The model linked to below was developed by me to represent the "common-sense" view of political space. Its basis is (an admittedly limited amount of) empirical research, apart from the positioning of "Anarchism" which is my attempt to place us on the diagram. More explanation can be found at: http://www.geocities.com/athens/agora/3199/newmodelexplanation.html
If this diagram excites interest (in my view it should) then I have considerably more to say about its use an relevance. (Incidentally I did try to put the diagram on this post, but somehow didn't manage....)
Mar 26 2007 03:15
Mar 26 2007 12:41
i understand what you're going for, but i think labelling the poles with the names of particular ideologies (and, rather, how these terms are used commonly, rather than precisely) is a bit of a bad idea, and will, i think, only create illusions about these ideologies or strengthen already existing illusions. in the case of Anarchism, people will get the idea that Anarchism is basically a mix of Socialism and Capitalism... ick. i dont think i need to go into the problems with that.
are you familiar with this thing?
http://www.politicalcompass.org/analysis2
it's fairly similar to what you're doing here, but... not meaning to be discouraging, but i believe it to be a bit more sensible, especially as the two axes aren't named after political ideologies. subsequently, it gives a clear idea of where Anarchism actually comes from (combination of equality with liberty), not to mention where other ideologies lay, and shatters the confusion created by the traditional left-right political spectrum which puts all sorts of oddities right beside one another. i dont think it's completely perfect (especially the test they use to see where you lay on that graph - i definitely think a fair number of the questions ought not to even be on there). well, there are a number of things i object/semi-object to on that political compass, but the idea is nonetheless a good one - just needs tweaking. and, subsequently, i might say the same about your model.
Mar 27 2007 00:45
The political compass test (as opposed to just the axis) fails because it assumes the existance of a state - if you try to answer questions on an anarchist/anti-state basis, your answers will simply shift you towards free-market capitalism (ie - in any question that asks if the state should intervene, it expects yes = welfare/socialist, no = capitalist. so if you answer no, because the state shouldn't exist, you get pushed towards capitalist). The axis itself however I don't think is too bad, if you're into that sort of thing.
As for your axis, Jeremy, to call Capitalism the "maximum point of freedom" is bizarre - "freedom" perhaps for a limited few, but certainly not for the vast majority.
Mar 27 2007 03:06
Thanks for the discussion so far. I get the feeling from the comments so far that people have not looked at the Model very closely, that is only natural. But it really is worth a few minutes to have a good look and think; I well know that it appears "obviously wrong" in some parts but I'm claiming that that is because it is productive of new insight
Feighnt, I was familiar with I suppose the original of the political compass thing, Christie and Meltzer's political square in the Floodgates. C & M's square was good, and has an interesting relationship to my New Model, but still I think projected out of the mind from a partisan position. The New Model was based on talking to people and trying to find out what they meant. The common use of a term is as "precise" as any other, no expert owns the language. I came up with 5 basic terms which people used to describe political systems ( "dictatorship" is an alternative to "fascism" but not a separate basic term) Anarchism surprise surprise was not one of those terms, nor was it easily described in relation to them. That is one of the problems of Anarhist propaganda........and probably one of the problems of clear thinking amongst Anarchists.
The political compass itself is I think too abstract to be of much use, and treats the political terms"left" amd "right" as primary concepts which they most certainly are not. You may be shocked if you ask around to discover how many people are utterly confused as to what "left" and "right" are supposed to mean. If you try explaining you may find yourself in difficulties. ....unless you have the help of the New Model! It is a virtue of the New Model that it is revealing, it makes clear stuff that wasn't clear before. Like "left" and "right" for example.
Asher, if you look at my notes to the Model, you will see that I explain that "freedom" is intended in strictly liberal sense; that is, the sense rejected by Bakunin and the early Anarchists. Have you never, on a picket line, been told by the scabs tha tyou are restricting thier "freedom"? Well, so you are. Having said that, if you look at the notes to the New Model you will see that Capitalism is at he extreme point of "freedom" only in terms of a static radius of possibility. "Capitalism" here means free market "libertarian" capitalism, as one moves "right" around the circle one moves closer to Fascism.
My placing of Anarchism in effect defines Anarchism as the project of continually expanding both freedom and equality; and thus even in the liberal sense of freedom it can claim to be freer than Capitlalism.
Enough for the moment, I do hope discussion continues. In all modesty the New Model is worth it, some years of thought has gone into it.
Mar 27 2007 07:36
Also, Feignt, it is a misunderstanding to think that the New Model shows Anarchism as a "mixture of socialism and capitalism". Strictly the New Model doesn't show Anarchism at all, that is Anarchism's problem. The position of Anarchism as shown in the diagram is my own suggestion, while the rest of the diagram was based on work with informants.
Rather it shows Democracy at the optimum point of "freedom" and "equality", given the present radius of possibility. It lies between Socialism and Capitalism; but Democracy I found was a basic political term, not a "mixture" of anything; one might as well say that Capitalism is a mixture of Democracy and Fascism. Anarchism is shown at the optimum point of freedom and equality but at a point farther out, beyond the present radius of possibility.
And I think that is right. Our task is to extend the radius of possibility.
It is, incidentally, a conventional wisdom that 'freedom" and 'equality", are opposites; and that the "right" tends to freedom while the "left" tends to equality. Yet that conventional wisodom falls dwon when it is reflected that fascism with its alck of freedom is of the right; while Soviet-style cCommunism with its nomenklatura is of the left. Anarchists often try to argue that there is no contradiction between freedom and equality but that also seems to flya gainst the most common experience.
The New Model reconciles all these contradictions on the basis that "freedom" and "equality" are not opposites but they are rather In tension..
Really it is a graphic elaboration of Bakunin's saying that "freedom without equality is exploitation, equality without freedom is tyranny".
I'm going to have another go at bringing up the image:
Mar 27 2007 08:34
hi again.
it's true that most of my criticisms were... fairly cosmetic. i did look over it with a little bit of detail, though, and while i objected to the "capitalism" etc thing, i understood that what you meant by "capitalism" was simply the farthest reaches of liberty, and that you used it due to how regular people tend to use the word. in many ways, what i didnt understand was particularly *why* you were using the common (and far from precise, or completely accurate) usage of these words, but i think i'm starting to get it a bit better. i had figured you used those words simply to try to explain where different political trends lay in relation to one another, in a way which a regular, unpoliticized joe or jane would understand reasonably well. but, if that were the aim, i figured it'd be a poor educational tool, as it would only perpetuate incorrect views about these terms - and then, to use Anarchism in a more accurate meaning (rather than the common meaning, ie "chaos") seemed to just add greater confusion.
but i'm getting the impression that i may have been wrong about this interpretation, and that your graph is not so much a tool to explain ideologies to a regular fellow, but to graph out the *mind* of the regular, unpoliticized person? which is why, of course, Anarchism is off the map - because the concept of Anarchism is simply so far from the mind of most people, it's not even thought about, or if it is, it's not taken seriously (treated as fantasy; might as well talk about "Heaven" or "Hell" as an ideological position). originally, i was... pretty resistant to the idea of putting Anarchism off the map, as, honestly, i thought it was an example of a conceited Anarchist - "my ideology is so special, it BREAKS the whole thing!" (even if there are *some* grounds for people saying that, even with the traditional political compass, i dont think there's enough genuine reason, and it seems like more of an ego boost than anything). so, anyway, though... is this idea the one you were going for? if so, sorry for not cluing in earlier - it does seem like an interesting way to look at it.
for the record, i do share similar objections to the "right/left" axis on the political compass - i just reconciled that by forcing it to make proper sense, as meaning "economically egalitarian (left) or economically elitist (right)," roughly said. i also think that site shouldnt have stuff like women's rights, gay rights, religious questions, etc put into the "authoritarian/libertarian" axis - i think that simply muddles things up, and, the simple fact is, you can have people who are otherwise very libertarian, politically, who nonetheless have really reactionary social views (homophobic, sexist, racist, etc etc). and, for that matter, you can have someone who is very authoritarian, who nonetheless accepts sexual freedom, equality of the sexes, equality of races, and all that jazz.
(and, as for the test they use, what Asher said is one of the big problems, i agree - and it's really ridiculous, because the people who wrote the test were obviously familiar with actual Anarchism, you'd think they could've been a little more precise in their wording of questions).
as a little last note... what's this talk about the political compass having roots in a "political square" by meltzer and christie? i'd not heard of that before - dont suppose there's anything about that online that you know of?
Mar 28 2007 04:58
Hi Feighnt, yeah
Quote:
to graph out the *mind* of the regular, unpoliticized person
was my original purpose, I was doing an honours thesis in linguistics when I did the research it is based on,
"The Semantics of Political Terms", you get the idea. Although the graph doesn't necessarily have to exist fully blown in one persons head, I was working with the idea of "cryptotypes", structured non-obvious semantic patterns existing in a speech community. (A simple example is to ask people the difference between a "road" and a "street".....often you'll get lots of characterisitcs like a road is probably longer, less likely to be sealed , a street is more likely to be in town etc before getting to the underlying difference)
Is the New Model just meant to be psychological, or does it represent some kind of more objective reality as well? A good question on which I am ambivalent but of limited immediate practical importance, because its psychological reality iin the heads of a lot of people makes it socially real as well.
The Christie and Meltzer square was first printed in the Floodgates of Anarchy. It had a "collectivist/individualist dimension" "the way we work"; and a libertarian/authoritarian dimension "the way we live"
This yielded a square from memory like so:
State socialism.................... Fabianism..........................Fascism
Democratic socialism....................................................Conservatism
Anarchism ...........................Liberalism .......................Capitalist Individualism
State socialism is at the Authoritarian-Collectivist corner; Fascism at the Authoritarian-Individualist corner,
Anarchism at the Libertarain-Collectivist corner, Capitalist indvidiualism at the Libertarian-Individualist corner
"State socialism" is the ideology of for example Lenin, the actually existing Soviet Union is closer to "Fabianism". C&M cited the great Fabian Bernard Shaw's affinity with fascism insupport of its placing in the square. "Democratic socialism" is the ideology of for example George Orwell. On the left of the Greens in Australia, I imagine also elsewhere, can be found something close to what I believe C&M meant by "Liberalism"
We have become only too familiar with waht C&M called "capitalist individualism", it was a fringe philosophy outside of the USA when they wrote.
Like I say, I've found it interesting trying to reconcile the New Model with C&M's square.
The Floodgates is worth getting hold of and reading BTW, although time has moved on there is still much in it of interest.
Nov 28 2007 03:52
I"ve put a copy of my New Model up on the wikipedia discussion pages at "political compass" and "Nolan Chart". Still reckon it is worth discussion.
Nov 28 2007 19:47
Does anyone else think that trying to map political beliefs in a semi-mathematical, graphical way doen't work? Politics is too complicated. There are too many different dimension: final aim, ends and means, democracy, equality, freedom. And none of these ideas are well defined.
I've seen proposals for "minarchist socialism", which modifies corporate law so that workplaces are self-managing, but maintains investment via a form of stock market (wih shareholders dividends legally connected to the average wage in a firm). Then its basically left to the market. Where does that fit in? Workers control makes it sound left wing, free market makes it right, corporate structure is anarchist but investment systems basically capitalist. Any graphical system would probably put this at some mid point between socialism and capitalism. But this is not in any way similar to traditional centrist politics.
Basically, I don't think political ideologies are like points on a graph. They are more like sets of ideasand proposals, and can often be recombined in very new and novel ways that defy conventional distinctions.
Nov 28 2007 20:47
Quote:
I've seen proposals for "minarchist socialism", which modifies corporate law so that workplaces are self-managing, but maintains investment via a form of stock market (wih shareholders dividends legally connected to the average wage in a firm). Then its basically left to the market. Where does that fit in?
Just to the right of bat-shit crazy.
Nov 28 2007 22:32
I think the 'political compass' is in general quite useful, but that it only shows the spectrum of capitalist politics (the egalitarian left quadrant showing some sort of democratic worker-managed collective capitalism). There must be a qualitative break somewhere in order to get to communism, it is misleading to show a continuous scale between extremes, implying you can get anywhere by gradual reforms (ie where on the graph is the abolition of exchange relations).
Nov 29 2007 10:50
sam sanchez wrote:
Quote:
I've seen proposals for "minarchist socialism", which modifies corporate law so that workplaces are self-managing, but maintains investment via a form of stock market (wih shareholders dividends legally connected to the average wage in a firm). Then its basically left to the market. Where does that fit in?
Which interests me because that was close to one of the examples I discussed with my informants, self-managed capitalism or "market syndicalism" as I prefer, although I did not go into details about the stockmarket. I asked them what they would call such a system if it was combined with (a) a Parliamentary democracy and (b) if it was combined with a one party state. For (a) the answers were some type of "democracy" (more common with women) or some type of "socialism" (more common with not-women).One or two out of forty regarded it was a form of capitalism. For (b) most of the women were stumped, a majority of them said that there was no name for such a system because it was self-evidently impossible; despite the fact that in those days there was something similar operating in Yugoslavia.
From which I concluded that there was a genuine difference in the semantics of politics between men and women, a point which has never been followed up so far as I know. (But then, I wouldn't, being no longer in the field)
Yep, Sam, I take your point that life is green but theory is grey.....and graphs are as grey as you get. What the seantic map shows is a relationship between words. Those who would put parliamentary market syndicalism in the 'democracy" position presumably do not find the "freedom" to own and manage a business very salient; the lack of such freedom is not enough to push it left of the freedom/equality optimum, "democracy" on my graph. I had not formulated the New Model when I did my research, it arose out of the research; if I had I think many of my informants would have been prepared to put market syndicalism outside of the current radius of possibility which would have allowed more flexibility and nuance.
Accepting the limitations of such diagrams, I again commend my particular diagram to your attention as productive of insight. For example what happens if one defines oneself as "left of communism", close to the nadir point of the New Model, but still feel committed to freedom and equality. I am thinking of some who label themselves as Anarchist. According to my Model the only way this position can be maintained is by reducing the radius of possibility. From the nadir position reducing the radius of possibility increases "freedom" and "equality";And so you get primitivism.
Sep 13 2013 00:39
Well, this is from long ago......some people have lately taken enough interest in the New Model such that I've revisited this thread in search of discussion material (and to save me time explaining) The link I originally gave is broken; but archivists have revived it at http://www.oocities.org/athens/agora/3199/newmodelexplanation.html
I still think it is productive of insight. For example, the old argument about whether Anarchism is "left wing" is easily untangled from the diagram. One sense of left is, in terms of the diagram, a counter-clockwise...and as the diagram shows moving counter-clockwise first increases equality at a cost in liberal freedom; and then moving further left decreases both liberal freedom and equality. Likewise moving clockwise, "right", around the circle first increases liberal freedom at a cost in equality but as you go further right not only equality but also liberal freedom is decreased. This shows and clarifies the common perception on this matter. It assumes as you will see a static radius of possibility. By this view Anarchism must be a doctrine of the "centre".as we seek to optimize and reconcile freedom and equality.Our trouble is that most people think that we do or recently did or would if politicians behaved themselves live in a society as free and equal a possible in practice....the cognitive dissonance that Anarchism causes come from the fact that we at once validate the essential political values of western culture _and_ call for revolution against the institutions of that culture. By this view we are of the centre but beyond the current radius of possibility (giving sense to "be realistic, demand the impossible"); we are of one might say the "radical centre".
On the other hand one might define left simply as favouring human equality. In that sense Anarchists are in fact of the "extreme left" as we tend to see ourselves. Also... in that sense what the diagram calls "socialism" is as far left as it is possible to go given the current radius of possibility. It is at the neutral point of liberal freedom, ie indifferent to it.
In fact there are some close to the Anarchist camp, and sometimes regarding themselves as Anarchists, who would be described as "socialists" in terms of the diagram. This shouldn't be surprising or disturbing. Western society is tilting heavily to the right and egalitarians will ally to each other and some fine distinctions will be blurred. And in struggle we will expand the raius of possibility whether we know that is what we are doing or not.
Getting back to Christie and Meltzer's Square, there are several ways it could be harmonized with the New Model (or the Dixon model as I have taken to calling it, making my bid for deathless fame). The most obvious would be to superimpose their "fascism" on the New Model's fascism and their "state socialism" on the New Model's communism, and their "capitalist individualism" on the New Model's capitalism. That would in fact mean that the New Model's "socialism" would be in the position of C&M's anarchism.
Yeah there is more to say, I am shocked coming back after a few years to see how good this model is.
Can comment on articles and discussions
I think its ass backwards.