Reading Gramsci through Fanon: Hegemony before Dominance in Revolutionary Theory

Abstract

This essay examines the importance of Antonio Gramsci's concepts of hegemony and dominance for anticolonial movements. Hegemony is a practice of power that rests substantially on the consent of various strata achieved by groups possessing or seeking state power, whereas dominance relies primarily on coercion. Subaltern groups and revolutionary parties, Gramsci argues, must displace ruling-class hegemony and become hegemonic themselves before assuming state power. But not all ruling classes are integrally hegemonic. As Ranajit Guha argues, colonialism represents “dominance without hegemony.” Examining Frantz Fanon's discussion of anticolonial nationalism, I argue that even in situations of apparent dominance without hegemony, subaltern classes and revolutionary parties must achieve hegemony before state power for genuine decolonization. The essay argues that the emergence, consolidation, and problematic outcomes of FRELIMO's (Front for the Liberation of Mozambique) resistance to Portuguese colonialism indicate the need to pay close attention to the dialectic of hegemony before dominance.

Key Words:

• Colonialism
• Frantz Fanon
• Antonio Gramsci
• Hegemony
• Revolutionary Theory

Acknowledgments

I thank Dale Shin, Esteve Morera, Joshua Moufawad-Paul, Zabia Afzal, Elleni Centime Zeleke, and Parmbir Gill for their encouragement and constructive comments. I also thank Peter Ives and an anonymous reviewer for their feedback, which contributed substantially to improving the paper. A version of this paper was presented at the 2009 Rethinking Marxism conference.

Notes

1. As I will elaborate, Fanon argues that colonialism did achieve the consent of certain comprador classes. That is, as per Femia (1981), there was minimal hegemony.