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Thu 25 May, 2006 02:33 pm
Dominate Ideology
To study a domain of knowledge one can take several ?'points of view'. One can concentrate on the narrow perspectives or one can take on the ?'standpoint of the whole'. Every citizen of every society has a point of view about almost everything. Opinions are quickly stated on most anything that is within the domain of discussion of a society at a specific time.
Society is less a collection of individuals and more a system of points of view. A society is a matrix of positions. To be a member of society is to be part of a prestructured social space. An individual has multiple roles; within each role is an established point of view. On occasion this is a considered point of view; more often than not it is an unconscious legacy of past experience.
Each of us harbors a hierarchy of views and I think that in every society there is a dominant position or point of view or ideology. The American dominant ideology is structured about the dominant value system, which is to maximize production and consumption.
The dominant ideology, like all ideologies or points of view, is narrow and dominated by the self interest of the commanding group who establish the view and maintain its superior position within the society. Being a partial point of view the dominant ideology is biased, distorted and unaware of its own assumptions. The partial point of view often claims universality and absolute validity. In some cases the claims are based on ignorance and in many cases it is based on self-interest.
Who controls the dominant ideology in your nation? I am convinced that in the USA the corporate and institutional elite control the dominant ideology.
We're all Marxists now!
And not one in a thousand would undestand why they would be considered such.
Marx thought that society's economic structure determines the way people think, For Marx, who called those aspects of society's economy (the relations of production, viz., the way in which people's lives are determined by the way they make distribute, and use material goods) the infrastructure, and beliefs, including religion and the arts, the superstructure, he believed that the infrastructure determined the superstructure.
But Max Weber believed that that the superstructure determined the infrastructure. Perhaps it was once true with the rise of capitalism, where the Calvinistic beliefs and view of saving money, investing it and the resultant economic prosperity reassured the people that they were favored by God, and this drove the engine of the Protestant Work Ethic. But it does not seem to be true in America anymore, in fact, quite the opposite. Here, the economic interests appear to set the agenda for the beliefs of the people.
kuvasz wrote:We're all Marxists now!
And not one in a thousand would undestand why they would be considered such.
Marx thought that society's economic structure determines the way people think, For Marx, who called those aspects of society's economy (the relations of production, viz., the way in which people's lives are determined by the way they make distribute, and use material goods) the infrastructure, and beliefs, including religion and the arts, the superstructure, he believed that the infrastructure determined the superstructure.
But Max Weber believed that that the superstructure determined the infrastructure. Perhaps it was once true with the rise of capitalism, where the Calvinistic beliefs and view of saving money, investing it and the resultant economic prosperity reassured the people that they were favored by God, and this drove the engine of the Protestant Work Ethic. But it does not seem to be true in America anymore, in fact, quite the opposite. Here, the economic interests appear to set the agenda for the beliefs of the people.
I do not think we are all Marxist now because a Marxist would not stand bovine like staring into the distance while the oligarchy controls the society. But generally I agree with your statement.
"Labour must, on the contrary, be performed as if it were an absolute end in itself, a calling. But such an attitude is by no means a product if nature. It cannot be evoked by low wages or high ones alone, but can only be the product of a long and arduous process of education." Max Weber "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism".
It is this ethos (the distinguishing character, sentiment, moral nature, or guiding beliefs of a person, group, or institution) that must be created and nurtured by the Matador so that the bull follows the cape rather than the Matador with its horns. Ideology is another word for ethos.
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