So more and more stories are rolling in to me about conduct on the ground over the last student elections for the SRC. The more I hear about this, the more I cant help but this that I am seeing evidence of an organic crisis. An organic crisis occurs when a hegemonic power (a collective that holds staid and uniform power, and not used to having that status actually challenged) encounters something that seriously challenges their legitimacy. This is especially important in democratic liberal economies, because both the vote and the purchase are dependent on legitimacy for the people to buy into it. When a hegemony experiences a threat to their legitimacy, they undergo organic crisis. Typically, the hegemonic group, by dint of being in power for so long, as lost the tools necessary for critical reflection and reform, and instead draws upon techniques and tactics of domination, absorption, control, and attack. All of this is not an attempt to reclaim and re-legitimate themselves, but to undermine and de-legitimate their opposition. The tactics I have heard about all conform to this model, of a powerful echelon being upset by a new opposition with genuine popular support, which cracks and wears down the institution of their power base. They experience instability, and respond in the only way they know how.
Posted on: Thu, 25 Sep 2014 22:57:55 +0000
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