The Genesis of Political Ideology by Andrew Oforma Eze
CHAPTER ONE CONCEPTUALIZATION OF IDEOLOGY The word “ideology” has remained one of the political concepts that have been distorted, falsified, misinterpreted, controversial, loved and hated, and misquoted in the world political spectrum in general and in the field of social sciences in particular. Since 1796 when the term “ideology” was first coined by a French philosopher Destutt Tracy, it has posed great challenges to social analysts to substantiate its actual, reliable and universally acclaimed meaning. According to Heywood (2003) “the first problem confronting any discussion of the nature of ideology is the fact that there is no settled or agreed definition of the term, only a collection of rival definitions”. David McLellan (1995) described ideology as “the most elusive concept in the whole of the social sciences” (cited in Andrew Heywood, 2003). This is because of its multifaceted nature; hence many writers, activists, ideologues cum ideologists, political ana