The Ideology-Utopia Dialectic

This chapter adds a complementary sphere to the discussion: the political. The wisdom-power dynamic is germane here because politics takes the required step of translating the ethics-morality dialectic into an institutional milieu. Why is the translation necessary? Because just as fish live in an aqueous domain, humans live in a political one. We mortals cannot escape this reality, so a governing structure must be in place to administer the modern state not only efficiently but also justly. Otherwise, absent propitious circumstances, individuals may be unable to become everything they could be; or, adverse conditions might compel them to live under authoritarian rule. For Shaw and Ricoeur, only one type of government meets their standards: a representative democracy that maintains an optimal balance between two primal concepts that are ever present and inevitably clash at the national level—ideology and utopia. Ordinarily, these terms have pejorative connotations, but our present-day dialecticians see things differently. They maintain that these conflicting sets of beliefs also have corresponding positive aspects, and the chapter elaborates the joint way Shaw and Ricoeur dialectically synthesize the intricate interplay between them. Their efforts, they believe, yield a coherent political philosophy that can withstand critical scrutiny.