Antonio Gramsci’s Concept of Ideology

Ioana CRISTEA (DRĂGULIN)

University of Bucharest

Abstract: The term and, later on, the concept of ideology have accompanied the theoretical history of the last two centuries. In this brief analysis, the author aims to highlight the key elements in Antonio Gramsci’s concept of ideology. The first part of this contribution discusses some theoretical landmarks, such as the birth and the basic elements of this concept as well as the main arguments against it coming from the area of politics and its theorists. The second part of the contribution talks about the crucial elements of Gramsci’s thoughts on the concept of ideology. The last part of the paper is devoted the author’s conclusions.

Keywords: ideology, the end of ideology, class, social phenomenon, structure, super-structure.

1. THEORETICAL LANDMARKS

1.1. The birth of the concept of ideology

Over the last two centuries of intellectual activity, one of the most difficult theoretical endeavours in the field of social sciences has been the attempt to find an optimal definition for an abstract and yet very seducing concept, namely that of “ideology”. This because, as Daniel Șandru wonders: “Fundamentally, is ideology a system of ideas and beliefs, or is it the expression of the manner in which social and political practices are structured?”[1]

Ever since the 23rd of May 1797, the moment when this term appeared for the first time in an intellectual context, many, philosophers, historians, sociologists, etc. have tried to impose a definition as comprehensive and as exact as possible. The difficulties encountered by these authors resided in the fact that, although “ideology has been a word frequently used in the vocabulary of this field during the last two centuries”, it has experienced “numerous re-significations from one period to the next and from one theorist to another”, entering into the “social vocabulary” along with the modernization and the democratization of societies”.[2]

            The inventor of the term “ideology” is Antoine Louise Destutt de Tracy. The word appears for the first time in his study titled “Memoires sur la faculté de penser”, published in Memoires de l΄Institut National des Sciences et des Arts pour l΄An IV de la République. The author’s goal was to overturn the old classifications in order to introduce a new “science of ideas”. The purpose of this new science was to replace the old type of “metaphysical” knowledge with a new kind of knowledge, namely, “scientific” knowledge.

Destutt’s thoughts were influenced by Claude Adrien Helvetius’ materialism. In Helvetius’ view, ideas are essentially the result of the influences that the society in which we live has on the individual. People’s representations derive from the sensations that the surrounding objects produce on their senses. Thus, ideology must conduct an objective study of ideas and their origins.

In 1801, Destutt published the first volume of Elements d’idéologie, where he carried out a structural analysis of language, a psychological-moral analysis, and a study devoted to economy. In this volume, “ideology” refers to a science of ideas grounded in the empirical through the removal of any gap or uncertainty. For Destutt, existence coincides with existence, or, more precisely, man lives as long as he experiences his own existence. The goal is to reach the elements before knowledge through the decomposition of psychological phenomena, with the aim of demonstrating that exact sciences can be applied to the study of human thought. This is why ideology may be considered an anti-metaphysical science. This position is assumed by taking over a critical valence in relation to all the dogmas which claimed to prove truths in areas in which it was not possible to use practical and empirical knowledge[3]. In the same vein, one of Destutt’s contemporaries, Melchiorre Gioia, considered that ideology was a “theory of knowledge and passions”.[4]

1.2. Critics of the concept of ideology

1.2.1. Practitioners

Ideology was criticized by both the practitioners and the theorists of politics. At the level of political practice, this conception was criticized from the very beginning by Napoleon Bonaparte, who believed that ideology, as abstract thought, proved to be incapable in its pursuit of truth, lacking the capacity to act upon reality[5]. This is why Napoleon deliberately changed the meaning of the term, claiming that ideologists were nothing but “doctrinaires”. To be more precise, Napoleon believed that ideologists were people who had little political sense and a limited contact with reality.

The ideological opposition against Napoleon was, on the one hand, enlightened by the idea of individual and national freedom, and, on the other, by the idea of legitimacy. And, according to the ideas of that time, legitimacy meant respect for order and traditions. This is why Napoleon was not a mere adventurer who managed to extort, by demagogic means, the good faith of peoples, but more than that, he was the expression of a revolutionary mentality which pretended to modify the secular structures of each country according to the rules of abstract reasoning[6].

So, the reason why Napoleon felt the need to position himself against the concept of ideology and against its supporters was political and had to do with the opposition of the intellectuals of that time, who saw themselves as ideologists and opposed the political projects promoted by Napoleon in France. Another explanation, which transcends the political element, pertains to the broader part that ideology may play in society. Thus, the future first emperor of France, with his political wits, observed what Șandru also states in his study Ideologia, namely, that:

“[…] as a central figure of the social imagery, ideology plays a fundamental role not only in influencing social and political reality, but also in legitimating a particular policy, in view of its integration”.[7]

1.2.2. Theorists

At the theoretical level, criticism against ideology, as a mental process, closes with the so called “end of ideology”. Specialists are of the opinion that the latter started with I. Kant’s criticism of knowledge and Feuerbach’s and K. Marx’s opposition to classic German philosophy and its failure to establish “scientific metaphysics”.[8]

In Kant’s mind, there is a clear relationship between reasoning, and, as a result, philosophizing, and knowledge:

“To think an object and to cognize an object are by no means the same thing. In cognition there are two elements: firstly, the conception, whereby an object is cogitated (the category); and, secondly, the intuition, whereby the object is given. For supposing that to the conception a corresponding intuition could not be given, it would still be a thought as regards its form, but without any object, and no cognition of anything would be possible by means of it, inasmuch as, so far as I knew, there existed and could exist nothing to which my thought could be applied”.[9]

Kant concludes that to think is clearly linked to an ideology, but it is not compulsory for the latter to overlap with knowledge.

With Karl Marx’s works the modern theory of ideology makes a qualitative leap even if it starts from the premise described by Napoleon. Marx knew Destutt’s works very well, as he carried out a thorough analysis of the economic doctrines presented by the French thinker, but he also criticized “ideology” for having stolen history’s empirical elements, reducing it to a list of “ideological products generated by human conscience”[10].

Besides Napoleon’s criticism, who saw ideology as an abstract construction which lacked any contact with reality, Marx also puts forth the argument of “instrumentality”, because it contributes to the concealment of social conflicts, being nothing but an illusion. And this because all the philosophical, political, moral, and religious theories are not autonomous, as they are established by people, and are due to the realities they have to face throughout their lives. The only areas in which they are autonomous are those in which the relationships of production, the means of production and their use are shared according to class principles[11].

As a result of this definition, Marx defines ideology as “false ideas” that material relationships inspire to material actors.

However, in spite of this criticism, neither Marx nor Engels denied the fact that ideology also encompasses elements of truth[12].

These authors define ideology as follows: the generation of ideas, representations, conscience, which is firstly and directly intertwined with the material relationships of people and the language of real life.

People’s representations and thoughts and their mood changes seem to be here an emanation of their own material behaviour. If in all the ideologies people and their relationships [13]seem to mix as in a camera obscura, this phenomenon stems from the historical process of one’s own life as that of the objects deriving from the immediate physical process.

Another critic of ideology is Vilfredo Pareto who, due to his reticence in accepting the term, replaced it with the concept of “theory”. If Marx linked the concept to a historically determined society which uses it as an instrument of domination, Pareto believed that man is an ideological animal and so ideology expresses some specific psychological needs of human nature.[14].

Pareto denies ideology its qualities of a science because the two act in distinct fields: one uses facts while the other uses conscience. However, although ideologies are non-scientific theories, they can be useful to societies because man is prone to be influenced by sentimental arguments more than by rational ones. Another type of finality would be its capacity to convince people to act.

When he analyses the period between the two world wars from an ideological perspective, Karl Manheim distinguishes two levels of ideologies: particular and total. The ideologies in the former category determine the opponent’s points of view while the latter takes into account his entire view of the world, and thus there emerges a theoretical level that analyses the relationships established between social-historical groups[15].

Starting from here, Manheim individualizes the ideology-utopia conceptual couple. By the term “ideology” the author attempts to state that, under particular circumstances, the factors dwelling in the collective conscience of several groups conceal the real situation of society. The concept of “utopia” sheds light on the existence of groups which are in a situation in which their own view does not represent an objective framework of that situation, being used only as a direction towards action[16].

Gyorghy Lukacs distinguishes between “true” and “false” ideology, in the sense that there are ideologies which interpret the historical process in its entirety and ideologies which do not go beyond their own class view[17].

Following the Marxist tradition, Louis Althusser believes that an ideology is a system that possesses its own logic and its own rigour of representations (images, myths, ideas or concepts, accordingly), being endowed with a historical life and function in the structure of a particular society; ideology as a system of representation is different from science because its social practical function prevails over its theoretical function[18].

At the same time, Althusser attempts to reject the Marxist ideology/science antinomy, trying to advocate the idea of an ideology in general and not of a theory of various ideologies. In order to support this theory, the author advances two theses:

a)                    ideology represents the imaginary relationship of individuals to their own conditions of existence;

b)                   ideology has a material existence.

According to this definition, ideology is part of any “social entirety” and this is why only an “ideologized conception of the world” could imagine a society with no ideology and admit the utopian idea that, its disappearance could be replaced by science[19].

Ideology is indispensable to a dominant class not only in order to maintain its dominance over other social groups but also to become a dominant class. At the same time, in the socialist society, ideology has a twofold purpose: to maintain the dominant class and to transform individuals[20].

Vladimir I. Lenin believes that ideologies are systems of ideas, theories that the protagonists of class struggle use in their fight. Of course, they can be more or less true, more or less false, but, above all, they are “useful”. Their usefulness does not necessarily depend on truth[21].

George Sorel shows that “ideology”, just as “utopia”, belongs to the category of “myths” seen as a system of images or fantastic representations capable of leading or stimulating the proletariat in its revolutionary political fight[22].

Max Weber said that when a social phenomenon, regardless of its nature, needs to be explained, it is necessary to look for and trace back the cases on which individual behaviours are based. They believe that, in the case of failure of this type of logic, irrational factors can be introduced.

Raymond Boudon tried to show that ideologies are a natural ingredient in social life. At the same time, the protagonists have good reasons to adhere to false or doubtful ideas, and any faith in ideology should not be regarded as a cause of passions or fanaticism[23].

Raymond Aron, who belongs to the category of non-Marxists, believed that political ideologies always gather, in a more or less fortunate manner, fact judgements and value judgements; they express a sure view of the world and a will to act.

For Edward Shils, ideology is a variant of the systems of positive normative faith which thrive in any human society, depending on various “views of the world”. Ideologies distinguish themselves by the explicit nature of their formulations. They are narrower, more rigid, and reluctant to innovation, but they spread and they are accepted with the help of strong emotional elements and command the full adhesion of those who embrace them. At the same time, they share with the systems and movements of thought (existentialism, pragmatism and Hegelian idealism) the trait that they are based on explicit or systematic intellectual constructions. The difference between systems and ideologies resides in the fact that ideologies command full and instant adhesion while the systems of thought do not. To sum up, Shils identifies eight criteria which determine the destruction of ideologies by other types of systems. They are:

1)    the exclusive nature of formulations;

2)    their will to differentiate themselves from other systems of belief, past or present;

3)    their will to regroup around a particular belief, positive or normative;

4)    their rejection of innovation;

5)    the passionate nature of their spreading;

6)    the intolerant nature of their norms;

7)    unreserved adhesion;

8)    the association with institutions whose purpose is to strengthen and materialize their own beliefs[24].

In his turn, Ferruccio Rossi Landi tried to systematize the criticism against ideology and he summed up eleven characterizations attributed to it:

1)                   mythology and folklore;

2)   illusion and deceit

3)   common sense;

4)   lie, falsification, obscurantism

5)   fraud or treachery

6)   false thought, in general;

7)   philosophy;

8)   view of the world;

9)   intuition of the world;

10)                system of behaviour;

11)                feeling.

Ferrucio arranged these characterizations around two great key conceptions: (1-6) ideology as false thought, (8-11) ideology as a view of the world, the link between these two being established by point (7), represented by the pair ideology-philosophy[25].

2. ANTONIO GRAMSCI’S CONCEPT OF IDEOLOGY

Antonio Gramsci is the most important Italian Marxist theorist from the inter-war period. His theoretical reflections have had a major impact on the area of left wing ideas since the end of World War II and up to now. The importance of Gramsci’s theoretical contribution also resides in the fact that the impact of his ideas has not been limited to the Italian academic area, because his theoretical approaches have reached all the continents. This is why after World War II we can talk about a “Gramscian School”. It is interesting to notice that the most important analyses grouped in Quaderni del Carcere (1929-1935), a work written while he was in prison, are also Gramsci’s most important theories. This work was translated in almost all the countries of Europe, in the United States of America, in Japan, and in Latin America, Brazil being a revealing example in this respect.

The importance of Gramsci’s reflections does not reside only in their geographical spreading[26]. The author’s fundamental contribution to the area of Marxist thought is that he emphasized “[…] how important it was to overcome a certain rigidity within Marxism, to make it more active in relation to the new political demands, advocating for the creation of a thought more adequate to a historical situation that had changed entirely since the events that had taken place in Bolshevik Russia”.[27] This element is very real in Gramsci’s works. The Sardinian author understood that the Italian social-political realities in the early years of the 19th century were different from those of tsarist Russia. The historical, social, and political conditions which had allowed the development of the Bolshevik revolution in Russia were not similar to those of post-war Italy. However, the two countries had some elements in common: for instance, the ratio of rural population and big land owners, the opacity of Italian elites, similar to that of Russian elites, with respect to the agrarian issue, the incipient stage of industrial development in both countries, the insufficient development of class conscience within the proletariat, the impact of World War I on their territories, their populations, etc. However, there were major differences between the cultures and the civilizations of the two countries. If we are to take into account only one aspect, that of territorial unification and state unity, the differences were huge. In the Russian case, the state was created between the 13th and the 18th century, after a process of territorial conquest, according to feudal principles. In Italy, Il Risorgimento began, according to the specialists’ general opinion, at the beginning of the 20th century[28], owing to the impact that the ideas of the French Revolution of 1789 had in Europe, and, also, in Italy. From here we can clearly see that the constitutive processes that led to the emergence of the two states were profoundly different, and this is why the ideas that animated them were also different. The immediate consequence of these different realities is that the elites who fought for the materialization of the two desiderata were also different. In Russia, there was a feudal elite ruled by an authoritarian monarch, in Italy, there was a bourgeois, liberal elite, which subordinated its actions to a constitutional monarch[29]. As a consequence, the social and political relations established between the two societies were entirely different.

According to Gramsci, the trap in which the Marxist theorists who supported positivist-mechanistic theories got entangled was that they attempted to explain history as a whole based on the principle of linear social development, in which historical processes are governed by dialectical laws of development[30]. This materialist-mechanistic view prevailed during the second International. This is why, with reference to Gramsci’s approach to this way of seeing history and social evolution, several scholars noticed that in the Sardinian theorist’s mind: “the evolution of society from the trend-related and dialectic perspective of a field of possibilities which condition the role of the subjective factor, of «will» based on some structural necessity. This is why necessity coincides with what is only a posteriori determinable, because the result is also the product of the struggle of the «will». So, it is only a posteriori that one can establish whether political action (the historical process) achieved its goal, because the situation was not mature enough (thesis), or maybe due to subjective forces (antithesis) which were not sufficiently elaborated yet[31].

In Gramsci’s mind, political thinking is a type of research that is deeply grounded in the social practice of a time. Gramsci’s philosophical conception continues in his political thoughts. Together they form an indestructible unit because the Sardinian author’s goal is to give answers regarding the relationship established between the structure and the super-structure of a society, between objective determinism and the role of social action[32].

In his attempt to explain social phenomena and the “course” of history, Gramsci undertook an analysis of the concept of ideology.

The author of the Quaderni questioned the issue of the origins and the meaning of the concept of ideology. Ever since he started to use the term, its meaning and signification became manifold in Gramsci’s mind, even though, in Tracy’s opinion, it was only seen as the “science of ideas”. And this because analysis is a method recognised by science, and, for this reason, the concept’s signification was that of “analysis of ideas”, that is, it aimed to “search for the origins of ideas”.

“Ideology is an aspect of «sensualism», that is, of 18th century French materialism. It means «science of ideas», because analysis was only a method recognized and applied by science to the «analysis of ideas», more precisely the «search for the origins of ideas”.[33]

The term ideology was used by Gramsci ever since the early texts of his Quaderni with the meaning of “system of political ideas”; on several occasions he used the expression Mazzinian ideology (Q1, pp. 43, 44); when he referred to the Jacobins, he said that they followed a particular ideology (Q1, pp. 48, 61); when he analysed the engaged literature he mentioned that there were some works with a determining ideological-political character, democratic in nature, with respect to the ideologies of ‘48 (Q3, pp. 78, 358); when he used the political argument, he made use of expressions such as Masonic ideology, puritan ideology (Q1, pp. 157, 138), Southern ideology (Q1, pp. 44, 46), patriotic ideology (Q2, pp. 107, 254), etc.[34].

The concept of ideology is both a connecting and a separating bridge between Gramsci and Marx. The manifold meaning acquired by the concept in time is given, in the first place, by the fact that, right from the start, he aimed to go beyond the limits imposed by the old philosophy by using the scientific method[35].

In order to understand the peculiarities of Gramsci’s theoretical approaches an observation needs to be made. Being imprisoned, Gramsci was unable to study the entire Marxist bibliography. For instance, he did not read the German Ideology (authors K. Marx and F. Engels, a.n.) which, although written in 1845-1846, was published much later in Italy (1932). Moreover, he could not have access to Engels’ latest writings, in which the German scholar saw ideology as “false conscience”.

The reference work that Gramsci studied in prison was A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (1859), edited by Marx and Engels. The Preface of this book states:

“Then begins an era of «social revolution».The changes in the economic foundation lead sooner or later to the transformation of the whole immense superstructure. In studying such transformations it is always necessary to distinguish between the material transformation of the economic conditions of production, which can be determined with the precision of natural science, and the legal, political, religious, artistic or philosophic – in short, ideological forms in which men become conscious of this conflict and fight it out”.[36]

From here, Gramsci took over two elements in his analysis: the idea of ideological forms and the study of mechanistic interpretations. Of course, as we have previously shown, Gramsci studied mechanistic interpretations with the purpose of showing that there can also be other types of approaches.

Gramsci’s option to accept the idea that there is no single ideology but several ideological forms shows us that his attitude towards the concept of ideology was neutral. This element of neutrality is particularly important because it distances the Sardinian theorist from the negative connotations present <t13>in Marxist thought. This option is also due to the fact that neither Marx nor Engels managed to give a punctual definition of the concept of ideology, even though, as F. Gentile shows, they “used the term ideology quite much”[37].

This approach is not singular in Gramsci but is also present in the socialist and Marxist intellectual circles at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the20th century.

The second element taken over from the Preface was the relationship with mechanistic interpretations. The Sardinian theorist considered that ideologies themselves were not negative, but that not all ideologies were equal.

 In Quaderni, Gramsci noticed that:

“[…] the mistake made when ideologies were analysed” is due to the fact that “this name was given both to the superstructure needed by a particular structure and to the arbitrary rigmaroles produced by certain people”… thus the concept became “…extensive, that is, it modified and distorted the theoretical analysis of the concept of ideology”[38]. (This is why we cannot believe that the superstructure is nothing but a mere reflection of the political structure.)

“The claim (presented as an essential postulate of historical materialism) that presenting and exposing any fluctuation of politics is ideology as an immediate expression of structure must be fought against from a theoretical viewpoint, as primitive infantilism”.[39]

Starting from these presumptions, Gramsci advanced an original anti-mechanistic and humanist interpretation of historical materialism.

“[...]there was omitted that in a very common expression (historical materialism a.n.) we must stress the first term: «historical» and not the second, whose origin is metaphysical. The philosophy of praxis is absolute historicism, thought rendered absolute, incorporated into the world and worldly, an absolute humanism of history. It is in this direction that the core of the new conception about the world should be explored”.[40]

When he analysed the existence of some historical-natural premises for the development of society, the Sardinian theorist had a viewpoint which was almost identical to that presented by Marx and Engels in Ideology. For him, philosophy and the history of philosophy are inseparable from man’s actions, from his practical, historical activity.[41]

However, in Gramsci’s mind, a class or a “social group” has from the start a first level of existence, which is mostly economic, and its scope of action is limited to the reproduction of its own interests, particular and corporative. In this stage, each group member finds himself in a state of heightened individuality, being in a situation in which he can achieve a corporative conscience of some common interests that could link him to other members.

When the members of a social group manage to acquire the conscience of group homogeneity and then are aware that their interests could also be of interest to other social groups, being able to harmonize them with those of the majority, then there emerges the phenomenon whereby the social group starts to have a political existence[42].

We see, from these statements, that starting from Gramsci, the concept of ideology receives a particularly different meaning, which is not present in the Marxist doctrine.

Another element described by the Sardinian theorist resides in the relationship established between ideologies. For Gramsci not all ideologies are equal. Ideology is the common and necessary ground of conscience and knowledge, but the superiority of Marxist ideology is given both by the awareness of its own character, which is eternal and absolute, but also by the awareness of partisanship, given by the existence of a historical moment and its belonging to a class[43].

How can we explain this classification in Gramsci?

The answer is provided by Palmiro Togliatti. The historic leader of the Italian Communist Party (ICP), when he talked about Gramsci several years after the latter’s death, characterized him as “a theorist of politics, a practitioner of politics, that is, a fighter”[44]. So, Gramsci was an ideologist, meaning that he was a theorist but also a politician, a political action man. While observing this reality, we cannot but see how Napoleon’s characterisation of ideologists as doctrinaires, abstract thinkers, who want to replace politicians, practitioners, by imposing ideas born in an intellectual laboratory, is not valid in this case.

The symbolic passage from Gramsci the theorist to Gramsci the politician is identifiable in Quaderno X, where Gramsci analyses the manner in which B. Croce refers to political ideologies: Croce’s doctrine (a.n.) within the area of political ideologies “clearly stems from the philosophy of praxis: they are practical constructs, instruments of political direction”[45]. For the philosophy of praxis, ideologies are not absolutely arbitrary, they represent real historical facts, whose real nature should be revealed, and which should be fought against, for reasons of political struggle and not for moral reasons. Revealing the nature of ideologies should allow us to become “intellectually free and governed by those who govern, in order to create a new ideology after having destroyed another. This could be one of the reading keys that would make us understand the passage from Gramsci the theorist to Gramsci the politician.

This is where the influence of N. Machiavelli on the Sardinian theorist is clearly visible. It is significant that an important part of his theoretical reflections were grouped under the name Note despre Machiavelli [Notes on Machiavelli]. As Florian shows: “Machiavelli’s works represent the system of reference for Gramsci’s political thought because its axis is the idea of creating collective will, of stimulating and organising it in order to materialize some determined goals of history[46]. Machiavelli’s endeavour was to introduce scientific sense into the approach to the political phenomenon. For this reason, we see how the Florentine thinker was one of Tracy’s predecessors, as well as a predecessor of the term and then the concept of ideology.

“[…] the difference between how people live and how they should live is so great that he who leaves aside what is for what should be will rather find out how people become doomed than how they could prevail”.[47]

Machiavelli does not advocate an action deprived of ethical criteria but the existence of autonomy for the political in relation to these.[48]

Thus, ideology is not something arbitrary; it compulsorily operates within the course of history. This is why the role of the philosophy of praxis is to fight and reveal the nature of the “domination tool”. Starting from this statement, the ideology of praxis has the role of revealing the true nature of ideologies, more precisely, it must prove that any ideology is an instrument of domination and so it is a component part of the domination tools that a class possesses and uses in order to maintain its domination over another class. This is why ideology becomes the fundamental element which leads to a breach between the ruled and the rulers. The role of the philosopher of praxis reveals the true structure of ideology, even if it is surrounded by the shroud of universality.

In Gramsci, the philosophy of praxis was conceived as a synthesis and an overcoming, a conception based on the organic and dialectical unity of its three components (philosophy, economy, and politics)[49].

“The philosophy of praxis is not confused with and is not reduced to any philosophy; it is not original only insofar as it overcomes the preceding philosophies but mainly because it opens an entirely new road, that is, it renews from start to end the manner in which philosophy is conceived”.[50]

The fight in which it gets engaged does not have a moral connotation, we are dealing with a political struggle whose aim is to overcome the gap created between the ruled and the rulers[51].

This explains why the Sardinian theorist agreed with Marx when he referred to the role of ideology. For Gramsci:

“Ideologies are ridiculous when they are empty words and are used to create confusion, to deceive and to enslave social energies that are potentially antagonistic”.[52]

And this because Gramsci,

“[…] as a revolutionary, as a man of action, cannot act outside ideologies and practical schemes, which are potential historical entities in course of forming”.[53]

Marxist ideology is just as any other ideology but distinguishes itself from the others by the fact that it does not deny contradictions, but, rather, it analyses them such as they are. What it has in common with other ideologies is the fact that it bears some usefulness for a particular social group and it does not claim to be something more.

Another element taken into account by Gramsci is the nature of ideologies. From his point of view, we need to distinguish between: “…ideologies which are historically organic and are necessary to a given structure, and arbitrary, rationalist, «wanted» ideologies. And here he does not take into account only Marxism but also the so called “progressive” ideologies.

From this moment on, Gramsci makes a connection between the concept of hegemony[54] and that of ideology. For him, ideology “ensures the most intimate binding matter of the civil society, and, so, of the state”[55]. Thus, hegemony can be defined as the capacity to organize the ideological substratum of society into a historical block[56]. And hegemony is imposed by a dominant class. This domination cannot be separated from the issue of power.

The dominant class has its own “ideological structure”; more precisely, we are talking about a type of:

“[…] material organisation whose aim is to maintain, defend and develop the theoretical and ideological «front». The most dynamic part is represented by the press in general, by publishing houses (which, implicitly or explicitly, have a program and support a particular trend), political newspapers, all kinds of journals, scientific, literary, philological, general, periodical, and even parish magazines”.[57]

Ideology can be imposed by a class or by a social group through hegemony. Yet, in order to understand this relationship, we need to analyse power relationships. When Gramsci analysed the concept of hegemony, the Marxist literature encompassed two dominant views. The first is visible in Marx’s and Engels’ works.

The Manifesto of the Communist Party says that: “political power is merely the organised power of one class for oppressing another…"[58], in The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State, it emerges as “… the state of the most powerful, economically dominant class, which, through the medium of the state, becomes also the politically dominant class, and thus acquires new means of holding down and exploiting the oppressed class”[59]. And Engels, in the Preface to The Civil War in France, believed that “…the state is nothing but a machine for the oppression of one class by another, and indeed in the democratic republic no less than in the monarchy”[60].

The second view belongs to V.I. Lenin: “[…] the state is an organ of class domination, an organ for the oppression of one class by another... the state is a special organisation of force, an organisation of violence in order to repress a particular class”[61]. For Lenin, the state’s role is the same regardless of the historical age: “The methods for exerting violence have changed but the existence of the state has always meant, in any society, the existence of a group of people who rule, command, dominate, and who, in order to hold power, possess a system of physical constraint, a system for exerting violence, with the weapons that correspond to the level of technology of that age”.[62] The result envisaged by Lenin was the outburst of a violent revolution which would lead to the recognition of the proletariat’s political domination, and of its dictatorship: “Replacing the bourgeois state with a proletarian one is impossible without a violent revolution… (which should lead to - a.n.) the recognition of the proletariat’s political domination, of its dictatorship, that is, of a power which is not shared with anyone and which is supported directly by the affirmed force of the masses”.[63]

By the manner in which they analyse the social relationships established within the state, Marx and Engels are profoundly anti-democratic. They have a schematic, mechanistic view of human nature, of its evolution, of the relationships between individuals or between individuals and the state. Their theoretical conception, based on the fact that the evolution of capitalism would inevitably lead to the outburst of class struggle and the imposition of the proletariat’s dictatorship, proved to be false. And this because in England, seen, at that time, as the most industrially advanced country in the world, and whose capitalism was considered to be the most well structured, this historic “event” has never happened. The “victory” of the proletarian movement took place in tsarist Russia, the country where the bourgeoisie, the proletariat, and the liberal regime were the least developed from the great European states. Moreover, we cannot talk about a class struggle but rather of a coup d’état that the paramilitary Bolshevik troops, armed by the German state, put into practice. This is why it is obvious that the reasoning of the two German theorists was not confirmed in practice.

In Lenin’s case, things are much clearer. We are dealing with an anti-system project, totalitarian in nature, which inspired the Marxist view of society, but whose original sin was the place in which it materialised. Their claim of imposing the same model within any kind of state, regardless of its development stage, in the Braudelian sense, proved to be a failure.

Coming back to Gramsci, he took over the term hegemony from Lenin, but he used it in the Quaderni in a manifold manner[64]. In his writings, we see how the term hegemony develops into a concept. If, initially, the Sardinian theorist takes over the meaning of the term hegemony in the sense used by Lenin, namely of that of the “proletariat’s dictatorship”, when it would reach a position from which it could rule and dominate, in Quaderni, this restrictive interpretation disappears. In the writings which analyse the Risorgimento phenomenon, we see that Gramsci distances himself from Lenin’s view of the concept of hegemony, because he removes the economic element. In fact, the economically dominant class such as it is presented by Lenin no longer imposes its hegemony by means of a system of physical constraint. In the Italian case, hegemony imposed itself by the power of attraction that the dominant class (the Action Party) exerted over its subordinated classes and mainly over the intellectuals.[65]

We see how Gramsci, in the Quaderni, is aware of the social complexity, given by social stratification, and this is why, in order to build and to impose the hegemony of one class it is necessary and compulsory to establish an alliance policy with other subordinate classes directed against a dominant block. And for this to happen, ideology must be seen as an “organic historical philosophy”, called upon “to organise human masses”, to “allow the creation of an awareness of their own position”.[66]

And in order to achieve this awareness, a political-moral guide is needed, which should not necessarily be irrational and which Gramsci calls organic ideology. It is different from arbitrary ideology, which is not historically necessary[67].

3. CONCLUSIONS 

The theoretical approaches that various theorists have used in the analysis of the concept of ideology over the years show that one important issue has always been the attempt to demonstrate its scientific or non-scientific nature. This is a very important issue because if, in itself, ideology is a science, then it could be covered by truth and thus it would be legitimate; on the contrary, if it is triggered in the area of irrational theories, then it loses its legitimacy.

Once this stage is overcome, almost all the authors notice that, by the clarity of its own goals and by making explicit the methods used, ideology has an important role in the activation of the masses and thus it manages to solve a fundamental issue in all societies, namely, social immobility. From the moment they adhere to an ideology, the masses play an active role in political life, producing profound transformations at the level of society. The result of these mutations determines a new image of that community and imposes, for a long or short amount of time, a new reality in the political area. This is why the emergence of ideologies is fundamental, because they accompany the development of the process of modernization and they influence it, allowing the various social actors to express themselves.

The genesis of Gramsci’s thought happened in the difficult moments of World War I and in the restless years that followed it. It was a period in which, for the first time after 1789, there developed a crisis of the bourgeois regime and of the liberal government type. It was a crisis announced by Marx and Engels in their works, but we should notice that it did not develop due to the reasons invoked by the two theorists. On this background, the Marxist ideas spread heavily in the peninsula. From an ideological viewpoint, it was not only a crisis of the historical liberal right but also an identity crisis of the democratic left, of socialism. The impact that the Bolshevik Revolution of October 1917 had on the socialist movement, created, at the political level, a breach which led to the development of the ICP, and, at the theoretical level, allowed Gramsci’s development. At the same time, in Italy, the crisis of the bourgeois regime made the petty bourgeoisie get closer to an authoritarian movement with totalitarian tendencies such as Fascism. Gramsci analysed the crisis of the bourgeois state through the lens of the Italian historical evolution from the moment when the Risorgimento phenomenon began and up to the Fascists’ conquest of political power.

At the theoretical level, there is a great confrontation of ideas between two great theorists: Croce and Gramsci. Positioned on different political sides, each of them legitimized their ideological options through the analysis of the Risorgimento phenomenon. This is why we can say that in his writings Gramsci uses Croce’s ideas to create, in a mirror, an innovating theory that aimed to provide an answer to the main themes of reflection of that time.

At the same time, Gramsci continued the core of ideas promoted by Machiavelli, not only at the political level but also at the level of philosophical research, because the Florentine thinker refused fatalism and the passive acceptance of historical faith.[68]

Gramsci’s contribution to the study of the term and the concept of ideology in the 20thcentury is very important.

Michael Freeden, in his study titled Ideology, showed that Louis Althusser, Karl Mannheim and Antonio Gramsci are the theorists who brought the most important contributions to the analysis of the concept of ideology in the 20th century.[69]

Radu Florian, one of the most important scholars of Gramsci’s thought in Romania, showed how “[…] in spite of the fact that Gramsci’s works do not have a systematic nature, do not encompass didactic definitions and clarifications, and are not easily accessible, they generated – under the circumstances of their break off and delimitation from dogmatism, a keen interest within contemporary Marxism”.[70]

In order to explain the role, the terminological valences, and the nature of the concept of ideology, Gramsci introduces into the Italian theoretical area the term hegemony, which, later on, he transforms into a concept. Here, Gramsci brings a major contribution to the theoretical level because, starting from the meanings provided by Marx, Engels and Lenin to the term hegemony, he imposes in the literature the concept of hegemony. The difference is major and original, because Gramsci uses a complex analysis, through the use of concepts such as: structure, superstructure, power, supremacy, domination, historical block, subordinate classes, dominant classes, the philosophy of praxis, social group, etc.

For Gramsci, ideology is not a unitary “moloch”[71], a pre-established, coherent block of ideas and positions, which is built in order to be installed in the minds of the subordinates by intellectuals, ideologists or party members. On the contrary, it represents a complex form of the social world, which is made of different parts, of various elements[72].

Of course, as we have shown in this study, Gramsci delimits himself from the negative meaning that Napoleon attributed to ideology, regarded as “ideas which claim to orient politics”, issued by intellectuals who aimed to replace “real politics by abstract considerations”.[73] Gramsci recognises the existence and the importance of ideologies, even if, in his mind, they are different and have unequal values.

For the Sardinian author, ideology must be used by a group or a social class in its fight with the dominant or subordinate class. The argument in favour of its use is political, not moral in nature.

As we have shown in the first part of this study, the impact of Gramsci’s ideas was a major one worldwide. In the United States of America, the American conservatives noticed the influence of Gramscian ideas at the level of north-American political elites: “At the beginning of the 20th century, an unknown communist, named Antonio Gramsci, theorised that «a long march towards institutions» is necessary before socialism and relativism become victorious. Up to that moment, a large part of the radical left still believed that the conquest of power could happen only after they had been able to convince a sufficient number of people from the proletariat to embrace this cause. But Gramsci theorised that, by conquering key institutions and by using power, there could take place a process of change in cultural values, through the disintegration of traditional morals, which could result in the defeat of the political and economic power of the Western world. The key, according to Gramsci (Limbaugh says, a.n.), was to change the manner in which society judged the same type of issues. At the beginning, Gramsci wrote, faith in God needs to be overturned and weakened. Then, those who think that there are some moral principles inspired by God need to be rejected; after this, everything will happen according to the socialists’, relativists’, and materialists’ wishes. Now, Gramsci is not, of course, a household name, not even among the smartest people on earth, dear readers. But please trust me when I say that his name and theories are well known and understood throughout leftist intellectual circles. Leftist think tanks worship at Gramsci’s altar”.[74]

Of course, as Michele Filippini also shows, Limbaugh attributes to Gramsci ideas that he had never expressed[75]. Rather, we can talk about a quick and superficial reading of Gramsci’s works, which led to the emergence of these interpreting errors. In Rush’ mind, there was a “culture war” going on in North-American politics,[76] which resulted in the adoption of the famous affirmative actions. It is the act which allowed women emancipation and offered the right of tutelage to minorities.

However, it is important to understand the origins of this aversion directed against Gramsci, and why he is seen as the ideologist of those power groups which aim to take hold of political power and “change the face” of American institutions through their cultural conquest.

In 1989, a conservative think tank entitled Council for Inter-American Security elaborated a document which presented the strategy that the US was to follow in Latin America. It is interesting to notice that in the ‘80s, several intellectuals who gravitated around this think tank had held first rank administrative functions in the Reagan administration, passing from the civil society to the political one, and thus validating Gramsci’s equation, according to which the State = civil society + political society. More precisely, a political state[77].

Starting from this equation it is visible how Gramsci delimited himself very strictly from Lenin’s views on the state[78]. If for Lenin, the state is an organ of class domination, whose role is to support one class’s oppression by another class, through the exercise and the imposition of force, in Gramsci’s mind, the state loses this classist and non-democratic connotation. For the Sardinian theorist, power is conquered by the imposition of hegemony. And this does not happen, as in Lenin, by means of a violent revolution. The technique put forth by Gramsci consists in alliances with the subordinate classes and in the creation of a “power of attraction” directed towards the intellectuals. The conclusion brought by Gramsci’s way of envisaging the conquest of power is that the Sardinian theorist has a democratic view of the game played within the political area. Once more, he distances himself from Lenin, who wanted to impose hegemony, seen as the proletariat’s dictatorship, through a movement of force, through a revolution. Gramsci becomes a theorist who aims to conquer through legal and judicial methods. This is why, when he analysed the Risorgimento phenomenon, he removed the economic element from the attempt to impose the hegemony of the bourgeois, liberal elite represented by the Action Party. If in Lenin’s case we can talk about the promotion of an anti-system political movement, which aimed to impose its own hegemony by force, in Gramsci’s case, the role of the awareness that should have been reached by the proletariat was doubled by the effort to attract organic intellectuals. Thus, power is conquered organically, we might say, by attracting important parts of the people. This is where Gramsci’s democratic conception about the conquest of power is clearly visible. It is interesting to notice that this democratic vision was less observed by left wing theorists; this particularly important element “needs” to be revealed together with the criticism formulated by the North-American conservative right.

When the Council for Inter-American Security analysed the evolution of Marxist ideas in Latin America, its members discussed Gramsci and the contribution that the Sardinian theorist brought to the understanding of the concept of culture and its relationship with power: “The key innovative Marxist theorist who recognised the relationship of the values people hold to the creation of the statist regime was Antonio Gramsci. Gramsci stated that culture, or a society’s sum of values, has an importance much greater than the economy. For Gramsci, it is difficult for the proletariat to attack a democratic regime, but the same is not true in the case of intellectuals. […] Gramsci inferred that, if Marxists were able to create the nation’s prevailing cultural values, then it would be possible to give shape to and control such a regime […], a process which would involve a strong influence on religion, schools, media, and universities. […] According to this pattern, the Marxist movements in Latin America were much more active in intellectual and scientific environments than in the proletarian setting”.[79]

We notice how Gramsci and his concepts are used to create reading keys, necessary in order to understand the issues faced by the North-American hegemony. It is also worth mentioning that there is no paragraph or idea which could affirm the non-democratic nature of Gramscian conceptions. Moreover, he analyses a process wherein the main element in the conquest of power is no longer fighting, the army, revolutionary violence or the physical destruction of a class. According to Gramsci, culture becomes the main weapon used to “conquer” institutions, which, in their turn, can maintain their hegemony over the entire society.

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