Political compass thread 3

People in the other thread seemed to be getting bogged down with discussing specific questions, so I thought I'd start a new one.

Looking at the admittedly incomplete data on the various charts at the political compass website, I was struck by the fact that one quadrant of the chart seems completely unrepresented by modern political leaders. This is, alas, the quadrant in which I found I belonged: the "left libertarian" grouping: those who believe in social liberalism and economic intervention.

Almost all European governments ended up on the economic right and towards the authoritarian end of the social scale. A few, such as the Danish and Dutch administrations, leant towards the libertarian right, ie, advocating both economic and social freedom, but none of these were very far into the libertarian sector. No European government is placed left-of-centre at all (although Sweden, even as presently governed by the more right-wing of the two main parties, comes close). However, outside Europe, the chart puts Robert Mugabe on the authoritarian left, and I assume other leaders in developing countries, such as Castro and some Middle Eastern rulers, would belong in the same quadrant.

So, we have governments in all quadrants except the left-libertarian. Certainly the current situation is anomalous by historical standards - for instance, the British Labour party in the 1970s was comfortably in the left-libertarian quadrant, whereas now it's way up in the right-authoritarian. So my question is basically - what has happened to social democracy? Why does left-libertarian sentiment no longer seem to have a viable place in political discourse?

It's an interesting question. Perhaps it's just that social liberalism has delivered its promises, and people now take its successes for granted, and instead focus heavily on minor flaws or mistakes in the implementation.

This is what basically happened in Holland in 2002, when the ruling Purple coalition (social democrats, conservative liberals, social liberals) was ousted due to the rise of the right-wing populist movement. The Purple coalition was a huge success, balancing the government budget, introducing liberal laws that improved freedom (gay marriage, cannabis decriminalization) and setting the conditions for massive economic growth (in the period 1994-2002 the economy grew 32%, state debt as a percentage of GDP dropped from about 60% to about 40% ). However, failure to address minor issues with immigrants cost it dearly and caused the conservative liberals, previously somewhat centrist, to move far to the right in an attempt to get back the right-populist vote.

Or maybe it's just a neverending cycle and we are about to face another counterculture movement... who knows?

Originally posted by KazetNagorra
It's an interesting question. Perhaps it's just that social liberalism has delivered its promises, and people now take its successes for granted, and instead focus heavily on minor flaws or mistakes in the implementation.

That's probably the case. I wonder if one of the successes of social democracy and liberalism is, precisely, that it creates a society where most people are reasonably prosperous and comfortable, and where there aren't big gaps between rich and poor. But the votes for a left-of-centre economic policy usually come from those who are relatively poor. So parties espousing left-wing economic policies may end up being victims of their own success, once redistribution has ensured that the majority are reasonably well off.

I also think the issue of time is relevant here. Most people like the generous state provision of health care, education, etc, provided by social democratic governments, but resent the tax burden needed to pay for it. Along comes a right-wing party and states that it can cut taxes and keep public services running smoothly - usually by making the service more efficient. Actually, the cuts in funding are going to impede the smooth running of the service, but only in the long run, because the investment has already been made and the service will continue to function smoothly for a while. So the right-wing government looks like it has fulfilled its promise.

A few years later, the service is beginning to show the strain, and the country no longer has top-notch health care. A left-wing party promises to correct the situation, but the only way they can do this is by raising taxes, which is unpopular. The electorate gives them a chance, and they start pumping tax money into public services. But because the service has suffered from years of underinvestment, it's going to take a while to turn the situation around. By the time of the next election, there's been little perceptible improvement, so the right comes back into power. When the benefits of the tax investment belatedly start to show, the right-wing government takes the credit for it.

Originally posted by Teinosuke
People in the other thread seemed to be getting bogged down with discussing specific questions, so I thought I'd start a new one.

Looking at the admittedly incomplete data on the various charts at the political compass website, I was struck by the fact that one quadrant of the chart seems completely unrepresented by modern political leaders. This is, al oes left-libertarian sentiment no longer seem to have a viable place in political discourse?

I'm working on a theory on that question and it's crystalizing more and more as the forum discusses the questions on the test.

My theory is two-pronged:

a) The questions are worded to tilt the reader towards the "liberal" side. The questions are worded so that the liberal side sounds more reasonable. Therefore, a conservative taking that test will probably test as a centrist, a centrist as a liberal and a liberal as a left wing tree-hugging nut.

b) Their estimate of where politicians stand based on their policies is misleading and probably off. It's not that they intentionally skew the results; it's that because the politicians are judged by concrete policies shoehorned into abstract ideas that are framed in a manner that skews the answers towards the liberal side. If politicians took that test, I can virtually guarantee you they'd place farther to the left of the spectrum than the are plotted by the site.

Just as an example, the first 4 questions on the site have all been discussed in the forum. For all 4, the discussion has gone heavily towards the liberal side. I've been fairly centrist on these questions and no one has argued the "conservative" side at all. Now, we know there's a conservative presence on this site. Where did it go in these discussions.

I don't care what the results say, I know I'm not far to the left of Barack Obama, John Edwards and all the mainstream Democratic American politicians.

One thing I was hoping to do by discussing the questions individually is to determine whether:

a) The forum discussion takes a heavier liberal tinge than we'd expect based on how well we know each other's philosophies; and

b) It really makes sense, as we go through it, to assume that Barack Obama, for example, is really a mainstream conservative.

Originally posted by sh76
I'm working on a theory on that question and it's crystalizing more and more as the forum discusses the questions on the test.

My theory is two-pronged:

a) The questions are worded to tilt the reader towards the "liberal" side. The questions are worded so that the liberal side sounds more reasonable. Therefore, a conservative taking that test will probabl ...[text shortened]... t, to assume that Barack Obama, for example, is really a mainstream conservative.

Perhaps it would be an interesting exercise, then, to try to word the same questions so that they favour a conservative view.

I didn't expect to land near Gandhi and the Dalai Lama! (Although I respect them both immensly.) So something a bit off could be going on, although I wouldn't be surprised if we are all a bit further to the left (than we think) when we think about individual issues.

Originally posted by HumeA
Perhaps it would be an interesting exercise, then, to try to word the same questions so that they favour a conservative view.

I didn't expect to land near Gandhi and the Dalai Lama! (Although I respect them both immensly.) So something a bit off could be going on, although I wouldn't be surprised if we are all a bit further to the left (than we think) when we think about individual issues.

I say let's reword them to be as neutral as we can get them.

Can someone post the questions on the thread?

Originally posted by eljefejesus
I say let's reword them to be as neutral as we can get them.

Can someone post the questions on the thread?

I'll admit that I suggested we try to put a right-wing tinge on them to see if it's even possible for some of them. 😛

If economic globalisation is inevitable, it should primarily serve humanity rather than the interests of trans-national corporations.

I'd always support my country, whether it was right or wrong.


No one chooses his or her country of birth, so it's foolish to be proud of it.

Our race has many superior qualities, compared with other races.

The enemy of my enemy is my friend.

Military action that defies international law is sometimes justified.

There is now a worrying fusion of information and entertainment.

People are ultimately divided more by class than by nationality.

Controlling inflation is more important than controlling unemployment.

Because corporations cannot be trusted to voluntarily protect the environment, they require regulation.

"from each according to his ability, to each according to his need" is a fundamentally good idea.

It's a sad reflection on our society that something as basic as drinking water is now a bottled, branded consumer product.

Land shouldn't be a commodity to be bought and sold.

It is regrettable that many personal fortunes are made by people who simply manipulate money and contribute nothing to their society.

Protectionism is sometimes necessary in trade.

The only social responsibility of a company should be to deliver a profit to its shareholders.

The rich are too highly taxed.

Those with the ability to pay should have the right to higher standards of medical care .

Governments should penalise businesses that mislead the public.

A genuine free market requires restrictions on the ability of predator multinationals to create monopolies.

The freer the market, the freer the people.




There's the first two pages... plenty more, though i don't have enough time atm.

Originally posted by sh76
I'm working on a theory on that question and it's crystalizing more and more as the forum discusses the questions on the test.

My theory is two-pronged:

a) The questions are worded to tilt the reader towards the "liberal" side. The questions are worded so that the liberal side sounds more reasonable.

b) Their estimate of where politicians stand based o ...[text shortened]... abstract ideas that are framed in a manner that skews the answers towards the liberal side.

You may have a point about a) - some of the questions which conservatives would have to answer Yes to are quite aggressively phrased, and this might make someone more reluctant to commit him or herself to the right-wing position than they would have done if the phrasing was more gentle.

But I'm not convinced about b), because it overlooks the fact that there has been a general rightward shift in recent years. If you look at the historical chart in the UK election section, you'll see that in 1972 we had the UK Labour part moderately to the left of centre and moderately in the libertarian corner, while the the UK Conservative Party was moderately to the right of centre and moderately authoritarian. So at that point in history, the two main British parties were basically equidistant from the centre. At that time you'd have had a somewhat more left-libertarian political spectrum in much of mainland Europe, and a somewhat more rightward spectrum in the US, so I don't see that the centre is necessary misplaced.

Originally posted by Teinosuke
People in the other thread seemed to be getting bogged down with discussing specific questions, so I thought I'd start a new one.

Looking at the admittedly incomplete data on the various charts at the political compass website, I was struck by the fact that one quadrant of the chart seems completely unrepresented by modern political leaders. This is, al ...[text shortened]... oes left-libertarian sentiment no longer seem to have a viable place in political discourse?

No kidding. I ripped this site into flash a couple years back.
Here's the original scoring xml file I had reverse engineered from the site.

http://www.4shared.com/file/116470858/38ea323e/questionBank.html

scoring (x,y)
where x = left/right and y = auth/lib

Can probably get the flash version working again. If you want to make your
own questions/scoring PM me.