Estudiante Universitario

 Course : Political sociology (SC2004)
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Explain the link between the work of Karl Marx and one of the following theorists in terms of Political Sociology:Antonio Gramsci



Prologue:

In this short essay I will analyze and explain the strong relationship the influence that Karl Marx had on the work of the Italian political and philosopher Antonio Gramsci.
Antonio Gramsci surely was one of the major political activist around World War I and one of the major leaders of Italian working- class movement since1920s, until arrest in November 1926.
Moreover, much of his work, whether it stems from his pre- prison years, or the research he persuaded in prison, does indeed deal with questions of political and social Marxism.
Gramsci is perhaps one of the most exemplary figure and thinker in an effort to confront the significant economic and social transformations, political, cultural occurred in histime,in the first half of the twentieth century, while maintaining a lively and fruitful relationship with the great theorists of modernity such as Machiavelli and Marx.
The relationship between Marx and Gramsci are expressed primarily on the assessment of the weight of tradition, idealism and materialism, and the relationship between structure and superstructure, the hegemony and the distinctionbetween political society and civil society.
Gramsci knew that Marx has set the conditions to overcome the polarity idealism-materialism. A concept that is clearly expressed by Gramsci in his book "Prison Notebooks", where the author, prompted by its need to avoid any misunderstanding about the distinction between civil society and the State (regardless of "methodology and non-organic nature”),proposes the concept of "extended state".
Gramsci, therefore, can only conceive of Marxism in key idealist because he remained anchored to “Crociano historicism” (the story as the creation of the spirit) and his concept of freedom.
The same idealistic inclination leads him to see in the Councils the opportunity to pre-objective, on the trunk of capitalism, the forms and institutions of socialistsociety, while remaining blind and deaf in the face of historical necessity of the formation of the revolutionary party.

Structure and superstructure:
Of particular importance is its stance in regard to the question of the nature of the superstructure and its relationship to the structure.
Also Marx and Engels had seemed ambiguous on several occasions in the interpretation of that question.Subsequently, a large part of the official Marxism was inclined to favor the structure (economic) and to consider the superstructure (political, institutional, and cultural) or merely a consequence of the first projection.
Gramsci is certainly one of Marxist theorist that has changes in greater depth at this position.
Gramsci criticizes the mechanistic interpretations of Marxism, which regarded thesuperstructure as mere reflection of economic structure. To do this, refer to the concrete analysis of Marx, which he deemed, in such a way, problematic in some cases, the same distinction of the structural aspects from those superstructural, and particularly examines the "errors" made by politicians and executives.
Where there is error, of course, there can be no determinism, since it isconsidered that a different behavior would affect the historical process.
By developing these assumptions, Gramsci offers an original interpretation, strongly anti-mechanistic and strongly humanistic, historical materialism. The "historical subjectivity" of a class conscious of its identity and its role may be changed by practice (political action), social reality, giving it a sense of unity, organized...