While secular theorists continue fine-tuning their exclusivist model of the
public sphere, others see a need to open the public forum to multiple voices, including
those of religious groups. In particular, recent post-Marxist reconsideration of the
concept of ideology, mainly in Europe, invites some modification of absolute separation.
This reconsideration involves two phases. First ideology is redefined as any
action-oriented ideas whether destructive or ameliorative including both secular theory
and religion. Then hermeneutical and critical studies of the power/ideology relationship
help us rediscover the role of 'utopia' as a social catalyst for amelioration.
As exemplified by Newspeak in George Orwell's Nineteen-Eighty-Four: destructive
ideology is used not to convey information but to provide a truth-indifferent rationale
for institutional policies and practices. Such obfuscation has been a government staple,
not just in the former Soviet Union but in the West as well, where governments have
misrepresented their coercive activities as fending off "bandits" earlier in the
twentieth century and "terrorists" more recently. What matters for my purposes
is that one might similarly appeal to religious beliefs to justify pursuing a goal that is
not obviously religious at all.(1)
Special terminology is needed, then, to distinguish religious beliefs from mobilized
religion. For this purpose some writers(2) use the term
'worldview' (in German, Weltanschauung), and others rely on 'ideology.' 'Worldview'
encompasses both religious and secular beliefs, as does 'visionof the world' or
'mentality,' which some historians favor.(3) But none of
these implies a call to action. The term 'ideology', though action-oriented, tends to be
associated only with nonreligious ideas. But some writers are beginning to apply it to
religious ideas that inspire action.
The term 'ideology' seems suitable for discussing religious activism. But militating
against this usage are the various ways in which the term has been used and is still
understood by many scholars. As reported in his 1976 study of the use of 'ideology' among
Anglo-American social and political theorists, British political theorist Martin Seliger
found that scholars typically announce a stipulative definition, which may be either
restrictive or inclusive. The restrictive definition, still favored when he was writing,
is applied only to extremist belief systems and parties, in particular those, such as
fascism and communism, that are associated with totalitarianism. The inclusive definition,
which he espoused, "covers sets of ideas by which men posit, explain and justify ends
and means of organized social action." Thus understood, ideology is "a belief
system by virtue of being designed to serve on a relatively permanent basis . . . to
ensure concerted action for the preservation, reform, destruction or reconstruction of a
given order.(4)
This definition of ideology embraces politicized religion. Its principal fault lies in
the word 'designed', which implies that the political use of a doctrine is somehow
intended from the outset rather than being so used adventitiously and even unconsciously.
Seliger also perpetuates the prejudice common among academicians that ideology is inferior
to theory. Some political theorists consider such hierarchization undemocratic.(5)
But French phenomenologist Paul Ricoeur has suggested that theory is inferior to ideology,
which he identifies with "the symbolic structure of social life."
A decade ago, Ricoeur recommended that ideology be thought of as "a language of
real life which exists before all distortions, a symbolic structure of action that is
absolutely primitive and ineluctable." So understood it is "not something that
is taught, but rather something within which we think."(6)
He did not then challenge the common assumption among academic liberals that an ideology
is based on secular rather than religious ideas; nor did he discuss the opposite Marxist
tendency to associate only religious ideas with ideology. But he has since taken up a
theme common among neo-Marxists, namely, that ideology needs to be broadened to take into
account the political use of appeals to science and technology in advanced capitalist
societies.(7) Even more important, he also recommends
including both past- and future-oriented views.
In historical terms 'ideology' dates only from the late eighteenth century. But learned
awareness of deliberate misinformation preceded the term itself by several centuries, as
in Francis Bacon's idols of the tribe, cave, market, and theater, Machiavelli's
distinction between thought of the palace and thought of the public square, and Hume's
sensitivity to "feigning" in his History of England.(8)
Then the French philosophes used 'ideology' to identify their new study of the ideas of
ordinary people as distinguished from those of priests and professors. But Napoleon
Bonaparte, associating the term with the democratic leanings of these scholars, used it
pejoratively. Marx did so as well, but only with regard to the ideas of the ruling class;
and scholars ever since have tended to apply the concept, selectively, to distorted
thought which they disfavor.(9)
Marx and Freud after him associated religion with 'illusions.' For Freud, religion is
an illusion that involves truth-claims which are notonly not yet verified but ultimately
unverifiable. An illusion, he tells us, is a belief which may or may not be true (in
contrast to a delusion, which is false) under a particular set of circumstances. Religious
ideas, though, are insusceptible of proof. They assert something about external or
internal reality which "one has not discovered for oneself and which lay claim to
one's belief."(10)
In 1939 Freud had to flee to London as the Nazis occupied Vienna. At about the same
time two other writers for whom ideology was an important concept also had to deal with it
in their personal lives. Karl Mannheim, a Hungarian Jew who had become a professor of
sociology in Germany, also fled to London when the Nazis came to power. A few years
earlier in Italy, the Fascists had put the director of the Italian Communist Party Antonio
Gramsci (1891-1937) in prison, where he secretly kept the famous notebooks most of which
were rescued after his death.
Gramsci identified ideology as a mode of thinking accessible to the masses which is
more advanced than but functionally equivalent to religion as a political motivator.
Religion, however, is more likely to be used to maintain conformity to an established
social system(11); so if people are to aspire to social
betterment they need to reach a higher level of thinking. The social instrument for
bringing about this higher thinking is the collective will, which as political party and
as popular government is the modern equivalent of Machiavelli's Prince.
The Prince, said Gramsci, is a utopian work in that the Prince exists only as a pure
theoretical abstraction, with which the people are merged in the epilogue. The ideational
instrument is philosophy, which, according to Gramsci's most often quoted words, involves
"criticism and the superseding of religion and 'common sense'." The only
philosophy that has an impact on the masses, however, is a "philosophy of
praxis" that opens people to a "higher conception of life" to which they
adhere not through reason but on faith. This faith is not in doctrines but in the social
group with which the masses identify, as it were organically rather than in response to
some arbitrary movement. If in fact they do so, an "equation between philosophy and
politics, thought and action" can be achieved which satisfies "the real critical
test of the rationality and historicity of modes of thinking."(12)
In short, Gramsci recognized both past- and future-oriented ideologies but gave priority
of place to the latter.
Mannheim's Ideology and Utopia (German edition, 1929) appeared just as fascism was
emerging in Europe. In this seminal work he argued that ideologies, which are
conservative, are challenged by utopias, which are future-oriented and potentially
transformative of social structures. He won little support for this vision of ideology and
utopia in competition with one another, but each has been studied separately. Moreover,
absolutism still set the standard for the social sciences when his work appeared; so
(until recently) critics needed only label the pragmatic if not postmodern aspects of his
approach as relativistic or internally inconsistent.(13) He
himself warned that absolutism encourages a false sense of superiority while concealing
the meaning of the present situation. This meaning, he claimed, drawing on Marx and Freud,
lies hidden in political actors' unconscious, even irrational, motivations. These the
political sociologist needs to unmask and combine into a comprehensive whole.(14)
What one is offered for analysis, however, are variously conflicting ideas, some favoring
stability and others favoring change.
Hegel had argued that history emerges out of their dialectic interaction; but, says
Mannheim, the roots of such interaction are to be found in"much deeper-lying vital
and elemental levels of the psyche." To make sense out of this complex political
turmoil, he proposed as heuristic devices the concepts of ideology and utopia, which, he
admitted, are "slogan-like," constitute a "crude dichotomy," and are
difficult to sort out because "the utopian and ideological elements do not occur
separately in the historical process." He hoped, however, that they could be used
heuristically to analyze the political interaction between ideas that favor the status quo
and those that envision change for the better.(15)
Max Weber had also identified a kind of dualism at work in social group motivation,
positing a seemingly less rational force as the challenger of the status quo, namely,
charisma. According to Weber, an ideology may be based on views of a philosopher-ideologue
such as Marx, the teachings of a political philosopher, or a religious authority. Any of
these may underlie a "rationality of purpose" (Zweckrationalitaet) that is
inherent in merely practiced beliefs. These form a system to the extent that they
contribute significantly to the cohesion of a social entity. Charisma, by contrast, is for
Weber a change-oriented view whose adherents apply to it the sacredness others ascribe to
existing institutions.
In the latter half of the twentieth century, these dualisms have been modified in
various ways and may not survive the emergence of postmodernism.(16)
Martin Seliger in particular has tried to show how sacred and secular beliefs perform
comparable functions; but in so doing he comes close to eliminating their difference. Says
Seliger, a merely practical belief system "stands in the same relation to ideology as
religion to theology. Where there is religion and no theology, the belief system is made
known in order to be practiced; the practices are left unexplained beyond their immediate
significance and purpose. Theology adds self-consciously rational argument to sustain the
beliefs and rituals as a system." Moreover, a religion-based system may clash with
one based on secular ideas.(17) But so may any distinct
beliefs in any combination as to sacred or secular content. What is more, Seliger's broad
definition of ideology, noted above, seems to envision these separate paths somehow
meeting. This functional interconnectedness is further elaborated by various approaches to
interpreting language and culture on the Continent.
Following the lead of structuralists and semiologists, who find unexamined meanings in
every aspect of a culture, French neo-Marxist philosopher Louis Althusser focuses on
ideology as an instrument of the state—more particularly, as the key instrument by
means of which primarily private-sphere enterprises do what the state itself does through
violence (i.e., coercion), namely, support the state. Such private-sphere activity
involves what he calls Ideological State Apparatuses (ISAs); that of the state, the
(Repressive) State Apparatus. For Althusser, then, an ideology is a representation of the
imaginary relationship of individuals to their real conditions of existence. It involves
illusion, as Marx and Freud had contended, so has no history; but it is used in a
particular historical context and accordingly also involves allusion, that is, it alludes
to reality. Thus understood, ideology is broad enough to include politicized religion; and
Althusser, like most Marxists, explicitly includes in his list of ideologies (ISAs) one
variant which he calls "religious ideology."(18)
Some non-Marxist scholars have also associated religion with ideology. This association
is implicit, for example, in Weber's broad concept of a rationality of purpose. More
recently, as suggested, structuralist and semiotic analyses of culture bypass the
sacred/secular bifurcation at leaston functional grounds.(19)
The work of some American scholars has also helped call attention to functional
similarities. Shils saw the sacred as central to an ideological orientation; and in the
same vein a book about political ideologies is entitled, as if about things sacred, Dogmas
and Dreams. A philosopher's study of Confucianism involves, according to its subtitle, The
Secular as Sacred. Inversely, Michael Walzer, a political theorist, and Robert Wuthnow, a
sociologist of culture, refer to politicized religious ideas as ideology.(20)
The most thorough treatment of this overlap to date, however, is to be found in Paul
Ricoeur's more recent writing.
Ricoeur now urges scholars to deal with both ideology and utopia in such a way as not
to claim any privileged position from which to judge a group's social identity. To this
end, he recommends combining the respective strengths of critical theory and hermeneutics
into a "situated" critique of the social imaginary. The desired result: a stable
but ever correctable "theory of cultural imagination." Contributors to this
theory should strive to work with a non-derogatory concept of group self-identification
and deal not with "misunderstandings," as hermeneuticist Hans Gadamer prefers,
but with the interests that underlie public knowledge-claims, as does critical theorist
Jürgen Habermas. The ideology/utopia tension, as asserted by Mannheim, needs to be
included as a part of this theory-building. For, if either is left unchallenged it can
(but need not) become pathological (ideology as distortion and concealment; utopia as
schizophrenia); and each is a corrective of the other.(21)
Clearly, then, academic usage now tolerates blurring the edges of the distinction
between the sacred and the secular as motive forces. But both 'ideology' and 'worldview'
falter at the divide between thought and action, mind and will. This is problematic,
especially because, as Marx recognized, some individuals in a group may be moved to action
with little if any understanding of or appreciation for the ideas that, to others,
underlie or motivate that action.(22) It does not follow
from this, however, that those less well informed act on the basis of falsehood, as some
analysts of ideology claim. Nor is it necessary to avoid cognitivist explanations by
saying that they follow a fetish, saving the term 'ideology' for after-the-fact
justifications. For, their participation is not unwitting, still less irrational, but is
likely to be prospectively emotive and etiologically associational.(23)
What matters, in other words, is that they identify themselves, and are identified by
others, with a set of beliefs at least to the point that they can under appropriate
conditions be moved to act in behalf of those beliefs as cause and end of action. For,
what motivates people to participate in a cause or movement is not so much a set of
doctrines as it is the belief-related group identity that comes with such participation.
Suitable language is needed to express this commitment to a cause.
Given the present fluidity of mainstream terminological options, I am inclined to
substitute another term that conveys much of the meaning and complexity these issues
entail, namely, 'mission'. For in both secular and sacred contexts missions are defined
and assigned to individuals or groups to enhance some aspect of the organizing entity's
sense of purpose and possibility. What stands out in each instance is that the sense of
mission is not passively epistemic but actively project-oriented, goal-directed. It does
not lack intellectual content, but as stated for the record (the 'mission statement') it
points beyond what is to what ought to be. It is, in brief, an end, and it is up to those
who seek it to settle on suitablemeans. The term 'mission', then, can be used with
reference to any end or goal that is at least implicitly normative and which people seek
to attain. A mission moves people, however, only if it is tied to some belief-based social
identity which can be interpreted as oriented to that end. The beliefs appealed to may be
deemed either secular or religious; but what matters here, in spite of the declarations of
Gramsci and others, is that religious beliefs can and do motivate missions aimed at
advancing the public good.
Seemingly secular missions were of course undertaken on the basis of religious beliefs
throughout the history of Western civilization, long before anyone thought of toleration,
or keeping politics out of the pulpit, or, for that matter, of ideology. Religious beliefs
available in the Judaeo-Christian catalog sufficed to stimulate an eventually successful
abolitionist movement in the United States, then movements to extend suffrage to women,
then to contain corporate greed and environmental degradation. In the 1980s, comparable
underpinning of anti-Soviet protests was also a factor in Poland, then East Germany, and
other countries as well. A strong case can be made, accordingly, for accommodating
religious views in our political discourse. For, they have a history of directing people's
thinking beyond what is to what ought to be; and without them we are ever more inclined to
tolerate mediocrity in ourselves and despair in others.
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