994032,00.html accessed on 16/02/2010 at 17:58. These works are also considered to extend the Marxist Theory of Superstructures and as such can be seen to contest Gramsci's claim to the the Marxist theoretician of the 'superstructures', but there heavy duty intellectualism and dense German prose limit their reach beyond Marxist academia in the anglophone countries.
[32]Rob van Kranenburg, Whose Gramsci? Right-wing Gramscism from http://www.internationalgramscisociety.org/igsn/articles/a09_5.shtml accessed at 11:06 on 15/03/2010
[33]A search on the Guardian website reveals 129 articles containing the word Gramsci with 2 for Korsch and 0 for Pannekoek. This is intended merely to show the greater penetration of Gramsci into cultural and political discourse. http://www.guardian.co.uk/ accessed at 11:21 on 15/03/2010
[34]This is the far left remnant of the PCI which split following the collapse of the USSR and the eastern bloc. Website: http://home.rifondazione.it/xisttest/
[35]The mainstream Left in Italian politics. Emerged as a union of various left wing and centrist groups in 2007. Website: http://www.partitodemocratico.it/gw/producer/producer.aspx?t=/prehome.htm
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