The Most Sublime Object of Ideology: Reworking Government's Sublime Object

The source of governmental power is the Zizekian sublime object of ideology. This object is composed of demands that are enforced by a force that is vast and powerful beyond comprehension. It is the Lacanian Symbolic Order enforced by the fear of castration by the Other. The evolution of government is characterized by the use of more subversive power mechanisms. The more subversive these mechanisms, the more they resemble the Symbolic Order and the greater their effectiveness. Marx outlines a progression of governmental structures. At each point of change, there is great unrest amongst the population. In this way, unrest and protest are indicative of a need for the change i.e., protest is a symptom of a system in need of revolution. There is a growing sense of unrest, particularly in the United States, characterized by growing participation in protest movements. The government is oftentimes responding with violence, a sign that the rules of its sublime object are failing to do their job. Thus, there must be a substitution for the current sublime object. Existentialist humanism seems to be the best substitution available because it promotes the safe release of instinctual drives while still promoting social cohesion. Humanism values all parts of the human condition and recognizes that human shortcomings are simply a fact of life. Recognition of peoples' tendency to fail and to later overcome these failures is a failsafe built into the new sublime object, thus preserving civil society in a way that religion or neo-liberal ideas cannot.