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George Walford: Conclusion from Beyond Politics

September 10, 2012

In the opening pages I noted that a theory of ideology must account for the presence of differing ideologies within the one society. Systematic ideology explains the major or main-sequence ideologies as stages in the universal system of evolution and the minor ideologies, the more localised and transient ones, as specialised versions of one or… read more »

George Walford: The Evolution of Ideology

September 10, 2012

We have distinguished three main stages of social development (four if one reckons the presence of the eidodynamics as constituting a distinct stage), each of them marked by the emergence of an ideological influence not previously active. We cannot precisely locate the first appearance of these influences and probably never shall be able to do… read more »

George Walford: The Origins of Ideologies

September 10, 2012

Having looked very briefly at the major ideologies and some of their effects on the history and present functioning of society, we now turn to trace out their origins. In doing this we shall need two concepts which Walsby developed beyond their usual significance: assumption (which we have already met) and limitation. I have been… read more »

George Walford: The Eidodynamic

June 25, 2021

Since introducing Walsby’s ascription of the ideologies of Expediency, Domination and Precision to the eidostatic and those of Reform, Revolution and Repudiation to the eidodynamic, I have spoken only of the first three. We found each of these established as the distinctive mark of a stage in social development, but the same cannot be said… read more »

George Walford: After the Empires

June 24, 2021

Each empire had its enemies, but serious resistance to the principle of imperialism did not arise until late in the Eighteenth Century, when the sans-culottes erupted against the aristos – both groups defined by political attachment rather than rank or income, the aristos often plebeians and the sans-culottes wearers of revolutionary trousers instead of reactionary… read more »

George Walford: From Village to Empire

September 10, 2012

Some ten thousand years ago Expediency, and the communities relying upon it, began to go down before an ideology and a way of life formerly unknown. The new methods, even in their earlier stages, permitted the formation of units up to a thousand times bigger than the previous ones and the changes, taken together, constitute… read more »

George Walford: The Beginnings

June 22, 2021

Early societies displayed a narrower range of activities than those we know today, showing their ideological structure to have been less complex. Go back two hundred years and our anarchist, communist and socialist movements dwindle to a few scattered visionaries. Another two hundred, to the 16th Century, science and the political outlook we know as… read more »

George Walford: Ideology Beyond Politics

September 10, 2012

People engaged in trades, and in professions outside party politics do not normally think of their activities as influenced by ideology, but governments sometimes take a different view. In Russia after 1917, in Germany after 1933, in China after 1948 and elsewhere at other times, the attempt was made to reduce the workings of a… read more »

George Walford: From Politics to Ideology

September 10, 2012

We now have before us six movements (strictly, five movements and one group), each of them extending over most of the world although under various names and with adaptations to suit local conditions. In introducing them I have taken the opportunity of showing that they form a series, and we shall find greater significance in… read more »

George Walford: The World Political Series

September 10, 2012

The British parties do not appear in the rest of the world and verbal correspondences are usually misleading. The Bolsheviks originated as one wing of the Russian Social Democratic Party, but this does not make a British social democrat a Bolshevik (or a Menshevik either), and an American liberal is not the same as a… read more »