American Intellectuals in the Neoliberal Hegemony in the 1980s – 2020s: A Gramscian Analysis

Abstract

The aim of the article is to identify the key theses and socio-political pillars of “neoliberalism” as an intellectual current that serves to formalize U.S. global dominance in the period from the 1980s to the present day. We apply the theory of political power by A. Gramsci, which allows us to draw lines from intellectual phenomena to political forces and, further, to socio-economic groups. The main Gramscian scheme employed in this article is the connection between “hegemony” as a form of political dominance, which has, among other things, an intellectual dimension, and a historical bloc - an association of socio-economic groups occupying a dominant position. The emphasis is placed on the role of intellectuals, who in Gramsci's theory are given a key role in the political and ideological design of hegemony. The analysis leads to the following main conclusions. Neoliberalism is an eclectic current that combines the economic theses of the Chicago and Austrian schools, political neoconservatism and the neo-Marxist theory of social movements, but at its core lies the assertion of unlimited economic freedom. This position corresponds to the stable dominance of the neoliberal bloc by financial capital. The main line of change in the position of the intelligentsia was the transition from the bloc's reliance on intellectuals displaced from the university mainstream to the co-optation of the university community.