By the early 1960's many social scientists assumed that the traditional political ideologies of the 19th century had lost their momentum in the advanced industrial societies of the West. Ernst topitsch argued that a new era in the history of mankind was about to begin in which politics would no longer be deter- mined by wholistic philosophies and meta-scientific ideologies. Carl Popper's famous book "The Open Society and its Enemies" appeared to have decided the case against the fundamentalist ideologies of the 19th century, in particular the varieties of Marxism once and for all. Daniel Bell heralded the "end of ideology". It appeared that in the democratic socie- ties of the West a general consensus had been reached about the principles of political rule; in future politi- cal and social problems ought to be open for solution by the rational technics of the empirical social sciences. "Piecemeal engineering", not wholesale reconstruction according to grand schemes or ideological blueprints seemed to be the order of the day. In the light of