Chapter
5
Crystallization
of Values
Ah, a man’s reach should exceed
his grasp
or what’s a heaven for?
Robert
Browning
So far we have
discussed
beliefs, myths and ideologies, among other dimensions of values. Now we
will
look at these same phenomena under a new light and from a different
angle, with
more emphasis on the value system characteristics.
To be significant in the social context, values cannot be a haphazard
collection of affectional behaviors, but a coherent system with
hierarchy and
order. Only then can they be identified, dealt with or opposed by other
values
and other value systems.
We frequently refer to
value
systems by different terms, such as beliefs, myths or ideologies, which
are
often used interchangeably.[1] I do not propose a strict separation of
these terms. All three and many others, such as religion, faith,
superstition,
mana, taboo, conviction or confession, lend themselves only with
difficulty to
rigid definitions, not only because of their indiscriminate
application, but
also because of their opinionated usage. One man’s religious belief or
ideological conviction is another’s myth. Those who believe in the
religious
experience of man label ideologies “secular religions” or, depending on
their
interpretation of the particular ideologies, “pseudo religions of
totalitarianism.”[2] The term “myth” has more generally covered a
wide spectrum from beliefs to ideologies, not only as a consequence of
opinionated usage of the term across semantic borders, but also because
the
more pragmatic and empirical tendencies require that affirmations
beyond
scientific inquiry be treated as myths. For our political analysis,
however,
scrutiny of the different processes by which a society crystallizes
values can
prepare the grounds for later inquiries into the mechanism of
government and
conversion of power into authority. For example, we will be able to see
the
relationship between natural law and the divine right of kings, between
the
German Pflichterfullung and Hitler’s
Fuhrer system of government, or between the dictatorship of the
proletariat and
Communist Party leadership and hegemony. Of course, even a gross
delineation of
beliefs, myths and ideologies will not be free from value
judgments-scientific
or otherwise. But while our examples are undoubtedly subject to our
prejudices,
our study can reveal different mechanisms which make values socially
operative.
I.
Beliefs
We are using “belief”
to cover,
grosso modo, religious experience,
superstition, taboo, confession and supernatural faith: the infinite,
the
ultimate, the absolute, the beyond. It includes, then, mythological
divinities
in the supernatural sense which are not to be confused with the concept
of myth
to be discussed later. Sometimes the term “belief” has been coupled
with
“opinion.”[3] The distinction we make here is that beliefs
are the basis of opinions.
We have already
mentioned the
religious beliefs by which values are made socially operative. For
example,
man’s need for transcendental premises in both primeval and more
complex
societies is developed into anthropomorphic and metaphysical beliefs
that help
to validate social rules and structures. The totem pole, the
mythological
divinities and the almighty power of a religion crystallize values into
social
“oughtness.” These transcendental premises refer to a concept of the
holy which
is admittedly related to the unknown. It is in that sense—the
Augustinian sense
of believing prior to understanding—that we use “belief.”
Men do not always use
their
capacities to connect cause and effect, to store knowledge, or to
memorize
experience rationally within the limits of the known. Their inferences
about
phenomena carry them beyond their knowledge and their possibilities for
factual
research. There are effects whose causes escape human understanding.
But men
want to know the unknown—in order to appease their fear and curiosity.
So when
a number of inferences from observable facts point them beyond their
reach,
they may surmise an area of concordance and convergence beyond the
sphere of
their knowledge or understanding. The “beyond” eventually turns into an
assumed
fact, itself the fruit of an inductive process. Once fixed as an
assumption, it
becomes the source of deductions. For example, primeval men will
relate,
through their observations and experiences, crops to water, water to
rain, rain
to wind; and then, not knowing about the source of natural phenomena,
they may
attribute conscious behavior—a spirit—to the wind, conceiving it
according to
their own image—anthropomorphically. On that basis they may also
connect
certain coincidental actions or circumstances to the changes in the
moods and
humor of the spirit. Then, when the wind does not blow the
rain-pregnant
clouds, they will appeal to its spirit. They will try to appease the
“beyond”
according to their understanding of its likes and dislikes as
manifested in the
coincidence of events. For example, if visiting certain places or
performing
certain acts coincides with the wind’s bringing rain, they will, in the
belief
that they are pleasing the spirit, visit the places and perform the
acts
ritually every time they need rain. They may also have to appease or
“buy” the
deity through offerings. The deity created according to man’s image
will have a
value scale similar to man’s.[4] As the deity becomes more important, men
will sacrifice to him their more valuable possessions—calf, lamb, son
or even
themselves. The more this process of god-building is contemplative, the
more
abstract and metaphysical will the deity become. Men will dedicate and
sacrifice to him their souls.
This affectional and
nonrational process is, as discussed earlier, one of man’s basic
drives. It is
a dimension within men which needs fulfillment beyond observable facts,
a
proposition which may set the limits of the dimension at infinity or,
as Hume
would say:
Let men
be once fully persuaded of these two principles that
there is nothing in any object, considered in itself, which can afford
us a
reason for drawing a conclusion beyond it; and, that even after the
observation
of the frequent or constant conjunction of objects, we have no reason
to draw
any inference concerning any object beyond those of which we have had
experience: I say, let men be once fully
convinced of these two principles, and this will throw them so loose
from all
common systems, that they will make no difficulty of receiving any
which may appear
most extraordinary.[5]
Belief is an article
of faith.
Beyond being nonrational, it should be what James identified as living,
forced
(I would rather say forceful) and momentous.[6] It should
sit deep and vibrate the sensitive
cords of man-therefore be living; it should be forced or forceful in
that it
offers only a one-way gain—to believe in its truth as the answer to the
unknown; and finally it should be momentous in its ultimate and yet
immanent
impacts and impressions. Of course, different degrees of these
conditions will
be involved in different beliefs and within different believers. The
example
James gives us, that an appeal to a Christian to believe in Mahdi will
leave
him cold because it is a dead hypothesis within the Christian context,
shows the
relativity of religious beliefs.[7] To embrace
a belief does not necessarily
imply unconscious surrender. A belief may serve as a conscious
projection
beyond the confines of understanding—what may be called conscious
religiousness. Pascal, whose precocious scientific genius amazed the
scientists
of his time, became an ascetic mystic. His words of early
existentialism, which
I would like to quote at some length, best indicate this kind of
religious
experience:
Let
man, then, contemplate entire nature in her height and full majesty;
let him
remove his view from the low objects which surround him; let him regard
that
shining luminary placed as an eternal lamp to give light to the
universe; let
him consider the earth as a point, in comparison with the vast circuit
described by that star [sun]; let him learn with wonder that this vast
circuit
itself is but a very minute point when compared with that embraced by
the stars
which roll in the firmament. But if our view stops there, let the
imagination
pass beyond: it will sooner be wearied with conceiving than nature with
supplying food for contemplation. All this visible world is but an
imperceptible point in the ample bosom of nature. No idea approaches
it. In
vain we extend our conceptions beyond imaginable spaces: we bring forth
but
atoms, in comparison with the reality of things. It is an infinite
sphere, of
which the centre is everywhere, the circumference nowhere. In fine, it
is the
greatest discernible character of the omnipotence of God, that our
imagination
loses itself in this thought.
Let
man, having returned to himself, consider what he is compared to what
is; let
him regard himself as a wanderer into this remote province of nature;
and let
him, from this narrow prison wherein he finds himself dwelling (I mean
the
universe), learn to estimate the earth, kingdoms, cities, and himself,
at a
proper value.
What is
man in the midst of the infinite? But to show him another prodigy
equally
astonishing, let him seek in what he knows things the most minute; let
a mite
exhibit to him in the exceeding smallness of its body, parts
incomparably
smaller, limbs with joints, veins in these limbs, blood in these veins,
humors
in this blood, globules in these humors, gases in these globules; let
him,
still dividing these last objects, exhaust his powers of conception,
and let
the ultimate object at which he can arrive now be the subject of our
discourse;
he will think, perhaps, that this is the minutest atom of nature. I
will show
him therein a new abyss. I will picture to him not only the visible
universe,
but the conceivable immensity of nature, in the compass of this
abbreviation of
an atom. Let him view therein an infinity of worlds, each of which has
its
firmament, its planets, its earth, in the same proportion as the
visible world;
and on this earth animals, and in fine mites, in which he will find
again what
the first have given; and still finding in the others the same thing,
without
end, and without repose, let him lose himself in these wonders, as
astonishing
in their littleness as the others in their magnitude; for who will not
marvel
that our body, which just before was not perceptible in the universe,
itself
imperceptible in the bosom of the all, is now a colossus, a world, or
rather an
act, in comparison with the nothingness at which it is impossible to
arrive?
Whoever
shall thus consider himself, will be frightened at himself and
observing
himself suspended in the mass of matter allotted to him by nature,
between
these two abysses of infinity and nothingness, will tremble at the
sight of
these wonders; and I believe that, his curiosity being changed into
admiration,
he will be more disposed to contemplate them in silence, than to
investigate
them with presumption.
For, in
fine, what is man in the midst of nature? A nothing in comparison with
the
infinite, an all in comparison with nothingness: a mean between nothing
and
all. Infinitely far from comprehending the extremes, the end of things
and
their principle are for him inevitably concealed in an impenetrable
secret;
equally incapable of seeing the nothingness whence he is derived, and
the
infinity in which he is swallowed up.
What
can he do, then, but perceive some appearance in the midst of things,
in
eternal despair of knowing either their principle or their end? All
things have
sprung from nothingness, and are carried onward to the infinite. Who
shall
follow this astonishing procession of things? The Author of these
wonders
comprehends them; no other can.[8]
The premises of
religious and
supernatural beliefs can be based, then, on man’s cognitive awe of
nature.
It is not, however,
the sage’s
or the mystic’s religious experience, which is personal and
untransferable,
that makes values socially operative. Rather, whatever is understood of
the
sage’s experience is molded and reinterpreted within the framework of a
belief,
and elaborated into a value system which supports the social structure
and
safeguards the various spheres of interest. The mystiques of Buddha and
Jesus
were adapted to social needs by their immediate apostles, and the
Buddhist and
Christian societies evolved with little relevance to the original
experiences
of their saints.[9] Pascal also elaborated his “Religious Wager”
to provide the flock of common men grounds to be faithful to the
church. This
“Religious Wager” amounts to an exhortation to play on the winning side
in the
gamble of belief and disbelief. (For you have nothing to lose if you
believe.
Therefore believe,)[10] The wager is obviously a social tool which
may not always be interpreted by the religious establishment in the
light of
Pascal’s earlier sublime preoccupations.
Beliefs, religious and
superstitious, are then social dimensions of man’s inner drives to
search and
fear the unknown. Addressed mainly to the affectional and nonrational
dimensions of man’s behavioral pattern, the supernatural appeal helps
crystallize values to regulate the social functional structures. The
following
passages quoted by Berelson and Steiner make the point better than a
long
discourse on my part.[11] I reproduce them in a sequence that
emphasizes an evolution from primeval to complex societies:
An
agricultural people inhabiting a cool and arid region needs, above all
things,
warmth and rain for the growth of its crops. It is understandable,
consequently, that the Hopi should worship a Sky God who brings rain,
an Earth
Goddess who nourishes the seed, and a Sun God who matures the crops, as
well as
a special Corn Mother and a God of Growth or Germination.[12]
In
ancient Egypt,...in the very early period, there were numerous deities,
many of
which were local gods, or patrons of little kingdoms. As the political
unification of Egypt progressed, a few of the greater gods emerged as
national
deities. As the nation became more and more integrated under the rule
of a powerful
single head, there was a tendency for one god to become supreme. [Thus]
the
ascendance of Re, the sun-god.[13]
A
specifically bourgeois economic ethic had grown up. With the
consciousness of
standing in the fullness of God’s grace and being visibly blessed by
Him, the
bourgeois businessman, as long as he remained within the bounds of
formal
correctness, as long as his moral conduct was spotless and the use to
which he
put his wealth was not objectionable, could follow his pecuniary
interests as
he would and feel that he was fulfilling a duty in doing so. The power
of
religious asceticism provided him in addition with sober,
conscientious, and
unusually industrious workmen, who clung to their work as to -a life
purpose
willed by God.[14]
We find
in religious philosophy a reflection of the real world; the theology of
a
people will echo a dominant note in their terrestrial mode of life. A
pastoral
culture may find its image in a Good Shepherd and his flock; an era of
cathedral building sees God as a Great Architect; an age of commerce
finds Him
with a ledger, jotting down moral debits and credits; emphasis upon the
profit
system and the high-pressure salesmanship that is required to make it
function,
picture Jesus as a super-salesman; and, in an age of science, God “is a
god of
law and order.”[15]
In a later chapter we
shall
examine the process by which beliefs and social and political
structures
transact and draw on each other.
II.
Myths
It is not necessary to
instill
values into anthropomorphic or metaphysical beliefs. Besides, in the
modern
world of technology and scientism, it is difficult to do so. Mythology
does not
always need Krishna or Zeus because the basic premises for
value-crystallization are not always godheads, but the vibrations of
man’s
nonrational and affectional cords. In order to become a myth, an
explanation of
phenomena has to go beyond the rational and the logical and provide an
interpretation appealing to the nonrational dimension.
As we said earlier,
the term
“myth” has a general usage covering whatever relates to the
nonrational. This
broad application, overflowing other terms relating to value systems,
somehow
obscures the treatment and definition of myth in its own right.
Although not
exactly synonymous, myth and belief have the contiguous zone of
mythological
divinities. On the other hand, a myth does not emanate from the
systematic
rationalizations which are usually the origins of ideologies. Yet two
modern
political value-crystallization processes, Fascism and National
Socialism, are nearly
always classified as ideologies despite having the main characteristics
of what
we can, in the narrow sense, identify as myth.[16]
A myth is based on the
folklore
of a people. Folklore as the reflection of a way of life, customs and
traditions can, under specific circumstances, provide for consolidation
of
group identity and, by receiving emphasis, be turned into a myth. As
Pareto
extensively elaborated, a myth is the deformation of historical and
philosophical f acts.[17] It is not, however, a deformation which
remains factual. It has the attracting and orienting power and field we
attributed to values in the last chapter. In the words of Erik Erikson:
A myth,
old or modern, is not a lie. It is useless to try to show that it has
no basis
in fact; nor to claim that its fiction is fake and nonsense. A myth
blends
historical fact and significant fiction in such a way that it ‘rings
true’ to
an area or an era, causing pious wonderment and burning ambition.[18]
The myth-builders
share some of
the fervor of the preachers and some of the certainties of the
ideologues. As
Cassirer argues, “In mythical imagination there is always implied an
act of belief. Without the belief in the
reality of its object, myth would lose its grounds”; and further, “it
seems to
be possible and even indispensable to compare mythical with scientific
thought.”[19] Those who take part in the elaboration of
myths cannot, however, be totally unaware of the distortion of facts in
which
they are involved.
Some indeed have
deliberately
used “myth” to define their particular style of value-system building.
Sorel,
for example, elaborated a myth of action for syndical socialists. This
myth was
to be based on a partisan and simplified presentation of historical
facts and a
utopian image of the future in order to move the masses. As a myth,
this future
image need not be achieved, but it should generate the force of
conviction in
its followers by magnifying and canalizing their feelings, tendencies
and
enthusiasm.[20]
The
significance of Sorel’s concept was its emphasis on action, which is,
in the
last analysis, the decisive factor for the existence and efficacy of a
myth.
Deformation of philosophical and historical facts does not necessarily
bring
about a myth unless the deformed facts ride on action. Without this
dynamism,
in so far as they are deformations of facts, myths either fall apart
and are
discredited or recede into folklore and mythology. To quote Cassirer
again,
“Myth is not a system of dogmatic creeds. It consists much more in
actions than
in mere images or representations.”[21]
Although Sorel himself was more of a classical anarchist, his myth of
action
later served the myth-building purposes of Italian Fascism.
Fascism
Although Fascism may,
as
statecraft, qualify as an ideology because of its rationale on the
pre-eminence
of the state, it has a stronger mythical dimension. Mussolini stated
that he
had no specific doctrine but that of action.[22] In the
particular conjuncture in which the
Fascist movement found itself after World War I, Mussolini’s will to
power
could not be satisfied with and did not need an ideology or a belief.
Italy was
already full of them. Another ideology or a new religion?--it would
have been
just another shade in the spectrum of choices. Besides, the fact that a
respected philosopher like Croce could find Fascism harmless because it
was
devoid of a doctrine was a great asset for Mussolini, helping him to
attract
allies of various beliefs and ideologies and making few enemies at the
outset.
All the political factions and parties contending for power were
counting on
using the Fascists for their different ends, assuming that the
Fascists’ lack
of a solid political platform would make them both useful and easily
disposable. So Mussolini was building something else: a myth—a myth of
action.
But a myth based on action, to spur a movement, should not only provide
a plan
for the action it preaches, but also find means for action. Mussolini
was not
unaware of this. He made action pivotal, but it was to be complemented
by
factual deformations, according to the circumstances. In August 1921,
in a
letter to Michele Bianchi, he wrote:
If
Fascism does not wish to die or, worse still, commit suicide, it must
now
provide itself with a doctrine. Yet this shall not and must not be a
robe of
Nessus clinging to us for all eternity, for tomorrow is something
mysterious
and unforeseen ....I do wish that during the two months which are still
to
elapse before our National Assembly meets, the philosophy of Fascism
could be
created ....
The new
course taken by Fascist activity will in no way diminish the fighting
spirit
typical of Fascism ....Fascism takes for its own the twofold device of
Mazzini:
“Thought and Action.”[23]
Mussolini, while
recognizing
the need for a doctrine, immediately made clear that he did not want
one which
would cling to him for eternity. As was reflected throughout his
political
career, he preferred to supply his myth of action with doctrines which
corresponded to situations as they arose. Philosophy itself, with which
he
wanted to arm Fascism, was needed only when issues did not lend
themselves to
action. The year after his letter to Bianchi, in the train which was
taking him
to Rome to become prime minister, he exclaimed, “Action has dug a grave
for
philosophy.”[24] On October 24, 1922, he stated: “Our myth is
the nation, our myth is the greatness of the nation.”[25] That was seven days before he was summoned
by the king to form a cabinet. Two years later, as head of the
government, he
declared: “We wish to unify the nation within the sovereign State,
which is
above everyone and can afford to be against everyone, since it
represents the
moral continuity of the nation in history. Without the State there is
no
nation.”[26] He was no lover of the state in his days of
journalism, but now he was the state.
So in his speech at the Scala in Milan he coined the formula,
“Everything in
the State, nothing against the State, nothing outside the State.”
Through Sorel’s myth
of action,
Pareto’s concept of the elite, Renan’s definition of a nation, in which
he
recognized pre-Fascist institutions, and a particular interpretation of
Hegel’s
idea of the state, which Giovanni Gentile, the Italian Hegelian
philosopher,
provided for him, Mussolini injected the Fascist myth with vital force.[27] Each of the original ideas was altered to
fit the myth-building mold. Standing between beliefs and ideologies,
the myth
drew from both and rejected both. For example, on religion, he said:
“All
creators of the spirit—starting with those religious—are coming to the
fore, and
nobody dares keep up the attitude of anticlericalism which, for several
decades, was a favorite with Democracy in the Western world. By saying
that God
is returning, we mean that spiritual values are returning.”[28]
But he also said:
Revealed
truths we have torn to shreds, dogmas we have spat upon, we have
rejected all
theories of paradise, we have baffled charlatans—white, red, black
charlatans
who placed miraculous drugs on the market to give ‘happiness’ to
mankind. We do
not believe in programmes, in plans, in saints or apostles, above all
use
believe not in happiness, in salvation, in the promised land.[29]
And then again:
The
Fascist State is not indifferent to religious phenomena in general nor
does it
maintain an attitude of indifference to Roman Catholicism, the special,
positive religion of Italians. The State has not got a theology but it
has a
moral code. The Fascist State sees in religion one of the deepest of
spiritual
manifestations and for this reason it not only respects religion but
defends and
protects it.[30]
Authors who have
covered the
Fascist period in Italy have demonstrated, sometimes abundantly, the
discrepancies between Mussolini’s statements and his versatile policies
in many
domains.[31] There existed, however, a constant in the
evolution of Fascism in Italy: Mussolini’s myth of action and
violence-the
latter as a need for the former. This myth of action had its source in
a number
of factors. There was, of course, Mussolini’s will to power, into which
Pareto’s concept of elites and Sorel’s myth of action and violence,
with some
transformations, fitted well. But there were also the historical,
social and
environmental conditions of Italy. Over half a century before
Mussolini’s march
on Rome, Cavour had said, “We have made Italy, now we have to make
Italians.”
The operation was still in process. The immediate past history of Italy
contained the memories of risorgimento
and the imposing, sometimes dictatorial images of Mazzini and Garibaldi.[32] Mussolini set himself to finish the
operation that Cavour had started by taking inspiration from some of
the
methods used by Mazzini and Garibaldi. For him, to make Italians
progress in
unison, the country had to be on the move. The direction did not
matter. It
would be dictated by the circumstances. Action would bring clashes and
violence, which Mussolini indeed welcomed. He had said in 1920:
Struggle
is at the origin of all things, for life is full of contrasts; there is
love
and hatred, white and black, day and night, good and evil; and until
these contrasts
achieve balance, struggle fatefully remains at the root of human
nature.
However, it is good for it to be so. Today we can indulge in wars,
economic
battles, conflicts of ideas, but if a day came to pass when struggle
ceased to
exist, that day would be tinged with melancholy; it would be a day of
ruin, the
day of ending.[33]
And in his “Dottrina
del fascismo” in 1932, he
reaffirmed that “war alone keys up all human energies to their maximum
tension
and sets a seal of nobility on those peoples who have the courage to
face it.”
Action and violence
through
Mussolini’s will to power within a totalitarian state was the road to
building
Italy as an empire and Italians into a nation. This was a myth of power
rather
than an ideal. To complete Pareto’s definition of the myth as the
deformation
and distortion of philosophical and historical facts, besides toying
with
philosophic ideas in support of the myth, Fascism proceeded to
reinterpret
Roman and world history and to revive imperial folklore and rituals.
Rocco, the
nationalist theoretician who became minister of justice in 1925, called
for a
full-fledged reassessment of history and a reinterpretation of
philosophic and
political thoughts of eminent Italians in order to align them to the
Fascist
doctrine and to show the genius of the Latin mind.[34] Under the direction of De Vecchi a program
to control and revise historical textbooks was undertaken to bring the
facts of
history into line with the Fascist myths. A Fascist academy was created
to
purify the language of foreign influence and to preserve the national
character
and the genius of Italian tradition and culture. Rites and ceremonies
of the
old Roman Empire were imitated. A vast archeological program to dig out
the
vestiges of the Roman Empire was started—notably in the Forum
Romanum—sometimes
at the expense of medieval historical monuments. So Il Duce
could exclaim, “We have created the United State of
Italy-remember that since the Empire Italy had not been a united State!”[35]
and, on the fall of Addis Ababa in 1936 call upon the Italians to
“greet after
an absence of fifteen centuries the appearance of the Empire over the
fateful
hills of Rome.”[36]
National
Socialism
But compared to the
myth that
grew in Germany, Mussolini’s distortions of philosophical and
historical facts
were rather mild. For Hitler had a more potent myth in a more potent
environment. In discussing Hitler’s National Socialism we should make
the
distinction between the distortions of facts in which Hitler “believed”
and the
distortions he “made believe.” His racial prejudices and nationalistic
feelings, were surely deep-rooted. He remained true to his hatred for
the Jews
to the catastrophic end. To some extent because of Marx’s Jewish
ancestry,
Hitler’s early negative trade union experiences and the Jewish
background of
many Social Democrat and Communist leaders, his hate for Social
Democrats and
Communists coincided with his anti-Semitism.[37] He also
connected the Jews to the
international finance and speculative stock exchange operation as
another
source of German misery. The indiscriminate mixture of Jews, Marxists,
Social
Democrats and international finance was a hodgepodge which he labeled
“the
international Marxist Jewish stock exchange parties.”[38] This, however, was a conscious lump-summing
of the target for myth-building purposes:
...It
belongs to the genius of a great leader to make even adversaries far
removed
from one another seem to belong to a single category, because in weak
and
uncertain characters the knowledge of having different enemies can only
too
readily lead to the beginning of doubt in their own right.
Once
the wavering mass sees itself in a struggle against too many enemies,
objectivity will put in an appearance, throwing open the question
whether all
others are really wrong and only their own people or their own movement
are in
the right.[39]
But part of Hitler’s
distortions was in his misconception of historical and economic facts.
Relating
the impact he received from Gottfried Feder’s lectures on economy,
which he had
attended in 1919,[40]
he says:
I began
to study again, and now for the first time really achieved an
understanding of
the content of the Jew Karl Marx’s life effort. Only now did his Kapital
become really intelligible to me, and also
the struggle of the Social Democracy against the national economy,
which aims
only to prepare the ground for the domination of truly international
finance
and stock exchange capital.[41]
He saw as victims to
these
plagues the Aryan people of Germany, who deserved a better lot because:
All the
human culture, all the results of art, science and technology that we
see
before us today, are almost exclusively the creative product of the
Aryan. This
very fact admits of the not unfounded inference that he alone was the
founder
of all higher humanity, therefore representing the prototype of all
that we
understand by the word ‘man’.[42]
This concept of man
obviously
denies a great many historical facts, yet it did work towards molding
the
awesome Third Reich. Its focal point was Volkstum—that is,
“peopleness,” if one
may say so. Volkstum was more than a simple concept of the folk or a
structured
concept of a nation-state. It was the convergence of race, language,
culture,
nation and state, thus going beyond nationhood, providing for the
extreme of
militant nationalism. Its precept was the purification of the Aryan
race,
returning it to its original qualities as the Teutonic, heroic
super-race of
the world—a goal which all ideas, doctrines and knowledge were to serve.[43] Hitler knew, however, that the raw
material—the people—he was to work with was not the finished product he
dreamed
about. From experience, he had learned about the shortcomings of the
people. In
observing the tactics of Social Democrats and trade unions in pre-World
War I
Vienna, he had noticed that:
The
psyche of the great masses is not receptive to anything that is
halfhearted and
weak.
Like
the woman, whose psychic state is determined less by grounds of
abstract reason
than by an indefinable emotional longing for a force which will
complement her
nature, and who, consequently, would rather bow to a strong man than
dominate a
weakling, likewise the masses love a commander more than a petitioner
and feel
inwardly more satisfied by a doctrine, tolerating no other beside
itself, than by
the granting of liberalistic freedom with which, as a rule, they can do
little, and are prone to feel that they have been abandoned. They are
equally unaware
of their shameless spiritual terrorization and the hideous abuse of
their human
freedom, for they absolutely fail to suspect the inner insanity of the
whole
doctrine. All they see is the ruthless force and brutality of its
calculated
manifestations, to which they always submit in the end.[44]
Analyzing the Allied
World War
I propaganda, he had concluded that:
The
receptivity of the great masses is very limited, their intelligence is
small,
but their power of forgetting is enormous. In consequence of these
facts, all
effective propaganda must be limited to a very few points and must harp
on
these in slogans until the last member of the public understands what
you want
him to understand by your slogan.[45]
To this he added that
the task
of propaganda was “not to make an objective study of the truth.”[46] Pondering the Kaiser’s leniency towards
Social Democracy in 1914, he had also noted that the treacherous
opponents of a
regime should be ruthlessly exterminated.[47] Although
there are conditions to be met in
the use of brutal force:
Only in
the steady and constant application of force lies the very first
prerequisite
for success. This persistence, however, can always and only arise from
a
definite spiritual conviction. Any violence which does not spring from
a firm,
spiritual base, will be wavering and uncertain. It lacks the stability
which
can only rest in a fanatical outlook.[48]
Armed with this
knowledge he
had drawn up a 25-point program as early as 1919, which was approved by
the
mass meeting of the National Socialist German Workers Party in February
1920.
It reflected in essence Hitler’s myths, convictions and prejudices—his Weltanschauung. It demanded the union of
all German people in a Great Germany. It emphasized one’s recognition
as German
through .German blood and denied German nationality to the Jews. It
declared
war on the parliamentary system. It also contained Hitler’s ideas to
cultivate
and train the German people’s physical and spiritual gifts through
social and
educational programs carried out by the state. The program’s economic
aspects
reflected Feder’s influence on Hitler and the latter’s lack of
knowledge and
interest in that domain. In a powerful slogan it suggested the breaking
of
interest slavery, the collection of all war profits, and
nationalization of
trusts. This measure, however, was directed against the speculative
stock
exchange capital and not against privately owned industries. Hitler was
in
favor of private capital but wanted to purify it from speculation and
hence
“nationalize” it, i.e., leave it in the hands of German nationals.[49] Economics for him was a means to an end. His
social programs were not socialist in the economic sense, but were
means to
attract mass support before the Nazi seizure of power and to mobilize
the
country for war after he took hold of the government. It was therefore
quite
within Hitler’s rationale later to draw closer to the industrialists
who ended
up supporting his movement and had started their program for rearmament
long
before the Fuhrer came to power.[50] The
National Socialist program was not a
functional plan for social reconstruction. It had as its goal the
purification
and enthronement of the Germanic people as the master race. In keeping
with
Hitler’s observation of the small intelligence and short memory of the
masses,
the myth was to be inculcated into the people by persistent and simple
propaganda,
creating the fanaticism which was needed for the brutal extermination
of all
obstacles on the road to the final goal. While the myth was being
nurtured, the
achievement of its goals had to wait for more appropriate
circumstances, which
did not fail to arise with the great depression of 1929 and the
consequent
economic crises. In the chaos which engulfed Germany the National
Socialist
party, with its uniformed SA (Sturmabteilung:
storm troop) marching to martial music under floating banners and its
fine-tuned
propaganda claiming the ability to provide bread and honor, became a
tantalizing solution. In the September 14, 1930, elections to the
Reichstag,
the number of National Socialist seats jumped from 12 to 107.[51]
It was unfortunate
that Hitler
was so right about so many traits of Parliamentarians, the bourgeoisie
and the
masses. After the arm-twisting of 1932 for wrestling power from
Hindenburg, and
the appointment of Hitler as Chancellor in January, 1933, the National
Socialists organized new elections in a mixture of police state and
revolutionary atmosphere of myth and brutality, securing control of the
government. By a masterful staging of the “day of Potsdam” on March 21,
1933,
commemorating the first Reichstag under Bismarck, Hitler played on the
German
myth to appease the conservatives and the bourgeoisie, thus preparing
favorable
grounds for obtaining the “Enabling Act” two days later, which gave
Hitler the carte blanche to bring about the Third
Reich.[52] Hitler and National Socialism were much more
totalitarian and ruthless than Italian Fascism. In Germany there were
no
dissenters like Gaetano Salvemini or Benedetto Croce who, years after
Mussolini
took power, could still raise their voices in Italy. Hitler eliminated
not only
his active opponents, but even those who had withdrawn from the
political
arena.
In some sectors
slowly, in
others more rapidly, but everywhere surely, all the machinery of the
state was
geared to the service of the Aryan myth. Among other things,
immediately in March 1933, Hitler created a
new
Ministry for Popular Enlightenment and Propaganda under Joseph Goebbels
which,
within a few months, controlled all mass media. Nazification was
equally
drastic and quick in revamping the educational system from kindergarten
to universities.
The latter lost their autonomy to the Ministry of Education and
introduced
courses on race science and National Socialist philosophy. Parallel to
educational establishments were the “Hitler Youth” and the National
Socialist
Students Federation, which indoctrinated the new generation into Nazi
thought
and used them in turn to indoctrinate and check on their families.
As for the racial
purification
program, the first steps were taken as early as April 1933, when Reich
Minister
Goebbels declared that German Jewry will be annihilated.[53] A law of April 7, 1933, provided for the
pensioning off of civil servants of non-Aryan descent. Another law,
passed on
July 14, 1933, concerned the revocation of naturalization and the
annulment of
German nationality. Still another law for the protection of German
blood and
German honor provided sanction against sexual intercourse between
persons of
mixed blood. These and similar laws aiming at the purification of the
Aryan
race were at times rigorously applied and at other times relaxed for
economic
or political reasons. But by 1939 their overall application had made
the
situation of the Jews in Germany worse than what they had suffered in
the
middle ages when they were at least allowed to participate in economic
and
intellectual activities. As Nolte rightly points out, at that stage the
extermination of the Jews was a matter of course.
The Protestant
churches,
misinterpreting Article 24 of Hitler’s 25-point program, were also off
guard
too long. Although that article did say that the National Socialist
party
“promoted the freedom of all religious confessions within the State,”
it added,
“in so far as they do not endanger the existence of the State or offend
the
ethical and moral feelings of the German race.” It was then in line
with the
ethical and moral feelings of the German race to declare that Jesus
Christ was
Nordic and that the New Testament had been falsified by “rabbi St.
Paul.”
However, the German Christian Faith Movement which was supported by the
Nazis
and proclaimed these theses did not succeed in taking hold of the
Protestant
churches altogether, and finally Hitler had to isolate the Protestant
churches
and combat them from the outside. The Catholics had the political
instrument of
the Center Party which had come into existence to fight Bismarck’s Kulturkampf in the nineteenth century
and resisted Hitler until his accession to power.[54] But after Hitler became head of government,
the Catholic Center Party was dissolved. The Catholic faith and the
activities of
its church in Germany were protected by a Concordat signed in 1933
between the
National Socialist government and the Vatican. There again, Hitler’s
intentions
were misinterpreted. For him, an international agreement was worthy
only in so
far as it helped him towards the final goal of his myth of Aryan
supremacy. In
1933, he created a Reich Church Ministry to supervise the activities of
the
churches. In 1934, Hitler appointed his Nazi philosopher Alfred
Rosenberg as
his plenipotentiary to bring about the total spiritual and
philosophical
education of National Socialism. From then on the part y and the Nazi
government officially promoted the Germanic pagan traditions.[55] Hitler, however, had no intention of
replacing the Christian faith with pagan rites in the supernatural
sense. While
he could not help believing in some supernatural providence as the
promoter of
his destiny, he believed that, in the age of science, knowledge of the
awesome
universe would give man a sense of religion without need for churches,
priests
or even a religious character for his own movement.[56] It is, however, also true that it takes time
to make a religion out of a myth—provided it has the right ingredients.
In
order to make a myth socially functional one has to keep the masses
intoxicated
by the myth and moving to it. Otherwise, its distortions of historical
and
philosophical facts fall apart. The whole of the Nazi programs and
propaganda
served that end. As Fest puts it, it was irrelevant whether Nazism had
a strong
ideology or not; within its grandiose orchestrations, fanfare and
impressive
monumental displays it provided “collective warmth: crowds, heated
faces,
shouts of approval, marches, arms raised in salute.”[57] Leni Riefenstahl’s film, Triumph
of the Will covering the Nazis’ Sixth
Party Congress in Nuremberg in 1934, remains a testimonial document.[58] What was appalling in all this, what made it
a fantastic case of crystallization of values through myth, was the
magnitude
of its process, of how, under favorable social, economic, and political
circumstances, lingering ethnocentric German values and prejudices
distilled
within one man could grow into a thunderous catastrophe.
Hitler discovered
himself an
orator and an actor, but as time went by and success followed success,
he became
more and more convinced of his providential mission and the
righteousness of
his myth.[59] This conviction eventually narrowed his
vision of realities and made him believe in the infallibility of his
fate. As
Bullock puts it:
..the
baffling problem about this strange figure is to determine the degree
to which
he was swept along by a genuine belief in his own inspiration and the
degree to
which he deliberately exploited the irrational side of human nature,
both in
himself and others, with a shrewd calculation. For it is salutary to
recall,
before accepting the Hitler Myth at anything like its face value, that
it was
Hitler who invented the myth, assiduously cultivating and manipulating
it for
his own ends. So long as he did this he was brilliantly successful; it
was when
he began to believe in his own magic, and accept the myth of himself as
true,
that his flair faltered.[60]
For twelve years
Hitler made
Germany the reality of German mythology from Rheingold to
Gotterdammerung. He
played Siegfried and Wotan at the same time, but he finally turned out
Brecht’s
Arturo Ui.[61]
Hitler and Mussolini
acutely
demonstrated the fertilizing properties of myths for state and nation.
In more
or less attenuated doses, myths have always been basic ingredients for
states
and nations. The concept of the greatness of the empire was much older
than
Mussolini, and Hitler did not invent the myth of Aryan superiority.
Writers
like Arthur de Gobineau had developed such theories long before to
explain the
miracles of European expansion and civilization.[62] Indeed, ethnocentric myths conducive to
nationalist feelings are widespread even among peoples whose political
culture
may not show such tendencies. “La culture
civilisatrice francaise” is a historical reality for the French and
was used
to justify a policy of grandeur. “The white man’s burden,” “Rule,
Britannia,
rule,” “Manifest destiny” and “the American dream” are all
myth-building
premises.[63] Nor is the phenomenon exclusive to the
Western world. The Chinese developed the concept of the “Middle
Kingdom” long
before Western ethnocentrism.
III.
Ideology
Besides using man’s
fear and
search of the unknown to form religious and superstitious beliefs or
intoxicating him by energized and deformed facts turned into myths,
values may
be crystallized through man’s capacity to think and to rationalize. The
Cartesian rationale, logical positivism, objective relativism and
dialectical
materialism can equally generate a sense of values.[64]
Of course, the more beliefs are anchored in the beyond, the more
absolute they
will tend to be: the anthropomorphic and metaphysical structures of
belief are
so constructed as to lie outside the confines of reason. Values based
on
rational logic should hold together within the thinking process. In the
latter
case the conditioning of the thinking
process becomes more directly the modus
operandi of the value system. The early Mohammedan soldiers who
fanatically
charged the materially superior Roman and Persian armies believed that
dying
for their faith would bring them to heaven. The militant
revolutionaries who
die under the torture of Gestapo-like police forces also believe—not in
heaven,
but in the righteousness of their cause and its final triumph. The
cause which,
without promising heaven, may claim the ultimate sacrifice is based on
a
rationally concluded and structured system of values.
In 1795, Destutt de
Tracy
coined a term which later evolved to cover this kind of a value
constellation.
He used his term—“ideology”—to refer to a systematic
and rationally concluded body of ideas organized on the basis of
scientific
application of knowledge and experience—hence the “science of ideas.”[65] Marx used “ideology” to refer to the complex
of legal, political, religious, aesthetic and philosophic dimensions,
which
reflected the social conditions, upheld a given social class
structure—notably
the bourgeoisie-and conditioned men’s thinking process or, in his
words, their
consciousness.[66]
The
semantics of the term, however, have evolved since Marx to include his
own
philosophy. Lenin wrote: “Marx was the genius who continued and
completed the
three main ideological currents of the nineteenth century, belonging to
the
three most advanced countries of mankind: classical German philosophy,
classical English political economy, and French Socialism together with
French
revolutionary doctrines in general.”[67] And
according to Althusser: “...in the
present state of Marxist theory strictly conceived, it is not
conceivable that
communism, a new mode of production implying determinate forces of
production
and relations of production, could do without a social organization of
production, and corresponding ideological forms.”[68]
Today the term
generally covers
both the systematic and the systemic
dimensions, and depending on
who is using it where and when, can have different emphasis.[69] In its systemic
connotation, referring to the factors that condition a society into its
particular shape, ideology can be used to encompass the whole of
value-crystallizing processes. When Althusser says that “Human
societies
secrete ideology as the very element and atmosphere indispensable to
their
historical respiration and life,”[70]
he is covering the entire value-crystallizing spectrum. And Santiago
Carrillo
makes the point by identifying the church as an ideological machinery
of the
capitalist state in Spain.[71] While the term is closely related to Marxist
philosophy, its systemic use is widespread. McClosky discerns a
tendency among
contemporary writers to regard ideologies as systems of belief “that
are elaborate,
integrated, and coherent, that justify the exercise of power, explain
and judge
historical events, identify political right and wrong, set forth the
interconnections (causal and moral) between politics and other spheres
of
activity, and furnish guides for action.”[72]
Referring to the
systemic
nature of ideology Marx says:
In the
social production which men carry on they enter into definite relations
that
are indispensable and independent of their will; these relations of
production
correspond to a definite stage of development of their material forces
of
production. The sum total of these relations of production constitutes
the
economic structure of society—the real foundation, on which rises a
legal and
political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of
social
consciousness. The mode of production in material life determines the
social,
political, and intellectual life process in general. It is not the
consciousness of men that determines their being, but, on the contrary,
their
social being that determines their consciousness.[73]
According to Marx,
ideology’s
power to condition consciousness is at its peak when it corresponds to
the
relations of production among the different classes of society.
Relations of
production are themselves conditioned by the combination of economic,
technical
and scientific bases—the means and forces-of production. When these
change,
there will be need for change in relations of production among the
social
classes, and this change will sooner or later weaken the prevailing
ideology
and make way for a new one.
When effective,
ideology gives
texture to the prevailing system and justifies its values—its sense of
good and
bad and its moral and social codes. It provides for the society a sense
of
identity which upholds it, warding off alien incursions dangerous to
its
existence. Thus, for example, capitalism, which may have been a
functional
economic process of production and distribution pragmatically based on
the
mechanisms of competitive enterprise and the laws of supply and demand,
becomes
a value-laden system—an ideology—in opposition to another value-laden
economic
concept such as communism.[74]
Capitalism and
communism have
become not merely economic methods for production and distribution of
man’s
material needs but value systems providing pattern and direction for
his
psychological and sociological drives. Affectionally upheld, they are
no longer
functionally analyzable. The capitalist or the communist cannot coldly
scrutinize his ideology and, concluding that it is not workable,
discard it. If
he did, he would lose his identity. The proposition applies not only to
those
of each group who have privileges and reap the fruits of their
ideology, such
as the industrial tycoon in the West or the party official in the East.
The
average man in the capitalist regime would not welcome a system that
denied him
the hope that he may one day become rich under competitive free
enterprise,
which he has come to conceive as the ideal of freedom; and the average
Soviet
citizen is apprehensive about a system which does not provide a planned
economy
wherein he is fitted. An ideology works when it is embraced by the
masses and
prevails as the value-crystallizing channel for the society.
So far, our discussion
of
ideology has not sharply distinguished it from other
value-crystallization
processes. We need to examine more closely the relationship between the
systemic and the systematic characteristics of ideology to identify its
proper
domain and its areas of overlap with beliefs and myths. At the
systematic
level, we said, ideology draws its arguments from rational and
scientific
premises. That requires, of course, consciousness of all the aspects of
the
subject under consideration, including their contradictions;
objectivity and
abstention from dogmatism in theory; rigor and presentation of
conclusions by
verifiable facts in practice. To gain insight as to how scientific
consciousness leads to conditioned consciousness, we can start by
looking into
the components of the systematic dimension of ideology.
To arrive at his
statement
quoted earlier about the conditioned consciousness of the masses, Marx
had to
make a conscious effort to observe social phenomena. This fact that he
could
surmount his own conditioned consciousness in itself contradicted his
statement
and permitted him to discover the inherent contradictions within the
social
structure. In other words, his scientific method was dialectical.
Dialectics
was not new. Ever since Zeno, it had connoted a method of study,
recognizing the
interrelatedness of phenomena, their flux and their inherent
contradictions.[75] More recently, Hegel—in his method, but not
in his conclusions—had followed this pattern to which he had added, in
his
treatment of measure, the relationship of quantity and quality.[76] But Hegelian dialectics had strong
metaphysical flavor. Hegel elaborated historical dialectics as a theory
of
logic to demonstrate rationally the relationship between reality and
values. He
postulated that this relationship could be grasped through an
understanding of
the relationship between the ideas of phenomena and the phenomena
themselves
and their evolution. This would ultimately demonstrate, through the
reasoning
process, the relationship of reason to Absolute Reason.
While using the
Hegelian
dialectical method for historical analysis, Marx and Engels replaced
his
idealism, which to them was the mystification of the real, with
materialism. In
that sense the Marxian dialectic method was the inversion of the
Hegelian.[77]
It was not by logically analyzing the idea of things that one could
understand
reality and its relation to value, Marx said, but by examining the
reality
itself.[78]
Reality is material, i.e., made of matter. Consequently, materialism
maintains
that matter is primary and thought and idea are secondary.[79] That is, thought is a product of the brain,
which is made of matter:[80] “Mind itself is merely the highest product
of matter.”[81] Since nature’s process is dialectical and
not metaphysical,[82]
and since
mind is the highest material product, “dialectical materialism ‘no
longer needs
any philosophy standing above the other sciences,”’[83]
for “there are no things in the world which are unknowable, but only
things
which are still not known, but which will be disclosed and made known
by the efforts
of science and practice.”[84]
Science and practice,
however,
cannot be uttered in the same breath without qualifications, especially
in
relation to social and political phenomena. Scientific inquiry—search
for and
grasp of abstract knowledge, theorizing-often calls for a different
kind of
temperament than does practical endeavor. Some feel more comfortable
having a
conditioned consciousness with established goals and values rather than
having
a conscious mind groping with dialectics of contradictions. This is a
social
reality which some consider changeable; i.e., they believe it is
possible to
make every member of society enjoy dialectical consciousness. Without
getting
involved in biological, ethological or psychological debate on this
issue, we
may reasonably assume that to achieve that goal scientific knowledge
should be
applied in practice. That is where, in general socio-political terms,
difficulties arise, because scientific knowledge is not always socially
operational.
We can, of course,
start at the
stage where scientific knowledge and conscious minds are the attributes
of a
certain segment of the society whose vested interest is to keep things
as they
are. That is, the masses have imbibed the ideology at its systemic
level while
the privileged class may be conscious of its contradictions at the
systematic
level but keeps mystifying the masses. The taxi driver lauds the
capitalist
system because he is his own boss, yet tie works twelve hours a day six
days a
week to pay the bank, the insurance company and taxes which go for
government
contracts and appeasement of the downtrodden through handouts. However,
as we
said earlier, classes are not tightly confined compartments. When
changes in
the relationship of production become more and more flagrant, in the
course of
repeated practice, as Mao Tse-Tung puts it, a change takes place in the
brain
in the process of cognition, and concepts are formed.[85] Within the masses a consciousness of
contradictions can begin to grow. This consciousness, however, may not
be
“scientific” in analyzing the overall contradictions but systemic in
that it
may lead to the knowledge of manipulating the rules within the system.
Lenin
was concerned about this:
We have
said that there could not yet be
Social-Democratic consciousness among the workers. It could only be
brought to
them from without. The history of all countries shows that the working
class,
exclusively by its own effort, is able to develop only trade union
consciousness, i.e., the conviction that. it is necessary to combine in
unions,
fight the employers and strive to compel the government to pass
necessary labor
legislation ....
Social-Democracy
leads the struggle of the working class not only for better terms for
the sale
of labour power, but also for the abolition of the social system which
compels
the propertyless to sell themselves to the rich. Social-Democracy
represents
the working class not in the latter’s relation to only a given group o
f
employers, but in its relation to all classes of modern society, to the
state
as an organized political force ....
Working-class
consciousness cannot be genuinely political consciousness unless the
workers
are trained to respond to all cases, without exception, of tyranny,
oppression,
violence and abuse, no matter what class is affected. Moreover, to
respond from
a Social-Democratic, and not from any other point of view.[86]
Scientific theory can
thus
supersede what in narrow practice may seem an appropriate course of
action. But
at this stage too, looking closer, we find the conscious mind of the
Communist
(Social-Democratic) Party leading the conditioned consciousness of the
proletariat. In terms of dialectics, of course, this amounts to party
control
in the systemic sense of ideology. Evidence to this effect are
developments in
the Soviet Union and other socialist states on which we are now getting
first-hand critical analysis.[87] The process corresponds to the general
concepts relating to group dynamics and the need for a value system
discussed
earlier. Sartre points out: “As an institution, a party has an
institutionalized mode of thought—meaning something which deviates from
reality—and comes essentially to reflect
no more than its own organization, in effect ideological thought.”[88]
Thus, as the party gains control, rational knowledge is conditioned by
the
ultimate goals and practices of the party and of the state controlled
by it. In
the name of the systematics of ideology a party may modify its guiding
principles and reject dogmatism which could encumber it and threaten
its continuity
(such as the Marxian proposition that the state will wither away). And
in order
to perpetuate the systemics of ideology keeping it in control, it may
reject
scientific empiricism which, if practiced widely among the masses,
would void
the value connotations of its theories and leave no ladder by which the
party
could claim ascendance over individual consciousness. In his analysis
of Soviet
Marxism, Marcuse elaborates on the magical and ritualized character of
the
official language in the Soviet Union and the rigidly canonized
statements by
the Soviets on their society “which are obviously false—both by Marxian
and
non-Marxian criteria,” but which in the context of Soviet political
practice
are aimed at historical processes, which will bring about
the desired facts.[89] This is ideology in the systemic sense,
fading into myth-building. When a scientific theory such as Marxism is
fixed as
a goal—as it is in the Soviet Union—and when in its name dialectical
contradictions to state practice are suppressed, the dialectical
flexibility of
the complex for synthesis is reduced, opening the door to deviations
from the
original theory. The systematic is turned into systemics of
ideology—rational
thinking into rationalization. Ideology, having thus become the
instrument to
perpetuate a given social structure and social stratum (the party),
will, in
the purest Marxian dialectics, nurture within its womb a new current,
represented in the Soviet Union by a line of dissidents such as
Pasternak,
Daniel, Sinyavsky, Solzhenitsyn, Amalrik, Sakharov, or Shcharansky,
whose
consciousness of contradictions underscores the conditioning of
consciousness
of the masses.
IV. The
Belief-Myth-Ideology Spectrum
At the beginning of
this
chapter we set out to unravel some of the particularities of the major
social
processes of value-crystallization. This we did despite the fact—as we
pointed
out—that often one of the terms is broadly applied for the whole
spectrum of
value systems. We hope that while showing the particular
characteristics of
beliefs, myths and ideologies, we have also provided enough clues to
demonstrate why the terms are interchanged. In discussing each process,
we
distinguished it from the others mainly at its essential origin, or
original
essence. We saw that the supernatural, religious and metaphysical
premises of a
belief are generally based on mystic experience, but also that at its
pure
stage, the mystic experience is personal and not transferable.
Bodhidharma
said,
Enlightenment
is naught to be obtained,
And he
that gains it does not say he knows.
A mystic experience,
to be made
socially operational in support of a value system, must be adapted and
transformed. You will notice how great are the chances that an
experience which
is not transferable in the first place can be distorted as it is
adapted and
transformed. The more the mystic origin of a belief is voluntarily
distorted
for social action and organization, the more it falls into the realm of
myths
which, as we saw, were brought about by conscious and systematic
distortion of
historical and philosophical facts.
Similarly, purely
scientific
conclusions based on rational and dialectic observations and research,
as we
saw, are not in essence supposed to have any value charge. In the words
of
Mannheim:
The
term
‘ideology’ in the sociology of knowledge has no moral or denunciatory
intent.
It points rather to a research interest which leads to the raising of
the
question when and where social structures come to express themselves in
the
structure of assertions, and in what sense the former concretely
determine the
latter.[90]
Adam Smith did not
establish
sanctity for private enterprise, rent, interest and commercial profit.
Indeed,
he pointed out that “in this [original] state of things, the whole
produce of
labor belongs to the laborer,” but that the incentive which private
ownership
of capital and commercial gain provides for the accumulation of wealth,
needed
for economic development, justifies capitalism and free enterprise.[91] Nor do the historical fact of class
antagonisms combined with the rationale of “from each according to his
capacity, to each according to his work,” lead to the conclusion that
each
should or will give according to his capacity and receive according to
his
need. Here again, to bridge the gap, some ideological acrobatics are
needed. To
serve the value-crystallization purposes of a particular social order,
an
ideology has to indulge in half-conscious and unwitting disguises
or-conscious
lies[92]--a
process which will move ideology toward myth.
We thus have a
spectrum with at
one extreme the detached and socially non-operative mystic experience
of the
sage or saint—the pure “value”—and at the other the “value-free”
empirical and
scientific rationale. As their adaptation for purposes of social
organization
is undertaken—on one side through religious beliefs, on the other
through
ideologies—the two are modified, transformed and distorted to provide
value
systems for social order. The more religions and ideologies transform
and
distort their original mystic and rational premises respectively, the
more they
approach the middle of the spectrum, where lie the myths with the
greatest
distortion of historical and philosophical facts.
Fig.
5.01
Our spectrum further
reveals—or
rather reiterates—the two interacting social and individual dimensions
of the
value-crystallization process and the relative doses of each under
different
conditions. Nearer to the individual mystic or rational dimensions,
where the
beliefs and ideological premises of individual group members are more
likely to
emanate from inner convictions, social action for value-crystallization
may be
less apparent for creating predictable and uniform behavior among group
members. Not that social action has not already conditioned and
continues to
reinforce the members to believe or rationalize as they do, but that
the
process and its effects are latent enough to make values sink into each
individual’s complex of action. Where the individual group members,
rather than
believing or rationalizing, should be intoxicated to follow a myth as
the basis
for the value system, social action needs to be dramatized and
engrossed to the
saturation point.
All these
circumstances refer,
of course, to situations where, whether through the individual
convictions of
group members or social action in a monolithic context, a potent value
system
gives the group a particular social texture. But what happens to social
cohesion if a monolithic value pattern cannot be maintained, because
the
heterogeneity of a society provides alternatives, resistance and
contradictions
to the value-crystallization process? Our question leads us into the
thick of
the socio-political complex because, while beliefs, myths and
ideologies are
the sources of social and political organization, they do not often
constitute,
in any pure state, the blueprint for that organization. And if that may
be so,
in order not to take our assumptions as facts, we will need to look
more
closely at the realities of value systems within the social context.
This is one of those
occasions
where the writer wishes he could, like the painter, simultaneously
impress upon
his audience all of the intertwining filaments stretching out of what
has been
developed so far. At this point in our inquiry, to answer the question
we have
posed, we are faced all at once with such problems as: How are the
interaction
and transformation of individual and social dimensions in the
value-crystallization process made possible? (which leads us to a very
basic
inquiry into the communications process and its ingredients—signs,
symbols and
rituals). How are the interaction of individual and social dimensions
in the
context of value systems made socially functional? (which leads us to
social
norms). By what agencies are values and social norms formed in the
social
context? And how do those agencies and the members of the society fit
together
within the social pattern? Alas, we cannot study all of these questions
at
once. But while discussing each, let us keep the others in mind.