Economic crises cannot by themselves overthrow advanced capitalist states.

Evidence

The superstructures of civil society are like the trench-systems of modern warfare. In war it would sometimes happen that a fierce artillery attack seemed to have destroyed the enemy’s entire defensive system, whereas in fact it had only destroyed the outer perimeter; and at the moment of their advance and attack the assailants would find themselves confronted by a line of defence which was still effective. The same thing happens in politics, during the great economic crises. A crisis cannot give the attacking forces the ability to organise with lightning speed in time and in space; still less can it endow them with fighting spirit. — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 892

Categorization

• DEFINE: Introduces the core war of position / war of manoeuvre distinction via the trench-system metaphor — the load-bearing concepts for this text.
• XREF: Connects to the Gramsci-derived concept of hegemony via civil society’s passive resistance to economic shocks; later Islamophobia readings treat cultural institutions as similar ‘trenches’. — connects to: Capitalism is constitutive crisis, so depression and unemployment do not threaten it. — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 580; Political contestation under capitalism cannot challenge the economic system itself; Deep crises that cull banks require state intervention to save capitalism. — Yanis Varoufakis, Technofeudalism: What Killed Capitalism, 827 (+1 more)