This leads to the question of whether there could be a “new” hegemonic politics which the WSF activists should be actively struggling for. And, perhaps, to asking whether a politics that would not be hegemonic, or would not strive to become hegemonic, would be worth fighting for at all?

My own belief is what I believe was already the conviction of Ambrogio Lorenzetti when he depicted the effects of good and bad government on the walls of the town hall of Siena. Yes, we must fight for good government,and such a government also has to be hegemonic. If not, it would not be a
government. However, since the time of Lorenzetti much water has passed under the bridges of the Arno (in Florence, I mean). So the question now is, for instance, whether an “ethical pirate” would be possible, as I tried to formulate it in my notes on Google and the library last summer (see http://www.libr.org/isc — in the most recent issue, the editorial). It is a bit like H.G.Wells’ “open conspiracy” — and thus what they used to call a contradictio in adiecto. Well, surely no hegemony can be perfect, however universal or universalist it would be in its aspirations.

Regards,
– Mikael