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Ideology and Utopia 61
present such facts from the scattered evidence as will most
c1earlfo,~4i,bjCilie::-dlStiifC:~!Qi!."E-eI~~Jf~~~~!V~'·,~~~~e
in the ErrjO!!L~a.E.~~r., a~~_t~_ tr~~e... ~.h:_Ero~es~!h~ch
gi-aduallye .. to the renne'a ana:.speclal1zeCT..n~~aning whIch
the terms have come to possess. Correspondmg to the dual
meaning of the term ideology which we have designated here
as the particular and total conceptions, respectively, are two
distinct currents of historical development.
The distrust and suspicion which men everywhere evidence
towards their adversaries, at all stages of historical development,
may be regarded as the immediate precursor of the
notion of ideology. But it is only when the distrust of man (
toward man, which is more or less evident at every stage of.
human history, becomes explicit and is methodically recog- "
nized, that we may properly speak of an ideological taint in ~,
the utterances of others. We arrive at this level when we DO ('
longer make individuals personally responsible for the deceptions
wh~ch we detect in their utterances, and when we
DO longer attribute the evil that they do to their malicious
cunning. It !S:Q.~!l_.~l1.~!l,~_!!1~~ ,~Je~~_co~sciqlls1y _se.e,~__to
discover the source of theIr untruthfulness in a social factor.
that we are propel'iy making an Iq:eologic~l i~t~rpi.~!iiion.
We began to treat our adversary's views as ideologies only
when we no longer consider them as calculated lies and
when we sense in his total behaviour an unreliability which
we regard as a function of the social situation in which he
finds himself. The particular conception of ideology therefore
signifies a phenomenon intermediate between a simpl.:
lie at one pole, and an error, which is the result of a d~
torted and faulty conceptual apparatus, at the other. It rt
fers to a sphere of errors, psychological in nature, which
unlike deliberate deception, are not intentional, but folIo"
inevitably and unwittingly trom certain causal determinants.
According to this inter,pretation, B~.:t--th~9!LE.L~
idolf!-!f1ay _~!egardedto.,.aj;erlai.IL~xtent.as. a forerunner
Of the mo.g~m_~~ti2~_ .2..L!~Ie.