Science, Hegemony and Action: On the Elements of Governmentality

Abstract

The article explores the character of counter-hegemonic social theory, including the Althusserian account of society and history, which provides an insightful theoretical backdrop to modern notions of hegemonic struggle. Developing Adorno’s notions of ‘abstract negativity’ and ‘quasi-practice’, it argues that the theory and practice of counter-hegemony does not touch by thought the society it sets out to transform. Instead counter-hegemony is consumed by the governmentality of a negative world