[WS:] Weberian sociology has some interesting insights into this. A simple way of putting it is that culture is a "garbage can" to which different people or groups pitch ideas, solution of existing or non-existing problems, beliefs, theories, narratives, etc. This "garbage can" is a repository of various ideas that can be recycled and used by different people for different purposes and occasions. The most frequent use of those ideas is legitimation, which means providing a reason why a certain group of people deserves what it wants and why others should give it to them. There is a certain concordance between the content of specific ideas and specific interests, called 'elective affinity.'
If a group claiming a particular idea to legitimate its demands becomes economically powerful two things usually happen. First that group has economic resources to promote and disseminate the idea to which they have 'elective affinity.' Second, the economic success of that group has a role modeling effect for the rest - others want to emulate it, and by that virtue they accept the idea to which the dominant group has elective affinity. Oftentimes, the acceptance of the idea is the only thing that other people can do to emulate the top stratum. After a while, this idea becomes entrenched in tradition and defended by the grunts,even though it lost its legitimation usefulness to the elite.
Witness for example, sport hunting. It used to be an activity demonstrating the prowess of the military aristocracy, but then it trickled down to the masses and became part of a popular tradition, even though it is no longer used to legitimate the status of the elite. Ditto for religion. Calvinism was a religion of the emergent bourgeoisie because it legitimated their wealth as a sign from god. That religion was trickled down to the masses and became a part of popular tradition, even though it no longer legitimates the status of the elite.
Today, economic doctrines play a similar role. In the 18th century liberal theories legitimated the claims of bourgeoisie against monarchy. Today, these theories have been recycled from the "garbage can" to legitimate the claims of the new elites against the state. Suddenly you see academics, politicians and jurnos parroting these 18th century ideas ad nauseam. You also see corporate grunts and wannabe entrepreneurs adopting these ideas to look more like elites with which they identify. Monkey see, monkey do.
On Tue, Jun 11, 2013 at 12:38 PM, Carrol Cox <cbcox at ilstu.edu> wrote:
> I wasn't interested in "the question" re IRS or Democrats etc. I am
> interested in what ideology is, how it is formed, etc.
>
> Carrol
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org [mailto:
> lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org]
> > On Behalf Of Arthur Maisel
> > Sent: Tuesday, June 11, 2013 11:23 AM
> > To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
> > Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Framing is everything
> >
> > The question was whether the IRS actually avoided investigating Democrat
> > groups because they were Democrat groups. That seems about as clear a
> > question of reality as whether my wife made a U-turn (she did) and
> whether
> > the cop declined to give her a ticket because he had someone else in hand
> > (he did). Neither is a question of ideology or of "common sense" (which
> > it's painting with a pretty broad brush to conflate with ideology, in my
> > opinion).
> >
> > On Mon, Jun 10, 2013 at 7:14 PM, Carrol Cox <cbcox at ilstu.edu> wrote:
> >
> > > > There was ideology 80K years ago?
> > > >
> > > > Really?
> > >
> > > Yes really. It is obvious enough that there is no point in debating it.
> > >
> > > Carrol
> > >
> > >
> > > ___________________________________
> > > http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk
> > >
> > ___________________________________
> > http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk
>
>
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-- Wojtek
"An anarchist is a neoliberal without money."