Power after Hegemony Cultural Studies in Mutation?

• Published in: Theory, culture & society Vol. 24; no. 3; pp. 55 - 78
• Main Author: Lash, Scott
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London, England SAGE Publications 01.05.2007; Sage Publications Ltd
• Subjects: Cultural studies; Dominance; Epistemology; Hegemony; Laclau, Ernesto (1935-2014); Ontology; Political culture; Politics; Power; Representation; Social control; Sociolinguistics; Theory of culture; the symbolic; post-hegemonic pouvoir; ubiquitous politics; ontological power; facticity; intensive politics; generative rule; transcendental empiricism; puissance; vitalization; power; communication; extensive politics
• ISSN: 0263-2764; 1460-3616
• DOI: 10.1177/0263276407075956

The treatment in what follows of the politics of hegemony is not per se one of Gramsci, or Laclau or of Stuart Hall's earlier work. At stake is something that encompasses a more general regime of power that will be developed throughout the length of this: what might be called 'extensive politics'. What I will try to show is that such extensive power or such an extensive politics is being progressively displaced by a politics of intensity. I will trace the shift from hegemony or extensive politics to such an intensive politics in terms of: 1) a transition to an ontological regime of power, from a regime that in important respects is 'epistemological', 2) a shift in power from the hegemonic mode of 'power over' to an intensive notion of power from within (including domination from within) and power as generative force, 3) a shift from power and politics in terms of normativity to a regime of power much more based in what can be understood as a 'facticity'. This points to a general transition from norm to fact in politics. From hegemonic norm to what we will see are intensive facts. The fourth section will look at this shift through a change from an extensive (and hegemonic) regime of representation to an intensive regime of communications.