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Robert M. D. Minto: Systematic Ideology and Science Fiction

July 28, 2014

Winner, 2014 George Walford International Essay Prize. 1. Introduction “Perhaps,” begins an essay by George Walford, “we should pay more attention to science fiction.” [1] He proceeds to analyze the novel Soldier, Ask Not by Phillip K. Dick. In Dick’s novel, the evolution of the human race causes it to split onto different planets, the… read more »

George Walford: The Free Marketeers

June 20, 2014

Jean Baptiste Colbert, Minister in charge of finance under Louis XIV, asked the merchants what he could do for them; they added to the common stock of cliches with the reply: “Laissez-nous faire.” Or so the story goes. After generations as an unassimilated immigrant the phrase has now been naturalised as the demand for a… read more »

George Walford: Editorial Notes (55)

April 28, 2014

CURRENT mores tend to produce a tangle of ex-husbands and ex-wives, their present partners and their present partners’ exes, that amounts to a new type of extended family. The nuclear family didn’t last long. PROGRESS includes reversals and regressions. The social advance from expediency to domination, for example, included the appearance of law, and “One… read more »

George Walford: Military Martyrs

April 24, 2014

Systematic ideology distinguishes between a major ideology and the ways in which it finds expression; the one ideology may appear in a variety of forms, authoritarian religion and military activities, for example, both giving shape to the ideology of principle / domination. (See “The Church Military“, IC50 p. 18). Fallen Soldiers, by George L. Mosse,… read more »

George Walford: Meet Systematic Ideology (54)

April 28, 2014

(Revision of November 1991) IDEOLOGICAL COMMENTARY announces itself as a journal of systematic ideology (s.i.), but it does not claim final knowledge of this theory; the formulation that looked like the ultimate last month needs alteration now, and the account given here undergoes continuing revision. Si. starts from observation of the limited success achieved alike… read more »

George Walford: Trousers Versus Breeches

April 19, 2014

It was the first of the big ones, the first to shake the world and the first to be taken as a model; the Bolsheviks acted with one eye cocked back at Marat, Robespierre, the Bastille, the Vendee and the events of Thermidor. It cannot sensibly be seen as an uprising of either the working… read more »

George Walford: The Iron Law

December 23, 2013

Robert Michels’ book, Political Parties, a sociological study of the oligarchical tendencies of modern democracy [1], first appeared in 1911, and quickly became famous [2]. The English translation has been available since 1915 (there were also Italian, German, French and Japanese versions) and in those seventy-five years nobody, so far as I have been able… read more »

George Walford: Editorial Notes (51)

December 14, 2013

THE TWO CLASSES There are two classes in society: the privileged few who know IC and the deprived multitude who don’t. Share your good fortune: take out a subscription for a friend – or, come to that, for an enemy. Send in the name, address and a cheque for £2 and the rest will be… read more »

George Walford: Ideological Notes (50)

August 21, 2014

AMONG foragers the only economic entity was the separate person (or at most the separate family) and the only political entity the community. The arrangement provided neither economic support nor political freedom. ONE theme of s.i. is that the eidodynamics, both as groups and as individual people, assert their intellectual individuality while the eidostatics prefer… read more »

Ailsa Pain: Review of Beyond Politics

August 21, 2014

Review of Beyond Politics, an outline of systematic ideology. From PLAN, Journal of the Progressive League, November 1990, by Ailsa Pain. This is a readable and thought-provoking little book. While many people have come to somewhat differing conclusions as a result of their own studies and speculation, I am sure they will find interest and… read more »