Hegemony must be actively won and can be lost, never permanent

Evidence

For Stuart, Gramsci’s critical contribution is to recognize the dynamic quality of the ongoing struggle for hegemony as necessarily operating as a “continuous process of formation and superseding of unstable equilibria,” in which dominant social forces always strive to frame and subordinate other cultures and perspectives within their own horizons of thought but can never be certain of success. Thus, hegemony has to be actively secured in the face of both residual and emerging forms of dissent and disaffection. It is within this framework that the media perform their ideological labor in the selective construction of the cultural lexicon of a given age (or in another terminology, the “mythologies” that Roland Barthes anatomized). — Hall, Stuart, Essential Essays, Volume 1, 767 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Power alone is in no way a sufficient condition for its self-realization (i.e. as if it would be up to its force to force itself). The power of power cannot be attributed once more to power. Rather it needs fundamental analysis from the point of view of evolution theory and systems theory, if one wishes to explain on what societal-structural conditions the development and institutionalization of more abstract, more effective media-codes depend. — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 743 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

Category: Definitional Content

Related

• Hegemony is an unstable equilibrium that dominant forces must continually resecure (similarity 0.93)
• Hegemony is an unstable equilibrium never certain of success (similarity 0.90)
• Hegemony is rule achieved through consent rather than coercion (similarity 0.88)
• Hegemony must be perpetually won and can be lost. (similarity 0.88)
• Hegemony is coercion combined with consent, won and perpetually reconstructed through class struggle. (similarity 0.87)
• Hegemony is a precarious, ever-rebuilt dominance won mainly through consent plus coercion. (similarity 0.87)
• Hegemony is an unstable ongoing process, never a settled victory (similarity 0.86)
• Hegemony combines coercion with actively won consent, with consent in the lead (similarity 0.86)
• Hegemony works by winning consent backed by coercion, not by force alone. (similarity 0.86)
• Hegemony is a fragile, multi-front achievement won through consent, not domination (similarity 0.86)
• Hegemony requires economic leadership, not just compromise concessions (similarity 0.86)
• Hegemony is reproduced through unstable, shifting equilibria rather than static dominance (similarity 0.85)
• Under hegemony, organized consent displaces direct coercion as the main instrument (similarity 0.84)
• Hegemony runs on consent backed by a standby coercive apparatus (similarity 0.84)
• Hegemony is a shifting power balance, never total victory or domination. (similarity 0.84)

Broader Connections

• Hegemony is a contestable, unstable equilibrium, never permanently secured. #corroborates (0.95)
• Hegemony is an unstable equilibrium that dominant forces must continually resecure #corroborates (0.90) — Hall, Stuart, Essential Essays, Volume 1, 767
• Power cannot self-realize but depends on societal-structural conditions for legitimacy #expands (0.78) — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 743
• Hegemony is coercion combined with consent, won and perpetually reconstructed through class struggle. #expands (0.75)
• Hegemony operates through winning consent backed by the threat of force. #expands (0.60) — Hall, Stuart, Essential Essays, Volume 1, 905
• Hegemony works by winning consent backed by coercion, not by force alone. #expands (0.55)
• Hegemony is rule achieved through consent rather than coercion #qualifies (0.50)
• Becoming common sense is a key route to hegemonic power #expands (0.50)