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The latter view is expressed in the context from which I have just quoted. 27 Thus, what is expressed through the simile of the camera obscura assumes the significance of an inevitable occurrence in the life of society, for all the political struggles in the state are 'nothing but the illusory forms in which the real struggles between the various classes are conducted' (MEGA, v, 23). In the same work (The German Ideology), though in a different context, Marx and Engels again deviate from these unequivocal statements by saying that the more the normal form of relations [Verkehrsform] of society and therewith the conditions of the ruling class develop their contrast to the [more] advanced forces of production, the greater therefore the conflict becomes 27 MEGA, v, 20, the last italics are mine.

There can be no doubt that in Marx's view the basic error as much underlies as it conforms with other errors, and that all are likewise characteristic of 'the ideological standpoint'. Thus he uses the terminology of ideology qua illusory distortion or simply misconception, where he speaks of 'the pure semblance [Schein]' of 'the independence of money over and against circulation', when he discusses the errors of Bastiat and other economists, including those of Smith and Ricardo,38 or when he exposes the misconception of the true nature of exchange value {Grundrisse, p.

Marx did not use 'ideology* according to a uniform definition, and the term itself did not occupy a central position in his work. 10 But here again he and Engels made categorical assertions which in principle identified these and similar terms with thought that was distorted, because all socially relevant thought was dependent on economic and social conditions. In so far as Marx did make a distinction between distorted thought and thought conditioned by class and time but reflecting reality faithfully, he did so neither clearly nor consistently, as Max Weber was to do.