Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- 1 The organization of consent
- 2 The politics of after-work
- 3 Taylorizing worker leisure
- 4 The penetration of the countryside
- 5 Privileging the clerks
- 6 The nationalization of the public
- 7 The formation of fascist low culture
- 8 The limits of consent
- Abbreviations
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
1 - The organization of consent
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 18 December 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- 1 The organization of consent
- 2 The politics of after-work
- 3 Taylorizing worker leisure
- 4 The penetration of the countryside
- 5 Privileging the clerks
- 6 The nationalization of the public
- 7 The formation of fascist low culture
- 8 The limits of consent
- Abbreviations
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
The “normal” exercise of hegemony on the classical terrain of parliamentary regimes is characterized by a combination of force and consent, which balance each other reciprocally without force ever prevailing too much over consent… In the period following the World War, the hegemonic apparatus cracked apart, and the exercise of hegemony became permanently difficult and aleatory.
A. Gramsci, Prison NotebooksThe question of “government by consent” became for the first time an overriding concern of political and economic elites in Europe as they sought to reestablish the bases of their rule after the enormous disruptions of World War I. With what authority could reconstruction be undertaken after the great upsurge of labor unrest in 1918? On what foundations could old governing coalitions be reconstituted as the sheer numerical force of the left parties threw the exclusive liberal caucuses into disarray? With what incentives could workers be induced to cooperate in retooling for peacetime production now that factory councils and militant industrial unions pressed their demands for “democracy in the workplace”? Conservatives, liberals, and technocrats naturally differed in their proposed solutions, debating the merits of consultations and negotiated compromises with organized labor, more active appeals to build responsive voter blocks, or a radical operation of social engineering. But whatever the political perspective, it had become clear that, with the end of the war, the era of laissez-faire capitalism – of disorganized labor, rigid management hierarchies, long working hours, and restricted consumption – was closed.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Culture of ConsentMass Organisation of Leisure in Fascist Italy, pp. 1 - 23Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1981