4 ms·

Confession: I only just realized over the past few years. I had always thought that authoritarians were a right phenomenon.

incompatible 5y ago
It depends how you see "left" and "right". I see the left as promoting equality, and generally freedom, and the right justifying or increasing inequality. An authoritarian system by definition gives far more power to some people than others, which is an idea of the right. However, systems of government in practice are generally not strictly left or right, and you get the likes of the Soviet Union which gave some degree of economic equality but little equality in terms of power.
- throwawaythekey 5y ago
  Left to me feels more pro fairness but anti freedom. Either way though in most conceptualizations libertarianism/authoritarianism is usually separated from left/right https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Political_Compass_standard_model.svg https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Political_Compass_stand...
  - incompatible 5y ago
    It depends what freedoms you are talking about. In a communist system you wouldn't have the freedom to own somebody else's house and charge them rent, for example. It's interesting how we throw around concepts like "left" and "right", or "liberal" and "conservative", either not understanding what they mean, or having many different understandings. I'm puzzled about how we manage to communicate at all, but maybe we don't.
    - 3np 5y ago
      Specifically "liberal" has very different implications in NA vs Europe.
      - incompatible 5y ago
        I'm a bit vague about how exactly it's used in different places. In Australia, it's the name of one of the major political parties, and it's considered a moderately "right wing" party. There was the classic 19th century liberalism, and its modern version neoliberalism. I guess the Liberal Party in Australia has some similarities to the Conservative Party in the UK.
- base698 5y ago
  Chaos and order is another scale for left and right.
- 3np 5y ago
  > freedom I think this word should be banned from such comparisons. Equal outcome can equal opportunity and different takes on what matters. Right-wing libertarianism tends to be the most "pure technical freedom" for the individual but tends to lead to little practical freedom for those without significant capital. You could rightfully argue that the far end of either in its pure form is the meaningful flavor of "freedom". Authoritarianism is orthogonal to that, in either case.

incompatible 5y ago

It depends how you see "left" and "right". I see the left as promoting equality, and generally freedom, and the right justifying or increasing inequality. An authoritarian system by definition gives far more power to some people than others, which is an idea of the right. However, systems of government in practice are generally not strictly left or right, and you get the likes of the Soviet Union which gave some degree of economic equality but little equality in terms of power.

throwawaythekey 5y ago
Left to me feels more pro fairness but anti freedom. Either way though in most conceptualizations libertarianism/authoritarianism is usually separated from left/right https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Political_Compass_standard_model.svg https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Political_Compass_stand...
- incompatible 5y ago
  It depends what freedoms you are talking about. In a communist system you wouldn't have the freedom to own somebody else's house and charge them rent, for example. It's interesting how we throw around concepts like "left" and "right", or "liberal" and "conservative", either not understanding what they mean, or having many different understandings. I'm puzzled about how we manage to communicate at all, but maybe we don't.
  - 3np 5y ago
    Specifically "liberal" has very different implications in NA vs Europe.
    - incompatible 5y ago
      I'm a bit vague about how exactly it's used in different places. In Australia, it's the name of one of the major political parties, and it's considered a moderately "right wing" party. There was the classic 19th century liberalism, and its modern version neoliberalism. I guess the Liberal Party in Australia has some similarities to the Conservative Party in the UK.
base698 5y ago
Chaos and order is another scale for left and right.
3np 5y ago
> freedom I think this word should be banned from such comparisons. Equal outcome can equal opportunity and different takes on what matters. Right-wing libertarianism tends to be the most "pure technical freedom" for the individual but tends to lead to little practical freedom for those without significant capital. You could rightfully argue that the far end of either in its pure form is the meaningful flavor of "freedom". Authoritarianism is orthogonal to that, in either case.