Alright folks, today I'm going to talk about the left-right axis and how a lot of people use it wrong. I'm going to try and keep my personal political opinions (which I doubt many people are unsure about) out of this, and just talk about generally-accepted political theory that you might find, say, on the Wikipedia info panels for political parties. I'm also going to mainly focus on people in the United States for reasons that will become obvious.
The Left-Right AxisIn the US, people are generally used to the following line of thinking.
- There are two political parties, the Democrats and Republicans.
- They're on opposite sides of the political spectrum.
- The Democrats are liberals, the Republicans are conservatives.
- The far-left is communist and the far right is fascist.
- Moderates are in the middle.
Left Center Right
Communism <- ████████████████████████████████████████ -> Fascism
Democrats Moderates Republicans
While this makes sense, it's also totally wrong. To see why, we're going to have to look at a broader range of views, such as what might be seen in a typical European parliament. The largest parties tend to be liberal, conservative, and social-democratic parties (usually named as such, although you'll find terribly named parties everywhere, such as a few so-called "liberal" parties that are actually far-right), but you'll also find a smattering of socialist parties, communist parties, right-wing populists, and very occasionally, fascists. They tend to be laid out like this:
Far Left Left Center L Center Center R Right Far Right
██████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████
Communists SocDems Conservatives Fascists
Socialists Liberals Reactionaries
That's a lot more nuanced than the US view, isn't it? You may also have noticed that the colors are backwards. It's actually long-established political tradition that conservatives are represented in blue, liberals in yellow, and socialists in red -
here's a picture from
1757 showing conservatives and liberals (Tories and Whigs, at the time) in the UK. Socialists, of course, came about later, but the color red still dates back to the 1800s. The United States, as it is with many things, is different for no apparent reason. In fact, the common associations with red and blue states only came about in the election of 2000! Anyway, libertarians in the audience are probably screaming right now about how they're not represented. I'll get to that in a second with the political compass, but first, we need to define some...
Terms that you've probably been using wrong!Made possible by Wikipedia!- Liberalism is a political philosophy or worldview founded on ideas of liberty and equality. In centuries previous, it referred to a strong belief in free trade, the free market, and civil liberties such as freedom of speech and religion. That form is still alive today as classical liberalism. A more modern variant, social liberalism, retains and extends the beliefs in civil liberties, but is more cautious about the free market.
- Libertarianism is a more extreme revival of classical liberalism, and puts very heavy emphasis on liberty and free markets. Many go so far as to advocate anarcho-capitalism - the absence of a state, allowing society to be governed by the market.
- Conservatism as a political and social philosophy promotes retaining traditional social institutions in the context of culture and civilization. In other words, conservatives generally want to maintain the status quo and focus on tradition, stability, and often, religion. It also takes several forms depending on economic stance, with some conservatives supporting the free market (as classical liberals do) and others desiring protectionism.
- Reactionism is basically conservatism, but more extreme (not necessarily in a bad way, mind you). Rather than supporting the status quo - things as they are - they support the status quo ante, or a return to how things were. Many of those who label themselves conservatives might actually be reactionaries, although quite a few people take offense to being labelled reactionary.
- Progressivism is a philosophy based on the idea of progress, which asserts that advancements in science, technology, the economy, and society are necessary or beneficial. In practice, progressives tend to be social democrats, social liberals, or democratic socialists.
- Socialism is a range of economic and social systems characterized by social ownership and democratic control of the means of production,and as the political ideologies, theories, and movements that aim to establish them. That leaves a lot of room for interpretation, and socialism is a very diverse ideology with very fuzzy lines. Revolutionary socialism is the belief that socialism must be established via force and revolution, while evolutionary or democratic socialism is the belief that it can be achieved via democratic elections. It has anarchist forms, such as anarcho-syndicalism, as well as forms with a state. Theorists debate endlessly on whether social democracy and communism "count" as socialism, and you're not getting an answer out of me. However, please stop calling anyone that looks even mildly leftist a "socialist." Obama is not a socialist.
- Communism is the philosophical, social, political, and economic ideology and movement whose ultimate goal is the establishment of the communist society, which is a socioeconomic order structured upon the common ownership of the means of production and the absence of social classes, money, and the state. "Wait, what?," I hear you say, "but the Soviet Union was authoritarian - it definitely had a state!" And you're right! It was. What's important to note is that communism is the persuit of a communist society, and that persuit very well might involve a strong state. Or it might not - anarcho-communism exists, too! They key point is that a communist society has never actually been achieved, and the Soviet Union achieved at best state capitalism, while China is nowhere even close.
- Social Democracy (or Labor) occupies the fuzzy border between socialism and social liberalism, and is a strong force in Europe and Canada. Basically, social democrats respect and support social liberty, and generally support the capitalist market system. However, they desire a social safety net, a government that actively intervenes in the economy on behalf of the people to oppose corporations, and strong welfare systems. This is NOT to be confused with democratic socialism, which advocates for a socialist (not a capitalist) economy. Bernie Sanders was not a socialist. He was a social democrat.
- Anarchism refers to any ideology or belief that opposes the existence of a state. How they expect crimes to be prevented and roads to be maintained is beyond me, but it's actually a very diverse group that spans from the far-left (anarcho-communism) to the far-right (anarcho-capitalism).
- Nationalism in most contexts refers to a belief that your nation is superior than others and that it should be free from outside influence; it generally opposes globalism and multiculturalism, while supporting militarism. It can be found on both the left and right, although in the West it's more common on the right.
- Authoritarianism is a form of government characterized by strong central power and limited political freedoms. Individual freedoms are subordinate to the state and there is no constitutional accountability under an authoritarian regime. Totalitarianism is authoritarianism on steroids. There is no limit on state authority, and seeks to regulate wherever possible.
- Fascism is a extremely nationalist and authoritarian ideology that supports a very strong military and a centralized, autocratic state. Economically, fascist regimes may support the free market, or they may support government intervention for social good (or their definition of it, anyway). Generally characterized as far-right.
That was a lot of words, and I hope you read all of it. Now, look back at the second left-right axis. Doesn't it seem woefully inadequate? It's way better than the first one, but the far right doesn't distinguish between fascism and anarcho-capitalism, while the far left doesn't distinguish between Stalinism and anarcho-communism. Stay tuned for
Part 2 where I'll cover:
- The Political Compass
- Better ways of organizing ideologies
- The American Left, or rather the absence thereof
- The fact that Bernie Sanders passes as "socialist" in the US, despite being more of a social democrat, is evidence of this.
- Also, SJWs are not "far left." They're just liberals with a stick up their ass.
And because I know someone will probably say this: I didn't write this to make myself look centrist. Even in the actual version of the political axis, I'd still be left-wing or center-left; being in the center doesn't make you correct.
