This paper argues that it is impossible to have a coercion-free political system and questions the bases and conclusions of democratic peace theory and ideals of deliberative democracy. It asserts that contemporary liberal democracies do seem less coercive (repressive), because they have become Gramscian “organic states”, where little direct coercion is needed in order to sustain the system. Due to the high degree of sedimentation of the ideology treating capitalist liberal democracy as the optimal system, the hegemony embodied in the state is able to sustain itself merely by means of ideological coercion. Consequently, the absence of state violence cannot be the sole criterion of a mature democracy, but can also be a characteristic of a totalitarian regime where ideological deviations are strictly controlled. The paper outlines the functioning of ideological coercion and casts doubt upon the postulates of radical democracy by inquiring whether it is possible to envisage an elimination of ideological hegemonies.
Keywords: coercion, ideological coercion, liberal democracies, hegemony, repression, violence
