- What is a Repressive State Apparatus? Why does Althusser call it “repressive”? Can we explain his choice of words here. Give an example.
1- A repressive State Apparatus is the use of police, the judiciary system in place against the people that fail to obey at the Ideological State Apparatuses. Althusser call it repressive because it is the last stage of punishment. It takes away freedom of people by punishing them when they do not accept authorities in discipline and rebelled. It consists also of detention and prison.
2. Let’s do the same for the Ideological State Apparatuses. What are they, how do they seem to work?
2- Ideological State Apparatuses are the use of methods other than physical violence to achieve the same goals when use the Repressive State Apparatuses, to make you accept authorities in discipline. They are schools, churches. They work in the sense that the lower class people is taught to behave according to the ruling class benefits, not in theirs, unconsciously. They make you believe that schools are mandatory for your growth while at Schools they not only teach you to read and write but they also force you to be disciplined. People are trained to respect and obey authorities but will be punished if fail to do so.
3. Important: this question will appear on our exam: How are the Repressive and Ideological State Apparatuses different from each other? What is the difference between the two?
3- I think Repressive State Apparatuses and the Ideological State Apparatuses differ in the following:
- The authorities are different. For Ideological it is the schools teachers, church leaders and the Repressive is the judiciary system such as police, court, army and prison.
- At the Ideological people are being taught on how to behave and obey. While the Repressive is the severe punishable consequences for disobedience of authorities.
- The Ideological is a soft power while the Repressive is tough one.
4. Post an example of ideology. This could be a piece of writing, an image, video, pdf document, visual art, or music, clip from a movie. Next to your example, specify if this is an example of repressive or ideological apparatuses at work. I’ll start us of off by giving an example.
Ideological Apparatuses example: The Church forbids fornication. Some churches would condemn or reject anyone because of fornication. The supposedly sinner will faced disfellowship, which is a disciplinary measure against members who did wrong. That person cannot participate in communion and will be expelled from any privileged group they were part of.
