Unravelling Gramsci: Hegemony and Passive Revolution in the Global Economy.

• Author: Zompetti, Joseph P.

Unravelling Gramsci: Hegemony and Passive Revolution in the Global Economy. By Adam David Morton. London: Pluto Press, 2007; pp. 272. US $28.95 paper.

Adam David Morton's new book attempts to "unravel Gramsci" by focusing on Gramsci's concepts of hegemony and passive revolution. Unravelling Gramsci is a close look at some of Gramsci's key ideas that converge in an effort to understand issues such as the nation-state, the role of history when interrogating texts, the problems of globalization, and the on-going possibilities of resistance to national, as well as global power.

Morton's goal is to unravel the "historical and contemporary relevance of the thought and practice of Antonio Gramsci to factors of hegemony and passive revolution to the global political economy" (1). While a bit ambiguous, Morton's purpose in writing the text is to uncover elements and concepts of Gramsci that have often been overlooked to shed insight into the dynamics of global power. In an era of increasing globalization, such a treatise is undoubtedly beneficial as our identities and markets tread between here and there, us and them, national and international.

Morton acknowledges that, given the cryptic notes in the Prison Notebooks as well as other writings, knowing precisely what Gramsci intended is not only impossible, but also not very helpful. Instead, in agreement with Stuart Hall, Morton suggests we look at "the Gramscian way" of Gramsci's writings (Hall, 1991, 7). In other words, we should not focus on the literal meanings of Gramsci's writings, necessarily, but instead should view the holistic project of Gramsci to see his overall concepts as they relate to many different situations. The Gramscian way is a pseudo-philosophy of not ignoring the forest when we stare at the trees. As Morton suggests, however, we must temper the Gramscian way from important pursuits of focused attention towards issues that Gramsci did concern himself with, such as the nature of the State, power and resistance, the role of intellectuals, etc. In this way, he structures the rest of the book on the underlying philosophy of Gramsci, as opposed to literal interpretations of Gramsci's writings. Morton claims he does a thorough job of analyzing all of Gramsci's writings, including the "overlooked" ones, to ascertain the Gramscian meanings of these important concepts (5). However, Morton fails to include some works by Gramsci, and he uses some of Gramsci's writings to support his own...