I’m pretty old and I’ve seen a massive shift to the right over the last 40 years, so what might seem leftist to others seems rightist to me. So most people might call The Guardian ‘hard left’ but that is only the case because of the shift. Likewise the Right media have been engaged in screaming, shouting and name calling for over 40 years and people have become habituated to it and obviously don’t even notice it any more. The Guardian can occasionally engage in similar abuse and it seems to be a terrible shock to people who have been reveling in it the other way around.
Let me try to express the current spectrum relating it to the realities of 50 years ago
FAR RIGHT:
Support for established hierarchy, power and wealth, until the far right take over, in which case the hierarchy is The Party. They deliberately use, or encourage, violence to persecute relatively powerless people who disagree with them, or who they think inferior such as gays, people of the wrong religion, people of the wrong race. Women are baby making machines no more. The far right are nationalist, sexist, racist and militaristic; raising hatred and anger against particular social groups is fundamental to their strategy – discussion between groups has to be hindered or stopped. Seeking enemies is what they need to generate loyalty. The party aims to become a militia and violence is naturalised, but blamed on others. Any election which does not deliver the “right” result is clearly faked up by the evil left. Eventually elections must either give the “right” result or be abandoned. Science is abandoned. ‘Truth’ is whatever helps the party to gain support. The death of people to support the comfort of the hierarchy is something they can easily live with.
When I was young, the far right was anathema to both mainstream right and left. We remembered the Nazis and the violence of Fascism in Italy and Spain – indeed Spain was still fascist. Nowadays this dislike, and the reasons for it, has been forgotten and the Republicans are moving into the far right with significant success, and some people in Australia clearly want to follow them.
RIGHT:
The right supports the established hierarchy. In modern terms they support the corporate hierarchy, whatever they might say to the contrary. People exist to serve the market and their employers, and the workers should be persecuted and the wealthy nannied. Education exists to provide jobs. Universities should become profit centres, not centres for investigation. Any thought which differs from this should shut up.
Current examples:
- Robodebt which penalises unemployed people who took temporary work (which you would have thought might be praised), and nanny big businesses who were paid Jobkeeper and did not need it but kept it.
- If there is a country and farmers party then farmers are always sacrificed to mining, or other corporate, interests.
- Freeloading pollution by business is good. Environmental protection that actually does anything, bad.
- Any science (or thinking ) that might hamper corporate profits must be wrong, exaggerated, or biased by leftism.
- Try to shield business from public anger; such as avoid Royal Commissions into banking for as long as possible, and then ignore most of the recommendations when it is found corruption is normal. Corruption is just the free market in action.
- Talk about liberty, but always mean the liberty of the wealthy, everyone else has to suck it.
- Be prepared to embrace a far right attack on a minority if it looks like it will be electorally pleasing and take votes away from the far-right and give those votes to the Right.
Currently moving into far right territory. This is the current position of the Coalition and Murdoch Empire, although Murdoch gives lots of space to the far right as well.
RIGHT LEANING:
Think of providing bandages and medicines for those who fail in the capitalist system, or to repair the damage done by capitalism, but otherwise leave the system alone. Try to be relatively humane, and occasionally mention social mobility as a good thing, and help it happen. Think you can control climate change AND sell coal and gas, because it might be inconvenient to do otherwise.
Current Position of the ALP. Old position of the Coalition. Sydney Morning Herald in the past, although steadily moving rightwards
CENTERIST:
Take positions from Right Leaning and Left Leaning
LEFT LEANING
Admit capitalism and The Market do not always work. Provide bandages for capitalist damage. Increase the power and security of workers, so they have decent jobs, conditions and income. Aim for a functioning social security system. Encourage education to be about learning for life, with free and open thinking untacked by the government, and aware that sometimes academics are a bit batty, but that is kind of interesting. Social mobility is recognised as vital to getting new ideas and approaches and avoiding stultification. Prosecute corporate corruption, and social damage generated by corporate behaviour. Worry about ecological destruction and climate change. Encourage green consumerism, and environmental protection that goes a little beyond “isn’t it sad that iconic animals are dying out”. Recognise you cannot solve the climate problem by selling fossil fuels no matter how profitable. Hope renewable energy will solve the problems with a little just transitions theory. Think science is the best guide we have to reality.
The Guardian, in general, with the exception of one or two writers who would never be published in the mainstream media. Most Greens.
LEFT:
The Capitalist system might be the best we have, but it is inherently destructive and raddled with contradictions. The Left is actively critical of the way the system works. Left to itself capitalism will destroy society completely. Everyone should have equal power and representation. Workers should have input into the businesses they work for, rather than be treated as obedient machines. Workers know what they are doing, often better than management does. Government only exists to protect all the people, and to open the hierarchies. It may be necessary to nationalise industries in the public good, especially if they form “natural monopolies” (such as energy or water) or if they are needed for life, as competition can run down natural resources: It may be necessary to set up State run businesses as public services to compete with commercial businesses to guarantee competition and end normal crony capitalism. In the past this included things like the Commonwealth Bank, Telecom, ABC, etc. This will not be popular with business, because they don’t like real competition and non-corruption as it lowers profits. The left believes that we should severely prosecute corporate corruption and non-competitive behaviour, as we are relying on its absence for the system to work. They may also try to avoid situations in which incompetent or corrupt corporate heads get payouts on dismissal which could keep many workers in jobs for years. The aim is to mitigate and reform capitalism to such an extent it becomes a democratic system responsible to the will of the people, and not intrinsically destructive. Aim to change the delivery of harms into the delivery of goods. This was the post-war ALP until somewhere in the Hawke and Keating reign, and parts of the doctrine used to be received favourably by the mainstream right – partly because of the real fear of worker based revolution.
Nowadays, some Greens, some old people, and very small parties run out of bedrooms 🙂
FAR LEFT
Capitalism is inherently corrupt and destructive. It must be overthrown, and its supporters given the choice of re-education and taking real work, or being put against the wall and shot. Given capitalism is inherently violent against workers and steals the products of their labour and ingenuity, violence is justified in its overthrow. Because the new state will be threatened by overseas capital (which is always the case) then the State will temporarily be a dictatorship of the proletariat, until it is established, and strong enough to resist these external threats. The aim is complete liberty for all, not just for capitalist elites, but this always fails because of the chaos produced by revolution coupled with attacks from outside.
Most people used to think the Extreme left was well intentioned, but unable to perceive the effects of their actions. There is hardly any of this movement remaining.
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My personal politics is more or less old fashioned left conservatism; we should not abandon the checks and balances which grew to moderate capitalism and protect ordinary people, together with an appreciation of the dangers of inherited hierarchy and well intentioned radical disruption.
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