- What is a Repressive State Apparatus? Why does Althusser call it “repressive”? Can we explain his choice of words here. Give an example.
Repressive state apparatus refers to the institutions and structures in society that enforce law and order through force or the threat of force, some example can be military, prison or the police. Althusser calls it “repressive'” because those institutions like prison or the court directly control suppresses people who resist or threaten the state’s power, “repressive” in that they use violence or punishment to maintain status quo, Althusser’s choice of the word “repressive” represents the violence and forceful nature of those institutions to maintain authority, and example can be the police force if people join a protest and join groups that go against the government the police can step in sometimes even using force to stop or suppress those groups to maintain social order, the Repressive State Apparatus primary function is to ensure that the state’s power is upheld.
2. Let’s do the same for the Ideological State Apparatuses. What are they, how do they seem to work?
The Ideological State Apparatuses is the institutions and systems in society that shape and control our(people’s) ideas, beliefs. values and consciousness, so they work through ideology by influencing how individuals think, feel and view the world, some examples are schools they teach us certain values and beliefs like respecting authority, discipline and work ethic, churches which promote moral codes and belief systems, Family’s teaching us the norms and the values like gender roles or the idea of being individual responsibility to name a few how the Ideological State Apparatuses works is by shaping people’s beliefs and ideas they don’t force us to act a certain way like the Repressive State Apparatuses with violence or punishment but they create a system where people(us) can accept certain beliefs or worldviews without realizing they’re being controlled by getting people to accept their roles within, like schools students learn about capitalisms economic systems or another thing like nationalism and make it seem like it’s the best choice over time reinforcing that idea and encouraging to conform to the most dominant ideology.
3) How are the Repressive and Ideological State Apparatuses different from each other? What is the difference between the two?
The main differences of Repressive State Apparatuses and the Ideological State Apparatuses is the way they maintain social control and power, one uses force(RSA) and the other one works primarily with Ideology(ISA). other differences would be how they control a situation one Repressive State Apparatuses using violence and the Ideological State Apparatuses works through beliefs, ideas and ideologies, how they function is also a difference Repressive State Apparatuses enforcing the law and making sure everything is stable, and then we have the Ideological State Apparatuses using ideology to make people accept existing power structures both of them work in different ways one through repression of psychical resistance and the other by shaping peoples minds and beliefs.
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.
In this Movie Akira(1988) Repressive and Ideological Apparatuses are at work I’ll give an explanation to both examples in the movie, Repressive State Apparatuses in Akira the government controls the population using it’s military force and police repression, the story takes place in a post-apocalyptic Tokyo where the government uses It’s armed forces to suppress resistance and manage the city. Also Ideological Apparatuses the government and the media are shown in the movie manipulating the population and also creating “experiments” which shows how the use of advanced technology for social control and the media making the government seem like the protectors of society by maintain the status quo by suppressing any rebellion, so It’ll be both Repressive State Apparatuses and Ideological Apparatuses shown in this piece of media.
