Gramsci in the Light of Marx: on Ideology and Hegemony

Abstract

This paper intends to analyse the political claim of the concept of hegemony in Antonio Gramsci's work in its application not only to the description of the mechanisms that underpin the current preponderance of neoliberal ideology, but also to the claim of the political left to build a new hegemonic project that counteracts its effects. In order to do this, it examines the Gramscian understanding of the ideology against the meaning that this term acquires in Karl Marx's legacy in order to show the discrepancies between the two. On this basis, the close alliance that Gramsci establishes between ideology and hegemony will show that, from the Marxian perspective, it is problematic to link the concept of hegemony to the strategies employed by the political left in order to reach government and introduce the changes into capitalism to correct the social injustice thereby generated.