The role of idea and ideology in creating individual movement or struggle is
important as an integral process in hegemony. The hegemon controls and manipulates
the thinking or belief among different social groups through new ideas and ideologies
which ‘serve as the informative principle of all individual and collective activities’
(Mouffe 1979, p.186). Gramsci further stresses the significance of the material and
institutional structure for the spreading of ideology, which is made up of ‘hegemonic
apparatuses [such as] schools, churches, the entire media and even architecture and
the name of the streets (Mouffe 1979, p.187). This conceptualization of hegemony
will be applied to the case studies, which discuss the importance of creating new
hegemonic ideas in the operations of the Confucius Institute as an educational
institution, invested in promoting certain positive ideas such as China’s harmonious
relations with Thailand