Darel, E. Paul The Siren Song of Geopolitics: Towards a Gramscian Account of the Iraq War

In the wake of the Iraq war, traditional geopolitical analysis has come to dominate left accounts of contemporary world politics. Such accounts fail a basic empirical test as well as introduce negative theoretical developments which threaten to reinforce outmoded realist assumptions about the international system and well as dilute class analysis and potentially water down Marxism into realism with a veneer of moral critique. This article seeks to reorient critical analysis of the Iraq war away from geopolitics and instead toward Gramscian `autonomous state' theory. It argues that the war is an outgrowth not of capital's strength but instead of its weakness, a temporary and circumscribed hegemonic crisis which produced a `neoconservative moment' of American caesarism. Ideology, a new class alliance, and an autonomous state achieved in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of 9/11 - and not oil - best explain the Iraq invasion, the disastrous occupation which followed, and the ongoing evolution of domestic US politics.

SolrDocument[{id=IT-GRAMSCI-BIB00001-0017362, livello=AP, titolo=The Siren Song of Geopolitics: Towards a Gramscian Account of the Iraq War, sottotitolo=, tipo_titolo=uniform, responsability_namePart=[Darel, E. Paul], autorevoc=[Darel, E. Paul], responsability_codice=[IT-GRAMSCI-EACCPF0001-006893], responsability_ruolo=[author], first_author=Darel, E. Paul, forma_parallela=, responsability=, note_edizione_traduzione=, luogo_pubblicazione=, editore=, forma_visualizzata=, forma_normalizzata=, tipo_data=, consistenza=, lingua=[eng], abstract=In the wake of the Iraq war, traditional geopolitical analysis has come to dominate left accounts of contemporary world politics. Such accounts fail a basic empirical test as well as introduce negative theoretical developments which threaten to reinforce outmoded realist assumptions about the international system and well as dilute class analysis and potentially water down Marxism into realism with a veneer of moral critique. This article seeks to reorient critical analysis of the Iraq war away from geopolitics and instead toward Gramscian `autonomous state' theory. It argues that the war is an outgrowth not of capital's strength but instead of its weakness, a temporary and circumscribed hegemonic crisis which produced a `neoconservative moment' of American caesarism. Ideology, a new class alliance, and an autonomous state achieved in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of 9/11 - and not oil - best explain the Iraq invasion, the disastrous occupation which followed, and the ongoing evolution of domestic US politics., table_contents=, titolo_collana=, collocazione=, relazioni_titolo_collegato=[Millennium: Journal of International Studies], relazioni_identificativo=[], relazioni_tipo_relazione=[padre], relazioni_numero_volume=[36], relazioni_numero_issue=[1], relazioni_start=[51], relazioni_end=[76], relazioni_pagine=[], relazioni_forma_visualizzata=[December, 2007], relazioni_forma_normalizzata=[20071200-20071200], relazioni_tipo_data=[inferred], relazioni_luogo=[], relazioni_editore=[], relazioni_paese=[GB], soggettivoc=[Medio Oriente, conflitti in, Relazioni Internazionali], subjectvoc=[Middle East Wars, International relations], note_riservate=, source=, recordInfo=lrighi@fondazionegramsci.org, identifier=IT-GRAMSCI-BIB00001-0017362, recordOrigin=MODS.2C96807ECC54D2E, condizioni_accesso=public, dateIssued=20071200-20071200}]