Abstract
Although our first association with the term “ideology” today is dogmatic thinking and political manipulation, Tracy intended first to associate scientific rigor and analytical clarity with this term. Relying, like other French Enlightenment philosophers, on Locke’s teaching about ideas, Tracy developed the concept of ideology in the context of his analytical methodology, which aimed to reduce complex ideas to essential elements. Therefore, the original meaning of the new term “ideology” should be understood much simpler and more elementarily - as “the science of ideas”. In their work The German Ideology, Marx and Engels define this term as a deliberate distortion of material reality that serves the ruling classes as a convenient cover for economic exploitation and political oppression. Steger, one of the most influential contemporary theorists of ideology, believes that we would be unfair to ideology and its historical manifestations if we limited them only to harmful aspects. Therefore, he unequivocally points out that ideology has its apparent “moral influence on human behavior”, that it is, therefore, helpful in creating “bonds of solidarity” in human communities, and that in this sense, it has a prominent “integrative role in ensuring social stability”. Analyzing the evolution of concepts within different ideologies, Freeden notes that an ideology’s relative “political success” depends on its ability to impose on others the belief that its definitions of concepts are consistently correct. This is precisely what leads to a kind of “competition in defining concepts”, in which each ideology tries to continuously “decontest” its concepts. We argue that the essence of ideology should be sought between, on the one hand, its necessity in the constitution of political life and, on the other hand, the possible abolition of politics if the tendency of ideology toward decontestation is not adequately controlled. Keywords: ideology, science of ideas, decontestation, politics, abolition, manipulation
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