Page 45 - Contemporary Political Sociology Globalization Politics and Power

Changing Definitions of Politics and Power 31

used simply as a tool or instrument to bring about change. Culture is
constitutive in the sense that it is only through symbolic representations
that humans experience, sense, access, and manipulate reality, whether
created by human beings or not. This is not to say, of course, that culture
creates reality as such: clearly, symbols do not create mountains out of
stone or trees out of wood. It is rather that culture is constitutive of our
reality, and this is crucial to how our social world (including its material
artifacts – buildings, borders, irrigation systems, and all the rest) is repro-
duced and transformed. We only know the effects of material artifacts,
as well as of existing social structures that exist “ outside ” our heads,
through our own understanding and use.

On the other hand, others see the significance of culture as historically
specific. As we shall see in chapter 2 , this view is particularly associated

with the idea that we are now moving into a new era, that of “ postmod-
ernism. ” Whereas in modernity, culture occupied a separate sphere of
society as high art, it is argued that in postmodernism there has been an
expansion of culture into other realms of society. Culture has been com-
modified as the value of art is increasingly closely linked to its market

price and, at the same time, the economy itself is increasingly dependent
on culture, in research and design, advertising, niche marketing according
to lifestyle, and leisure and service industries. Politicians perform to their
audiences through the media, and personalities count more than policies.
And in the social realm, distinctions of status depend to an even greater
extent than before on the display of cultural credentials, rather than on
economic or political power (see Crook et al., 1992 ; Kumar, 1995 ).
According to this version of the “ cultural turn, ” the historical importance
of culture has been determined by changes in social structure.
Whether culture is seen as universally or historically preeminent,
however, cultural politics now takes on an unprecedented importance.

The term “ culture ” is notoriously difficult to define. As a working defi ni-

tion, we will adopt that of Raymond Williams: culture is “ the signifying
system through which necessarily (though among other means) a social
order is communicated, reproduced, experienced and explored ” (Williams,

1981 : 13). This definition includes the more commonly used conception
of culture as “ the works and practices of intellectuals, and especially
artistic activity ” (Williams, 1976 : 80), and also the still narrower under-
standing of popular and media culture. In this most general sense, culture,
as Jeffrey Alexander puts it, “ is not a thing but a dimension, not an object
to be studied as a dependent variable but a thread that runs through, one
that can be teased out of, every conceivable social form ” (Alexander,
2003 : 7).