Just to clarify are you talking about the european left-right spectrum (big governement vs small governement)
Or the US left-right spectrum (societal liberal vs societal conservative)

Is the political spectrum a myth?

No.

Is the political spectrum a myth?

No. — ssu

well that it is an important way to view political things? Is that a myth?

do you agree that to the extent that the political spectrum is defined by the people who self identify with locations on it, that it is much less useful a way to view political thinking?

First, the "political compass" is a bit better to use:



It's not that it's a myth, but it's a bit oversimplistic, and people can tend to pigeonhole themselves to fit into a spectrum or compass, which isn't a good idea.

I think there are several Political stance and everyone is placed on a spectrum of all of them. (The middle being ether uncaring or thing both extremesides have good Ideas)


The political left just stands for radicals and right for keeping with the current traditional Ideological thought.

The idea of political right and left came from how France setup one of there government closer to the end of the revolution. Left being the people against monarchy, the right being those for monarchy.

yes, I remember on another forum a thread had a questionnaire that put one on that compass. There was one person who seemed very proud as to how far left, and libertarian he was, and I do really think he may have been answering some of the questions just to put him further on the chart in that way....not just for the questionnaire, but for his general view of himself..

To the extent that such people's views are fed back into the definition of 'left' and 'libertarian' to redefine those scales, the system is flawed.

I would say this person was perhaps a bit more authoritarian in reality, but there he was defining himself, and so the authoritarian scale system to some extent, as libertarian...

I think he was smart enough to realise this might be the case, and tailored his actions to be more libertarian due to this....rather than be the storming norman of the left. :D

It's not a myth, but like all such diagrams/maps/symbolic representations, it's a crass over-simplification. It helps you orient yourself and others, but it shouldn't be taken as an exact science or representation.

To me, the individual/society spectrum is the defining one in politics. But I don't argue with what else has been posted here. This could turn into a thoroughly worthwhile thread....

people can tend to pigeonhole themselves to fit into a spectrum or compass, which isn't a good idea. — Terrapin Station

Yeah, even with the compass "people can tend to pigeonhole themselves to fit into a spectrum or compass, which isn't a good idea," as I noted.

But the compass is a bit better than a simple left/right line. Not much better, maybe, but there's at least an additional metric to it. It would be nice if we could just give our views on various things without needing to categorize them, organize per the categories, etc.

do you agree that to the extent that the political spectrum is defined by the people who self identify with locations on it, that it is much less useful a way to view political thinking? — wax

That's a different question than is the spectrum a myth. I would put it this way: is the current political spectrum an useful tool to describe current politcal environment?

I'd say largely yes. Not at all times though. There can be issues that divide people in other ways just than the left and right. I think Terrapin Station's picture of more/less authoritarianism on the y-axis shows this quite well: are you authoritarian or not doesn't depend on the left/right divide.

Another thing is when some political agenda or objective is accepted universally, then the old way of dividing left and right doesn't work anymore… on that specific issue. This has to be remembered. From the origins of the term left and right (from the French revolution, if I remember correctly) many issues have been at least on some level universally been agreed to. Or a consensus has been reached and all sides have accepted the issue. For example, the agenda of classic liberalism in the 19th Century, eradication of the feudal remnants of the society of the ancien regime aristocracy with democratic systems. Then the success of the labour movement on legislation that is universally accepted labour laws in the West and third example is the success of suffragettes. These kind of advances have changed the current political spectrum from what earlier existed.

Hence let's say in one or two hundred years the current hot potatoes of politics might be quite different, yet I assume that the divide between left and right will remain. After all, the issue of wealth distribution has been there from the Ancient times. Just remember the Gracchi brothers from ancient Rome.

I believe there is a spectrum from libertarianism to authoritarianism. There is also a spectrum from anarchism to communism for economics.

But that would put communism on the far right where some put laissez faire capitalism on the far right. I think there is a spectrum for capitalism all its own.

It is interesting to me to consider a gap between self-identification and the desire to know how one's opinions relate to others. On the face of it, people who seriously identify themselves with one program or another don't care where they fall in any measure of comparison.

So is that the compass? People unconcerned with the measurement as opposed to those who are curious?

It is interesting to me to consider a gap between self-identification and the desire to know how one's opinions relate to others. — Valentinus

This assumes thinking in terms of an abstract relation, and there are billions of people who have difficulty thinking in the abstract.

Does the thought require so many people?
The self identified are invested in certainty.
The curious don't know what is happening.

The curious don't know what is happening. — Valentinus

I don’t know what is happening right now.

Me neither.

This test is mistaken in that you can only responsibly score a -9.49 on the libertarian/authoritarian scale due to two of the questions in the last section and the more obvious one on Astrology.

@thewonder, out!

It's mostly useless in the public sphere. Myth in the sense you've framed it ... not entirely, but probably mostly. It's just tribalism on a different level.

I think it is ridiculous to say you are anywhere in a multidimensional and highly complex abstract representation of 'political standing'. People will fall all over the map of of the political landscape depending on the subject matter.

The problem is that the individual is a different beast when put into a group of people. Depending on the group of people they will alter their stance one way or another.

In terms of psychological traits I'd say openness is something we should be looking to nurture in political discourse.

I should add. Don't forget that 'myths' are essentially how humans live their lives. Most people are happy to accept the existence of 'nations' and 'groups,' which are just our way of mapping the world more readily so we can attend to matter of more radical interest to us.

One thing is to say that many people don't understand the political spectrum correctly, so they may call themselves "libertarian" when they in fact may be a conservative, or else someone calls themselves a socialist but in actuality they are "mixed-economy capitalists" and other examples.

But that there is a spectrum is quite clear.