But it is also one that illustrates an expanding ideological consensus on the need to address poverty, disease, famine and conflict in Africa - as well as the remaining gulf between left and right about how best to do it.
Becher (1978) denied that a general ideological consensus about educational ends is 'necessary in theory'; in practice he believed that teachers can, and do, negotiate a working consensus, usually framed in terms of basic minima.
This approach has been backed up by a much broader ideological consensus about higher education, which has gone almost unchallenged for more than a decade.
A two-party democracy cannot provide stable and effective government unless there is a large measure of ideological consensus among its citizens.
He tried to present himself as a leader-reformer, a state-builder and nation-builder by developing and modernizing the country's socio-economic infrastructure, achieving political stability, economic opportunities and ideological consensus.
As he wanted to create ideological consensus and national unity, Assad advocated a dynamic regional policy while opposing Zionism and imperialism.
If Democrats are doing less infighting, it isn't because they've reached some sort of ideological consensus.
The ayatollah's fatwa however created what, in retrospect, seems an extraordinary ideological consensus among the largely secularized Western intelligentsia.
Evacuation thus shows us that the ideological consensus of wartime, so stressed by Titmuss and some historians, was something of a myth.
This is no surprise given the ideological consensus among the main political parties that only the market can deliver, which underpins the privatisation-and-job-cuts agenda that is causing so much damage to public services and our communities.