| Well, this experiment clearly failed. Either I explained the technique very badly, or there is no interest in analysis (I have my suspiscions on which is the answer). The net result is going to be a bunch of endless "my political philosophy's bigger than yours" arguments that will never get anywhere. But hopfully I will have the good sense to keep my head out of them.
For the record, ideal types are practical, because they allow us to analyse (break down), categorise and compare social pheneomena. Without being able to perform those basic functions, then these phenomena are not ameable to our reason. Typing is one of the most common and most important methods by which we do that. When we refer to the US as a capitalist state (or a democratic state, or a copratists state, or anything else like that), we are referring to it's possession of certain characteristics of the capitalist ideal type. When we are referring to it as imperfect capitalism, we are referring to the differences between the reality of the US and the concept. |