Ideocracy (aportmanteau word combining "ideology" andkratos,Greek for "power") is "governance of a state according to the principles of a particular (political) ideology; a state or country governed in this way".[1] It isgovernment based on amonistic ideology—as distinct from anauthoritarian state, which is characterized by strong central power and limited political freedoms.[2][3] An ideocratic state can either betotalitarian—citizens being forced to follow anideology—orpopulist (citizens voluntarily following an ideology).[4]
Every government has ideological bases from which assumptions and policies are drawn; ideocracies are governments wherein one dominant ideology has become deeply ingrained into politics and generally politics has become deeply ingrained into all or most aspects of society. The ideology of an ideocracy presents itself as an absolute, universal, and supreme system for understanding social life, much as agod in amonotheistic belief system.
Sidney andBeatrice Webb used the termideocracy in 1936, and it was given added currency byNicholas Berdyaev in 1947.[5][clarification needed]
An ideocracy may take atotalitarian form, reliant on force, or apopulist form, reliant on the voluntary support of true believers. The totalitarian form contains six components; 1)ideology, 2) a single party typically with one leader, 3) a terroristic police, 4) a monopoly of communications, 5) a monopoly of weaponry, 6) a centrally directed orplanned economy.[6]
Furthermore, Jaroslaw Piekalkiewicz and Alfred Wayne Penn state that an ideocracy such as a strict religious state or Nazi Germany will suppressscientific research and knowledge if it conflicts with the ideology.[7] Piekalkiewicz and Penn argue that every state is either organic (the organized expression of a community, within which all individuals are dependent and subsumed, as the fingers belong to the body), or mechanical/pragmatic (an artificial concept in which individuals have rights against the state and are co-equal). AsAdlai Stevenson II has said, "Since the beginning of time governments have been engaged in kicking people around. The astonishing achievement in modern times is the idea that citizens should do the kicking".[8]
In the view of Piekalkiewicz and Penn, ideocracies derivepolitical legitimacy from one of the following ideological sources: nation, race, class, or culture.[9] They also believe that ideocrats willproject their own feelings of guilt onto groups of people — Jews, communists, capitalists, heretics — as forces undermining the ideocracy. Thesescapegoats symbolize the forces that true believers must combat within themselves. Blame for failures of policy is diverted away from the ideocrats onto the scapegoats, who are subjected to mob attacks, terrorism,show trials, and stylized punishments.[10] In Hitler's Germany the drive to exterminate the Jews eventually took priority over every other goal.[11]
Citizens ofpluralist states may emigrate freely, but those who leave an ideocracy may be branded as traitors.[12]
Individuals within ideocracies develop anauthoritarian personality, say Piekalkiewicz and Penn, in order to succeed or survive. Long after the collapse of the ideocracy, these individuals remain resistant todemocratization.[13] They develop aclosed mind in which their self-realization within the ideocracy overrides the hostility of the 'heretical' outside world. Simple slogans are adopted and repeated as signs of conformity and loyalty.[14] Those who disbelieve the ideology arefatalistic, supporting the system because they feel powerless to change it, or Machiavellian, cynically exploiting the system for their own ends. Both groups develop a form ofdoublethink.[15]
A small minority ofself-actualisers, tolerant of ambiguity, are able to resist the monistic belief system and continue to search long-term for new ideas and complex answers.[16]
According to Piekalkiewicz and Penn, ideocracies rise and fall in the following manner:
This usually takes 10–15 years. The leader is no longer a Prophet, but is now deified. There is apurge of followers, and bureaucratization of the state and party.[23] The economy is nationalized, and totally mobilized in support of the ideocracy.[24] There will be scapegoating of enemies and terrorizing ofdissidents.[25]
Piekalkiewicz and Penn describedPharaonic Egypt, ancientBabylon, theAztec andInca empires,Sparta, theIslamic empire,Imperial Russia andImperial China as ideocracies[30] and citeTito'sYugoslavia,[31] PeronistArgentina,[32]Iraq underSaddam,[33] the USSR,Salazar's Portugal, Albania, theWarsaw Pact countries,[34] andImperial Japan[35] as among those that rose and fell in the 20th century. Both Catholic and Protestant extremists inNorthern Ireland sought ideocratic solutions,[clarification needed] but were thwarted by British troops.[36]
According toUwe Backes andSteffan Kailitz, theUSSR,[37] Italy underFascism,[38]Nazi Germany[39] and theGerman Democratic Republic (East Germany)[40] all rose and fell as ideocracies during the 20th century.
The populist form of ideocracy has been an important force in Latin American political history, where manycharismatic leaders have emerged since the beginning of the 20th century.[41][42]
Uwe Backes listsChina,[43]North Korea[44] andCuba[45] as regimes currently showing ideocratic tendencies. Willfried Spohn states that China is an ideocracy.[46] Gordon White said in 1999 China had ceased to be one.[47]
Piekalkiewicz and Penn citedBa'athist Syria,Iran,North Korea, andSudan as extant ideocracies.[48] In Israel, only the religious Jewish settlers and ultranationalists seek ideocratic solutions.[49]Peter Bernholz asserts thatSaudi Arabia, with itsWahhabist ideology, has been an ideocracy since 1924.[50]
