Recognition as a counter hegemonic strategy

Abstract

Building on the analyses of cultural hegemony in the works of Nancy Fraser and Wendy Brown, I argue in the paper that the historic bloc (order of cultural hegemony) of post-Fordist capitalism is characterized by a particular dynamic between several ‘axes’ of hegemony that gives rise to the ‘paradox of engagement/disengagement’. The ‘progressive-expertocratic’ axis of hegemony creates a subject-position of the ‘engaged self’, a figure embodying a certain promise of political agency that is simultaneously obstructed by other, depoliticizing axes of hegemony. This dynamic is conducive to the rise of contemporary right-wing authoritarianism, which purports to fulfill this promise of political agency through a series of displacements - the counterhegemonic left, I argue, has so far not formulated an effective alternative to this strategy. In the second part, I explore the potential of Axel Honneth’s theory of recognition, in particular his concept of ‘interpersonal respect’, for grounding a left strategy of connecting (mutually articulating) the hegemonic figure of the ‘engaged self’ with a progressive politics of social transformation. To that end, I elaborate Honneth’s perspective by means of an argument about the role of trust in the context of societal crises that Igor Cvejić, Srđan Prodanović and I have recently formulated.

Keywords

• hegemony
• post- fordism
• engagement
• recognition
• respect
• trust