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Full Idea
An ideology generally has three components: a judgement (usually critical) of how things are, a picture of the ideology's ideal society, and a strategy for progressing towards the ideal.
Gist of Idea
An ideology judges things now, and offers an ideal, with a strategy for reaching it
Source
Andrew Dobson (Environmental Politics: very short intro [2016], 2)
Book Ref
Dobson,Andrew: 'Environmental Politics: Very Short Intro' [OUP 2016], p.35
A Reaction
Conservatives tend to think we are already living in the ideal, and they reject most ideologies for being 'idealistic' (which presumably means delusional). I'm a fan of ideals, but combined with cool judgement.
| 21384 | The Stoics saw the whole world as a city [Stoic school, by Long] |
| 20859 | The best government blends democracy, monarchy and aristocracy [Stoic school, by Diog. Laertius] |
| 23830 | A group is only dangerous if it endorses an abstract entity [Weil] |
| 15664 | Ideology is 'socially necessary illusion' or 'socially necessary false-consciousness' [Adorno, by Finlayson] |
| 23955 | Ideologies are mythologies which guide our actions [Solomon] |
| 21906 | Political theory should not focus on the state or economy, but on the small scale of power [Deleuze/Guattari, by May] |
| 23424 | An ideology judges things now, and offers an ideal, with a strategy for reaching it [Dobson] |
| 22851 | In the 1950s they said ideology is finished, and expertise takes over [Lukes] |
| 20530 | Political choice can be by utility, or maximin, or maximax [Wolff,J] |
| 21118 | Constitutional Patriotism unites around political values (rather than national identity) [Shorten] |