Daily Loaf

I've lost my sense of left and right.

And I'm not talking about my physical ability, either. It's that recently I've been forced to redefine or at least question my position on the political spectrum. Now, some would say that the whole left-right axis is void of any meaning in post-communist thought. Certainly there are now far fewer people suggesting full deprivatisation of industries, nationalisation of banks, abolition of inheritance rights and other staples of Marx. But the removal of one extremity of the axis doesn't make the axis itself disappear, it merely shifts the center.

Where, then, does my lack of direction stem from? I believe I am suffering from the malady of multiple frames of reference. Over the course of my adult life, I have tried to closely follow the politico-economic life of three regions, namely, Europe, Brazil and North America. While this has occasionally led to not having the slightest clue about what is going on in any single one of them, on the better occasions I feel I've had occasional flashes of insight into how different pieces of the puzzle that is global politics really fit together.

As a side-effect, however, of following the lives of my friends on the one hand and political life on the other, in welfare Finland, consumerist US and confusing Brazil, I must have lost sense of where the shifting center of the left-right -axis has settled. No Finnish right-wing politico in their right mind would ever suggest reducing gun-control or selling public schools to the highest bidder and then offering education vouchers to the general population, nor would a US Senator propose increased public child allowances for children under 7 or demand a law specifying maximum waiting times in a comprehensive national medicare program. All the while the recently officiated Brazilian ex-union-leader president Lula speaks of "fiscal responsibility" and "drastic cuts in pensions". Confusing, non?

Craig suggested (referring to our discussion on the left-right -positioning of some global media) that there is a clear connection, or rather, a reduction, in our use of the words, where left can be substituted for "anti-american" and right for "pro-american". And simultaneously Jaakko, aka J-Ko, pointed out how quintessentially American the whole concept of "anti-Americanism" is - and how absurd would it be to call something "anti-European"? The thought behind this is that there is no such thing as "America", there's just the US Government, the people that live in the United States (not all necessarily Americans?), the public opinion of the majority of these people, and the American culture.

I'm not pushing the limits of propriety (or originality) here, but something similar must be true of the left-right -axis as well; that in our ridiculously complicated post-postmodern world, there is no monolithic right or left, but a web of interests at either side and filling the space between the extremities along the entire gamut. So, while I might fully agree with representatives from the Finnish Left Alliance on issues of equality between genders, since most of my economic opinions verge on the extreme liberal (in the European sense) edge, I'm right wing - but only as long as I remain in Finland.

Introducing a new axis, Authority, like the Political Compass does, clears up the situation somewhat. I do think, though, that more often than not one axis is used merely as a justification for the other. Take the test and please report your results in at the "Got Opinions?" section, below, and do tell if you agree with your result. Should be a fun read!