Talk:Far-left politics

Lead section

Hello fellow Wikipedians, The introduction requires some improvement. Although the article is experiencing constant improvement the lead section needs to be up to date nevertheless. I intend to give a clear overview of the contents of this article, as well as expand on the definitions of far-left politics and far-left terrorism. Considering that the reader spends only a couple of minutes in each page the lead section is the most important one and requires constant updating. I will summarize the most important points and introduce the sources. car4uso (talk) 14:22, 15 May 2020 (UTC) car4uso — Preceding unsigned comment added by Car4uso (talk • contribs) (Car4uso (talk) 14:51, 15 May 2020 (UTC))

I agree this article is really lacking, but I'm not willing to go near it. How we have an article on the far-left that does not mention Marxism-Leninism, Stalinism, Trotskyism or Maoism is beyond me, it's totally and utterly ridiculous. But if you try and add them, you'll be wasting your time. Editing this article is gonna be a WP:BATTLEGROUND and I don't need the stress, incivility, edit wars and inevitable ANI reports that come from trying to improve an article like this one. Good luck and best wishes to anyone who is game. I'll certainly support any attempt by others to include the most prominent far left ideologies like Marxism-Leninism - I don't know what to say about such glaring absences. Bacondrum (talk) 01:08, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

Bacondrum, thanks for your comment, but I have to disagree with your edits to your comment about Marxism–Leninism et al. As noted by The Four Deuces, their governments were not far-left and the political spectrum was Communists on the left and anti-Communists on the right. As was noted elsewhere, anarchism, communism and socialism are left-wing ideologies, not far-left; only several traditions and currents are considered far-left and there is no real agreement because far-left is about being more left-wing than you and there is not a Handbook of the Far-Left like the far-right. I would consider some traditions within anarchism and communism such as autonomism or left communism as far-left rather than Marxism–Leninism et al. I do not see how being authoritarian makes one more left-wing; that would make one more right-wing and closer to the centre. I would say one that is consistent on means and ends is more left-wing than one who use right-wing means to reach left-wing ends.

And there is indeed this centrist bias that the far-left must be authoritarian and Stalinist so they can say there is no real difference between the far-left and the far-right and that both are authoritarian/totalitarian. A political spectrum that see anti-capitalism as far-left and social democracy and social liberalism as left-wing rather than centre-left or centre is one skewed so far to the right and biased towards the status quo. So I do not see what was particular far-left about Marxism–Leninism et al. They were left-wing and essentially took the place of 19th-century liberalism; both introduced capitalism. Nothing wrong about that. With the fall of the 1917–1924 revolutionary proletarian wave in Europe and elsewhere, the Bolsheviks were clear about following the state capitalist path to industrialize and modernize the country so as to make the future development of socialism possible. Just do not sell that as socialism when wage labour, commodity exchanges, the law of value et al are all part of the capitalist mode of production.

Note that it is mainly Marxist–Leninists and anti-Communists who say the Soviet Union et al were socialist, albeit for vastly different reasons. Many academics, including non-Marxist, dispute they were even socialist planned economies, hence the term command economies. They say they were essentially centrally-managed, not planned; hence, they called it the administrative-command system to refer to the Soviet model adopted by the Eastern Bloc, but I digress. Current sources used in the article do not make any specific mention to the Soviet Union et al, or Marxism–Leninism et al; they are essentially saying it is more left than the left but there is no agreement about what that does entail and I do not think that has changed by now. Davide King (talk) 05:39, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

Hey Davide, thanks for your thoughts. I respectfully disagree, but I'm not going to get too deep into it. Two things I will say: In my opinion claiming Stalin and Mao were not far-left is ridiculous obfuscation, it's as silly as the lunatic fringe right-wingers who claim fascism isn't a far-right ideology. I'm a socialist, for the sake of arguing the socialist case I wish Stalin, Mao et al were not, but they obviously were. I think the socialist denial comes from my parents generation of leftists who wholeheartedly supported the soviet union until the 90's when the true horrors of soviet cruelty became very well known in western nations and very hard to deny, at which point many people on the left started indulging in historic revisionism and denialism. I also believe the horseshoe theory is a joke - far-Left and far-right are not comparable, they have very little other than authoritarianism in common, ideologically they are antithetical. Bacondrum (talk) 23:00, 6 July 2020 (UTC)

I think the issue is that just because Hitler and Mussolini were far-right, that does not mean that Stalin and Mao were far-left; I would not be surprised to find that many people, even on the left, say Stalin and Mao are far-left just so they are not associated to the left, the normal left, so as to conflate the far-left with authoritarianism and Stalinism and the moderate left with democracy and liberty, when both lefts include more democratic/libertarian and more authoritarian strands; it is simply not true and we need a source that defines within the Left where it can be called far left. I think The Four Deuces was right when writing [p]eople did not refer to the governments of the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China after Mao as far left. The problem is that there is not agreement among sources about where [the Left] can be called far left. Some say social democracy (I find this a bit odd as I would consider social democracy centre-left and it would represent a spectrum skewed to the right and the status quo, in this case capitalism, with anti-capitalism considered far-left rather than left-wing).

As noted by The Four Deuces here, [b]oth in the world outside the U.S. and academic writing in the U.S., left-wing means socialist, communist or anarchist. They would not call politicians whose base of financial support is Walmart, Amazon and other corporations left-wing. So yeah, I find this far-left definition as anything to the left of social democracy as a bit odd and too broad. Others say anything left of the communist party. Again, there is a much wider and clearer literature about the far-right than the far-left. Note also for example that Stalin represented the centre but was probably closer to the Right Opposition, although in practice he did implement the program of the Left Opposition and even went too far by forcing the rapid industrialization and collectivization.

Again, I do not see anything far-left in the system they introduced as a step to capitalism; they may have been far-left only before overthrowing the previous feudal elite, but the liberals were not far-left and are not considered far-left when they did the same thing one century earlier (both were considered left-wing; I think far-left and far-right have been popularised exactly in the 20th century). Once they did that and overthrown the existing elite (something the far-right never did, hence they did not move on the political spectrum), they were no longer far-left and indeed there were many factions to their left. It makes no sense to speak of the Communist parties in the few remaining Communist states as far-left today; they would represent the centre or the right. I believe The Four Deuces can better answer any doubt you might have. I think we were left in trying to give a definition of both the far-left and the left.--Davide King (talk) 00:46, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

Well, we'll just have to disagree. If you treat political discourse as a moderation fallacy, then there's no far right either - this is circular logic, it's a false equivalence itself. I think these contemporary claims about Nazi's being socialists and Bolsheviks being state capitalists are nothing more than historic denialism. I certainly think the Bolsheviks were left and the extreme violence and other measures they took to implement their ideology makes them extreme ie "far-left". Bacondrum (talk) 01:29, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

Both far right and far left are relative terms. So to Fox News viewers, mainstream media is far left. Luke March in his article about Left parties, used the term far left to refer to anything to the left of established social democratic parties, but has since abandoned the term because he thought it was pejorative. So this is basically an article in search of a topic.

While Communism is considered a variety of socialism, the belief that they had established a socialist state is not widely supported outside Marxism-Leninism. It depends on whether or not one believes that the working class actually owned and controlled the means of production in the Soviet Union. Were for example factories controlled by workers collectively and profits distributed to them as they agreed, or were decisions made by political commissars? Were parliamentary bodies democratically chosen by the people or were they appointed by the party?

BTW the 1990s was late in the day to figure out how the Soviet Union worked.

TFD (talk) 03:45, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

I agree that many on the right think everyone left Hitler is a radical leftist. I also hear what you are saying generally, I simply disagree (by the way, the 90's wasn't late to figure it out for some, I know a few from the old school who still defend the Soviet Union with their hands on their hearts, they are out there...shit I have friends that defend the Soviet Union...but there weren't many left by the 90's ) and I really do find attempts to make it out like the Soviets were on the right or whatever very silly at best. But anyway, if there's no far-left? Nominate for the article for deletion? Bacondrum (talk) 11:22, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

The way to resolve this dispute would be to grab a political science manual and go with the sources. MonsieurD (talk) 14:22, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

(edit conflict)

Bacondrum in response to this, could you please clarify how I committed the moderation fallacy? I thought my point was arguing exactly against that, that just because Hitler et al were far-right, it does not mean that Stalin et al were far-left rather than simply left-wing. Nevermind, I think you were not saying I did that fallacy, but you were more commenting about how many, especially centrists, see the far-left and far-right the same way, which is something you and I agree on (i.e. you and I agree that is nonsense) and which is incidentally also the views in academia, with only the more anti-Communists arguing Nazi Germany and Soviet Union were literally the same thing without any nuance. However, I have to disagree with your conclusion that then there's no far right either - this is circular logic, it's a false equivalence itself for the simple fact that, as again noted by The Four Deuces again, there is an actual literature that clearly define the topic of the far-right, something that cannot be said to be the same for the far-left.

Also, discussing the nature of the Soviet Union et al is no denialism. Indeed, as I wrote above and as noted by The Four Deuces, it is mainly Marxist–Leninist (the ones who still defend the Soviet Union as socialist to this day or excuses other things) and right-wing anti-Communists that agree the Soviet Union et al were socialists (albeit with vastly different implications; the Soviet Union was bad, so it was socialist, etc.). That is notwithstanding Lenin himself and many Bolsheviks declaring the state capitalist development as a path for socialism and that it was Stalin who re-defined state capitalism as socialism, for example by saying the law of value would still exist under socialism, or how commodities exchanges, extraction of surplus value from the peasantry and the free labour from the Gulags, wage labour, etc. have much more in common with the capitalist mode of production than a socialist one. Again, neither I or The Four Deuces said they were right-wing (I simply wrote that current Communist parties in so-called Communists are not far-left either), we are merely saying that they were not far-left; and I think The Four Deuces and I agree that they were left-wing, not far-left.

This is really not at all surprising considering the right is more homogeneous and the left has so many factions and is so much broader (which I believe is just one more reason why it is so hard, even for scholars, to define the topic). Also, there were impossibilist groups like the Socialist Party of Great Britain who argued the Soviet Union was state capitalist by 1918 and many left communists who reached the same conclusion in the 1920s. Many academics reached the same or similar conclusions only later, for example in the 1980s with the administrative-command system. However, the death toll was really politicised and it is far lower than the estimates of 20 million (I always found this road to the death toll absurd, for even 600,000 or one million would still be awful and there is no need to conflate the number as many right-wing anti-Communists have done) or above which were made before the opening of the archives (there are still debate on which killings were deliberate and which ones were not, for example whether the Soviet famine in the 1930s which affected not just Ukraine was a genocide or not) and hopefully now this is less politicised from both sides.

The Four Deuces, it is really interesting that Luke March abandoned the term; is he using radical left instead? Maybe we should add this to the article and make more clear March's position? I really found it odd too and pejorative to define the far-left as anything left of social democracy.--Davide King (talk) 14:30, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

• Davide King Hey good sir, I wasn't saying you committed a moderation fallacy at all, you're a very reasonable editor. I was saying that political positions being subjective is a moot point, that the moderation fallacy doesn't apply here - if we apply that reasoning to the left-right spectrum, it is all subjective where ideologies sit on the spectrum because everyone thinks their view is the correct one. I hope that makes sense. Bacondrum (talk) 23:58, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

• Thanks for your kind comments. I agree about that; one could easily say that Robespierre and Stalin were right-wing because they adopted right-wing means, but they are both seen as left-wing because that was their ends while, notwithstanding what right-wingers may claim, Hitler's ends were right-wing, hence why Stalin was left-wing and Hitler right-wing even though both adopted right-wing means. However, I see it is mainly right-wingers that do that, for example making the spectrum about how much big or small the government is, so Stalin, Hitler et al are on the left, following W. Cleon Skousen. Anyway, the point I was trying make was that, as far as I am aware, none of the ruling parties in Communist states are called far-left.--Davide King (talk) 00:22, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

But yes, more back to the topic, we should go with the sources. What do they actually say? Problem is they seem to disagree on whether the far-left is the left of social democracy or of communist parties, so this article is still in search of a topic.--Davide King (talk) 14:30, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

MonsieurD, do you have a political science manual that has an entry for far left? Per disambguation, this article must be about a clearly defined topic. Instead the article attempts to conflate groups to the left of Tony Blair with terrorism. TFD (talk) 15:13, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

Davide King, March writes in Radical Left Parties in Europe (2012), p. 1724: "I prefer the term 'radical left' to alternatives such as 'hard left' and 'far left', which can appear pejorative and imply that the left is necessarily marginal."[1] The term far left seems odd considering that he said the most successful far left parties were "pragmatic and non-ideological." But the most common term is "left parties," which is what they call themselves. Obviously his concept deserves an article, but in that case we should change the name.

TFD (talk) 23:39, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

So maybe the topic of this article should really be those Left parties and we should add a section about them?--Davide King (talk) 00:22, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

Yes, I mean my view of the contemporary "far-left" is that they argue for peace, social justice and equality, hardly comparable to the far-right, we don't have to have a far-left article just because there's a far-right one - symmetry is not essential. if what I think of as far-left isn't actually far-left, well I don't really care that much - I'd prefer to disown Stalin et al from the left anyways. I've been looking through my collection of politics books, but none of mine really cover left-wing ideologies in a broad sense, at least not like Cas Mudde's The Ideology of the Extreme Right does with the far-right. Even looking at books on the Soviet Union, they don't place Stalinism or Bolshevism on the political spectrum...whatever the case, we really shouldn't have an article that needs a topic. Bacondrum (talk) 00:28, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

I agree that we should not have a far-left article just because there is a far-right one; the far-right one has a bunch of bibliography and literature about a clear defined topic whereas the same cannot be said for the far-left. That research seems to confirm The Four Deuces' comment that [p]eople did not refer to the governments of the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China after Mao as far left. Still, I am not sure whether this should be turned into a disambiguation page like radical left. I find the Definition section more useful and helpful than a disambiguation.--Davide King (talk) 01:53, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

• comment There is a really poorly cited, dogs breakfast of an article Ultra-leftism, perhaps we could merge the far-left politics and Ultra-leftism articles into a radical left article and expand, culling the many dubious claims in Ultra-leftism while we are at it. Bacondrum (talk) 00:35, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

Bacondrum and The Four Deuces, my understanding is that Marxism–Leninism et al are neither left-wing nor far-left but rather authoritarian left. While journalists and news may conflate the authoritarian left and the far-left (this is the centrist bias, that there more you go left or right, the more you go authoritarian, which may be true for the right but not necessarily for the left), authoritarianism is not a defining characteristic of the far-left the same way it is for fascism or the far-right; radicalism is, which is a different—not exactly the same—thing. This is consistent with The Four Deuces' comment that [p]eople did not refer to the governments of the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China after Mao as far left, i.e. they were considered (authoritarian) leftists (if put on a political spectrum at all) rather than far-left.--Davide King (talk) 13:45, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

Marxist-Leninists were considered to lie between social democrats (or whatever you want to call them) and Trotskyists. The article American Left lists numerous small left-wing groups in the U.S. that are considered to be to the left of the Communist Party. TFD (talk) 15:19, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

The Four Deuces, that is what I thought as well.--Davide King (talk) 05:55, 24 August 2020 (UTC)

Antifa

Helper201,

Anarchism or hard-left is as well not necessarily far-left, however, antifa is descibed as well as far-left.(KIENGIR (talk) 23:31, 2 September 2020 (UTC))

However, this below is quoted directly from the Wikipedia page on Antifa (United States):

"Antifa involvement in violent actions against far-right opponents and the police has led some scholars and news media to characterize the movement as far-left and militant."