ABSTRACT
This chapter analyzes the concept of mediation and focuses on the specific political alternatives that have been proposed to mediate structural possibilities and popular struggle. It argues the self-negating aspects of social practices make the mediating and synthesizing function of rhetoric essential to human life and growth. The concept of mediation, then, despite its murky Hegelian roots, is extremely useful in creating linkages between Marxism and rhetoric. Marxism’s emphasis on the way in which economic structures limit the possibility for exercising moral virtues seems to give way to the rhetorical need to personalize impersonal structure in a hated group or person. The chapter analyzes the problem of mediation in twentieth-century Marxism. The gap between structure and struggle presents a moment for theorizing both negative and positive mediation. Gramsci’s Marxism solves the problem of mediation created by classical Marxism with an emphasis on praxis and creative activity.
