The left–right political spectrum is a system of classifying political positions, ideologies, and parties, with emphasis placed upon issues of social equality and social hierarchy. In general, left-wing politics support the sharing of political power, while right-wing politics are in favor of the concentration of political power. In addition to positions on the left and on the right, there are centrist and moderate positions, which are not strongly aligned with either end of the spectrum. It originated during the French Revolution based on the seating in the French National Assembly.
On this type of political spectrum, left-wing politics and right-wing politics are often presented as opposed, although a particular individual or group may take a left-wing stance on one matter and a right-wing stance on another; and some stances may overlap and be considered either left-wing or right-wing depending on the ideology. In France, where the terms originated, the left has been called "the party of movement" or liberal, and the right "the party of order" or conservative. and
History Origins in the French Revolution
The terms "left" and "right" first appeared during the French Revolution of 1789 when members of the National Assembly divided into supporters of the Ancien Régime to the president's right side and supporters of the revolution to his left side. The quotation is an extract from a longer quotation translated on p. 110 of Voices of the French Revolution edited by Richard Cobb and Colin Jones accessible via the next citation. One deputy, the Baron de Gauville, explained: "We began to recognize each other: those who were loyal to religion and the king took up positions to the right of the chair so as to avoid the shouts, oaths, and indecencies that enjoyed free rein in the opposing camp".
When the National Assembly was replaced in 1791 by a Legislative Assembly composed of entirely new members, the divisions continued. "Innovators" sat on the left, "moderates" gathered in the centre, while the "conscientious defenders of the constitution" found themselves sitting on the right, where the defenders of the Ancien Régime had previously gathered. When the succeeding National Convention met in 1792, the seating arrangement continued, but following the coup d'état of 2 June 1793 and the arrest of the Girondins, the right side of the assembly was deserted and any remaining members who had sat there moved to the centre. Following the Thermidorian Reaction of 1794, the members of the far left were excluded and the method of seating was abolished. The new constitution included rules for the assembly that would "break up the party groups". Following the Restoration in 1814–1815, political clubs were again formed. The majority ultra-royalists chose to sit on the right. The "constitutionals" sat in the centre while independents sat on the left. The terms extreme right and extreme left, as well as centre-right and centre-left, came to be used to describe the nuances of ideology of different sections of the assembly.
Thomas Jefferson's Democratic-Republican Party supported the French Revolution in the 1790s when he opposed the Federalist Party that supported Britain. His friend Marquis de LaFayette had been a leader in France. Jefferson wrote LaFayette on November 4, 1823, where "Côté droit" means "right side" and "côté gauche" means "left side".:"From Thomas Jefferson to Marie-Joseph-Paul-Yves-Roch-Gilbert du Motier, marquis de Lafayette, 4 November 1823" (U.S. National Archives) onlineSee also: Gordon S. Wood, The Radicalism of the American Revolution (1992) p.97, online.
for in truth the parties of Whig and Tory are those of nature. they exist in all countries, whether called by these names, or by those of Aristocrats and democrats, coté droite or coté gauche, Ultras or Radicals, Serviles or Liberals.
France after 1848 After 1848, the main opposing camps were the "democratic socialists" and the "reactionaries" who used red and white flags to identify their party affiliation. With the establishment of the Third Republic in 1871, the terms were adopted by political parties: the Republican Left, the Centre Right and the Centre Left (1871), the Extreme Left (1876) and the Radical Left (1881). The beliefs of the group called the Radical Left were actually closer to the Centre Left than the beliefs of those called the Extreme Left.
20th century usage Beginning in the early twentieth century, the terms "left" and "right" came to be associated with specific political ideologies and were used to describe citizens' political beliefs, gradually replacing the terms "reds" and "the reaction". The words left and right were at first used by their opponents as slurs. Those on the Left often called themselves "republicans", which at the time meant favoring a republic over a monarchy, while those on the Right often called themselves "conservatives". By 1914, the Left half of the legislature in France was composed of Unified Socialists, Republican Socialists and Socialist Radicals, while the parties that were called "Right" now sat on the right side. The use of the words Left and Right spread from France to other countries and came to be applied to a large number of political parties worldwide, which often differed in their political beliefs.
There was asymmetry in the use of the terms Left and Right by the opposing sides. The Right mostly denied that the left–right spectrum was meaningful because they saw it as artificial and damaging to unity. However, the Left, seeking to change society, promoted the distinction. Émile Chartier said in 1931, "When people ask me if the division between parties of the Right and parties of the Left, men of the Right and men of the Left, still makes sense, the first thing that comes to mind is that the person asking the question is certainly not a man of the Left." In British politics, the terms "right" and "left" came into common use for the first time in the late 1930s in debates over the Spanish Civil War. Sociologist Robert M. MacIver said in The Web of Government (1947):
The right is always the party sector associated with the interests of the upper or dominant classes, the left the sector expressive of the lower economic or social classes, and the centre that of the middle classes. Historically this criterion seems acceptable. The conservative right has defended entrenched prerogatives, privileges and powers; the left has attacked them. The right has been more favorable to the aristocratic position, to the hierarchy of birth or of wealth; the left has fought for the equalization of advantage or of opportunity, for the claims of the less advantaged. Defence and attack have met, under democratic conditions, not in the name of class but in the name of principle; but the opposing principles have broadly corresponded to the interests of the different classes.
Ideological groupings Generally, the left wing is characterized by an emphasis on "ideas such as freedom, equality, fraternity, rights, progress, reform and internationalism" while the right wing is characterized by an emphasis on "notions such as authority, hierarchy, order, duty, tradition, reaction and nationalism".
Political scientists and other analysts usually regard the left as including anarchists, communists, socialists, democratic socialists, social democrats,See Euclid Tsakalotis, "European Employment Policies: A New Social Democratic Model for Europe" in The Economics of the Third Way: Experiences from Around the World (eds. Philip Arestis & Malcolm C. Sawyer: Edward Elgar Publishing 2001), p. 26: "most left-wing approaches (social democratic, democratic socialist, and so on) to how the market economy works..."). "Introduction" in The Nordic Model of Social Democracy (eds. Nik Brandal, Øivind Bratberg & Dag Einar Thorsen: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013): "In Scandinavia, as in the rest of the world, 'social democracy' and 'democratic socialism' have often been used interchangeably to define the part of the left pursuing gradual reform through democratic means." left-libertarians, progressives, and social liberals.JoAnne C. Reuss, American Folk Music and Left-Wing Politics, Scarecrow Press, 2000, Van Gosse, The Movements of the New Left, 1950–1975: A Brief History with Documents, Palgrave Macmillan, 2005, Movements for racial equality,Michael J. Klarman, "From Jim Crow to Civil Rights: The Supreme Court and the Struggle for Racial Equality", "... many of the white Americans who were most sympathetic to racial equality belonged to left-wing organizations...", p. 375, Oxford University Press, 2006, as well as trade unionism, have also been associated with the left.See Heikki Paloheimo, "Between Liberalism and Corporatism: The Effect of Trade Unions and Governments on Economic Performance in Eighteen OECD Countries" in Labour Relations and Economic Performance: Proceedings of a Conference Held By the International Economic Association in Venice, Italy (eds. Renator Brunetta & Carlo Dell'Aringa: International Economic Association/Palgrave Macmillan, 1990), p. 119: "It is easier for trade unions to have a mutual understanding with left-wing governments than with right-wing governments. In the same way, it is easier for left-wing governments to have mutual understanding with trade unions." Thomas Poguntke, "Living in Separate Worlds? Left-wing Parties and Trade Unions in European Democracies" in Citizenship and Democracy in an Era of Crisis (eds. Thomas Poguntke et al.: Routledge: 2015), p. 173 ("So far we have argued that parties of the left are the natural allies of the trade union movement ... it goes almost without saying that this a simplification."), p. 181: "When it comes to overlapping memberships, left-wing parties have always been, by and large, strongly connected to the trade union movement.").
Political scientists and other analysts usually regard the right as including conservatives (among whom there are many strains, including traditionalist conservatism, libertarian conservatism,Arthur Aughey, Greta Jones & W.T.M. Riches, The Conservative Political Tradition in Britain and the United States (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press: 1992), pp. 150–53. neoconservatism,Justin Vaïsse, Neoconservatism: The Biography of a Movement (Belknap Press: 2010), pp. 111–12: "In 1995, however, a new age of neoconservatism was born, ... one that persists to this day ... Neoconservatism became a full-fledged element of the Republican party, now unambiguously on the right. The newcomers, such as William Kristol and Robert Kagan (the editors of the Weekly Standard), David Brooks, Gary Schmitt, Max Boot, and David Frum ... were men of the right, even if their stance on domestic policy was somewhat different from that of other conservatives."George H. Nash, The Conservative Intellectual Movement in America Since 1945 (Regnery Gateway: 2023), p. 368. and ultraconservatismJohn S. Huntington, Far-Right Vanguard: The Radical Roots of Modern Conservatism (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2021).); right-libertarians, anarcho-capitalists, monarchists,See Politics in Europe, 6th ed. (eds. M. Donald Hancock et al.: SAGE/CQ Press, 2015), p. 139: "Historically, the political right was characterized by its identification with the status quo. It favored monarchism and deplored the Revolutions of 1789 and 1848." Thomas M. Magstadt, Understanding Politics: Ideas, Institutions, and Issues, 12th ed. (Cengage Learning, 2015), p. 28: "Ideologies of the right: Monarchism is at the opposite end of the political spectrum .... After World War I, fascism supplanted monarchism as the principle ideology of the extreme Right." fascists,See Robert O. Paxton, The Anatomy of Fascism, passim, e.g. "The Communist International was certain that the German swing to the Right under Hitler would produce a counterswing to the Left ...", p. 128, Vintage Books, 2005, ;