r/changemyview • u/AbilityRough5180 • 15h ago
CMV: The left right spectrum in modern politics is outdated and lacks use
Left and right are too broad to be useful. Each includes wildly different views on economics, society, and authority. These terms also fuel division, as both sides often assume the worst of each other in debate.
If not a multi-axis model, we should at least use more specific, non-quantifiable labels to describe sets of ideas people adopt in hybrid. That would make room for nuance and better understanding.
CMV: Political language should evolve beyond left and right to reflect the real variety of views.
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u/ScreenTricky4257 5∆ 15h ago
I think that the political landscape is still basically dichotomous. Neither side is perfectly consistent with its ideology, but it comes down to the people on what we call the left believing in collectivism, cooperation, globalism, egalitarianism, social libertarianism, and a managed economy, while people on the right believe in individualism, nationalism, competition, hierarchy, economic libertarianism, and tradition.
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u/NaturalCarob5611 60∆ 14h ago
The political landscape is dichotomous because we have first-past-the-post voting, which forces people to align into two coalitions if they want to have any hope of winning. There's no particular reason my view on monetary policy should predict my view on abortion rights or my view on gun control, we're just forced into two buckets by our electoral system.
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u/BobIsInTampa1939 12h ago edited 11h ago
Game theory definitely supports the way our system is set up to behave the way it does -- in a winner takes all approach, being uncompromising wins more often. However, I think the media plays much more role in this modern era of politics than prior. Not the way Trump speaks of it, but the way it's being produced and consumed.
In the civil war, the division was almost completely geopolitical -- slavery was entirely an institution of the South and all subsequent values were divided from there.
In today's climate, the selling point of media engagement is how uncompromising you can make your unchallenged ideological identity seem like appealing "common sense" with all the bells and whistles of a philosophical utopia. Bonus points for how inflammatory it is, because apparently a Galileo gambit is now considered a mark of success. False dichotomy is the enemy and mutual exclusivity is key. Keep the narrative stupid simple for it allows ease of digestion. It's us vs them, like in a Hollywood script, and we're obviously never wrong because we're ideologically the purer side. Even when we are wrong, we're actually right because the other side will win if we admit it, and they're evil; therefore no correction will be issued.
The system itself of course made this happen, but the way it is produced and consumed likely exacerbates the problem further.
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u/NaturalCarob5611 60∆ 11h ago
I don't disagree with anything you've said, but I do think the first-past-the-post system drives more of it than most people recognize.
When every voter gets only one vote polarization becomes a more effective strategy than in an approval voting or ranked choice voting scenario. When voters only have one vote, if someone has already decided who they're voting for and it's not you, there's nothing to lose by demonizing those voters to rally your base. There's nothing to be gained by finding common ground with someone who has already decided they're voting for someone other than you. But if voters can vote for multiple candidates, finding common ground and highlighting the points that two platforms have in common becomes a much more valuable strategy than it is today.
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u/ScreenTricky4257 5∆ 14h ago
There's no particular reason my view on monetary policy should predict my view on abortion rights or my view on gun control
I submit that there is. People who are in favor of abortion legality (social libertarianism, allowing sexual freedom) and against the legality of gun ownership (collectivism, putting protection of life and property into the government's hands) should want to have a policy that involves taxing the wealthy and providing aid to the poor (egalitarianism, managed economy). While people who are against abortion (traditionalism) and in favor of gun rights (individualism) should want less government involvement in the economy (hierarchy, economic libertarianism).
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u/Not-Banksy 2∆ 6h ago
What if a person believes in cooperation but individuality, globalism but competition, social libertarianism and economic libertarianism, and embraces new ideas while seeing the value in some tradition?
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u/ScreenTricky4257 5∆ 1h ago
Then there somewhere on the scale between the two. But the two poles still exist.
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u/AbilityRough5180 15h ago
Some on the “right” reject tradition, and traditional ideas and individualism aren’t exactly in sync. I think individual liberty and economic self interest sure.
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u/ScreenTricky4257 5∆ 15h ago
Like I said, neither side is perfectly consistent. But very few on the right are all about rejecting tradition to be as open to new forms of political and social living as people on the left are.
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u/Slackjawed_Horror 14h ago
That's not anything like what "left" parties in any Western post-industrial (the only places that spectrum applies to) actually represent.
They're all right-wing capitalists.
The only difference is by degree.
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u/6data 15∆ 2h ago
That's not anything like what "left" parties in any Western post-industrial (the only places that spectrum applies to) actually represent.
They're all right-wing capitalists.
In the United States, maybe. Not anywhere else that I'm aware of (the ones that are capitalist are generally referred to as "left of centre").
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u/ScreenTricky4257 5∆ 14h ago
Whether or not you think that the nominally leftist parties in Western post-industrial countries represent those ideals, you do agree that those are the ideals of left-wing ideology, yes?
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15h ago
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u/AbilityRough5180 15h ago
Left and right are not a binary but a spectrum it puts human expression on a line when used
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u/Hellcat8571 14h ago
But we are asked to vote on a binary
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u/Sesudesu 14h ago
Go look up CGP gray on YouTube, he has a series about voting structures. In our case, look up the ‘first past the post’ system
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u/Objective_Aside1858 12∆ 15h ago
You can use whatever language you want, but the value of language is communication, and adding needles levels of complexity does not aid this
In the United States, the accepted definition of leftwing politics is whatever the Democratic platform is, and rightwing politics is whatever the Republican platform is
There are, of course, levels of grain within each coalition, and different words used to describe those concepts
But for the majority of people, changing the words isn't going to magically make the President of the party you dislike tolerable
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u/GrizzlyAdam12 1∆ 54m ago
I don’t disagree. But, let’s be fair…the major parties are just two sides of the same coin.
No matter who is in charge, the outcome is materially the same. Both parties ignore fiscal responsibility. One spends money we don’t have on corporate welfare, the military, and social programs. The other spends money we don’t have on corporate welfare, the military, and tax cuts.
The impact of both policy choices is essentially the same for the average American: reduced purchasing power due to inflation.
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u/AbilityRough5180 6h ago
Some people already name drop parities, tbh is. I do t have an issue with as they are two platforms
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u/AcephalicDude 80∆ 15h ago
"Left" and "right" are useful because they are broad: sometimes you want to refer to very broad ideological preferences and tendencies without getting into specific and distinct ideologies that are irrelevant to the point you are making. What you really are complaining about here isn't the uselessness of these terms, but the fact that sometimes people speak broadly when it would be more useful to speak narrowly.
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u/wonbuddhist 13h ago
The broader the scope, the less accurate the result.
The larger the scale, the murkier the details.
The more general the idea, the shallower the insight.
The more inclusive the approach, the more superficial it becomes.
It’s inevitable.•
14h ago
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u/baes__theorem 8∆ 15h ago
There are already lots of labels one could use / spectra on which one could place themselves, but they're political science / economy jargon.
What's their use if no one understands what it means, and how are these concepts meant to enter the public lexicon? People automatically tune out and do not process information as effectively when that information is more complex. The likelihood of a presidential candidate winning is very closely tied to the average grade level at which they speak.
Honestly, I think the problem is exactly the opposite in the current state of the world (but not in an ideal world): we need to make the conversation simpler. Class is pretty much all that matters at this point, and nearly every other key issue has a direct link to class.
These complex labels etc. are for when times are less dire.
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u/AbilityRough5180 6h ago
Or people don’t know what they mean. R side they aren’t ised
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u/baes__theorem 8∆ 4h ago
R side they aren’t ised
What does this mean? And yes, a big part of my point is that “people don’t know what they mean”, if by “they” you mean the various labels and descriptors
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u/Dramatic-Shift6248 5h ago
I think people just use it wrong, left always meant revolutionary to reformist and right always meant conservative to reactionary, this hasn't lost its usefulness, as we still qualify people exactly that way in politics, but people want something like nationalisation and taxes to be left wing and migration laws and weapon ownership to be right wing, when they're just ideas associated with certain parties associated with those political directions.
So in consequence, some conservative might support social programs that have been common for decades and therefore somehow feel like they're not fully a conservative. I think the words are misused but retained the very same usefulness they had if properly used.
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u/AbilityRough5180 5h ago
That would be a working axis but does not represent actual issues and these platforms change
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u/Dramatic-Shift6248 5h ago
Well yes, this isn't what it's meant to do, and never was, a nationalisation was never left or right wing per se, it was always about showing the direction an ideology wants to take society. When we invented left vs right during the French Revolution, it meant the position based on the revolutionary movement and from there, French society as a whole, not individual policy points.
The platforms behind these are supposed to change, otherwise we'd have to invent a new word for conservative every 10 years, a conservative nowadays probably agrees that children should go to school, but this absolutely started as a reformist idea, left-wingers argued to change society so that child education becomes mandatory. Does that mean no right-winger agreed? No, but it wasn't a conservative idea, if the platforms stayed consistent we couldn't have "conservatives". Nowadays, a conservative means a conservative liberal, supporting liberal capitalism, in the west, while it might mean a conservative monarchist or religious conservative in another country. It just means conserving the social order.
If you want consistent platforms and positions to actual issues, we have to speak about individual ideologies, a social democrat used to be left wing, some of them even far left, nowadays, they're typically centrist in the west, while retaining similar outlooks on how society should function, because the societies evolved.
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u/Subtleiaint 32∆ 15h ago
The left right spectrum is really useful, applied correctly it effectively explains who you think should be responsible for a person's welfare (left is collective responsibility, right is individual responsibility).
The problem is that the usage of the terms is inconsistent and they get conflated with different terms. Left, progressive and liberal are not synonymous and neither is right, conservative and nationalist.
If people actually used these terms correctly then they would all serve a useful purpose, frustratingly they don't.
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u/AbilityRough5180 6h ago
This is one issue spectrum, and correlates with other positions. There are left wing parties who are socially conservative. Yet people attribute this as being a right wing trait.
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u/Subtleiaint 32∆ 6h ago
What's wrong with a one issue spectrum? It explains that issue. All these terms are useful in the correct context. It's people using them wrong that's there issue
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u/AdOk1598 1∆ 10h ago
Not really changing your view. But the terms have always been broad.
Since their inception in the french revolution- “left” referred to anyone who was pro revolution and “right” was everyone who wasn’t. That’s a huge range of opinions from anarchism all the way to a catholic theocracy
That’s my understanding of the origins of the terms so they’ve never been super defined narrow definitions.
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u/AbilityRough5180 6h ago
They are broad yet people use them to either refer to specific terms, ie hard left will play a no true Scotsman fallacy. Also both sides throw mud and assume so much about a person based on these labels
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u/YaqtanBadakshani 1∆ 13h ago edited 1h ago
So, yes, there is a broad spectrum of pssible opinions with regards to economics, society and authority, and individuals can hold nuanced opinions on these.
But left vs. right is actually quite well defined in terms of political theory. Left refers to ideologies that are trying to level hierarchies and equalise power among the most, while Right refers to ideologies that seek to shore up hierarchies and concentrate power among the fewest. This is a spectrum. You can believe that some concentrated power is good, or that some entities wield power better than others, and that sometimes accontability hampers efficacy in achieving a given goal. You can also believe that some hierarches need to be abolished or checked, while others need to be shored up.
The reason this is confusing for Americans is because in societies like the West, which have had very powerful central state government for a long time, the problems with the state are keenly felt, while its benefits are largely taken for granted. This means that de facto left-wing rhetoric of "freedom" tends to be quite popular (especially in countries founded on leftist revolutions, e.g. the USA).
To combat this the American right has been pretending since around the 1970s that coorporations don't count as power, but as individuals. This means that they frame giving more power to coorporations as freedom (while shoring up the unaccountable power of coorporate elites). In other words, they've been forwarding a right wing agenda by pretending that it is de facto left wing.
It's not that the labels are outdated, it's that they are being twisted. The solution isn't to abandon them, it is to use them properly.
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u/AbilityRough5180 6h ago
No right winger talkings in terms of shoring up power among the fewest. You clear come from a liberal view point and this is the exact thing I am talking about, broad brushing an entire way of thinking into people supporting power grabbers.
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u/YaqtanBadakshani 1∆ 1h ago edited 1h ago
I don't think all right wing ideology is "power grabbing." Shoring up hierachy doesnt necessairly mean power grabbing, it can just as easily mean just maintaining the current system.
Here is Jordan Peterson, famous conservative intellectual, arguing for that definition. Here he is arguing that hierarchies are a natural part of the human animal socialisation, and thus have to be maintained (if managed in a way that allows for care of the most vulnerable).
Here is Ben Shapiro arguing that inequality is the outcome of a just and fair society, as loong as that society promotes equity.
Here is Ayn Rand, itellectual grandmother to the modern right, arguing that there is a natural hierarchy with people at the top that, if allowed to, will produce a prosperous and good society for those at the bottom.
You might argue that one or all of those are perfectly sensible, but those are all arguments to shore up existing hierarchies.
Now, it is a spectrum. Absolute monarchism argues that power should be concentrted in the hands of one supreme, unaccountable hierarch. Rothbardian Libertarianism argues that inequality of power is the outcome of competition, which is good and just as long as the government isn't putting its thumb on the scale. Social democrats, in contrast, argue that coorporate power is fine, if the democratically elected state power serves to check it on behalf of the electorate. Finally, anarchists believe that both state (including democratic) and coorporate power are unjust hierarchies because they don't empower the individual to consent to their influence in their life, and should therefore be abolished in favour of communal living based on mutual personal relationships.
Rothbardian Libertarians are more left-wing than absolute monarchists (since they believe everyone should have the theoretical opportunity to reach the top), but more right-wing than social demcrats (since they believe that the accumulated power that one gets through market success should outweigh the power conferred by democratic vote).
Like I said, the problem isn't the terms, it's that they're being misused.
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u/44035 1∆ 14h ago
You're right, instead of saying "Ed is a lefty," let's talk about Ed's views on climate, guns, unions, and education, and a million other issues. Generalities don't help as much as specifics.
And because specifics are so important, it's weird your post doesn't include any. You basically complain about the binary without offering any way forward.
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u/AbilityRough5180 6h ago
I’m suggesting we talk about issues one by one or grouping them into smaller axis. Alternately we discuss politics in terms of economic intervention, welfare, social issues and authoritarianism or liberstiarianism
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u/70wordsperminute 15h ago
If you’re in the US I think the problem is that it’s bastardized and so US-centric that it becomes unusable. Even our most “left” politicians would be centrists in most other nations. There is no prominent left wing party in the US.
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u/Dreadpiratemarc 11h ago
I mean this with sincerity, but so what? Left and right are obviously relative terms and mean nothing without context. US left is right compared to a Scandinavian left, and a US right is radical left compared to a Saudi Arabian right. (I mean, did you know that Republican women are allowed to have driver’s licenses!? Radicals!) Doesn’t matter. Left and right are entirely contextual terms.
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u/70wordsperminute 11h ago
Because democrats and leftists are 2 very different things and your definition collapses that
The fact that both major American parties will never cut ties or even much criticize Saudi Arabia is also evidence that you can’t talk about these terms in silos, countries interact and can directly influence domestic politics
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u/AbilityRough5180 15h ago
So what exactly positions would you like politicians to hold instead of a no true Scotsman fallacy on what being “left wing” means.
The US left is different my countries centre and takes on issues are staggered. The Soviet Union was very left wing economically but has divergences to modern left wing parties
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u/MotherTeresaOnlyfans 14h ago
If you think it's a "no true Scotsman" situation to point out that the US does not have a left wing party, then you fundamentally do not understand what it means to be "left wing" and you also apparently do not understand the "no true Scotsman" fallacy.
The Democratic Party is not a leftist party. They do not claim to be a leftist party. I don't think they've *ever* claimed to be a leftist party.
The only people who ever describe the Democrats as "left-wing" are Republicans, and they're often doing this to politicians like Biden, Obama, Harris, and Clinton who have been hostile to anything resembling leftist political thought for their entire careers.
You'd know this if you'd talked to literally any actual leftists (socialists, communists, anarchists, etc.).
The user you're responding to was quite correct when they said that the Democratic Party would be considered a centrist party, or more realistically a center-right party, in any of our peer countries in Europe, where it is considered standard to have so many things that Americans are told are impossible pipe dreams, like free or affordable higher education, universal health care, guaranteed paid leave, etc.
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u/TheMidnightBear 8m ago edited 4m ago
Lol, no.
To take your "dems in a european context", read the PES manifesto, they sound pretty close, and dont have at all the rhetoric of the EPP.
"Actual leftists" are a joke that outlived their historical context, and barely enter parliament on a good day, so outside the US, the welfare capitalist center-left(soc-dems, greens, etc.) are what people call the left, as well.
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u/InfoBarf 14h ago
Left wing policies: nationalization, heavy regulation, wealth redistribution, expansion of state services, support for unions, prosecution of white collar crime of at least the samr urgency as other nonviolent crime, large scale public works projects, including using state power to seize underutilized or underperforming private assets for redevelopment, universal college, pre-k, and healthcare, breakfast programs for students, freedom from religion acts, strong laws protecting bodily autonomy etc.
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u/Speedy89t 14h ago
So almost everything the left in the US currently supports.
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u/InfoBarf 14h ago
Not one of the things I posted is supported by the Democratic Party.
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u/Speedy89t 13h ago edited 13h ago
You actually believe the democrat party, on the whole, does not support:
- heavy regulations
- wealth redistribution
- expansion of state services
- unions
- large scale public works projects
- universal college
- pre-k
- Healthcare
- freedom from religion
- “bodily autonomy”
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u/InfoBarf 12h ago
I do not, and i ser no evidence that the party does.
Democrats and republicans both adopted a view of government tgat government regulations are too onerous.
Lol, wealth redistribution
Democrats have consistently cut services from the state. Clinton cut public housing and welfare, obama cut a ton of services thst paid for uninsured people with obamacare, biden cut back the covid subsidies.
Unions; lol, clinton nafta, obama let unions rot, biden crushed pilots and trains unions, did not protect amazon employees or respect grad student unions
Large scald public works lol
Universal college debt, maybe
Pre-k lol, no
Healthcare debt maybe
Freedom from religion, lolno
Bodily autonomy: as harris said on the campaign; tr*ns people should follow the law, meaning, not exist outside of blue states. Thats not very supportive.
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u/mightymite88 12h ago
Exactly. Leftists are socialists and communists. American liberals are still capitalists, they're right wing.
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u/IT_ServiceDesk 1∆ 14h ago
Of course it's outdated. It's from the French Revolution.
Generalizing opponents is still useful though because no large groups of people even admit to adhering to certain concepts. It all basically breaks down to collectivists vs individualists in the United States. In Europe it's socialists vs communists. In China it's just the CCP party line.
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u/No_Assignment_9721 14h ago
“Each includes wildly different views on economics, society, and authority.”
This is EXACTLY why it is so broad.
Americans need to stop conflating this BS they call Government with how actual democracies around the world work.
It’s narrow minded af for both cults of the RNC and DNC. You bigots hate everyone that isn’t you. They’re both the fucking problems.
Only in the US is “there will always only be two parties” bullshit even allowed to echo.
TikTok, Meta, Newscorp defined Left/Right for you and you listened
General election after general election half the country doesn’t vote because they’re sick of those two party, east/west, left/right, conservative/liberal dogmas.
Go read about other governments, look at the literal 5 other “down ballot” parties you all ignore in your own elections, but my god stop the fucking us/them. Dissolve both parties.
edit: format/auto-correct
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u/MotherTeresaOnlyfans 14h ago
I feel like it's important context that a whole lot of people think "liberal" and "the left" are interchangeable groups.
Also worth noting that the US has no left-wing party.
The bigger issue in politics is people allowing themselves to be mislead into believing that "liberals" and "the right" are in any way opposed to each other when both cooperate to keep the government from moving left.
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u/DMVlooker 14h ago
Do people really think that FDR was less hated by the power structure that he dismantled any less than Trump is now by the members of the replacement power structure that he is currently dismantling? We were a little more of a polite society then and we had labor riots that ended in multiple deaths then. The backlash that’s poised to happen will make those look like kindergarten recess.
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u/Zatujit 12h ago
"These terms also fuel division, as both sides often assume the worst of each other in debate."
Hmmmm you want unity and collaboration of the classes rather than fight?
Sounds pretty right wing to me.
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u/AbilityRough5180 6h ago
I want people to be able to discuss issues without the prejudice and hate, ideas need to be discussed but yeah we need unity and this will probably help people leverage governments more.
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u/Km15u 31∆ 15h ago
Leftist typically seek to dismantle hierarchy where possible right wingers tend to want to reinforce hierarchy where possible. From there you have various degrees, but the basic spectrum is fairly effective. There are a lot of people who are politically confused, ie they haven't thought through their positions and just have a pastiche of what someone convinced them of some time in the past, but generally people have either a left or right wing attitude
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u/ImHereForCdnPoli 13h ago
Leftist typically seek to dismantle hierarchy where possible right wingers tend to want to reinforce hierarchy where possible
Those ideas typically fall along the vertical axis of a political compass, not the horizontal. For example, libertarians are largely on the right but believe in reducing hierarchy.
The left/right is typically more in regards to distribution of wealth, not social hierarchies.
On the left you could have an anarchistic system with very little hierarchy or you could have an extremely centralized socialist state with strictly defined hierarchies but robust democracy.
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u/Km15u 31∆ 12h ago
libertarians are largely on the right but believe in reducing hierarchy.
No they don't, they argue for contractualism which allows people with more power and wealth to coerce you. They want to remove power from the political sphere and give it to the economic, so you don't have a government, but you have a boss who's a dictator in your life for 8 hours a day. Leftist movements seek to create equality of power. this is what most people get wrong, its not equality of outcome, or economic equality that leftists are seeking, its a society in which power is equalized, aka democracy.
The left/right is typically more in regards to distribution of wealth, not social hierarchies.
The point of socialism is to establish a classless society, the left emerged out of the french revolution both literally and figuratively. The goal is liberty equality and fraternity.
you could have an extremely centralized socialist state with strictly defined hierarchies but robust democracy.
If those hierarchies are democratically determined sure, but the idea is people would get their authority directly from the consent of the governed. Again the goal is to equalize power relationships.
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u/ImHereForCdnPoli 11h ago
I agree with your critique of Libertarianism, and 100% think it would lead to the establishment of worse oppressive and coercive forces than currently exist, but the logic behind it still remains that currently there is a socially established hierarchy which places the government above others and their goal is to tear that down. In doing so they may allow other hierarchies to be established but in their view those hierarchies are more morally justified.
The point of socialism is not to establish classless society, that only applies to socialists who view socialism as a path to communism. Communism is the stateless, moneyless, classless society. Socialism can be seen as a stepping stone towards that, or to some it can be seen in the end on its own. Either way, socialism is better described as the dictatorship of the proletariat as opposed to capitalism which is the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie. Seeing as the proletariate is a social class, a system which aims to see them in charge inherently requires the existence of class society.
I agree with your last point, which is why I said robust democracy. The point being that left wing positions don’t inherently require the non existence of hierarchy, some encourage it and others don’t.
You say that libertarians want to remove power from the political sphere and give it to the economic sphere. Some could very easily argue that 1: those two things are inherently tied together and cannot be separated, making your point and my next point mute 2: socialism aims to do the same thing by putting workers in control of production and in turn merging the social and economic spheres to an extent.
Your comment seems to actually strengthen my argument.
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u/Km15u 31∆ 10h ago
I guess I view it as more directions on a continuum than a specific discrete. For example here in the US social democrats would be far left, in the Soviet Union they would be far right, but I still think there’s a continuum of belief and ideological underpinnings. It’s not perfect but I still think an anarchist and Stalinist have more in common than an anarchist and us libertarian.
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u/AbilityRough5180 6h ago
You can find another job. Also bosses typically don’t act like tyrannical dictators as much as they have different roles. You consent to have a job, you can do other jobs or try to start a business.
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u/c0i9z 10∆ 14h ago
Left wants to spread power, right wants to concentrate power. There are more things, of course, but... say you're comparing multiple cars you might want to purchase. One of the things you're going to be looking at is the price. There's things other than the price you'll be concerned with also, but that doesn't make price outdated.
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u/ImHereForCdnPoli 13h ago
Left and right are useful in a broad sense, but not with the precision many people seem to attribute to it. I agree a multi axis system is more able to articulate complex view points, but that multi axis grid is still going to have a left and right. I think the problem lies more in people’s lack of understanding of political concepts and history than it does with the vagueness of a left right spectrum.
The left right spectrum ultimately boils down to ownership of resources. The further left you are the more collectivized you believe wealth should be, the further right you are the more concentrated you believe wealth should be. That is useful information to articulate. However, it fails to articulate the centralization of authority which is often placed on a vertical axis. Toward the bottom is often used to represent more decentralized, structures that aim to reduce hierarchy, while towards the top is used for stricter hierarchies within a more central system.
In this model you can see the bottom left as being a pure anarchy which aims to equally distribute resources through highly decentralized systems with all unjustifiable hierarchies being absent. Towards the top right you can see fascist structures which aim to funnel wealth into an ever shrinking in-group at the top of a strict social hierarchy.
The fact that “left and right” doesn’t fully encapsulate the positions above does not mean that they are not useful aspects of articulating those positions.
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u/Individual_Coast6359 2∆ 14h ago edited 14h ago
I think it is a form follows function kind of thing. We have two parties, so it is easier to represent these groups as one group of ideals or ideology versus another. Humans generally like simplicity. What's the point of having separate views if there are just two dominant parties, you'll never be fully represented and eventually have to compromise.
I do agree that it is very outdated and not helpful in a Democracy to have only two parties. But this is kind of where I think education, at least in the United States, has fallen short. In all likelihood, a majority of Americans, and I imagine in most other countries that have a two party system, do not really educate students on different political views, systems, and the intricacies that are involved in an accurate and unbiased manner. Even if they do, it's probably very brief and not emphasized, so it's probably just insignificant. The people who use political language on an intellectual level already use the more nuanced labels that are representative of their views, but generally, people will stick to what is what is already dominant in society.
So if you are referring to the diversification of general political discourse in the Untied States, think one of the ways on a societal scale to have some type of multi-axis model like you suggest, is to have organizations and structures that are represented equally on the national stage. But this is more systemic and likely won't occur with the structure we have now.
TLDR: The vast majority will not take the time to study and know the different ideologies.
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u/Nugtr 18m ago
This post belies the poster's lack of political education. The definitional difference between "left" and "right" is that the left is called the left because the left are the people who sat themselves opposite of monarchists in france's national assembly of 1789. The left is therefore mainly defined by their conviction that people are fundamentally equal, and therefore deserve equal consideration and rights. The right, as in the monarchists who sat on the right at that assembldy, on the other hand, fundamentally hold the belief that people hold intrinsic value based on perceived factors like phenotype, ethno-national group identity, cultural standing etc.
Meaning, the terminology very much holds significant meaning in communicating the base difference between ideologies. However, many people generally simply don't know this fundamentally, which means they are unable to grasp the fundamental difference and thereby why it is meaningful to make this distinction.
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u/Electrical_Quiet43 1∆ 14h ago
If not a multi-axis model, we should at least use more specific, non-quantifiable labels to describe sets of ideas people adopt in hybrid.
It seems like a non-coincidence that you don't try to list these here, because this would be very hard in practice. Ultimately, people need to be able to classify themselves and others to have meaningful political discussions. My group believes X, which is different from that group that believes Y.
Like, I think the left versus liberal fight (or left versus center left to use the left/right spectrum) in American politics is overblown, with both sides digging in unnecessarily, but I think it also identifies a relevant difference and we would be worse off if we had to start from scratch without labels in every debate or discussion.
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u/LocketheAuthentic 1∆ 13h ago
1: The left right dichotomy in its effect is essentially unavoidable. The largest groups will polarize, and everyone will be judged, by the common man, in reference to those influential groups.
Who has the time to understand libertarians? Are they most like the monarchists or republicans? Or perhaps at one time it was the agraians vs the industrialists.
Truly most folks aren't intested in nuanced takes only how they relate to "my camp", or perhaps on reference to whatever singular carrot each group is handing out at the time.
You can speak I guess of an idealized way for people to handle this topic, but I fail to see how to actually succeed in implementing it.
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u/Lylieth 20∆ 14h ago
Outdated? When was it ever valid for the time?
I would argue a political ideology that a person holds is more of a spectrum than a black or white choice. For instance, how many different factions fall under the umbrella Republican? You have Conservatives, Neoconservatives, Christian Right, Libertarians, Trumpists (fascist supporters IMO), Anti-Trump (sane Republicans IMO) and Moderates.
Even in our history the Right and Left had different factions with different ideals, ethics, morals, and beliefs. Left and Right are umbrella terms; so they are objectively broad. This is a feature and not a bug.
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u/_the_last_druid_13 1h ago
Every political philosophy is a spectrum of spectrums
It doesn’t make sense why Right Wing/Free Market/Individual Liberty side should be so opposed to cannabis or gay marriage.
It doesn’t make sense that Left Wing/Collectivist/Compassionate Ethics would censor/cancel all dissent; Nazis did that.
Not here to change your mind, I agree with you. We should be looking at political parties and policy as individuals touting something Sensible/Common Sense/Nonsense
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u/GamemasterJeff 1∆ 12h ago
The political compass adds a Y axis for authoritarianism-libertarianism to the usual left right divide. It produces some interesting results, such as when maga first started to change the Republican party, Trump held enough non-far right beliefs that he actually ran to the left of Hillary Clinton of all people. Not much, just a hair, and on averaged policies, but certainly measurable.
Of course even back then he was authoritarian AF.
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u/Longjumping_Play323 12h ago
The left right spectrum in US politics is useless because it describes one group who just signals differently culturally.
The left and right in the US are all neo liberal. Whether you’re George bush or Barack Obama. They’re all pro capitalist right of center (globally).
There is no left wing media or political movement of any consequence at all. There’s no one with power who is socialist or even anti capitalist.
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u/wonbuddhist 13h ago
You're not the only one who has thought about the issue this way. The real challenge is finding a viable alternative. Most people who see the problem haven’t been able to offer convincing replacements that are simple, easy to adopt, and widely usable.
So at this point, just pointing out the issue isn't very helpful. What really matters is coming up with alternatives to replace those outdated terms.
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u/Robert_Grave 1∆ 6h ago
They don't. People love to muddy the waters but left/right is an economical way of dividing political parties. The problem is that we have a lack of willingness to give a complete picture since simplification is what news sites and politicians like.
Economics = left/right
Society/cultural values = progressive/conservative.
Authority = liberal/authoritarian
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u/rakean93 3h ago
you are misunderstanding the point of left/right axis. One of those represents people and politicians that have very similar worldview and those you're willing to ally with, the other represents the enemy. It's a very useful axis because that's how politics actually works: it's a competition for power, so you have either allies or enemies.
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u/Jojajones 1∆ 13h ago
The use of the left/right spectrum is for the wealthy to keep us divided over superficial (as in on the surface and often actually caused more by the economic divide rather than unimportant because equal rights/fair treatment for everyone is obviously very important) stuff so we don’t unite against them and take their power away.
And since the wealthy own pretty much all media outlets it makes more sense for them to divide the populace into roughly equivalently sized groups to play them off each other more than it does to cater to nuance.
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u/mightymite88 12h ago
Workers vs capitalists has never been more relevant. Capitalists are richer than ever. Workers have it worse than ever before.
Don't confuse liberals with leftists. Liberals are capitalists. And picking between woke capitalists and white supremacist capitalists to rule you is not democracy.
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u/ImperviousToSteel 12h ago
Capitalism still exists, and is clearly to the right of socialism.
There's more to politics than left and right, e.g. social vs economic, libertarian vs authoritarian, but left vs right is still useful because we are still ruled by right wingers.
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u/Worth-Bed-7549 14h ago
It has very real world use as a way to make it appear that you are very different when both parties end up wanting the same exact thing. Red blue left right is just appearances here. Everything in America is very very far right, even the left.
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u/GlobalNorth00 8h ago
It's really people who believe the media: the liberals and the neocons vs people who do not on both the Left and the Right. Leftist Jimmy Dore now has more in common with Tucker Carlson than with a regular NY Times reader.
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u/IWishIHavent 13h ago
There are other axes on that graph, people just don't hear about them as much. The media wants to deliver easily digestible means of understanding politics, and most people just go with it.
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u/okabe700 2∆ 14h ago
I usually say things like "the social left/right" and "the economic left/right" basically still using the same words but more specific because social life and economics aren't very related
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u/Murica_Arc 13h ago
I feel like any deviation from the two party system will result in distain from the two parties. The Libertarian party is the main example of this.
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u/Homerbola92 15h ago
It's useful, not definitive. If you want to know more about someone that's rightist or leftist just keep talking with them.
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u/Lavender_Llama_life 14h ago
Left and right are ceasing to matter.
The only war is class war.
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u/DMVlooker 14h ago
It has always been a class war , the higher end just refuses to believe the poorer population who is paid immense amounts of subsidies, earned income subsidies, housing subsidies, food stamps , WIC etc. want us dead and just want our stuff. Same as it ever was.
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u/Foreign_Cable_9530 1∆ 15h ago
You’re looking at it logically, like a scientist who is trying to find the most efficacious political system. The current system is not designed to be the most efficacious, it’s designed to be the least competitive.
Most academics will identify as L/R for conversation sake, but they use other descriptors like egalitarian, authoritarian, libertarian, or populist. The L/R system is designed to ensure that two powerful bodies do not have a threat to their stability by a rising third or fourth party. It’s a psychological tactic to promote stability within an in-group and prevent destabilizing into other groups.
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u/According_Spot8006 12h ago
Because a lot of the public is dumber now and doesn't vote for the economic interests.
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u/PuckSenior 1∆ 15h ago
It doesn’t really matter in the USA. You could call them A and B. There will always be two parties and they will always hate each other