Determining your left from right: an explanation of left and right wing

“Left-wing politicians say no to motorway.”

“Right-wing party faces defeat at the polls.”

Every day the news headlines use the phrases left wing and right wing in relation to politics.

But how many of us actually know (or can easily define) what these terms mean, particularly when most of today’s mainstream political parties seem to be occupying the same middle ground.

The use of left and right wing to describe differing schools of political thought dates back to the time of the French Revolution and the seating arrangements of the French National Assembly.

The commoners, who were known to be more radically in favour of change sat on the left. Sitting on the right were those with ties to the upper class and the church, and were more inclined to maintain the status quo.

Given that the French king eventually went to the guillotine, it would seem they were all pretty much in favour of revolution.

However, the idea that the right is aligned with conservatism and the left with liberalism caught on and has remained with us for the last 200 years.

So how are left wing and right wing different from one another? Let’s paint a broad picture.

Left wingers take the view that government should be working towards a society where everyone has equal opportunities.

The government should provide free healthcare and education, and there should be social welfare available for the less fortunate.

Taxation needs to be high to pay for this, and ideally certain businesses should be kept under government ownership so the profits can be used to help run the country.

Left wingers tend to be liberal on social issues. They’re pro gay marriage and abortion and also have strong views on conservation and saving the environment.

In contrast, right wingers take the view that the government should step back and let individuals stand or fall on their own.

Taxes should be lower, and healthcare, education and social welfare should primarily be the responsibility of the individual, not the government.

There should be no government ownership of businesses and the free market should reign, with profit giving business owners the incentive to perform and provide better products.

Right wingers are conservative on social issues. They’re anti gay marriage and abortion and feel that business should trump the environment, particularly when it relates to oil exploration or the mining of valuable commodities.

That’s the theoretical view. In reality, there’s a spectrum of beliefs running all the way from hard left political systems like Communism to the Fascists of the extreme right.

Most people and political parties sit somewhere in the middle.

This has led to the development of the terms centre-left and centre-right to describe this middle ground.

While many of today’s political parties have historically had strong ties to either right or left wing philosophies, as time has passed, these views have become more moderate as they’ve sought to appeal more to voters.

The centrist model sees politicians today choosing policies from both sides of the equation, whichever is likely to play best in the electorate.

Britain’s Labour Party is a good example of this. Formerly the party of trade unionists and workers, in the 1990s under the leadership of Tony Blair they repositioned themselves as ‘New Labour’ and became the darlings of the British middle (and even upper) classes.

There are also cases of supposedly left or right wing parties executing some amazing right turns (or left turns) once in government.

For instance, after gaining power in the mid 1980s, the left wing New Zealand Labour Party instituted a hard core right wing economic strategy (known as Rogernomics), leading to accusations that the party had betrayed its socialist roots.

Ultimately though, the terms left wing and right wing encompass a wide range of political value systems – especially when comparing different countries.

Indeed, they are really just a handy guide, and not a guaranteed indicator of how a politician or political party will act.

By Jo Blick