Antonio Gramsci used the term ‘passive revolution’ to describe the limitations and weaknesses of the 19th century bourgeois state in Italy which permitted economic development whilst thwarting social and political progress. This detailed study consists of seven essays each exploring a different theme of the economic and social basis of the Liberal state, providing a broad understanding of the background against the emergence of Italian fascism and present a number of debates and controversies amongst Italian historians. By critical discussion of Gramsci’s reading of modern Italian history, the essays present an analysis of the structure and development of social and economic relations in the formation of the Liberal state, illustrating the transition from liberalism to fascism.

This volume analyses the philosophical nature of Gramsci’s Marxism and its Hegelian source, the radical critique of the economistic tradition and the original analyses of the role of superstructures, ideology, consciousness and subjectivity in the revolutionary process. It relates the central themes of Gramsci’s writings, such as hegemony, ‘historical blocs’, the role of intellectuals and political praxis, to the more peripheral ones, such as science, language, literature and art. The introduction includes a brief intellectual biography of Gramsci.

Winner of the prestigious 'Giuseppe Sormani International Prize' for the best monograph on Antonio Gramsci (4th edition, 2012-2017). Antonio Gramsci (1891-1937) is one of the most translated Italian authors of all time. After the Second World War his thought became increasingly influential, and remained relevant throughout the second half of the century. Today, it is generally agreed that his Marxism has highly original and personal features, as confirmed by the fact that his international influence has continued to grow since the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union. Gramsci and Languages offers an explanation of this originality and traces the origins of certain specific features of Gramsci’s political thought by looking at his lifelong interest in language, especially in questions of linguistic diversity and unification.

Drawing on the rich recent season of Gramscian philological studies, this book offers a reconsideration of Gramsci's theory of the state and concept of philosophy, arguing that a renewal of the 'philosophy of praxis' constitutes a necessary element in the contemporary revitalisation of Marxism.

Antonio Gramsci (1891-1937) is one of the major social and political theorists of the 20th century whose work has had an enormous influence on several fields, including educational theory and practice. Gramsci and Education demonstrates the relevance of Antonio Gramsci's thought for contemporary educational debates. The essays are written by scholars located in different parts of the world, a number of whom are well known internationally for their contributions to Gramscian scholarship and/or educational research. The collection deals with a broad range of topics, including schooling, adult education in general, popular education, workers' education, cultural studies, critical pedagogy, multicultural education, and the role of intellectuals in contemporary society.

This book familiarizes the English-speaking reader with the debate on the originality of Gramsci’s thought and its importance for the development of Marxist theory. The contributors present the principal viewpoints regarding Gramsci’s theoretical contribution to Marxism, focussing in particular on his advances in the study of the superstructures, and discussing his relation to Marx and Lenin and his influence in Eurocommunism. Different interpretations are put forward concerning the elucidation of Gramsci’s key concepts, namely: hegemony, integral state, war of position and passive revolution.

Antonio Gramsci is widely celebrated as the most original political thinker in Western Marxism. Among the most central aspects of his enduring intellectual legacy is the concept of subalternity. Developed in the work of scholars such as Gayatri Spivak and Ranajit Guha, subalternity has been extraordinarily influential across fields of inquiry stretching from cultural studies, literary theory, and postcolonial criticism to anthropology, sociology, criminology, and disability studies. Almost every author whose work touches upon subalterns alludes to Gramsci’s formulation of the concept. Yet Gramsci’s original writings on the topic have not yet appeared in full in English. Among his prison notebooks, Gramsci devoted a single notebook to the theme of subaltern social groups. Notebook 25, which he entitled “On the Margins of History (History of Subaltern Social Groups),” contains a series of observations on subaltern groups from ancient Rome and medieval communes to the period after the Italian Risorgimento, in addition to discussions of the state, intellectuals, the methodological criteria of historical analysis, and reflections on utopias and philosophical novels. This volume presents the first complete translation of Gramsci’s notes on the topic. In addition to a comprehensive translation of Notebook 25 along with Gramsci’s first draft and related notes on subaltern groups, it includes a critical apparatus that clarifies Gramsci’s history, culture, and sources and contextualizes these ideas against his earlier writings and letters. Subaltern Social Groups is an indispensable account of the development of one of the crucial concepts in twentieth-century thought.

Inspired to contribute to the symbiotic relationship between the academic and activist worlds, Day has decided to pick up the pen instead of the Molotov cocktail. The result is this brilliant book. Ann Hansen: Ann was sentenced to life imprisonment for blowing up a cruise-missile component factory, and is the author of Direct Action: The Memoirs of an Urban Guerilla. Gramsci and the concept of hegemony cast a long shadow over radical political theory. Yet how far has this theory got us? Is it still central to feminism, anti-capitalism, anti-racism, anarchism, and other radical social movements today? Unlike previous revolutionary movements, Day argues, most contemporary radical social movements do not strive to take control of the state. Instead, they attempt to develop new forms of self-organisation that can run in parallel with -- or as alternatives to -- existing forms of social, political, and economic organization. This is to say that they follow a logic of affinity rather than one of hegemony. This book draws together a variety of different strands in political theory to weave together aninnovative new approach to politics today. Rigorous and wide-ranging, Day introduces and interrogates key concepts. From Hegel's concept of recognition, through theories of hegemony and affinity to Hardt and Negri's reflections on Empire, Day maps academia's theoretical and philosophical concerns onto today's politics of the street. Ideal for all students of political theory, Day's fresh approach combines Marxist, Anarchist and 'Post-structuralist theory to shed new light on the politics and practice of contemporary social' movements.

Mapping the resonances, dissonances, and linkages between the thought of Gramsci and Foucault to uncover new tools for socio-political and critical analysis for the twenty-first century, this book reassesses the widely-held view that their work is incompatible. With discussions of Latin American revolutionary politics, indigenous knowledges, technologies of government and the teaching of paediatrics in post-invasion Iraq, complexity theory, medical anthropology and biomedicine, and the role of Islam in the transition to modern society in the Arab world, this interdisciplinary volume presents the latest theoretical research on different facets of these two thinkers’ work, as well as analyses of the specific linkages that exist between them in concrete settings. A rigorous, comparative exploration of the work of two towering figures of the twenty-first century, Gramsci and Foucault: A Reassessment will appeal to scholars and students of social and political theory, political sociology, communication and media studies, and contemporary philosophy.

This volume provides evidence for the argument of a central place of pedagogy in the interpretation of Gramsci’s political theory. Gramsci’s view that ‘every relationship of hegemony is necessarily a pedagogical relationship’ makes it imperative to dismiss narrow and formal interpretations of his educational theories as applying to schooling only. This book argues that what is required rather is an inquiry into the Italian thinker’s broad conceptualisation of pedagogy, which he thought of as a quintessential political activity, central to understanding and transforming society. Preceded by a broad introduction that positions Gramsci in his context and in the literature, the essays in this book critically revisit the many passages of the Prison Notebooks and pre-prison writings where Gramsci addresses the nexus between politics and pedagogy. Some essays apply those concepts to specific contexts. The book for the first time brings to the attention of an English-speaking audience voices from the current historiography in Italy and Latin America. We are forced at regular intervals to consider how Gramsci might still be useful, in particular national territories, in an international context. How can we carry on with pessimism of the intelligence, but find some basis for optimism of the will? From the foreword of Anne Showstack Sassoon, Visiting Professor of Politics at the Department of Politics at Birbeck, University of London