Gramsci and the Twenty-first-Century Latin American Left

Marxist social scientists, among others, have used various theoretical frameworks to explain the rise of neoliberalism in the 1980s and the popular reaction against it. Marxist economists, for instance, use the theory of the falling rate of profit (which Marx viewed as an eventual consequence of technological development) to explain the economic crisis in the 1970s and capitalism’s response in the form of globalization and neoliberalism. (Marxists are divided as to whether the same tendency continues to this day, a debate with important implications for anti-neoliberal strategy.) In another example, the political scientist Eduardo Silva (2009) in Challenging Neoliberalism in Latin America applies Karl Polanyi’s “double movement” concept (in which laissez-faire formulas generate popular resistance) to the emergence of anti-neoliberal movements in Latin America beginning in the 1990s. In the book under review, Tom Chodor relies on theories formulated by Gramsci to shed light first on the phenomenon of neoliberalism worldwide and then on the distinguishing features of Venezuelan politics in the age of neoliberalism in the 1990s and in the twenty-first century. For this purpose, Chodor contrasts Venezuela under Hugo Chávez, whose movement he characterizes as “counter-hegemonic,” with the changes under President Lula designed to favor the Brazilian bourgeoisie, which he labels a “passive revolution.” Both concepts are derived from Gramsci’s writings.

In keeping with Gramsci’s perspective, Chodor focuses on the dominant discourses associated with different historical stages of capitalism and the breadth of their appeal. Thus the post–World War II period of “Pax Americana” based on the “Keynesian consensus” (45) sought to achieve widespread acceptance of the state interventionist model by appealing to what Gramsci called “common sense” rooted in popular beliefs and myths. Chodor invokes another Gramscian term, “historic bloc” (46), to refer to the attempt to build a coalition around support for the Keynesian model. The celebration of Keynesianism, however, was deceptive in that it was defined differently for developed and underdeveloped nations. In the United States it signified welfare capitalism, but in Latin America it was translated into “embedded liberalism,” which combined free trade and other policies favorable to U.S. economic interests with an acknowledgment of “the right of governments to protect their own economies from the turbulences of the international economy” (46).

The not so perfect consensus began to falter in the 1960s with the rise of “student and counter-culture movements” in the developed countries as well as a new right that feared the “breakdown” (51) of traditional family values. The ensuing political disequilibrium was what Gramsci called an “organic crisis,” which cannot be resolved without far-reaching change and which opens possibilities for counter-hegemonic forces. The radical change took the form of neoliberalism, and its defenders “began to reconstruct the world order in their own image” (45). Even in the case of Latin America, the neoliberals in the 1990s engaged in what Chodor labels a “war of position” by putting forth “an ideological project that sought to elicit consent for . . . restructuring” (73). This strategy contrasted with that of Pinochet in Chile, where the “neoliberal revolution was imposed through repression and violence” (73). Another exception was Venezuela, where the war of position undertaken by Chávez after his release from prison in 1994 preempted the consolidation of the neoliberal project.

Chodor points out that developments in the twenty-first century have in some ways distanced the United States and Europe from the hegemony and consensus that Gramsci associated with advanced democracies. Along these lines, U.S. imperialism has taken a less nuanced form than that of the post–World War II Pax Americana years (as David Harvey [2003] demonstrates in The New Imperialism), while the Great Recession “has undermined the ability of the United States to project its power and to assert its hegemony” (171). In the face of this loss of legitimacy, however, popular and leftist movements in the developed world have failed to mount a war of position that would effectively challenge the ruling class. Chodor notes that “there is little hint of a Polanyian ‘double-movement’” as demonstrated by the “rapid dispersion” (63) of the Occupy Movement and the “stymieing [of] any counter-hegemonic war of position” (64). In Latin America, however, the story is different. There “neoliberalism’s organic crisis has been most acute—exemplified by a series of riots, protests, insurrections, and toppling of governments” and the subsequent emergence of a “Pink Tide of leftist governments” (64).

Chodor devotes two main chapters, titled “The Bolivarian Revolution as a Counter-Hegemonic Project” and “Lula’s Passive Revolution,” to the experiences of left and center-left governments in Venezuela and Brazil. He credits Chávez with having “embarked on a war of position” through a “radical critique of common sense” in order to “combat ruling class ideology” (100–101). He calls this “attempt to enact . . . a counter-hegemony” a “radical war of position” (100–101). In one chapter subsection titled “Education and Society in the Bolivarian Revolution,” Chodor maintains that “the government seeks to use the education system to create organic intellectuals for the Revolution, who can continue the ideological struggle into the future” (111). In the following chapter, he argues that, as Gramsci pointed out, Brazil’s “passive revolution” does not attempt to break with past structures, but by creating “a new balance of forces” in the continent it opens the possibility of more “fundamental transformation” (143). The implication is that Lula’s social programs have engendered a sense of empowerment among the marginalized sectors, which may go on to play a major role in favor of far-reaching change. The essence of the contrast between the two nations is that while the Chavistas have created a “Bolivarian historic bloc” (92) of social groups that act in a bottom-up fashion, Brazil’s governing leaders, although opening possibilities for thoroughgoing change, seek to “re-secure . . . consent for the hegemony of neoliberal social forces” (121).

The application of Gramsci to the Venezuelan case, however, underestimates the importance of economic structural challenges facing Venezuela while possibly overestimating the importance of the battle of ideas and the appeal of “common sense.” Thus, for instance, the failure of the Venezuelan united opposition on the right to put forward an attractive worldview or even a program impedes its ability to wage an effective “war of position,” but it has nevertheless gained ground in the recent past. Furthermore, the government’s inability to overcome oil dependence or increase the nation’s productive capacity in order to solve the problem of scarcities is the most important explanation for its loss of popular support following Chávez’s death in 2013. Thus any analysis of Venezuela’s acute crisis of recent years needs to focus on the capitalist structure that remains intact despite the Chavista movement’s socialist commitment.

This observation notwithstanding, Chodor’s writing stands out for the coherence of its arguments regarding Gramsci’s relevance and the consistency of its analysis. Specifically, his use of Gramscian concepts of “organic crisis,” “passive revolution,” and “counter-hegemonic forces” sheds light on the potential for far-reaching change of certain developments in the recent past in Latin America and elsewhere.