I'm in -

(I hope you read this and draw something from it because I'm typing it from a book and not from the net so hopefully)

Political Ideologies (section in a chapter about political CHANGE):

Ideologies are an important factor in the process of political change. They can explain, justify, accommodate and encourage CHANGE; they are also universal. They are action-related, normative systems of ideas that are coherently articulated and are used to defend or ATTACK the EXISTING DISTRIBUTION of POWER within and between political systems.

All political change, whether evolutionary or REVOLUTIONARY, and likewise RESISTANCE to change, is equally justified by ideological PRINCIPLES. The 1789 French Revolution summed up its ideological aims with the powerful slogan of 'LIBERTY, EQUALITY, FRATERNITY' and the Bolshevik Revolution carried the same ideological message, albeit with important qualifications. Liberalism has been and remains a significant ingredient of most revolutionary changes; the american declaration of independence of 1775 constitutes one of the most powerful ideological statements in modern history. The revolutionary changes in Europe, Latin America nad Southern Africa of the 80's and 90's have all been accompanied by liberal democratic justifications.

Some ideologies are more coherent than others. Marxism is far more coherent than fascism, irrespective of the political influence of thees ideologies in the modern world. Populism, despite its drawing power, defies systematic conceptualization. Populism, together with fascism, and unlike Marxism or Conservatism, defies attempts to apply the label of either 'right' or 'left'. Ideologies are often historically and intellectually linked. Thus since the 19th century, liberalism has gone hand in hand with democracy; in the 20the century, fascism has been closely identified with nationalism.

Nationalism is now one of the most powerful motors of political change, yet it is one of the most difficult of all contemporary ideologies to analyse. The post-1989 events in the former Soviet Union and the political disintegration of the former Yugoslavia are powerful examples of the role of nationism in contemporary political change. Nationalism is even more potent when it is allied to other ideologies, such as liberalism and fascism. Nationlism also indicates tha problem of separating ideolgies from other systems of belief and from political culture. Thus modern Islam cannot be defined soley as an ideology. It is far more comprehensive because of its religious essence and cultural dimensions, yet it is currently a powerful agent of political change, particulary when allied to forms of nationalism. The changes in the Middle East since 1945 are impossible to analyse without reference to these TWIN FORCES and the Iranian Revolution of 1979 is a relevant example.

Of course, not all political scientists and historians have accepted either the universality or politcal releveance of political ideolies; it was once 'fashionable'