Chapter 2 political ideas and ideologies

POLITICAL IDEAS AND IDEOLOGIES LIBERALISM KEY IDEAS

 Individualism
Classical Ideological Traditions
 Freedom; Individual freedom or liberty,
 Liberalism; meta-ideology liberalism is given priority over say, equality,
 Conservatism; ancient régime justice or authority.
 Socialism; revisionist  Reason
Other Ideological Traditions  Equality
 Fascism  Toleration; That is, forbearance: the willingness
of people to allow others to think, speak and act
 Anarchism
in ways of which they disapprove
 Feminism
 Consent
 Green Politics
 Constitutionalism
 Cosmopolitanism
 Non-western Ideological Trends
STRANDS OF LIBERALISM
Ideologies; Form a social scientific viewpoint, all
Classical Liberalism
ideologies therefore
 extreme form of individualism
1. Offer an account of the existing order, usually in
 ‘negative’ liberty paying for healthcare
the form of world view,
2. Provide a model of a desired future, a vision of  ‘positive’ liberty free healthcare
the good society  The state is necessary evil by Tom Paine
3. Outline how political change can and should be  economic liberalism; the belief that the economy
brought about works best when left alone by government

Political Ideologies Modern liberalism

 Modern liberalism is characterized by a more
 The term ideology was coined 1796 by Destutt sympathetic attitude towards state intervention.
de Tracy. (Literally, an idea-ology)  in the USA, the term ‘liberal’ is invariably taken
 For Marx ideologies to the new ideas of the to imply support for ‘big’ government rather
“ruling class”, ideas that therefore uphold the than ‘minimal’ government
class system and perpetuate exploitation.  ‘J. M. Keynes’ important economist. He save
 Later Marxists such as Lenin and Gramsci. US for the great depression.
These referred not only to ‘bourgeois ideology’,
but also to ‘socialist ideology’ or ‘proletarian CONSERVATISM
ideology’  Conservative ideas first emerged in the late
eighteenth century and early nineteenth century
CLASSICAL IDEOLOGICAL TRADITIONS  More flexible and more successful form of
conservatism developed in the UK an USA
 In this tradition ideologies developed for shape
 The New Right’s draws heavily on classical
industrial society. So in this time ideological
liberal themes and values.
debate was the battle between capitalism and
socialism.

Laissez-faire; The principle of non-government in

economic affairs.
Chapter 2 political ideas and ideologies

Paternalistic conservatism Neoliberalism;

The paternalistic strand in conservative thought is Neoliberalism is an updated version of classical
entirely consistent with principles such as political economy that was developed in the writings
organicism, hierarchy and duty. Early writings of of free-market economists such as Friedrich Hayek
Benjamin Disraeli draws on a combination of and Milton Friedman, and philosophers such as
prudence and principle. In warning of the danger of Robert Nozick
the UK being divided into ‘two nations: the Rich and
the Poor’  The central pillars of neoliberalism are the
market and the individual
 ‘Middle way’ approach adopted in the 1950s by  The principal neoliberal goal is to ‘roll back the
UK Conservatives. This approach eschewed the frontiers of the state’,
two ideological models of economic  ‘private, good; public, bad’.
organization laissez-faire capitalism on the one  Margaret Thatcher’s famous assertion that ‘there
hand, and state socialism and central planning is no such thing as society, only individuals and
on the other. their families’.
 ‘Private enterprise without selfishness’ (H.
Macmillan). Neoconservatism
 Christian democracy, most rigorously developed  The conservative New Right wishes, above all,
in the ‘social market’ philosophy to restore authority and return to traditional
values, notably those linked to the family,
The New Right religion and the nation.
The New Right represents a departure in  Authority is seen as guaranteeing social
conservative thought that amounted to a kind of stability.
counter-revolution against both the post-1945 drift
towards state inter-vention and the spread of liberal SOCIALISM
or progressive social values.  Reaction against the emergence of industrial
capitalism.
CONSERVATISM: KEY IDEAS  Socialism first articulated the interests of
 Tradition; tradition reflects the accumulated artisans and craftsmen threatened by the spread
wisdom of the past of factory production,
 Pragmatism  goal was to abolish a capitalist economy based
 Human imperfection on market exchange and replace it with a
 Organicism qualitatively different socialist society
 Hierarchy; gradations of social position and  Bolsheviks, called themselves ‘communists’,
status are natural and inevitable in an organic while reformist socialists, who practised a form
society of constitutional politics, embraced what
 Authority increasingly came to be called ‘social
 Property democracy’.

Neoliberalism + Neoconservatism = strong but SOCIALISM: KEY IDEAS

minimal state: in Andrew Gamble’s (1981) words,  Community
‘the free economy and the strong state’.  Fraternity
 Social equality
 Need
 Social class
Chapter 2 political ideas and ideologies

 Common ownership
STRANDS OF SOCIALISM
 Marxism Neo Marxism
o Classical Marxism  Complex form of Marxism developed in western
o Orthodox Marxism Europe by with the mechanistic and avowedly
o Neo-Marxism scientific notions of Soviet Marxism
 Social Democracy  Human beings were seen as makers of history,
 New Social Democracy and not simply as puppets controlled by
impersonal material forces
MARXISM  Georg Lukács (1885–1971) was one of the first
 As a political force, in the form of the to present Marxism as a humanistic philosophy
international communist movement, Marxism
Social Democracy
has also been seen as the major enemy of
western capitalism  Social democracy lacks the theoretical
 Marxism, now divorced from the vestiges of coherence of, say, classical liberalism or
Leninism and Stalinism, a fresh lease of life. fundamentalist socialism
 A form of orthodox Marxism, usually termed  social democracy stands for a balance between
the market and the state
‘dialectical materialism’ (a term coined by
Plekhanov, not Marx)  a balance between the individual and the
community
Classical Marxism
 This highlights the importance of economic life ‘New’ social democracy
and the conditions under which people produce  ‘New’ social democracy (sometimes called ‘neo-
and reproduce their means of subsistence revisionism’ or the ‘third way’)
 is a term that refers to a variety of attempts by
Orthodox Communism social-democratic parties, in countries ranging
 Marxism in practice is inextricably linked to the from Germany, Italy and the Netherlands to
experience of Soviet communism, and the UK and New Zealand
especially, V. I. Lenin and Joseph Stalin  the state came to be seen not as a vehicle for
 That is, as orthodox Marxism modified by a set wholesale social restructuring
of Leninist theories and doctrines.  ‘traditional’ social-democratic commitment to
 Stalin created a model of orthodox communism ‘cradle to grave’ welfare in favour of an
that was followed in the post-1945 period by essentially modern liberal belief in ‘helping
states such as China, North Korea and Cuba, people to help themselves’,
and throughout Eastern Europe.  ‘new’ social democracy, on the other hand,
 State Planning Committee (Gosplan) was argue either that it is contra dictory, in that it
established simultaneously endorses the dynamism of the
 Orthodox communism did not survive Stalin’s market and warns against its tendency to social
death in 1953. disintegration, or that, far from being a centre-
 Political Stalinism survives in China and North left project, it amounts to a shift to the right.
Korea remains an orthodox communist regime
Third Way; The term the third way the idea of an
alternative to both capitalism and socialism.
Generally uses by fascist, but now linked to “new”
social democracy
Chapter 2 political ideas and ideologies

“second wave feminism” however emerged in

the 1960s
OTHER IDEOLOGICAL TRADITIONS  Liberal Feminists;
Other ideological traditions have nevertheless tended o Such as Wollstonecraft and Betty
to develop either out of, or in opposition to, these Friedan
core ideologies. o understand female subordination in
terms of the unequal distribution of
Fascism (20th century) rights and opportunities in society
 Shaped by World War I and its aftermath and, in  Socialist Feminist;
particular, by the potent mixture of war and o Female subordination and the capitalist
revolution that characterized the period. mode of production
 There are two principal manifestations of o Drawing attention to the economic
fascism significance of women
1. Mussolini’s Fascist dictatorship in Italy  Radical Feminism
in 1922–43 o Gender divisions are the most
2. Hitler’s Nazi dictatorship in Germany in fundamental and politically significant
1933–45 cleavages in society.
 Forms of neofascism and neo-Nazism resurfaced o In their view all societies, historical and
in recent decades, cause to combination of contemporary, are characterized by
economic crisis and political instability patriarchy
 The fascist ideal is that of the “new man” a hero. o Radical feminism is thus ‘the personal is
Prepared to dedicate his life to the glory of his the political’
nation or race. Not all fascism alike
 Italian fascism was like an extreme form of GREEN POLITICS
statism absolute loyal to state  Usually seen as a new ideology that is linked to
the emerge of the environmental movement
Anarchism
 Anthropocentric, or human-centred, stance
 The central theme within anarchism is the belief adopted by all other ideologies; it does not see
that political authority in all its forms, and the natural world, simply as a resource available
especially in the form of the state, is both evil to satisfy human needs.
and unnecessary
 Holism by drawing on the ideas of Eastern
 Anarchism is unusual amongst political religions that emphasize the oneness of life, such
ideologies in that no anarchist party has ever as Taoism and Zen Buddhism
succeeded in winning power
 Anarchist movements were powerful in, for Ecologism; is the study of the relationship between
example, Spain, France, Russia and Mexico living organisms and their environment. Ecologism
through to the early twentieth century is a political doctrine or ideology that is constructed
on the basis of ecological assumptions, notably
Feminism about the essential link between humankind and the
 a developed political theory until the publication natural world: humans are part of nature, not its
of Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the ‘masters’.
Rights of Women
 1840s and 1850s feminist ideas reached a wider
audience this was called a “first wave feminism”
Chapter 2 political ideas and ideologies

therefore amounted to attempts to apply western

ideas in nonwestern contexts
COSMOPOLITANISM
Fundamentalism
 Cosmopolitanism can be viewed as the  essential ‘truths’ which have unchallengeable
ideological expression of globalization and overriding authority
 Due to its association with the unfashionable  fundamentalisms have little or nothing in
idea of world government.  it is usually associated with religion and the
 Moral’ cosmopolitanism, the notion that literal truth of sacred texts
underpins much anti-globalization activism, is
the belief that the world constitutes a single Religious fundamentalism
moral community.  In religious fundamentalism and, most
 Liberal cosmopolitanism has been expressed in importantly, Islamic fundamentalism, or
two ways. political Islam. The idea that an intense and
1. the attempt to universalize civic and militant faith that Islamic beliefs constitute the
political rights, especially classic overriding principles of social life and politics
‘liberal’ rights such as the right to life, Asian values
liberty and property, freedom of  ‘Asian values’ gained growing currency, fuelled
expression and freedom from arbitrary by the emergence of Japan as an economic
arrest. superpower and the success of the ‘tiger’
2. Derives from economic liberalism, and economies of Hong Kong, South Korea,
places particular stress on attempts to Thailand and Singapore.
universalize market society, seen as a Beyond dualism
means of widening individual freedom
 found in some non-western philosophical
and promoting material advancement.
traditions with the resolute dualism of
Postcolonialism conventional western philosophy
 Postcolonialism is a trend in literary, cultural  Aristotle’s insistence that everything has a
and political studies that seeks to expose and distinctive essence that it cannot lack, expressed
overturn the cultural and psychological through the idea that ‘everything must either be
dimensions of colonial rule or not be’
 An early but influential attempt to do this was John Locke
undertaken at the Bandung Conference of 1955, Locke was a key thinker of liberalism, placing
when 29 mostly newly-independent African and particular emphasis on ‘natural’ or God-given rights,
Asian countries, including Egypt, Ghana, India identified as the rights to life, liberty and property
and Indonesia, initiated what later became  His most important political works are A Letter
known as the Non-Aligned Movement Concerning Toleration (1689) and Two Treatises
 They saw themselves as an independent power of Government.
bloc Edmund Burke
 This is based on Gandhi’s political philosophy Seen as the father of the Anglo-American
conservative tradition. He supported free market
NON-WESTERN IDEOLOGICAL TRENDS economics on the grounds that it reflects ‘natural
 Ideological trends such as ‘Arab nationalism’, law’.
‘African socialism’ or ‘Chinese communism’ Friedrich von Hayek
Chapter 2 political ideas and ideologies

Hayek was awarded the Nobel Prize for Economics.

Hayek’s writings fused liberal and conservative
elements, and had a considerable impact on the
emergent New Right.
 Karl Marx  Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi
Usually portrayed as the father of twentieth-century After returning to India in 1915, he became the
communism his work was three-volume Capital and leader of the nationalist movement, campaigning
most known work is communist manifesto. tirelessly for independence, finally achieved in 1947.
Gandhi’s political philosophy was based on the
 Herbert Marcuse assumption that the universe is regulated by the
Founder of neo-Marxism, His most important works primacy of truth, or satya, and that humankind is
include Reason and Revolution Eros and ‘ultimately one’
Civilization and One-Dimensional Man

 Eduard Bernstein
His attempt to revise and modernize orthodox
Marxism, Bernstein is often seen as one of the
founding figures of modern social democracy

 John Rawls
His major work, A Theory of Justice, the most
important work of political philosophy written in
English since World War II, It has influenced
modern liberals and social democrats alike. Rawls’
other works include Political Liberalism and The
Laws of People

 Adolf Hitler
He was appointed Chancellor of Germany in 1933,
and declared himself Führer (leader), Hitler’s
policies contributed decisively to both the outbreak
of World War II and the Holocaust.

 Mary Wollstonecraft
UK social theorist and feminist .Wollstonecraft
developed the first systematic feminist critique some
50 years before the emergence of the female-
suffrage movement. Her most important work, A
Vindication of the Rights of Women, Wollstonecraft
was married to the anarchist William Godwin, and
she was the mother of Mary Shelley, the author of
Frankenstein.