Göran Therborn, from MAPPING IDEOLOGY

Rather than reading this version which is a draft, you can download the corrected and cleaned up text of all the annotations and my introduction to them here now called, "One Possible Narrative of the Concept of Ideology since Marx". 

“The New Questions of Subjectivity” - Göran Therborn

Therborn is, in the text, reviewing The Dominant Ideology Thesis by Nicholas Abercrombie, Stephen Hill and Bryan S. Turner. He mentions being aware that they in turn are reviewing his book, but this text contains no response to that, leading me to assume that he’d not seen it at the time of the writing. Just as AHT had done in their piece, he spends some time praising aspects of the book, but as the meat of this and the last text are in the criticism, I’ll focus on those. Therborn begins by listing the authors that AHT target in DIT, all of whom are said to manifest the “widespread agreement (...) that there is a powerful, effective, dominant ideology in contemporary capitalist societies and that this dominant ideology creates an acceptance of capitalism in the working class” (AHT qtr 167). Therborn say that AHT claim that these thinkers of ideology (and “common culture theory” all Parsons) “tend to focus on the normative integration of societies, thereby departing from the emphasis on non-normative constraint central to classical social theory” (168). Therborn is interested in this claim, as he writes later that both DIT and his own book “stress the crucial importance of non-normative constraint, the different relations of different classes to the same ideology, and the lack of coherence and consistency of most ideologies” (169). What strikes Therborn as most distinctly different about the two books is that his is attempting a new theorization of ideology, but that DIT is “a work of destruction” aimed at the concept [ideology] and all who hold it (169). Therborn reproduces in the three linked definitions that AHT offer of the dominant ideology thesis; 1) the DIT held to be manifestly present in Habermas, Marcuse, Miliband, Poulantzas, Gramsci and Althusser; 2) what Therborn calls the “stress definition” quoting the authors who write that their “argument is that there has been an increased emphasis on the autonomy and causal efficacy of superstructural elements, and of ideology in particular, in modern Marxism . . . This emphasis on ideology amounts to advocacy of what we have called the dominant ideology thesis,” and; 3) what Therborn calls a “constructed DIT” which is found in a four part definition formulated by the authors (169-71). Here is the “constructed DIT” reproduced by Therborn from the book in question;

The main elements of this thesis are as follows: 

1. There is a dominant ideology . . . 

2. Dominant classes 'benefit' from the effects of the dominant ideology. . . 

3. The dominant ideology does incorporate the subordinate classes, making them politically quiescent . . .

4. The mechanisms by which ideology is transmitted have to be powerful enough to overcome the contradictions within the structure of capitalist society.  (171)

Therborn begins by observing that given definition one, about the authors implicated, that “it must be possible to locate, or at least to distil, the construct from the works making up the identifiable definition; and the ‘modern Marxist’ authors” in question must be referring to “the same thing that AHT understand by ideology” (171). Then turning to the four part definition above he says that only item 3 is important as AHT, by using as evidence for their position, the situation of medieval feudalism where that and only that aspect’s presence is enough, in their view, to make their case (171). He then considers the strange case of Marx and Engels, “absolve[d] (...) of the sin of DIT” as they are said not to have held “an incorporation theory” (171). As a stepping stone to what follows, Therborn begins with Althusser, who in the postscript to the ISA essay says a number of things about ideology which seem quite close to what AHT would wish to claim, that is, ideology is not monolithic, that “the ISAs are not the realization of ideology in general,” and where he stresses again, not beliefs but embodies practices (Althusser qtd 171-2). Therborn quotes and wonders about AHT’s dual insistence that Gramsci both does and does not hold the DIT and notes a few misunderstandings they evince of Gramsci’s claims (172). He then quotes a passage of Marx - which he takes from the pages of DIT - “the capitalist production develops a working class which by education, tradition, habit, looks upon the conditions of that mode of production as self-evident laws of nature” (172). His reason for this quote is that it directly parallels something in Gramsci that had just been quoted and prompts him to ask why “Marx escapes their indictment” and not Gramsci? Therborn thinks that the best candidates from the roster for holding the DIT would be Marcuse and Habermas, but turns next to Miliband and Poulantzas, both of whom are given generous block quotes. What each quote demonstrates rather explicitly that neither would agree with the “constructed DIT” and that both in fact share some of the same criticisms that AHT make of this construct (173).  This basically sets the pattern, Therborn quotes generously from Poulantzas, Althusser and Gramsci showing each time that AHT are repeatedly making their targets into straw men, and that there is ample evidence in each that the do not hold anything like the dominant ideology thesis, and further that they have both similar and dissimilar criticisms of many of the aspects of construct. He also makes use of historical evidence provided by AHT in their book as support for positions that they criticize in the works of Althusser and Poulantzas (174). Marcuse, at least the Marcuse of One-Dimensional Man, is thought by Therborn to be the closest thing to DIT to be found amongst the alleged proponents of the theory (176). He also thinks that their positions on legitimation in Habermas is close to the mark, but he also observes that Habermas is not susceptible to many of criticisms offered by AHT of the DIT (176). His biggest criticism of their own positions - presumably ones that they hold with or without DIT being in questions - are with their understanding of subjectivity, which he characterizes as a “black box” theory, and with their understanding of ideology (of whatever sort) as a set of, specifically, normative beliefs  of the “this is right, that is wrong” variety (177). The notion of subjectivity as a black box, Therborn decries as wholly inadequate as it leaves aside anything other than “dull compulsion” as having any explanatory power when faced with questions about how subjects choose, why they are compelled, what they hope for, what they fear, etc. He admits that AHT are welcome to find such questions uninteresting, but he refuses to lock all answers away in the inaccessible black box of subjectivity that they depend upon (177).  Of the working definition of ideology as a set of normative beliefs Therborn has little sympathy, having already cited passages from Althusser and others which substantiate that for them, this is insufficient as it leaves aside the questions of practices and rituals and so forth as well and the insistence on the material aspect of all these things (178). 

Yes, this is pertinent!