Our left-vs.-right conception of politics was born in revolutionary France. The maps that followed were more sophisticated, but each carries a bias of its own.
Excellent! Clearly most labels used by politicos are rather useless and malleable.....and perhaps that is for the best because total rigidity makes for toxic politics. In the USA, our horrific primary system coupled with gerrymandering actually makes such distinctions even less useful; indeed, old fashioned racial and class voting supersedes any ideology. NIMBYism knows no ideology. Too bad the USA does not offer more political options and choices to reflect your interesting delineation. Proportional voting is all well and good so long as minimal thresholds are used to get a seat.
A great primer that should be reviewed by every politician and discussed in every civics course! People have no idea what the implications of the 'left-right' stratification means. The electorate is trying to navigate the issues, without knowing the political doctrine that underpins each stratum.
My first dean had a response to such labeling and referential practices. He would say: I don't care what you call any of this junk, just name it Fred and get on with the actual issues.
Frank — your line about the map revealing as much as the territory kept turning over after I closed the tab. I'd push it one step further. "Left" and "right" aren't descriptions of politics. They're a reflex — something a collective body learned in 1789, for sorting safe from threat fast. Reflexes survive because they once worked. They keep firing long after the threat has left the room.
The 2016 cross-over voters weren't confused by the spectrum. Their bodies were trying to exit a map that had stopped describing what they felt.
We do the same thing in smaller rooms every day, with the people we live with. Most of what we call "their personality" is a gesture their body learned when no one came.
Thanks for the great read. I wrote about the origins of the left right divide, and suggested that it was an unconscious reflection of the two basic ways we see the world, ie, from either the left or right hemisphere of the brain. All the charts you depict are the product of the left hemisphere, and your assessment of them indicates a right hemisphere seeking of context and wholeness. You are correct to remark that none of them have a place for more organic styles of governance....probably because they are so rare! It got me thinking about a new kind of governance chart, one that might exist one thousand years from now, showing how all governments based on a Living Systems Framework match up on scales that measure decentralization, heart, left and right hemisphere balance in decision making, circular economies, immune system inspired security apparatus, circulatory system inspired transportation sector, and so on.
I'm French, well acquainted to the origin of this single dimensional spectrum.
Yet another axis, perpendicular to the Left-Right is brewing in Europe, as it closely resembles one that was established by the USA: a Federalist vs. Confederate axis, one that better than Left Right, described the formation of the USA and led to the US civil war which forged the USA (singular).
I wish we had a Madison and Hamiltons in the EU. As of todays we only hear, increasingly the modern Patrick Henrys, Jeffersons, and othe George Masons, except far more mediocre copies.
It will take a real, life threatening crisis, think Putin or his stooge , China( unlikely) or , God forbids the USA, under a Trump cum Hegseth/Vance chimera, to force the welding of a union that looks like the (1781) Confederation , with a weak central government, with no power to tax, no standing army, no real executive, and a requirement of unanimous consent from all 13, no, far worse, 27 states to amend anything.
It was barely functional then, its EU embodiment is barely functional today. I just hope we don't need yet another internal war like like the Civil War ( aka the war of Secession in France, perhaps in Europe, as "Civil War" carries a political agenda, e.g. we were one, which "we", the Americans that is, weren't really) . I am, we are European and many other identities stacked and imbedded.
Funny thing. In HS and college (early to mid 1960s I don't remember hearing "right" or "left" distinctions that much. I never knew what they were supposed to mean. It seems like they are suddenly much more important to people. Trying to assign labels to people and ideas never has seemed particularly productive to me. Same with name calling.
“Observing how Communists and Nazis had frequently collaborated in the early 1930s to undermine Germany’s liberal center” yep its too bad no one wants to learn from history bc history is apparently propaganda 🤡
oh dear Latin. Sinister for left, dexter for right. The bias predates every political map by centuries. What the French Revolution did in 1789 was not invent the prejudice, it just gave it a parliamentary address. Every left-right debate since has been conducted with language that was never neutral to begin with.
I propose a different discernment of homo politicus. Rather than figuring out which nuance of social or fiscal policy one supports, let's focus on something that does or does not represent a threat to freedom:
Man is a social animal; there's no Mowgli, raised by wolves.
If we're not socialized by two or three, we never acquire language or functional identity.
The tension then is the power of the individual versus the group.
Cultivation demanded both China and Egypt have strong central authority.
England across the Channel, and her offspring taming North America, both developed highly independent folks.
The real danger today? A government that offers everything will always demand everything in return.
De Tocqueville had similar thoughts about when "the people vote themselves money..."
Excellent! Clearly most labels used by politicos are rather useless and malleable.....and perhaps that is for the best because total rigidity makes for toxic politics. In the USA, our horrific primary system coupled with gerrymandering actually makes such distinctions even less useful; indeed, old fashioned racial and class voting supersedes any ideology. NIMBYism knows no ideology. Too bad the USA does not offer more political options and choices to reflect your interesting delineation. Proportional voting is all well and good so long as minimal thresholds are used to get a seat.
A great primer that should be reviewed by every politician and discussed in every civics course! People have no idea what the implications of the 'left-right' stratification means. The electorate is trying to navigate the issues, without knowing the political doctrine that underpins each stratum.
My first dean had a response to such labeling and referential practices. He would say: I don't care what you call any of this junk, just name it Fred and get on with the actual issues.
One of my pet peeves: there is no "left vs right". Only practical and sensible or impractical and non-sensible.
Frank — your line about the map revealing as much as the territory kept turning over after I closed the tab. I'd push it one step further. "Left" and "right" aren't descriptions of politics. They're a reflex — something a collective body learned in 1789, for sorting safe from threat fast. Reflexes survive because they once worked. They keep firing long after the threat has left the room.
The 2016 cross-over voters weren't confused by the spectrum. Their bodies were trying to exit a map that had stopped describing what they felt.
We do the same thing in smaller rooms every day, with the people we live with. Most of what we call "their personality" is a gesture their body learned when no one came.
Thanks for the great read. I wrote about the origins of the left right divide, and suggested that it was an unconscious reflection of the two basic ways we see the world, ie, from either the left or right hemisphere of the brain. All the charts you depict are the product of the left hemisphere, and your assessment of them indicates a right hemisphere seeking of context and wholeness. You are correct to remark that none of them have a place for more organic styles of governance....probably because they are so rare! It got me thinking about a new kind of governance chart, one that might exist one thousand years from now, showing how all governments based on a Living Systems Framework match up on scales that measure decentralization, heart, left and right hemisphere balance in decision making, circular economies, immune system inspired security apparatus, circulatory system inspired transportation sector, and so on.
Many thanks!!
For what little it is worth, I consider myself to be a social libertarian and a economic liberal.
I'm French, well acquainted to the origin of this single dimensional spectrum.
Yet another axis, perpendicular to the Left-Right is brewing in Europe, as it closely resembles one that was established by the USA: a Federalist vs. Confederate axis, one that better than Left Right, described the formation of the USA and led to the US civil war which forged the USA (singular).
I wish we had a Madison and Hamiltons in the EU. As of todays we only hear, increasingly the modern Patrick Henrys, Jeffersons, and othe George Masons, except far more mediocre copies.
It will take a real, life threatening crisis, think Putin or his stooge , China( unlikely) or , God forbids the USA, under a Trump cum Hegseth/Vance chimera, to force the welding of a union that looks like the (1781) Confederation , with a weak central government, with no power to tax, no standing army, no real executive, and a requirement of unanimous consent from all 13, no, far worse, 27 states to amend anything.
It was barely functional then, its EU embodiment is barely functional today. I just hope we don't need yet another internal war like like the Civil War ( aka the war of Secession in France, perhaps in Europe, as "Civil War" carries a political agenda, e.g. we were one, which "we", the Americans that is, weren't really) . I am, we are European and many other identities stacked and imbedded.
Funny thing. In HS and college (early to mid 1960s I don't remember hearing "right" or "left" distinctions that much. I never knew what they were supposed to mean. It seems like they are suddenly much more important to people. Trying to assign labels to people and ideas never has seemed particularly productive to me. Same with name calling.
No, blame mysticism which is the cause of that false dichotomy of evil colectivism.
“Observing how Communists and Nazis had frequently collaborated in the early 1930s to undermine Germany’s liberal center” yep its too bad no one wants to learn from history bc history is apparently propaganda 🤡
oh dear Latin. Sinister for left, dexter for right. The bias predates every political map by centuries. What the French Revolution did in 1789 was not invent the prejudice, it just gave it a parliamentary address. Every left-right debate since has been conducted with language that was never neutral to begin with.
There is no right, there is only far left and slightly less far left.
Essentially “Communist” Socialists like Obama vs “Fascist” Socialists, like Trump.
I propose a different discernment of homo politicus. Rather than figuring out which nuance of social or fiscal policy one supports, let's focus on something that does or does not represent a threat to freedom:
https://jonathanblake.substack.com/p/how-should-we-define-homo-politicus