One legacy of that original "correct"
understanding is a third peculiarity that makes our systems different from
other modern dictatorships: it commands an incomparably more precise, logically
structured, generally comprehensible and, in essence, extremely flexible
ideology that, in its elaborateness and completeness, is almost a secularized
religion. It of fears a ready answer to any question whatsoever; it can
scarcely be accepted only in part, and accepting it has profound implications
for human life. In an era when metaphysical and existential certainties are in
a state of crisis, when people are being uprooted and alienated and are losing
their sense of what this world means, this ideology inevitably has a certain
hypnotic charm. To wandering humankind it offers an immediately available home:
all one has to do is accept it, and suddenly everything becomes clear once
more, life takes on new meaning, and all mysteries, unanswered questions,
anxiety, and loneliness vanish. Of course, one pays dearly for this low-rent
home: the price is abdication of one’s own reason, conscience, and
responsibility, for an essential aspect of this ideology is the consignment of
reason and conscience to a higher authority. The principle involved here is
that the center of power is identical with the center of truth. (In our case, the
connection with Byzantine theocracy is direct: the highest secular authority is
identical with the highest spiritual authority.) It is true of course that, all
this aside, ideology no longer has any great influence on people, at least
within our bloc (with the possible exception of Russia, where the serf
mentality, with its blind, fatalistic respect for rulers and its automatic
acceptance of all their claims, is still dominant and combined with a
superpower patriotism which traditionally places the interests of empire higher
than the interests of humanity). But this is not important, because ideology
plays its role in our system very well (an issue to which I will return)
precisely because it is what it is.
Havel, Vaclav: The Power of the Powerless. In “Living in
Truth”. London, Boston: faber and faber, 1986. The document could be downloaded from:
