評論
打印
What is wrong with faith in ideology? The trouble is this. An ideology is not a picture of actuality; it is a model derived from actuality, a model designed nto isolate certain salient features of actuality which the model builder, the ideologist, regards as of crucial importance. An ideology, in other words, is an abstraction from reality. There is nothing wrong with abstractions or models per se. In fact, we could not conduct discourse without them. There is nothing wrong with them—so long, that is, as people remember they are only models. The ideological fallacy is to forget that ideology is an abstraction from reality and to regard it as reality itself.
對意識形態體系的忠誠錯在哪呢？問題是這樣的，意識形態體系不是現實的描述，它是來自現實的模式，這一模式的創造者（意識形態主義者）把現實中至關重要的某些明顯特征區分出來。也就是說意識形態體系是來自現實的抽象概念。抽象觀念或模式本身并沒有錯。事實上，沒有它們，我們就不可能進行討論。
The besetting sin of the ideologist, in short, is to confuse his own tidy models with the vast, turbulent, unpredictable and untidy reality which is the stuff of human experience. And this confusion has at least two bad results-it commits those who believe in ideology to a fatalistic view of history, and it misleads them about concrete choices of public policy.
意識形態體系的謬誤是忘記了意識形態體系是對現實的抽象概念，而把這種抽象概念本身當成了現實。簡而言之，意識形態主義者不斷發生的錯誤是他們混淆了自己整齊的模式與廣闊的、洶涌的不可預見的和不整齊的人類經驗的現實。這種混淆至少有兩方面的惡果：讓意識形態體系的信仰者犯、宿命論歷史觀的錯誤；誤導他們對公共政策的具體選擇。
Consider for a moment the ideologist's view of history. The ideologist contends that the mysteries of history can be understood in terms of a clear-cut, absolute, social creed which explains the past and forecasts the future. Ideology thus presupposes a closed universe whose history is determined, whose principles are fixed, whose values and objectives are deducible from a central body of social dogma and often whose central dogma is confided to the custody of an infallible priesthood. In the old philosophic debates between the one and the many, the ideologist stands with the one. It is his belief that the world as a whole can be understood from a single viewpoint that everything in the abundant and streaming life of man is reducible to a single abstract system of interpretation.
讓我們思考一下意識形態主義者的歷史觀。他們認為歷史上的奧秘可以用清晰的、絕對的、能解釋過去和預測未來的社會信條來理解。意識形態體系因此預先假定了一個封閉的世界，它的歷史是確定的，它的原則是一成不變的，它的價值和目標是可以從社會信條體系中推理出來的，而這個理論體系的本質掌握在永無謬誤的圣人手中。在關于“一”和“多”的古老的哲學爭論中，意識形態主義者支持“一”。他們堅信世界作為一個整體是可以被認知的，一個單一的觀點是：豐富的、永不停頓的人類生活可以簡化為一個單一、抽象的解釋系統。
