“Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses (Notes Towards an Investigation)” (1970)
Louis Althusser

For Marx, capitalism is unimaginable without ideology. Put simply, if Marx is right then capitalism is a system whereby the vast majority of people are exploited by a much smaller group. Although Marx believes that this sort of unequal distribution of wealth and power will eventually and inevitably lead to its own destruction through revolution, his theory also needs to account for why, for most societies under capitalism, this has not yet happened. In other words, why is it that people allow themselves to be systematically exploited? Why do people continue to vote for an economic system which enslaves them? A big part of the answer to this question is ideology.

 

In orthodox Marxist thought, ideology can be understood through the term “false consciousness.” To suffer from false consciousness is to have an incorrect set of beliefs about the world. Worse still, this incorrect set of beliefs prevents you from seeing the world as it really is and causes you to act against your own interests. A false consciousness causes you to believe in and support the very system which exploits you on a daily basis.

 

An example of false consciousness concerns the question of fairness. Many people understand that capitalism does not distribute wealth and resources in an equal way, but do believe that the system is ultimately fair. They would say that under capitalism, there is no king, putting his subjects in their places; there is no one deciding who is rich and who is poor. Instead, everyone has an equal chance at becoming wealthy so long as they are prepared to work hard, take their chances and be resourceful. They would point to examples like Andrew Carnegie, who started off as a factory worker only to become one of the richest people of his time.

 

Marx, on the other hand, would say that capitalism is inherently unfair. He would invite you to zoom out and look at capitalist societies as a whole. He would point out that while a tiny number of people do move from one class to another, most do not. Moreover, he would state that movement between classes does not solve the more fundamental inequality of the class system itself. Looking more closely at work under capitalism, Marx would insist that whenever anyone works for someone else, they are being exploited – a company boss will always make more money from their employees than the employees receive in return. Companies are machines which slice off as much profit as they can and move it into the pockets of the business owners. Capitalism, in short, guarantees inequality. 

 

Zoom out still further and we can see that exploitation does not just exist between individuals but also between nations. Capitalism produces not just poor and rich people, but poor and rich nations. It is a system which is based on the exploitation of poor and weak nations by rich and powerful ones. It allows wealthy nations to make use of the resources and labor of poorer nations in a manner which enriches the rich and keeps the poor poor. These phenomena are not bugs in the system, rather, they are its most fundamental features. 

 

So fairness is an example of ideology. It is an idea which people commonly hold about capitalism which is, in fact, mistaken. Believing capitalism to be fair is a part of having a false consciousness about capitalism.

 

Louis Althusser, writing more than 100 years after the publication of Marx’s Capital, seeks to refine and add nuance to the understanding of ideology in Marxist thought. In this text, he is interested in how states exert power over their citizens. In particular, he looks in detail at how ideology arises and is maintained through a variety of institutions such as religion and the family.

 

Before we dive into the essay, we should examine what he means by ideology. He states that individuals living under ideology are subject to:

 

a determinate (religious, ethical, etc.) representation of the world whose imaginary distortion depends on their imaginary relation to their conditions of existence, in other words, in the last instance, to the relations of production and to class relations (ideology = an imaginary relation to real relations).

 

To unpack this, we should recall that for Marxists, everything boils down to the relations of production and to class relations. Or, in other words, the economy. So when he says “conditions of existence,” he means the ways in which capitalism divides people into classes, some of whom work and some of whom own businesses. As we have seen, this relation is unequal in terms of power. So when Althusser speaks of imaginary relations to conditions of existence, he means a false understanding of the material reality of this unequal power relation. Ideology, for Althusser, is getting the world wrong; misunderstanding the real, lived relations of people under capitalism. In reality, under capitalism, people live in unfair and exploitative  relations with one another. Ideology is the set of ideas which distorts people’s perceptions, deceiving them into misunderstanding the world.

 

Althusser’s essay begins by dividing between Repressive State Apparatuses (RSAs) and Ideological State Apparatuses (ISAs). He wants to explore how it is that capitalist states cause people to behave themselves. That is to orient their lives around the service of capitalism. The most obvious tools that states use to make us behave are RSAs. Here, we are talking about the army, police, courts, prisons etc. At the base of these institutions is physical violence. If you misbehave enough, a representative of the state will arrest you, imprison you, perhaps even kill you. Even if it does not always come to physical violence, the threat of violence ultimately underscores the ways in which these institutions discipline people.

 

ISAs, on the other hand, do not operate primarily through physical violence. Instead, they exert influence by ideology. Althusser presents a useful list of ISAs:

 

– the religious ISA (the system of the different Churches),

– the educational ISA (the system of the different public and private “Schools”),

– the family ISA,

– the legal ISA,

– the political ISA (the political system, including the different Parties),

– the trade-union ISA,

– the communications ISA (press, radio and television, etc.),

– the cultural ISA (Literature, the Arts, sports, etc.).

 

His claim is that, despite the differences between these ISAs, they share an ideological unity – they all operate beneath the ruling ideology of the state which is the ideology of the ruling class. To put this another way, the ideology of all ISAs is capitalist ideology. He also claims that the ISAs are crucial to the functioning of state power in that “no class can hold state power over a long period without at the same time exercising its hegemony over and in the State Ideological Apparatuses.” This is to claim that while states obviously need repressive apparatuses in order to control citizens (it is difficult to imagine a state without a police force for example), they also need ideological apparatuses which are at least equally crucial. 

 

A more modern way of thinking about this is to use the distinction between hard and soft power. Hard power forces one nation to bend to the will of another. It typically involves guns and bombs. Soft power persuades another nation to fall into line with the values of another through cultural diplomacy or economic ties. Soft power may be less obvious and more subtle, but these qualities may be precisely what makes it more powerful, perhaps, than hard power. 

 

To give a concrete example on the state level, if you live in a state where armed police constantly check that you are modestly dressed, then although you are likely to dress appropriately, you are also likely to resent it. At the very least, you will be aware that you are being forced to do something that you might prefer not to do. If, on the other hand, your parents and teachers have brought you up to believe in the virtues of modest dress and all of your friends dress modestly, then not only will you most likely dress modestly, but you will probably believe that it is the right thing to do. In this way, we can see the profound power of the ISAs.

 

Althusser does not give many examples of ideology operating in ISAs but it is worth thinking about what he might have in mind. Taking the educational ISA, we can see how the capitalist principle of competition is deeply embedded in the daily experiences of school children. From a young age, students are put into competition with one another through sports lessons, test results, setting by ability, points systems, special awards etc. While for most people in the west, this seems like a natural way to educate children, it is not difficult to imagine a school without the competitive elements where students learn through collaboration on mutually-beneficial projects. This type of ideology is powerful precisely because it does not look like ideology. As we noted above, it looks natural. Furthermore, it looks so natural that many people would argue that being competitive is actually a part of human nature; that competitiveness is hard-wired into the human animal. 

 

Althusser argues, then, that through ISAs, we are constantly exposed to the ideology of the ruling classes. It structures our religious ceremonies, our political parties, the media, culture and even our families. What looks normal and neutral on the outside is in fact determined by the ideological preferences of the economic system which organizes our lives and from which there is no escaping.

 

Before we move on to Althusser’s most well known insight in this essay, we will conclude this section with a word about materialism. Marxism is a materialist philosophy. This means that it places great emphasis on the material conditions of society; real relations between people. So although any philosophy involves the discussion of ideas, Marx insists that these ideas are always rooted in reality – people, relations, actions, transactions, the movement and ownership of resources, rituals etc. In this vein, Althusser takes pains to demonstrate how ideology must be understood as material action:

 

Ideas are [...] material actions inserted into material practices governed by material rituals which are themselves defined by the material ideological apparatus from which derive the ideas of that subject.

 

The point here is that ideology is less about what people think than what they do. Being a Christian, in Althusser’s example, means that a person is required to act on their Christian beliefs. For Catholics, this means going to mass, kneeling, making the sign of the cross, praying, confessing, doing penance etc. In other words, people’s ideas exist in their actions. When people act in ways which contradict what they supposedly believe, it must be that they have other ideas in their heads – that there is another, contradictory, ideology which is being expressed.

 

Althusser’s focus is on how the material actions of a subject are largely governed by specific rituals which are found within ISAs. So individuals are not free to act as they please, rather, their actions are prescribed in advance by the ISAs in their particular society. In a stunning inversion of how we generally understand reality, Althusser writes that subjects act insofar as they are “acted by the [...] system.” The claim here is that our actions are already decided for us by the ISAs that we have no choice but to engage with. Like puppets, we act out the roles which these powerful apparatuses have made for us.

 

Interpellation

 

We have just seen that Althusser claims that subjects are acted by ideology. Ideology, then, must come before the subject. And since ideology can only act through subjects, Althusser concludes that the category of the subject only comes into being through ideology – that ideology has the function of “‘constituting’ concrete individuals as subjects.” The subject, therefore, is not a neutral or spontaneous being, but it is an ideological construction which only comes into existence through ideology. There are no subjects wandering around, searching for an ideology to believe in, instead it is ideology that causes us to see one another as subjects in the first place. 

 

The fact that it is seemingly obvious to everyone that humans are all just natural subjects is, in itself, a function of ideology. As we were saying above, the most powerful ideology is that which does not appear to be ideology at all and one of the operations of ideology is to erase its tracks; to disguise its own ideological nature. One of the key lessons from Althusser’s text is to be suspicious of the obvious. Whenever we say to ourselves “That’s obvious! That’s right! That’s true!” this is where ideology is at its most powerful and most hidden.

 

Althusser gives an example of how we recognize each other as subjects:

 

We all have friends who, when they knock on our door and we ask, through the door, the question “Who’s there?”, answer (since “it’s obvious”) “It’s me”. And we recognize that “it is him”, or “her”. We open the door, and “it’s true, it really was she who was there.”

 

Althusser uses this example to demonstrate how we are “always already” subjects. Meaning that before this ritual at the door took place, the friend on the other side was already a subject. Before we greet one another in the street or at home, we are already subjects, which have been brought into being by ideology. If Althusser’s point is difficult to grasp, it is because he is commenting on something which is obvious to us. The idea that we are subjects is simply the case – what could be more clear? But what Althusser points out is that the subject is anything but a natural or neutral entity. To understand what he has in mind, we will examine the difference between a “subject” and an “individual.”

 

As we saw above, Althusser states that ideology constitutes individuals as subjects. We might think of the individual as the human raw materials and the subject as the way in which the individual is understood though ideology. Since individuals are always already subjects, there is no way of accessing an individual as anything other than a subject. The subject under capitalism has a set of specific features: it is characterized as autonomous, and free in thought and action; subjects know their own minds, they make their own decisions and are responsible for their own actions. Of course, for Marxists, this is entirely false. People under capitalism are anything but free. As we saw above, they are constantly acted by the ISAs which they are subject to.

 

So how does ideology make individuals into subjects? The answer is through the process of interpellation. As Althusser writes “ideology hails or interpellates individuals as subjects.” The French verb interpeller has two senses. It means to call out to and to interrogate someone. In Althusser’s example, it is a police officer who does the calling out and hence we see that interpellation is done both by RSAs and ISAs and that there is a violent element to the phenomenon.

 

We can turn back to the example of schools to consider how interpellation happens. Pupils appear in schools as subjects. The premise of the education system under capitalism is that students can think for themselves, that they are responsible for their actions, that they are rational, conscious beings. These principles are enforced each time a student answers their name during roll call, receives a report card or test result, each time a student is reprimanded for their behavior or given a detention. Students are told that if they work hard in school, they will succeed; that their success or failure is entirely down to them. These ideas are premised on the claim that students are free, rational agents who just need to make appropriate use of the resources available to them.

 

As we go about our lives in a capitalist society, we are constantly subject to interpellation. Each time someone addresses us, they do so on the basis of a set of assumptions of what a subject is like. They expect us to be rational free agents, responsible for our actions and able to conduct our lives in an autonomous manner. We are expected to act in accordance with this set of assumptions, and if we fail to do so, we can expect to be punished. Interpellation happens everywhere, all time. Sometimes it is obvious and violent, as when someone is arrested, at other times, it is invisible, like when someone gives their friend some advice.

 

To sum up, Althusser’s analysis demonstrates that our sense of ourselves, the very notion of who we are, is not something which emerges from deep within us as individuals. Instead, it is something which is forced on us from the outside. The very shape of who we are and who we think we are is presided over by the economic system in which we live. Our lives are dominated by a powerful and interconnected system of repressive and ideological apparatuses which force us to act according to the ideology of the ruling classes. On a daily basis, these apparatuses constantly reinforce this sense of subjectivity by interpellating us as subjects – reminding us of who we are and subtly but powerfully keeping us in place.

 

We will end this discussion with a meta-comment on the discussion itself, for as Althusser notes, there is a kind of impossibility to writing about ideology. In order to write about ideology in an objective manner, it is necessary to be outside of ideology. Yet, as we have seen, there is no outside to ideology. The moment we say “I” and thus think of ourselves as subjects, we are in ideology. Any piece of writing to which we sign our name is also subject to ideology. If we are to appear in society, then we can only ever appear as a subject which is an ideological construction. Nor are we permitted to conceive of our subjectivity in a different way since, it is not up to us – we were made into subjects in advance, our subjectivity was thrust upon us and is constantly reinforced by the RSAs and ISAs which we are subject to. This is a familiar paradox and not only relevant to Althusser. If there is no outside to something (whether it is language, discourse or ideology) then how can anyone write about it without being compromised? This is a problem which casts a shadow over much of critical theory.