Liberals Ideology example essay topic

How far do liberal democrats and Marxists agree on their views on ideology? Any comprehensive and mutually consistent set of ideas by which a social group makes sense of the world may be referred to as an ideology. Otherwise, an ideology is a set of ideas providing the basis for political action. This means that in order for an ideology to function properly, and not be a mere philosophy or kind of dogma, three main concepts must exist: an account of existing society, a vision of a future good society and a course of action i.e. a method by which political change can occur.

' The history of all hitherto existing society", Marx wrote in the Communist manifesto, 'is the history of class struggles'. Marxism is therefore a body of ideas that conceal the contradictions of class society, thus promoting passiveness and inactivity amongst the subordinate classes. The State is a "machine" of repression, which enables the ruling classes to ensure their domination over the working class. The course of action, which was to bring about political change, according to Marxists, is the overthrown of capitalism and the bourgeois state by a proletariat revolution. Karl Marx said that getting rid of class struggle is the end of ideology.

This means that in a classless communist system, ideology becomes useless since there is no ruling class to justify its domination. Liberals on the other hands have viewed ideology as an officially sanctioned belief system that claims a monopoly of truth often through a false claim to be scientific. In general, liberalism is the belief that it is the aim of politics to preserve individual rights and to maximize freedom of choice. The ideological stance of liberalism is embodied in a commitment to a distinctive set of values and beliefs such as the individual, freedom, reason, justice and toleration. Liberals give priority to freedom as the supreme individualist value By looking at the definition of the Marxist and liberalist view on ideology one can detect the first and most obvious similarity: that both views believe that ideology is created due to some kind of repression. For Marxists, ideology is the class struggle whereas for liberals ideology comes into existence once an oppressive, totalitarian system dominates people's lives i.e. as in communism or fascism.

Though quite different in a number of respects, Liberalism and Marxism share some common ground on their views on ideology. Both ideologies are teleological. This means that they believe that if certain developments take place, ideology can eventually come to an end. For Marxists, that the end of ideology would be the creation of a classless society.

Since Marxism is the ideology which supports the struggle of the oppressed against the oppressors, once equality is achieved and class barriers are withdrawn, then there is no reason for someone to struggle- this thus would be the end of ideology. Liberalism is also essentially teleological. Liberals believe that ideology is repressive, even totalitarian, its prime examples being communism and fascism. Once these two systems stop to exist then ideological would come to its telos- to its end. Another similarity the two ideologies share is their view of rationalism. Rationalism is the belief that the world has a rational structure and this is due to the exercise of human reason and practical knowledge rather than experience.

Though rationalism does not dictate ways of human behavior, it does suggest ways through which human should pursue their ends i.e. it proposes a course of action to bring about change and dismisses governance based on tradition or custom. Rationalists are social engineers who believe that a deliberately planned society they dream of finally eradicating poverty and unemployment, of putting an end to war, of continuing a particular way of life, and so on. In both Marxism and liberalism, rationalism plays a vital role. Marxists for example believe that reason is normal and therefore people can construct a rational alternative to an unsatisfactory (and therefore irrational) reality. Unlike conservatives, who believe that the human nature is irrational and develops non-rational visions, Marxists and liberals believe in the essential good in people, in the power of logic and reasonable decision-making, supporting the desire to release humankind from its bondage to superstition and ignorance and unleash an 'age of reason'. The two views have in fact come to a similar standpoint in recent years.

Concepts such as freedom and equality seem to be developed similarly in both views on ideology- both Marxists and liberals agree that freedom is the realization of individual potential. In any case, both schools of thought support rationalism as the most acceptable process in human nature. Furthermore, both views are teleological, meaning that eventually ideology can come to an end. In global politics of today, where ideological positions are asked to exist within liberal democracies, it is evident that as time passes by, ideology becomes more and more a 'trend' of the past..