Material(-ised) ideology: reconceptualising the object of ideology-critique

Lukas Meisner

Chapter 10 in Research Handbook on Critical Theory, 2026, pp 101-114 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: The critique of ideology can be understood as the main method of critical theory, which is why it is put at the heart of this chapter. It starts by developing the concept of ideological function as an obstacle in the democratic mediation between individuals and society, or between people and material culture (Section 1). Next, it differentiates four layers within this function under capitalism, focusing on primary and secondary ideology as the necessitating and normalising regimes of ideology (Section 2). Beyond the dualist one-way approach to ideology as the superstructure of a base known from vulgarised Marxism, it furthermore shows why ideology must be grasped as a capitalist infrastructure in which the base is an ideological materialisation as much as ideology has turned material (Section 3). In this way, the concept of ideology can be shown to go beyond the one-dimensionality of ‘false consciousness’ by including its relationship to ‘false being’ (Section 4). Ideology is not just a problem of the mind; which is why it can be overcome only by a change in society as a whole. Consequentially, the remainder of the chapter develops the concept of material ideology as the material culture of domination and of materialised ideology as a totalisation of capitalist false necessities into false objectivity (Section 5).

Keywords: Critique of Ideology; Ideological Function; Capitalist Infrastructure; Material Ideology; Materialised Ideology (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
ISBN: 9781800373754
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