A political theory can in principle divert attention from the distorting influence of relations of power without its even being the case that some part of the content of the theory, narrowly construed, is false, wrong, or incorrect. Diverting attention from the way in which certain beliefs, desires, attitudes, or values are the result of particular power relations, then, can be a sophisticated way of contributing to the maintenance of an ideology, and one that will be relatively immune to normal forms of empirical refutation. If I claim (falsely) that all human societies, or all human societies at a certain level of economic development, have a free market in health services, that is a claim that can be demonstrated to be false. On the other hand, if I focus your attention in a very intense way on the various different tariffs and pricing schema that doctors or hospitals or drug companies impose for their products and services, and if I become morally outraged by “excessive” costs some drug companies charge, discussing at great length the relative rates of profit in different sectors of the economy, and pressing the moral claims of patients, it is not at all obvious that anything I say may be straightforwardly “false”; after all, who knows what “excessive” means? However, by proceeding in this way I might well focus your attention on narrow issues of “just” pricing, turning it away from more pressing issues about the acceptance in some societies of the very existence of a free market for drugs and medical services. One can even argue that the more outraged I become about the excessive price, the more I obscure the underlying issue. One way, then, in which a political philosophy can be ideological is by presenting a relatively marginal issue as if it were central and essential. The (mis)direction of limited human attention in this case would be the analogue in the theoretical sphere of the Nietzschean issues of “priority” discussed above. Raymond Geuss (2008 Philosophy and Real Politics, 53-4.
Geuss's core insight here is that attention is scarce and that directing it in certain ways preserves or enhances the unjust/unfair, not to mention ugly, status quo. He is also correct that theorists should be reflexive about this. Because I do not want to quibble about a word (ideological), I'll grant him that the shaping power of directing attention to less pressing concerns in ways that reinforce or entrench the status quo may be ideological in the sense he uses it.* Geuss here resonates with contemporary concerns over not just so-called fake news, but also debates over the status of so-called identity politics.
Now, one might think that Geuss is right that attention-grabbing outrage about the relatively trivial while being indifferent to or obscuring the significant is problematic. That we do so all the time makes it no less problematic. Many fine people are de facto utterly indifferent to (say) starving children (not just in foreign countries but in the town next over), yet get very exercised about where in town parking is zoned (or not). But in virtue of the fact that attention is finite, it's clear that focus on things one can influence directly without complex coordination is pretty rational and may well be selected for our evolutionary history--our attention and emotions direct us toward the actionable. That is, preference distortion in the sense that Geuss uses it, is inevitable. (Political theory is, then, a battle over what distortions to prefer.) For attention-grabbing outrage about the relatively trivial may be worse (in a moral and aesthetic sense), attention-grabbing outrage about stuff one can't really influence without extraordinary effort may well turn into empty symbolism.
Before I continue; I'll resist the temptation to spend time on the theoretical quicksand on which Geuss decides what the "more pressing" or "narrow" or "underlying" or "relatively marginal" issues are. I'll spot him the (rather questionable) assumption that this can be done in a non-question begging way (although I am extremely doubtful that his own philosophy has the resources to do so--that is, he'll have to draw on normative theories that he clearly rejects).**
The central (ha!) problem here is not that Geuss's stance has a tendency to be scornful of anything short of revolution, but rather that it leaves little room for ameliorative and mitigating projects if these entrench or leave the status quo untouched. To be sure, there are other kinds of thinkers who falsely assume that the removal of, say, injustice X is always a good and so never a cause for qualms. (I have animal rights activists friends who refuse to consider that removing the right to ritual slaughter for minorities may, in fact, reinforce the subordination of these minorities.)+
It's clear that many ameliorative and mitigating projects reinforce the status quo because they detract attention from its fundamental reform and make it better functioning (and so more likely to endure, etc.). And it's also true that most ameliorative and mitigating projects involve engagement in what from the perspective of eternity is really attention to trivial mechanisms of salience production, issue framing, etc. But these are the life-blood of political struggles.
But it is notable that a disciplined theoretical focus on underlying or central issues also entails a practiced indifference to the many ways in which our lives are harmed routinely in medias res. For, our political order is imperfect and necessarily so. The modern liberal, bureaucratic-administrative state with its military-industrial-financial-biotechnological complex [etc!] necessarily generates all kinds of ugliness, injustice, and distortions. (I say necessary because it's true of all political orders. For, if humans were capable of fully just or aesthetic (etc.) political order, we would not have political orders.) And while such indifference to petty harms to self may well be a necessary step on the path to Stoic wisdom, or the expression of Hobbesian magnanimity, indifference to harms to others is not just acceptance of (preventable and unworthy) cruelty,++ but also acquiescence in the many ways noble aspirations are frustrated because (say) of the decisions of petty functionaries and -- dare I say it -- lack of access to drugs.
*Having said that not all distractions that reinforce or entrench he status quo involves "distortion" of our beliefs and not such distraction will take the
form of presenting these beliefs, desires, etc., as inherently connected with some 'universal' interest or 'natural' perspective.
**Geuss rejects theories that defend "particular interests," but he is equally critical of theories that defend impartial, neutral, universal, or disinterested perspective.
+Having noticed this, it does not follow the minority is off-the-hook. But that's a different post.
++Given Geuss's fondness for Nietzsche he need not take this as criticism. But I doubt we are in the realm of cruelty that promotes a worthy aristocratic culture. More subtlym
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