Welcome to the first installment of Know Your Frenemy, where I’m going to explore various left-of-liberal factions, beliefs, labels, and splits. The idea originated, as so many Substack posts do, with a Noah Smith tweet.
That’s more or less the pitch of the series.1 Enjoy the ride!
א. The roots of the left.
First, let’s start with the obvious: There is no singular “leftism.” Socialists, communists, anarchists, and alien-dolphin-futurists all claim for themselves the title of “left,” and the purpose of the series is not2 to exclude ideas as not “truly” leftist. But the line must be drawn somewhere.
The easiest place to begin is probably where the left/right distinction comes from, before heading to the left/liberal split. The distinction emerged during the French Revolution: those who supported the Bourbon Monarchy and the Ancien Regime would sit on the right of the Estates General, while those that sat on the left supported the Revolution, secularism, and the creation of the Republic. But here lies the first catch, because while proto-socialists and hardcore anti-monarchists sat on the left, they sat alongside self-recognized liberals. To further add to the confusion, there were some liberals, like Marquis de Lafayette, that supported monarchic rule, so long as it was limited by a Constitution. They largely sat on the left in the Estates General, but came to be seen as enemies of the left as the Revolution wore on.
French History is where much of our modern political terminology emerged, and the left grew from “supports the Revolution” to a coalition of beliefs: liberal republicanism, utopian socialism, anti-clericalism, and more. By the mid-19th century, our old comrade Karl Marx was advancing his own notion of ‘scientific socialism,’ and engaging in debates with anarchists like Mikhail Bakunin. Meanwhile, famous liberal philosopher John Stuart Mill had declared himself a socialist in Britain. If there’s one simple fact about leftism, it’s that its story is anything but simple.
The historical lineage of leftism is dense, confusing, and filled with people that disagreed with each other and disputed the labels that their contemporaries applied. Sometimes they disagreed with themselves. There is no easy way to answer what leftism is. Still, it’s worth it to have some rough idea of what leftism is, so let’s draw a line in the sand, but don’t get too attached to it.
ב. Leftism = anti-capitalism + moral equality, mostly.
Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit. Central characteristics of capitalism include capital accumulation, competitive markets, price system, private property, property rights recognition, voluntary exchange, and wage labor. In a market economy, decision-making and investments are determined by owners of wealth, property, or ability to maneuver capital or production ability in capital and financial markets—whereas prices and the distribution of goods and services are mainly determined by competition in goods and services markets.
This is how Wikipedia describes capitalism. A perfect definition? No. A consensus one, maybe. Capitalism, defined roughly in the terms described above, is the common enemy of leftist political movements. The shared foundation of leftist movements is a recognition of human equality, and the resulting necessity that all people share some fundamentally equal status or situation.
So, fascism might reject capitalism, but because it is rooted in notions of inherent superiority and inferiority, it cannot be considered leftist. Alternatively, a liberal egalitarian might recognize human equality, and go so far as to push for equality of outcomes, but if they still maintain a pro-capitalist outlook, or even just a fatalistic non-opposition to capitalism as the best possible alternative in a tragic world, they cannot be considered properly leftist.
This is not a perfect taxonomy. There are liberal egalitarians that are leftists (although certainly many leftists wouldn’t count them among their allies). And there are leftists who reject any moral notions, including “equality.” But in most cases, it suffices. The exceptional cases where it doesn’t are interesting, and worthy of further consideration. I hope to discuss them in this series. But for now, when you hear of the left, think of anti-capitalism and equality.
ג. What’s next?
This post isn’t meant to be a grand exegesis on what leftism is. Frankly, it’s barely willing to make a claim on what leftism isn’t. But coming to a grand conclusion on what leftism is, is not the aim of this series. This installment is simply meant to prime readers on some baseline assumptions of this series, and to carve out a sufficiently narrow niche.
In the following entries to this series, I hope to take various factions and beliefs on their own terms. It’s not as important whether they are or are not “left” in any strict sense, but whether their ideas are valuable, and if they’re not, why they nevertheless appeal to people.
If you have ideas you’re confused about, factions you don’t understand, references you’re curious about, or anything else, leave a comment and I’ll take a look! And as always, if you have a big problem with what I wrote, yell at me on here, on Twitter, or into a paper bag! See you next time!
One final note: the name of this series is an homage to the amazing podcast Know Your Enemy hosted by Matthew Sitman and Sam Adler-Bell. I’m a huge fan, and if you found this post interesting at all, you must check them out. I’m a member of their Patreon, and I think you should be too. But let me be absolutely clear: there is zero affiliation between their show and this series.
Although I hope I will provide slightly more value than understanding abstruse internet arguments.
For the most part.
Yes! Another Ben's Newsletter post!
I think you should do a "Profiles in Courage" (pick a more suitable word lol) about individuals who are members of specific leftist sects, inspired by me reading Ghadaffi's writings and realizing Pierre Salinger write the CRINGE introduction