WHEN IT COMES to comparing two countries and two occasionally divergent historiographical traditions, the notions of “ideology” and “civic ideal” raise some considerations. In Germany, until the reunification of 1990, two separate scientific systems used different terminology. In the former DDR (German Democratic Republic or East Germany), on the basis of Marxist theories, theoretical concepts such as class struggle were used, though often rejected or criticized by historians from the former BRD (German Federal Republic or West Germany). The very notion of ideology was linked to this context and its use and definition underwent several changes.

The sociologist Raymond Boudon begins his book on ideology with the observation that “the definitions of the term are very variable from one author to another and the explanations call for heteroclite principles” and that “all in all, it gives the impression that the same word is used to describe a multitude of phenomena.” According to Boudon, sociologists like Max Weber or Emile Durkheim appear to have carefully avoided this notion. For German historiography, Max Weber's book on the western city exerted an important influence and prompted a whole series of works following its reception. According to the Dictionnaire de l’Académie française of 1878, ideology is “the science of ideas” (la science des idées): “a system explaining the origin and formation of ideas” (un système sur l’origine et la formation des idées). As such, the notion was invented by Antoine-Louis-Claude Destutt de Tracy (1754–1836). For him, “this science can be called ‘ideology’ if we only pay attention to the subject, ‘general grammar’ if we only consider the means, and ‘logic’ if we only consider the goal. Whatever name is given to it, it necessarily contains these three parts.” Under the influence of Napoleon I, ideology quickly became a notion of combat with negative connotations. In a speech given in December 1812, during a reception at the Conseil d’État he said: