Abstract
How does power work in a world of ever-growing complexity? In this chapter the author introduces the argument that we can do so by introducing the concepts of complexity into the theory of hegemony. It introduces the idea of social complexity as providing a set of models and tools enabling order to be brought to bear upon complex social phenomena. It discusses the commonalities between the Gramscian tradition of hegemonic political theory and elements of complexity theory. Finally, it summarises the argument pursued in the rest of the book, the deployment of an original account of social complexity to rethink hegemony theory.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Agnew, John, and Stuart Crobridge. 2002. Mastering Space: Hegemony, Territory and International Political Economy. London: Routledge.
Anderson, Perry. 1976. The Antinomies of Antonio Gramsci. New Left Review I: 5–78.
Beasley-Murray, Jon. 2010. Posthegemony: Political Theory and Latin America. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.
Bobbio, Norberto. 1979. Gramsci and the Conception of Civil Society. In Gramsci and Marxist Theory, ed. Chantal Mouffe, 21–47. London: Routledge.
Bousquet, Antoine, and Simon Curtis. 2011. Beyond Models and Metaphors. Cambridge Review of International Affairs 24: 43–62.
Byrne, David. 1998. Complexity Theory and the Social Sciences: An Introduction. London and New York: Routledge.
Cahill, Damien. 2014. The End of Laissez-Faire? On the Durability of Embedded Neoliberalism. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.
Cerny, Philip G. 2008. Embedding Neoliberalism: The Evolution of a Hegemonic Paradigm. The Journal of International Trade and Diplomacy 2: 1–46.
Chesters, Graeme, and Ian Welsh. 2006. Complexity and Social Movements: Multitudes at the Edge of Chaos. London and New York: Routledge.
Cilliers, Paul. 1998. Complexity and Postmodernism: Understanding Complex Systems. London: Routledge.
Connolly, William E. 2010. A World of Becoming. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
———. 2013. The Fragility of Things: Self-Organising Processes, Neoliberal Fantasies, and Democratic Activism. Durham, NC and London: Duke University Press.
Corning, Peter A. 2002. The Re-emergence of “Emergence”: A Venerable Concept in Search of a Theory. Complexity 7: 18–30.
Crouch, Colin. 2011. The Strange Non-death of Neoliberalism. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Cudworth, Erika, and Steve Hobden. 2011. Posthuman International Relations: Complexity, Ecologism and Global Politics. London: Zed Books.
Davies, Jonathan S. 2011. Challenging Governance Theory: From Networks to Hegemony. Bristol and Chicago, IL: Policy Press.
Day, Richard J.F. 2005. Gramsci Is Dead: Anarchist Currents in the Newest Social Movements. London: Pluto Press.
Dean, Jodi. 2013. Complexity as Capture—Neoliberalism and the Loop of Drive. New Formations 80: 138–154.
DeLanda, Manuel. 2006. A New Philosophy of Society: Assemblage Theory and Social Complexity. London: Continuum.
Elder-Vass, Dave. 2010. The Causal Power of Social Structures: Emergence, Structure and Agency. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Gershenson, Carlos. 2012. Complexity and Information: Measuring Emergence, Self-organization, and Homeostasis at Multiple Scales. Complexity. Early View. https://doi.org/10.1002/cplx.21424.
Gilbert, Jeremy. 2008. Anti-capitalism and Culture: Radical Theory and Popular Politics. Oxford and New York: Berg.
Gramsci, Antonio. 1971. In Selections from the Prison Notebooks, ed. Quintin Hoare and Geoffrey Nowell-Smith. London: Lawrence & Wishart.
Hall, Stuart. 1983. The Great Moving Right Show. In The Politics of Thatcherism, ed. Stuart Hall and Martin Jacques, 19–39. London: Lawrence & Wishart.
Harvey, David. 2005. A Brief History of Neoliberalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Hayek, Friedrich. 1962. The Road to Serfdom. London: Routledge.
———. 1964. The Theory of Complex Phenomena. In Readings in the Philosophy of Social Science, ed. Michael Martin and Lee McIntyre. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Jervis, Robert. 1997. System Effects: Complexity in Political and Social Life. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Jessop, Bob. 2007. State Power: A Strategic-Relational Approach. Cambridge and Malden, MA: Polity.
Joseph, Jonathan. 2002. Hegemony: A Realist Analysis. New York: Routledge.
Karatzogianni, Athina, and Andrew Robinson. 2010. Power, Resistance, and Conflict in the Contemporary World: Social Movements, Networks, and Hierarchies. London and New York: Routledge.
Laclau, Ernesto, and Chantal Mouffe. 1985. Hegemony and Socialist Strategy. London and New York: Verso.
Landau, Jean-Pierre. 2009. Complexity and the Financial Crisis presented at the Conference on “The Macroeconomy and Financial Systems in Normal Times and in Times of Stress,” June 8, Gouvieux-Chantilly.
Landstreicher, Wolfi. 2004. Autonomous Self-Organization and Anarchist Intervention. Portland, OR: Venomous Butterfly Publications.
Lash, Scott. 2007. Power After Hegemony Cultural Studies in Mutation? Theory, Culture & Society 24: 55–78.
Marx, Karl, and Friedrich Engels. 1848. The Communist Manifesto. London: Pluto Press.
Mirowski, Philip. 2013. Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste: How Neoliberalism Survived the Financial Meltdown. London and New York: Verso.
Mitchell, Melanie. 2009. Complexity: A Guided Tour. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Morin, Edgar. 2006. Restricted Complexity, General Complexity. ArXiv e-print cs/0610049.
———. 2008. On Complexity. Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press.
Mudde, Cas, and Cristóbal Rovira Kaltwasser. 2014. Populism in Europe and the Americas: Threat or Corrective for Democracy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Müller, Jan-Werner. 2016. What Is Populism? Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.
Murray, Robin. 1989. Fordism and Post-Fordism. In New Times: The Changing Face of Politics in the 1990s, ed. Stuart Hall and Martin Jacques, 38–53. London: Lawrence & Wishart.
Olssen, Mark. 2008. Foucault as Complexity Theorist: Overcoming the Problems of Classical Philosophical Analysis. Educational Philosophy and Theory 40: 96–117. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-5812.2007.00406.x.
Plehwe, Dieter. 2009. Introduction. In The Road from Mont Pèlerin: The Making of the Neoliberal Thought Collective, ed. Philip Mirowski and Dieter Plehwe, 1–42. Harvard: Harvard University Press.
Plehwe, Dieter, and Bernhard Walpen. 2006. Between Network and Complex Organization: The Making of Neoliberal Knowledge and Hegemony. In Neoliberal Hegemony: A Global Critique, ed. Dieter Plehwe, Bernhard Walpen, and Gisela Neunhoffer, 27–50. New York: Routledge.
Sawyer, Robert Keith. 2005. Social Emergence: Societies as Complex Systems. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Strand, Roger. 2007. Complexity, Ideology, and Governance. In Reframing Complexity: Perspectives from North and South, 195–217. Mansifeld, MA: ISCE Publishing.
Thoburn, Nicholas. 2007. Patterns of Production: Cultural Studies After Hegemony. Theory, Culture & Society 24: 79–94.
Thomas, Peter. 2009. The Gramscian Moment: Philosophy, Hegemony and Marxism. Chicago, IL: Haymarket.
Urry, John. 2003. Global Complexity. London: Polity.
Walby, Sylvia. 2003. Complexity Theory, Globalisation, and Diversity presented at the Conference of the British Sociological Association, York University.
Williams, Raymond. 1977. Marxism and Literature. London: Oxford University Press.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2020 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Williams, A. (2020). Introduction. In: Political Hegemony and Social Complexity. International Political Theory. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-19795-7_1
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-19795-7_1
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-19794-0
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-19795-7
eBook Packages: Political Science and International StudiesPolitical Science and International Studies (R0)