T the debate between “technologists” and “ideologists.” The former impute
the major dynamo of cultural change to material and technological developments,
which are then followed by adaptations in social organization and,
finally, in ideology. The latter see the ideological current-values, beliefs,
attitudes-as the fount of change. Redfield placed himself on the side of the
ideologists. Referring to Ogburn and to Childe as proponents of an interpretation
of history that holds “ideology as chiefly more or less adaptive to the
technical (economic) order,” Redfield believed, “it is the role of ideas in history
which demands consideration in revising the more materialist interpretation of
the broad outlines of human history” (1953: 75-6).