The distinction that the reading makes between owners and employees is that “Owners” is the extremely wealthy, where they gain so much wealth they can instead live off their investments rather then doing labor for their income. “Employees” are the ones who work for the “Owners” in order to be able to make a living. They essentially don’t own any business and need to provide labor in order to live because their income is not large enough to live off of investments. An example of an owner would be a wealthy CEO. They gain their income and wealth from investments, stocks, and high paying salary. An Employee would be an office desk worker working in the company. They need to work in order to live.
I understand the quote from Adam Smith as saying that labor is the determining factor that gives items for sale its value. The amount of effort and labor we put into an item for sale is what give its value not its sticker price or the arbitrary number we sell it for.
My thoughts on the main argument of class not being an identity is that I agree and both disagree, It seems to me that class is a special kind of marker we can give to people. It can work like race or gender in which these social categories are distinctions that we can group people in, like upper class, lower class, ect. but it also has the major difference of class being dependent on one another. The worker needs the capitalist in order to get a job. a persons race is not dependent on other races like class is. So it seems to me that class is a hybrid category.
How I understand the argument Reading 4.4. makes when stating that “class structures are built around a close form of dependency” is that class identity like the worker are dependent on the capitalist and vice versa and with that holds some power to people in that positions. For example the worker is dependent on the capitalist in order to get and keep their job and with that dependency the capitalist holds power over workers with the ability to take away the job if they don’t comply and easily exploit the workers for their own gain. In vice versa the capitalist is dependent on the worker and the worker has the power to force the capitalist to comply in order to maintain being a capitalist since you can’t be a capitalist if you don’t have workers working for you.
Repressive State Apparatus is a way to control behavior through violence and fear. Althusser uses the word ‘repressive’ because its supposed to suppress freedom through fear of punishment for breaking the rules. An example of this would be the police stopping you from stealing through force by chasing you down and arresting you.
Ideological State Apparatuses is a way to control behavior through social means like group acceptance and social efforts for conformity through ideas using institutions like schools. its meant to maintain the status quo.
Repressive and Ideological State Apparatuses differ by how they control behavior. Repressive State Apparatuses controls behavior through violence and threat from authority, while Ideological controls behavior through ideas and social efforts. The main difference in how both apparatuses do is that one does it through the police or justice system through violence and the other does it through other institutions like schools or churches. Usually when Ideological State Apparatuses fails to control behavior Repressive State Apparatuses is used afterwards as a backup option.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggUt0gJh9U8 This is a video on protest during the civil rights movement in the 1960s. The police attacking and arresting protestors is an example of Repressive State Apparatuses because they are using violence from the police to correct the behavior of speaking out against the racist laws and system in place at the time.
Ideology is the beliefs, values and structures in our lives that we agree with and follow. and with that belief, value, or structure is how we want our society and world to function. Its a collection of opinions we put value in and in turn want others to put value in too which. For example Conservatism is an ideology. In America at least it is the belief of smaller governments and less government influences on the freedoms of its citizens. Conservatives value self reliance and put an emphasis of ‘pulling yourself up by your boots straps’ as well has hold traditional values on how society should function, religion, economics, and gender and sexuality. And with those values and beliefs believes in structures that helps maintain those values and believes, such structure of the church or families. How I understand ideology is like a hierarchy. it starts with what you believe, and then from those beliefs comes what a person values in life and then from there you want to maintain or create a structure or system that ensures those beliefs are dominant and everlasting.
The way how I understand the difference between liberal and conservative ideology is an emphasis on tradition. I see Liberals as less traditional on social and economic issues whole Conservatives are more traditional on social and economic issues. For examples economically, Conservatives believes in less government regulation in business and free markets which has been that way for a while now in America while Liberals favor more government regulation not really trusting unregulated markets and big business. socially Conservatives has traditional beliefs on gender, sexuality and religion while Liberals have a more open interpretation and acceptance of these beliefs
I understand Althusser’s definition of ideology as a way to maintain control of people in a capitalistic society through repression or ideology.
