International Gramsci Society Newsletter
Number 12 (February, 2002): 38-42
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Paula Allman: Revolutionary Social Transformation: Democratic Hopes, Political Possibilities and Critical Education

(Westport, Connecticut: Bergin & Garvey, 1999)

Debbie Hill (University of Waikato, New Zealand)

The September 11 tragedy stands as one of those monumental incidents where substantive conceptions of human identity and community conduct were violently and brutally forced to consciousness. Personal and civic questions of who we are, what we believe in and what we are willing to defend were questions that quickly took on heightened significance and meaning in the days that followed the aftermath of the tragedy. The preservation of the "democratic hopes" of all people throughout the world soon became a much-vaunted slogan that provoked an admixture of defensive and retaliatory counter-measures on an unprecedented global scale.

Given this spirited appeal, nonetheless, and despite all the positive connotations that the idea of democracy engenders, well might we question whether the campaign of counter- violence launched in retaliation against the Afghani people has really been the most appropriate means of defending our democratic hopes and moral aspirations. Indeed, discussion about what constitutes an "authentic" democracy and how best it is to be attained is the same debate that underpins one of Paula Allman's recent publications, Revolutionary Social Transformation: Democratic Hopes, Political Possibilities and Critical Education.

Allman's thesis is one which many of us will already understand: that capitalism will always undermine our "democratic hopes" if those hopes happen to include aspirations that are essentially counter-capitalist in nature. In this regard, that democracy is non- discriminatory in terms of its support for and sustenance of a diversity of human values and lifestyles is certainly a claim that Allman finds to be particularly fraudulent. And nowhere is this "fraud" better expressed than in terms of our contemporary "free market" conceptualization of what it means to be a human being. Revolutionary Social Transformation is therefore Allman's unapologetic effort to outline and justify what she considers bereft about our present conceptions of democracy and humanity. [END PAGE 38]

Locating her vision for creating the possibility of an alternative human condition squarely within Marx's own writings, Allman additionally calls upon the ideas about culture and education that have emerged from the work of Paulo Freire and Antonio Gramsci to extend this initial analysis. Indeed, recognizing the loss of traction and relative absence of Marxist teaching these days, one of the sub-theses--and definite merits, in my opinion--of Allman's book is that the thoughts and theories of both these thinkers are anchored very securely within the critical Marxist paradigm. Despite the fact that some may very well challenge this positioning of Freire (on the grounds that his Catholicism was at least as prominent within his liberationist project as his Marxism), I believe that Allman's claim is nonetheless a valid and legitimate one. Marxist concepts do strongly permeate the theorizing of both these thinkers, but, as Allman recognizes, an overall societal ignorance of Marxism in particular, and socialist thought in general, has led to a corresponding ignorance of the contribution of this legacy. It is for these reasons that Allman's careful explanation of the underlying "Marxism" of both Freire and Gramsci, and how it shapes the entire spirit of their bequest, provides a substantially valuable--and even "corrective" --addition to the existing literature.

With regard to Allman's treatment of Gramsci, my reading of her work leads me to conclude that she more than succeeds in capturing the flavour of his contribution to Marxist thought and contemporary radical theory, despite the fact that her discussion of his ideas is more or less confined to a single chapter. Certainly, her earlier chapters enable her to create an advanced point of entry from which to examine Gramsci's work, being devoted, as they are, to a discussion of Marx's concept of critical consciousness and revolutionary praxis. But there is more to it than just this. Unlike the two previous works that I have profiled in earlier IGS Newsletters (see my reviews of Coben, 1998 (Hill, 1999) and Mayo, 1999 (Hill, 2000))--studies that take both Gramsci and Freire as their central focus and which have evolved from doctoral research by each of the respective authors--Allman's work displays that rich and fertile understanding that can only come from many years of intellectual toil to engage with theory at the deepest possible (emotional) level. By the very nature of this difference, therefore, hers is no abstract or isolated study. Revolutionary Social Transformation implies the practical cultural commitment that its title suggests. That there is an alternative to the present social reality and that it is still possible to initiate authentic, humanized relationships is the thesis that she strives so passionately to see realized.

I put much of the merit of Allman's reading of Gramsci down to the fact that she displays a sophisticated understanding of the distinctive Marxist ontology and epistemology that underpins his alternative philosophical position. That is, she recognizes that it is the very point of difference between the ontology and epistemology that is prevalent within a bourgeois/capitalist social order and the ontology and epistemology that would have to [END PAGE 39] underscore a proletarian/Marxist one, that lends intelligibility to the entire legacy of Gramsci's work. From this, it follows, too, that the successful advance of socialism depends ultimately on the degree to which this dominant bourgeois psychology can be transgressed; a psychology, moreover, which is imbued within our everyday relationships, modes of behaving and language usage as much as it is enshrined within our more formal social and institutional arrangements. In proactive terms this translates, even further, into recognition of the fundamental urgency of broad-based cultural activity that urges a critical interrogation of those patterns of thought (intellectual and moral forms of judgement) that have been largely inherited uncritically from the past. In other words, it sanctions educational activity. For it is only when our own "education" is rendered "conscious" and "critical" that the shortcomings of our existing conceptual legacy will stand duly exposed.

To illustrate her own struggle to come to grips with the leitmotiv within Gramsci's work, Allman opens her discussion with a close examination of two of the more prominent concepts within the Notebooks themselves: that of "ideology" and "hegemony". Using this discussion not only to illuminate the considerable confusions that surround the meaning of both of these terms, she also posits her own understanding of how Gramsci came to reappropriate fundamental bourgeois concepts, thus effectively socializing them in the process. Indeed, one does not even have to look as far as the Notebooks to detect this tendency. A reading of Gramsci's pre-prison writings reveals that "culture" and "education" and "state" were among many of the concepts that he saw were (and still are) liberally traded within the bourgeois marketplace as a type of "currency" or "capital" in their own right. Insofar as this possession of "culture" and "education" and "governance" therefore invests its owners with status and privilege as a result, rearticulating these concepts in socialist terms must mean, correspondingly, to popularize or humanize them;
that is, to make them available as of right. In this regard, Allman is correct in suggesting that the terms "ideology" and "hegemony" sometimes carry a capitalist meaning and sometimes a proletarian one in Gramsci's work. And she is also quite right in noting how these new socialized terms imply a re-authored ("humanely" reinvigorated) set of relationships, additionally.

The replacement of a bourgeois (capitalist) epistemology and ontology with a proletarian (popular, humanistic) philosophy cannot but mean the generation of alternative ways of behaving and thinking as the antithesis of these essentially exclusive and divisive relationships. To be sure, it might be argued that such a shift is integral to a socialist/communist philosophy. Refusing to accept a predominantly divisive view of humankind through the taken-for-granted conceptual legacy within which these divisions are most freely and strongly expressed, is not only indicative of our healthy disobedience towards one particular (inferior) view of humanity, but so, too, does it serve to confirm [END PAGE 4] that very potential that indeed distinguishes us from any other species - our ability to refashion ourselves. As both Gramsci and Freire argued, to commit one's mind to the judgments of others meant to adapt to "what is" rather than to actively strive to achieve "what ought to be". As Allman rightly notes, the struggle for both of these thinkers was to create a "literate" (critically conscious) and "proactive" (humanized) society. This was their common Marxist commitment. Activating passive minds, and thereby investing agency ("human dignity") to previously submissive selves, was their shared philosophy.

Only with respect to one matter am I perhaps inclined to disagree with Allman. This is the matter of the value of Gramsci's historical analyses (p.122). Rather than his musings being purely and simply an historical analysis of how the bourgeoisie had established their hegemony, and one which either did or didn't pay due regard to the economic aspect, my own tendency is to view his historicism as the "new taste" and the "new language" that he intimated that we would all have to learn. Indeed, developing more keenly one's own powers of judgement is the message that, above any other, Gramsci's journalistic exertions and prison musings appear to me to affirm. That we all too easily and too quickly yield our judgments--our will--to the "care" of others, translates as nothing short of our consenting to the dispossession of our own humanity; that is, it is a form of self-imposed determinism. With this in mind, as I see it, anyway, the undisputable value of Gramsci's Notebooks legacy is that his writings testify to the fruits of his own furtive endeavours to 'lubricate' his mind and to 'sharpen' his intellect. In other words, as I interpret his work, at least, the point of intersection between 'the theory' and 'the practice' lay in the very method that Gramsci himself privileged: continuous cognitive struggle.

And it is precisely for this reason that overcoming the limitations and contradictions of our lived relationships requires an active and critical mind; a new intellectual orientation that is itself synonymous with taking responsibility for challenging--and then of actively changing--the existing configuration of our culture. This is undoubtedly what Gramsci meant by his imperative to make our "common sense" critical. To the extent that a changed relationship between "knowledge" and "being" is undoubtedly the inevitable outcome also, by the same token, the obsolescence of traditional ways of viewing--and justifying--traits such as "authority" and "leadership" are similarly assured. In fact, as has been noted above, a transformed intellectual orientation opens up the very possibility for human self-liberation inasmuch as our expression of active, cognitive defiance concomitantly signifies our movement beyond a state of passive, uncritical submissiveness. Therefore, by simply expressing our own uniquely human characteristics--of opening our minds and exercising our intellects to challenge the arrogance of capital's divisive logic in all its myriad forms--correspondingly, we unlock [END PAGE 41] the potential to create a new reality for ourselves and for others. In short, a revolution within the mind is where the repossession of power ultimately begins.

That said, this is no "simple" educational project. It exists only as potential until it is actualized. And here, so many factors intermesh to dull what distinguishes us as human beings and to stymie us from ever achieving (much less even contemplating) more intimate and enduring forms of human interaction. If good judgments are formed by a history of participation in the rich and varied practices of judgment making, then, as Allman rightly remarks, the poverty of our age does not auger well for the advent of socialism and the inauguration of an "authentic" democratic ethos. The grip of relativism; the loss of our sense of "the social"; the priority of "rights" at the expense of "responsibility"; the absence of reflective time: these are but a few of a raft of destructive features characterizing our loss of social consciousness.

Unfortunately, the events of September 11 are prone to affirm Allman's thesiis: that numerous pathologies are apt to emerge when "contested life" displaces "collective life." Indeed, if ever a time was ripe for 'authentic, humanizing, social transformation,' that time is surely now.

REFERENCES:

Hill, D. (1999). Review ofDiana Coben's Radical Heroes: Gramsci, Freire and the Politics of Adult Education (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998). International Gramsci Society Newsletter, 9, March, 19-26.

Hill, D. (2000). Review of Peter Mayo's Gramsci, Freire and Adult Education (London: Zed Books, 1999). International Gramsci Society Newsletter, 10, March, 17-22. [END PAGE 42]
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