If you follow political issues, you’ve probably come across references to “the left” and “the right.” These terms are used everywhere. But what do they actually mean? Do they capture systematic distinctions across time and space, or are they just arbitrary labels of convenience, perhaps overly simplistic? It can even be misleading.
Over the years, various attempts have been made to develop a systematic theory of left and right. Matt Yglesias, a prominent liberal political commentator, recently wrote an article arguing that the main difference is that the right supports religion and class, while the left is secular and egalitarian. Ta. He argues that this distinction unifies all or most left-right conflicts from the French Revolution to the present.
For several years, libertarian economist Brian Caplan (my colleague at George Mason University) has promoted his “simple theory of left and right.” He sums it up this way:
- The left is anti-market.
- The right is anti-left.
Both Iglesias and Caplan offer interesting insights, and I’m a big fan of their writing on a variety of other issues. Iglesias’ article is a useful overview and summary of numerous left-right conflicts. And Caplan’s position captures some real dynamics.
But ultimately, neither theory really works as a comprehensive classification system. Many movements do not fit or completely contradict his two theories.
First, let’s look at Iglesias’ theory of religion and hierarchy. If religion is right-wing, it is difficult to explain clearly left-wing religious movements like liberation theology, which combines Catholicism and Marxism. To make matters worse, the position of the mainstream Catholic Church is difficult to explain.
Pope Francis is socially conservative on issues such as abortion. But he also takes positions that are usually considered left-wing when it comes to economic regulation, immigrant rights, the welfare state, and environmental policy. Although the current pope has taken some of the Church’s “leftist” positions further than recent predecessors, the general idea of combining social conservatism with interventionist positions on economic issues is that the Catholic Church It’s something I’ve kept for a long time.
If your religion-focused left-right theory has significant difficulty explaining the leadership of the world’s largest religious denominations, that seems like a significant problem for the theory. And Catholicism isn’t the only sect that doesn’t fit this theory well. For example, many Protestant, Jewish, and Muslim movements are also anomalies in Iglesias’ framework.
The hierarchical aspect of this theory is also problematic. Consider the fact that communist regimes are characterized by strict hierarchical structures, with power concentrated in a small elite at the top of the ruling party. Does that make communist regimes “right wing”? So are their opponents necessarily leftists? What if they were conservatives or religious traditionalists like Alexander Solzhenitsyn? There seems to be a problem with the theory that Stalin and Mao were on the right and Solzhenitsyn on the left. At least, it’s highly counterintuitive.
Iglesias’ hierarchy also causes other anomalies. For example, he points out that Israeli citizens who are radical Muslims are considered leftists under this theory, perhaps because they oppose their country’s dominant hierarchy. If radical Islamists are considered leftists despite their extreme sexism, homophobia, intolerance, and rejection of secularism, that is yet another problem with this theory.
Caplan’s approach has its own problems. There is some truth to the idea that many right-wingers are above all “anti-leftists.” For example, right-wing Twitter influencers can appear to prioritize “owning the library” over all other objectives, including consistency with their previously professed values. . It is also true that many of those commonly thought of as leftists are deeply anti-market.
However, there are still problems with this theory. If the right’s main focus is anti-left, and the left is defined by its hatred of the market, you would expect the right to be very pro-market. In such a framework, being pro-market would be the most anti-left stance possible.
However, throughout history there have been many right-wing movements that are themselves highly anti-market. Consider, for example, the various nationalist movements from the Nazis to the fascists to today’s “national conservatives” in the United States.
Additionally, there are important right-wing movements that not only oppose the left but are primarily focused on their own agenda. That also applies to many of the nationalists mentioned above. That’s true of many religious social conservatives as well. These people, at least many of them, truly believe that abortion is murder or that same-sex marriage is likely to erode the foundations of Western civilization. If they are anti-left, it is because leftists support what they hate, not because being anti-left is their primary motive.
Kaplan’s left-wing concept also has its flaws. Some left-wing movements are actually defined by their hostility to markets. That’s certainly true of most types of socialism, for example. But some are prioritizing distinctly different issues, such as promoting racial and gender equality and strengthening bodily autonomy. Those who focus on the latter issue sometimes even advocate radical policies. reduction Government regulation of markets (e.g., similar to efforts to end the war on drugs, end immigration restrictions, etc.).
Kaplan or Iglesias, or both, could respond to my criticism by saying that they advocate a different use of “right” and “left” than is common today. If the correct theory of right and left concludes that communists are right-wing and radical Islamists are left-wing (at least in Israel), then we should get used to calling them that. However, such language revisionism is unlikely to succeed, and it is not clear what value it would have if it did.
As it turns out, I lean toward the discussion of Verlan Lewis and Hiram Lewis’ recent books. Myth of left and right, “left” and “right” are ultimately arbitrary classifications that are likely to refer to very different things at different times and places. For example, while today’s American right-wingers tend to oppose abortion, that was not the case for most European right-wingers, nor was it necessarily the case for their own predecessors in earlier periods of American history (e.g. (Ronald Reagan was elected governor of California in the late 1960s as a pro-choice candidate).
I still sometimes use the words “right” and “left.” Because it’s hard to avoid these terms. However, they do not seem to point to an underlying continuity across time and space that stretches back to his 18th century. At most, it refers to a concentration of positions on the political spectrum at a particular time and place. As that clustering changes (for example, the right-wing in the United States has become more hostile to free markets in recent years), the use of terminology also changes or begins to become confusing.
In contrast, there is deep continuity when it comes to more specific ideologies, such as socialism, libertarianism, liberalism, and nationalism. Today’s socialists have much in common with their 19th century predecessors, including advocating state control of the economy and economic egalitarianism. Today’s liberals have much in common with their predecessors like John Locke and Adam Smith (e.g., support for strong property rights and strict limits on government power over a wide range of issues). Libertarianism is just a branch of liberalism. And today’s liberal movement still has much in common with its Enlightenment roots (e.g., reliance on reason, skepticism of tradition, support for a variety of strong individual rights). Finally, today’s nationalists have much in common with the nationalists of 100 years ago, such as Nazis and fascists.
Advocates of libertarianism, socialism, liberalism, and nationalism in different countries also have important similarities. For example, socialists in many different societies support similar economic policies. Bernie Sanders’ positions on most economic issues are similar to those of the European Sanders. The same goes for libertarians. For example, much of the economic policy agenda of libertarian-leaning Argentine President Javier Millei is immediately recognizable to American liberals (myself included).
Clearly, there are notable internal disagreements among liberals, socialists, and adherents of certain other ideologies. However, they tend to be much narrower than those often found within the nebulous categories of “right” and “left.”
