Counterhegemonic strategies in neoliberal Argentina.(Argentina Under Menem)

This article outlines a strategy of action for subordinate groups confronted

by the neoliberal pluralist projects currently in vogue in Argentina and

elsewhere. To do so, it applies Gramsci's often underappreciated (and

somewhat scattered) thoughts on counterhegemonic movements to the realities of

the present conjuncture. It is therefore less a finished empirical analysis than

a preliminary rumination on the theoretical and practical problems

surrounding subordinate-group collective action under conditions of atomizing

pluralism and survivalist alienation. Not by chance, these pathologies are

reinforced and promoted by market-driven logics imposed by national elites,

which gives them a structural base that presents formidable obstacles to

effective subordinate-group collective action. Nor are these obstacles

short-lived or tied to the dynamics of regime transition. By 1994, the

postauthoritarian conjuncture was well into its consolidation phase: over ten

years of

elected rule, a successful rotation of office between the two major political

parties, the subordination of the military hierarchy to civilian government

authority, and the expansion of popular participation in the political life of

the nation. But beneath the surface lay profoundly negative undercurrents

that worked against the consolidation of democracy in its substantive sense.

Economic policymaking by executive decree, the disarticulation or neutering

of traditional subordinate-group collective agents such as the Confederacion

General de Trabajo (General Labor Confederation -- CGT), and the

dismantling of the public-goods infrastructure all signaled that democracy in

Argentina was hollow at its core.

This type of election-based regime, recently characterized as "delegative

democracy" (O'Donnell, 1990), is neither liberal, representative, nor truly

popular. As a result, the prescription for giving it substance rests in the

hands

of social movements and political actors that, along with elements of the

traditional socioeconomic and political elite that have a true democratic

vocation, are committed to extending the fruits of the reopened political and

social arena to the most disadvantaged sectors of the population.

The strategy outlined herein weds Gramsci's thought on hegemony,

praxis, and the "war of position" to simple strategic interaction analyses

based on rational-choice theories of collective action (e.g., Olson, 1965).

Unlike the "war of maneuver" (armed struggle) that characterizes (the not

often successful) subordinate-group struggles against military authoritarian

regimes, as Evers (1985), Perlman (1976), and Schmitter (1988) have pointed

out, the institution of bourgeois democracy makes a "war of position(s)" the

most appropriate and effective course of action in the present conjuncture.

This is an ideological struggle that begins on the terrain of consciousness but

to be successful requires that the types of collective action engaged in be

reconsidered, revitalized, and ideologically informed by a counterhegemonic

perspective. According to Schmitter, the moment is one of "settling into the

trenches," in which actors "organize their internal structures more

predictably, consult their constituencies more regularly, mobilize their

resource base

more reliably, consider the long-term consequences of their actions more

seriously, and generally experience the constraints imposed by deeply-rooted

material deficiencies and normative habits much more saliently" (1988: 7-8).

Yet this process has as much to do with creating social identities and

redefining both citizenship and interests as it does with pursuing power. It is

as much a matter of defining "good sense" as of making "common" sense of

an adverse sociopolitical moment. If Gramsci is correct that the "arena of

consciousness" is the site of the primary struggle between the dominant and

subordinate classes (Carnoy, 1984: 77), then the issue is one of re-creating

socially given identities by modifying public discourse to elevate mass (as

opposed to strictly class) consciousness. This is accomplished by focusing

on the common needs of the disadvantaged majority rather than on the

particularistic wants of the elites and their minions -- by applying the

redefined principles of citizenship "from below" (or, as Oxhorn [1991:4] would

phrase it, lo popular) to the making of collective choices (Schmitter, 1988:

15). This involves a process of collective identity (re)formation that, as

Munck (1991: 5-8) points out, calls for reconciling the three analytical

dimensions of group self-perception: identity (i.e., breadth and composition),

strategy (goal orientation), and consistency (relationship between means and

ends). The formation of effective mass consciousness requires transcending

the parochial concerns of traditional functional, spatial, ethnic, or other

narrowly defined social groups. Individual and group identities can then

become the subjects of new forms of collective socialization that are more

congruent with the realities of social existence and responsive to the need for

new means for addressing them (Colombo and Palermo, 1985: 98, 110).

Each of the three dimensions of collective identity formation involves a

logic of collective action with a dynamic of its own. Bringing the three

dimensions together requires overcoming the inevitable tension between the

need for group autonomy and the need to expand and cooperate in order to

secure gains in the larger social milieu. Reconciling these factors constitutes

the crux of a successful counterhegemonic project.

THE STRATEGIC POSITION OF SUBORDINATE GROUPS

The initial postauthoritarian moment saw a "rebirth" of civil society in

virtually all of its guises, but when the euphoria had (rather quickly) worn

off, the position of subordinate groups was not appreciably better than before.

More freedom of expression and less fear of repression did not translate into

individual or group economic or political gains, at least in terms of

state-generated and traditionally defined rewards. Instead, the basic claims to

citizenship that marked the transition from authoritarian to democratic rule

were considered to have been addressed by the holding of elections, the

reconstitution of parliament and the party system, and the increased freedom

to voice dissent, criticism, and unhappiness with the status quo (Mainwaring

and Viola, 1984). Having done all this, in a sense, there was nothing left for

the resurrected social actors to do: they had gained what they had demanded

within the limits of the political structure but had little in the way of a

coherent (counterhegemonic) agenda for expanding upon these basic gains. Focused

on satisfying immediate demands denied them under the dictatorship, they

were left fragmented and often contradictory once the elected regime was

installed. This allowed them to be easily divided and conquered if not ignored

by governmental authorities.

Initially, this was not entirely disadvangeous, since the Alfonsin

administration worked hard to adopt a "heterodox" approach to macroeconomic and

social policy that would ameliorate the negative social effects of economic

stabilization measures (Smith, 1990). But as the economic malaise inherited

from the Proceso de Reorganizacion Nacional (the euphemism used by the

dictatorship to cloak its terrorism) increased under the strains of

uninstitutionalized democratic conflicts (partisanship and sectoral opportunism

rather

than compromise being the norm) and the inability to prevent further decline,

the inability of subordinate groups to take the initiative in formulating a new

social agenda eventually proved their undoing. Lacking a compelling

rationale for unity, many postauthoritarian collective agents of Argentina's

subordinate masses submitted to the seemingly inevitable and reluctantly turned

to the party system and the state for redress. In doing so they relinquished

any counterhegemonic potential.

This is particularly unfortunate because many of the dominant groups in

Argentine society, particularly the financial elite and other industrial and

commercial sectors structurally favored by the economic policies of the

Proceso, have ideological projects of their own (see Schvarzer, 1983). To

paraphrase Lenin, with the "useful fools" of the military regime dispensable

once their reign of state terror had successfully suppressed subordinate-group

challenges to the rule of capital, the thrust of these projects has been to

exploit

democracy as capitalism's "best possible political shell" (1965: 59-61).

The perverse genius of this strategy lies in the fact that the economic and

psychological assaults perpetrated by the Proceso lowered the material and

political thresholds of consent of the Argentine subordinate classes.

Abandoning the position of contesting bourgeois power of the early to mid-1970s,

they are content to be the passive recipients of whatever largesse the

sociopolitical elite is willing to offer. Basically tolerant of dissent and not

as violent, the elected regimes of the 1980s and 1990s have been viewed as

marked improvements over their authoritarian predecessor, even though the

current project subtly reaffirms the dislocating efforts of the dictatorship by

coupling the ostensibly democratic influence of pluralism on civil society

with a move toward a "free" economy in which market-determined logics,

not social concerns, "rationally" steer the material choices of all individuals

and groups.

The result has been a weakening and dividing of preexisting

subordinate-group social identities. Pluralism atomizes the masses by

multiplying the

collective agents competing to represent them while stripping them of the

institutional referents that constituted the collective dimension of their

pre-Proceso identities. Individuals are left feeling isolated and divorced from

their traditional sources of community and respond by looking inward to

more egocentric, nihilistic forms of self-reaffirmation. The simultaneous

imposition of a vulgar social Darwinist brand of capitalist logic helps to

alienate individuals from all "others" in a ruthlessly competitive quest for

basic material survival. Finally, along with their compassion and solidarity,

subordinate groups lose the institutional advantages accrued through

previous collective action.

This is not merely the alienation from one's productive labor that is central

to marxist critiques of capitalism as a productive force. This form of

alienation paradoxically allows workers to derive pleasure from commodity

consumption (Ranis, 1992: 197), but in an era of economic scarcity and

market-driven

logics it disassociates individuals and groups from the other integral elements

of their existence: consumption, community, leisure, and cultural pursuits.

Removed from their traditional referents at both the individual and collective

levels, the disadvantaged sectors are left to fend for themselves in the feral

economic atmosphere of the Menem stabilization project -- forcibly divorced

from their traditional sources of collective identification, consumed by

egocentric strategies of self-preservation, increasingly driven into the

informal economy, required to hold several menial jobs at once to make ends

meet,

and institutionally under- or unprotected …