Liberalism or socialism?

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Which broad ideological tradition do you adhere to?

Liberalism: this includes both the "right" liberals (e.g. John Locke, Karl Popper, etc) and the "left" liberals (i.e. John Maynard Keynes, FDR, etc). Also included are the Libertarians/Objectivists (e.g. Murray Rothbard, Ayn Rand, etc). US examples of political parties based upon the ideas of the above are: US Republicans, US Democrats, US Libertarians, etc. If you support one of those parties (or a similar party in a different country), then 'Liberalism' is probably the option for you.

Socialism: included are reformist socialists (e.g. Bernstein), revolutionary socialists/communists (i.e. Marx, Engels, Lenin and many others) and utopian socialists (e.g. Thomas More). In sum, this category is for social-democrats, communists and others of the left.

I have also included a "Neither" option as well.

I guess I'm a libertarian. And I think collectivism is a tool of the devil. Just pure sinister evil it is I say!

I am a socialist/communist.

I'm right on the borderline between "Left" Liberalism and Socialism.

Popper wasn't a "Right" liberal AFAIK, as least based my my reading of The Open Society and It's Enemies.

Popper was a member of the Mont Pelerin society though. That society was founded to defend "classical liberal" ideas and founded by right libertarian Friedrich Hayek and had many right libertarian members such as Ludwig von Mises, Milton Friedman, Henry Hazlitt, and other major right libertarians at that time, and many right libertarians continuing up to the present day. The man was very likely a right liberal at the least if he was in that group considering that a few of the members were hardcore minarchists.

Also, I am pretty sure I fit into the libertarian category which means that I am a liberal by far. I dunno, are conservatives right liberals? The people claimed as right liberals there are could be lumped in the libertarian category so I am just curious.

What do you call collectivist? Some radical libertarians would call the entire government, whether minarchistic or not to be collectivist.

It depends on the type of conservativism:

1. Most political conservatives are economic liberals.

2. Most political progressives are economic Keynesians or neo-Keynesians.

3. Neoconservatism is a blend of Trotyskyism, fascism, and Platonism.

4. Then, paleoconservatism tends toward political isolationism.

Well, I was asking for the OP's idea. I can analyze the words according to my definitions, but our OP is the one who is deciding upon what he wants to consider what.

1 tends to be correct which is why I asked.

2 is not so relevant as I did not bring up progressives. I really don't think that most progressives are that economically minded as to be called Keynesian or neo-Keynesian. The intelligent ones perhaps, but, like conservatives, the dumb progressives get suckered into all sorts of odd economic ideologies. So even though we have supply-side economic ideas twisted beyond all virtue on the right, we also have some left-wing gobblety gook on the left.

3 Neoconservatism is a blend of things. It is arguable that they are less liberal than other conservative groups as even though they tend towards some economic liberalism their policies are less liberal.

4 Isolationism does not say much about liberalism outside of the trade stance perhaps. The lack of military interventionism could be argued as more liberal but the trade stance can easily be regarded as illiberal at least from an economics point of view.

Anarchism.

I wasn't sure if that was liberalism or socialism. I looked up the definition of both on wikipedia:

Anarchists strive towards total, absolute freedom, and the lack of any hierarchical authority. This is in line with the first statement, but contradicts the second - anarchism has no form of government, and no formal system of law.




Socialism seems to be based around enforcing a fair system. Anarchism supports a fair system, but I believe that one can arise without needing the community or state to own property, pay wages/benefits, and have power over what people can and can't do.

I voted neither.

Yeah, anarchism sounds like a good neither to me. I don't think his paradigm was designed to handle a typical anarchist. It could have handled a person who claimed to be a market anarchist or anarcho-capitalist as noted by the inclusion of Murray Rothbard, but those folks aren't as tied into the same school of thought as most anarchists.

That is probably true. I am referring mostly to my colleagues in the economics department (just down the hall from me).



Neoconservatism is rejected as progressive by progressives, and it is rejected as conservative by most paleoconservatives (including media commentators like Pat Buchanan and Bob Novak).



Traditional political liberals and conservatives in the U.S. generally agreed on isolationism - especially prior to World War II.

I think that it is accurate to describe most supporters of the 'mainline' center-right parties (i.e. conservatives) as being "right liberal". I also had not heard of Karl Popper's association with actual libertarians - I find that to be quite interesting.

But what I've read by him seems to show that he was not against the welfare state and other Left Liberal interventionist things (what he called "piecemeal social engineering", he was just against the notion that economies could be centrally planned and he rejected "utopian social engineering." I consider myself a left-wing Popperian in that I think multi-national corporations are just as much a threat to the open society as idealistic wannabe utopian social engineers

When I read Popper's stuff on Plato and the connection with Fascism in The Open Society I realized "OMG, that sounds like the Neocons!! !"

Right, another thing you can do is try to see how progressive they are. Even though many economists are left-wing, the policies they typically recommend tend to be very market oriented. The full-on Keynesians are more likely to be progressive though, but even then to find a very progressive economist you would probably need a post-Keynesian or some other non-Austrian, heterodox economist. Neo-Keynesians are probably closer to the center, Bush advisor Greg Mankiw was a well-noted neo-keynesian so the position is not necessarily that notably left-wing.

I know, neoconservatism is a bastard position.


Well, yes, I know it was a historical US position