WEBVTT

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Ideologies is a
really tricky concept,

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and academics have argued a
lot about what it really means.

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I'm here today
with Matt Humphrey

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to talk about how our
two disciplines, history

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and politics, use the word
ideology, why some people are

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reluctant to use
it at all, but why

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we think it's still a useful
concept to work with today.

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So Matt can you begin
by outlining for us how

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political scientists
think about this term

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today in your discipline?

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Yeah, certainly Maiken.

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So the interest in ideology
in political science

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to an important extent
is about extending

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the range of interests
beyond the traditional focus

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on political philosophers.

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So the study of
politics, traditionally,

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when it comes to
political ideas,

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has looked at people like
Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau,

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Nietzsche.

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But these are unique
individuals whose political

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thought attains a level of
sophistication and coherence,

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which is not really reflected
if you look at how ideas tend

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to flow through everyday life,
and how ideas are expressed

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in the media, and say,
in public discourse.

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So the lens of
ideology allows us

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to look at how ideas really
flow through society, rather

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than how they're articulated by
these very important figures,

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but these figures are,
as I say, unique in terms

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of what they actually do.

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It's important to
say, I think as well,

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that ideology in
political science

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has a rather chequered history.

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What we don't tend to
be interested in today

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is either the Marxist
projects of ideology analysis,

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in terms of uncovering
forms of false consciousness

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and revealing the truth about
society and the economy.

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Nor do we tend to see ideologies
as very rigid doctrinaire

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systems.

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So if you look back at, say
political science in the 1950s,

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when people talked
about ideology,

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they tended to mean things
like Stalinist communism

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or national socialism.

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And now we apply the analytical
lens much more broadly

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to, really, all forms
of political thought.

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So for us it's about
trying to understand

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the ways in which ideas
flow through society,

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the ways in which
ideas matter, if you

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like, for ordinary
people in politics.

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Is that similarly with history?

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Yeah I would say it is.

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History is a very
old discipline,

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goes back to the 19th century.

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And when it was
first formed, it was

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very much about
political elites,

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about very formal structures
of political decision making,

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institutions, and states.

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But in the last 50
years or so the emphasis

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has moved much more
towards social history,

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cultural history.

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So it's about understanding
ordinary people's lives

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and how they form particular
belief systems, identities,

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ideologies.

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So the term ideology in that is
disputed, some of my colleagues

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don't like to use it at all.

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They think it's
still too elitist,

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it's what political
leaders might

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use rather than ordinary
people who speak of, maybe,

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identities or political
opinions and feelings,

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even, and sentiments.

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But I think it's important
to hang onto this concept,

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because I think it's
important helping us to see

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the connections between every
day discourse and everyday

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practise and
political discourse,

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political decision making,
political mobilisation.

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It shows how these
two hang together

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in the sense, what goes
on in everyday life shapes

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the political language that
political leaders can then

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draw on to articulate their
projects and their ideas.

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So then, they're
mutually interdependent,

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and, ideology I think, brings
out that cross-fertilization.

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So if I can give you an
example from my own work.

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My own work, at the moment, is
on the history of Nazi Germany,

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and I'm particularly
interested in photography.

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This is a regime that's
very attentive to the media

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and about projecting
political images.

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But, again, we can see that
kind of two-way process at work.

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My research is about looking
at private photography.

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I look at family albums that
people made in the Third Reich.

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And what we see there is
something really interesting.

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It's how ordinary people
make ideology work for them.

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and what you see in
the photos that I

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look at-- I look at
these private family

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albums is how
people use ideology

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for their own purposes,
in very private settings.

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So it's almost like a
prop, like a consumer item.

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You might call pose
in a photograph

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with a new car or
the new outfit,

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or with an ideological
artefact or setting,

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in front of the
Olympic stadium, say,

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that the Nazis built in Berlin,
or with the Fuhrer speaking

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in the background.

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It's a way it's a prop
that allows you to position

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yourself, to define
your identity,

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to document it for others or
to live out an aspiration.

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To stage what you want to
be and who you want to be.

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And the regime, in turn, is
very attentive to that kind

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of use of ideology.

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And you can see that
in the visual sphere,

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too, where, to take an
example, Heinrich Hoffman, who

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was Hitler's propaganda
photographer of choice,

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he's very interested
in vernacular,

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everyday photography.

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And his images
often copy the sort

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of spontaneity of
amateur snapshots,

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he even copies the
mistakes that amateurs

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make in their snap
shooting photography

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to give his photos that
sort of authenticity,

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to make them feel real,
because the regime is very

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aware of the fact
that propaganda,

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if it doesn't speak to lived
experience, will not persuade.

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So how does that
work in politics,

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how do people think
about ideology,

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working in everyday life?

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Political science,
nowadays, is quantitative.

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So, for example, so my own work
on the politics of shale gas

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in the UK uses survey evidence.

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And people will use data,
such as electoral behaviour,

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as well, as part of an
explanatory story about how

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political outcomes are realised.

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But I think there's an
increasing awareness,

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and that really only tells
us part of the story.

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So there's been
what's been referred

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to as an ideational turn
in political science

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in recent years.

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And really a sense
that ideas matter,

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which again, probably
wasn't so much

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the case maybe 20 years
ago, with the rise of things

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like rational choice theory.

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Whereas all of that interest, or
maybe interest in institutions,

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but ideas were seen as a kind
of explanation of last resort,

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if you like.

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If you couldn't explain the
outcome any other way at all,

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then maybe you
might turn to ideas.

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And I think has changed now.

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The notion of the
political idea, ideology

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has become more
central to politics.

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Because that, in turn, raises
a whole set of new questions,

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right?

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If ideas matter,
how do they matter?

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How do people come to hold one
set of political ideas and not

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another?

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Why do some political
ideas appear

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to really capture the
public imagination

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and take off and be
incredibly influential,

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and others just seem
to whither on the vine?

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So the study ideology,
now, is partly

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about trying to understand the
ways in which ideas matter,

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if they do, and how
ideas might actually

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operate as an
explanatory variable

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for understanding certain
kinds of political outcome.

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How do people come to
hold one political belief

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or set of political beliefs,
rather than another?

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Why do some ideas seem to
pick up momentum and become

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very influential in
a democratic society,

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and others just seems
so wither on the vine?

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So if you think ideas
matter, that still

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leaves us with an
awful lot to explain.

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So one question might
be, "Well, is the concept

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of audiology useful in
helping us to achieve

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this level of explanation?"

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And, I think ideology refers
to something slightly different

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to just political ideas.

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People will have ideas about
things like justice and freedom

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and the sort of concepts were
talking about on this course,

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but they also will
put those together,

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even at the level
of the individual,

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into a system of ideas,
which will hopefully

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have at least some sort of
minimal level of coherence,

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so that people
aren't contradicting

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themselves every time
they talk about politics.

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And we still tend
use these labels

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of conservative or
liberal or socialist,

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problematic as
these labels may be,

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it give us a kind of
shorthand for understanding

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the systems of political
ideas that both individuals

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and political parties cleave to.

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So that's what, for
me, ideology is doing.

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Is trying to understand the
systematic interrelationship

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between these ideas, how they
correlate with each other,

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how do they, sort of fit
together into a system.

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Now, I think the role
of political ideas

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today, becomes
obvious if you look

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at some contemporary examples.

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So the 2016 Presidential
election campaign,

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the success of individuals
like Donald Trump, or Bernie

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Sanders, or even
the rise of populism

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more generally in
Western democracies.

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It's very interesting to look
at the role of ideas in that,

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I think .

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These candidates are presenting
themselves as the authenticity

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candidate, right?

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This is one of the
important factors

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of their current
political discourse,

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it's a stand against a kind
of corrupt establishment,

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as a stand against a kind of
managerial politics, right?

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These people believe
in something,

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and they're not scared to reveal
those beliefs to the public,

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in a way, by
implication they think

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previous generations of
politicians have failed to.

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So ideology remains a
very important component

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of political life that we
need to understand if we're

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to understand politics fully.

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