What Is the Difference Between Left Wing and Right Wing?

Questions like 'what is the difference between right and left-wing?', or 'what side are we on - the left or the right?' are ones which have come up often at meetings and events I have attended recently.  Sadly the prevailing knowledge on forums and other Internet sites also tend to be very ill-informed about the left-right political spectrum.

Here, a broad description of differences between 'left-wing' and 'right-wing' politics is presented.  This political spectrum can be bleary.  It can be quite a technical topic also - there is no black and white answer - however, an attempt is made below to give a basic explanation of the differences, which are not always polarised.

Left to right-wing is just one version of a political spectrum.  The concept of left-wing and right-wing originated in France during the French Revolution in 1789.  Members of the National Assembly would be divided into two groups; supporters of the king - who sat on the right; and supporters of the revolution - who sat on the left.   In France, the left may be referred to as 'the party of movement', and the right as 'the party of order'.  This remains true now, in a very broad sense.

Seating in the 2009 European Parliament
     European United Left–Nordic Green Left (35)
     Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats (184)
     European Greens–European Free Alliance (55)
     Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (84)
     European People's Party (265)
     European Conservatives and Reformists (54)
     Europe of Freedom and Democracy (32)
     Non-Inscrits (27)

Generally, left-wing parties, individuals and groups tend to be progressives, greens, liberals (in the social/cultural sense), democratic-socialists, communists or include some forms of anarchist groups also.  The right-wing often describes the outlooks of reactionaries or conservatives, neo-conservatives, neo-liberals (in an economic sense), monarchists, theocrats, nazis, fascists and some forms of nationalism.  Above, you can see a diagram of the left-right divide within the European Parliament seating arrangements.


Left-wing parties are generally interested in social justice and reforms.  Right wing parties are generally concerned with order, maintaining privilege, protecting private property and defending capitalism.   

In economics, the right-wing outlook tends to favour the top-down approach.  This is the belief that wealthy entrepreneurs, employers, corporations, etc. (in other words, the privileged few of wealth and ownership of production in capitalist societies) will create employment and wealth for the working-class who are dependent on them doing so for employment and well-being.  This is often referred to as the 'trickle-down' effect; the wealth is eventually passed down as the value and productivity of profit-seeking organisations goes up (See Margaret Thatcher's remarks on this) Groups on the right may also see themselves as responsible for maintaining order, and traditionally rely on harsh laws and policing to combat crime.  Prioritising nationalism, religion, imperialism, individualism and competition are usually of the right.

Left-wing views tends to disagree with the 'trickle-down' approach.  Marxists have shown, for example, that wealth is created by the working class who are exploited for the benefit of capitalist employers.  That wealth is turned to profit, which is not returned back into the economy through taxes for the benefit of all, but is either "sat on" cautiously in times of recession, or gambled on markets in a speculative manner.  The left would generally support higher taxes on the wealthy, reforming capitalism, or eradicating the capitalist system through popular revolution.  The left tends to be more concerned with progressive social justice than harsher laws as a method of reducing crime.  Internationalism, secularism, equality, solidarity and cooperation are mainly priorities of the left.

The left/right explanation for political theory is in no way an accurate definition of political theory.  There is no point in becoming pedantic about it.  For example some anarchists may be right-wing.  Stalin, it can be shown, exemplified extreme right-wing actions at times, though many would describe him as 'communist' which would be of the left. Nationalist parties in Ireland, such as Sinn Féin, are sometimes regarded as being relatively left-wing economically, but relatively right-wing socially.

As a socialist, I do not believe the right-wing approach to economics is a fair and efficient method.  Wealth is not distributed fairly to workers without massive struggle - if even then.  There is an abundance of waste of talent, resources, capital, and so on.  Of course, Margaret Thatcher's economic policies were disastrous, which brought about the destruction of the working-class while she was in power (see Chavs, Jones, 2011), and have inevitably lead to the current crisis today.  It is possible that totalitarianism, bureaucracy and authoritarianism can arise from groups throughout the political spectrum - Mussolini, Napoleon and Stalin would have gained power from the struggle for implementation of ideas from completely different sections.  Hence the importance of maintaining democracy, and the principles of Republicanism such as 'Civic Virtue' and 'Non-Domination'.  A republic, although a vague concept, can be thought of as a framework for managing society, in a civilised way.  In my opinion, capitalism is incompatible with the definition of a republic, because of the inherent need of groups and individuals to dominate others, and because of a governments' general inability to stop this from happening.  In a republic, it is the role of the government to block domination, whether it is from a group, individual or the state, and to protect its citizens who give the government legitimacy. (See Up The Republic!, O'Toole, 2012)