Ideology, the State and Ideological Confrontation

Abstract

The analysis of ideology and ideological struggles is the Achilles’ heel of Poulantzas’s contribution to Marxist political theory and practice. Concepts such as the ‘isolation effect’, ‘hegemony’, ‘generalised ideological crisis’ and ‘ideological state apparatus’ are central to his interpretation of the state and class struggle. Yet his overall account of ideology is sadly deficient. This is true not only of his early writings but also his subsequent studies from PPSC through to SPS. This does not mean that his views on ideology survived unchanged — there were certainly important shifts throughout his intellectual and political career, but these shifts generally operated within a continuing ‘politicist’ bias. This is especially clear in FD and CCC but significant ‘politicist’ residues also occur in later work. To the extent that Poulantzas broke with this approach it was probably because he wanted to develop a more effective mode of ideological intervention in political struggle. Indeed it was primarily through his reappraisal of the political role of intellectuals and their work on the ‘ideological front’ that he moved towards a more open account of ideology and ideological class domination.