{"id":1343,"date":"2022-04-17T19:01:32","date_gmt":"2022-04-17T08:01:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/davidmhart.com\/wordpress\/?p=1343"},"modified":"2026-04-08T06:08:21","modified_gmt":"2026-04-07T20:08:21","slug":"left-or-right-radical-or-conservative-free-or-unfree-the-problem-of-measuring-freedom-in-an-unfree-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/davidmhart.com\/wordpress\/left-or-right-radical-or-conservative-free-or-unfree-the-problem-of-measuring-freedom-in-an-unfree-world\/","title":{"rendered":"Plotting Liberty: The Multi-Dimensionality of Classical Liberalism and the Need for a New \u2018Left-Right\u2019 Political Spectrum"},"content":{"rendered":"

[Note<\/strong>: This post is part of a series<\/a> on the History of the Classical Liberal Tradition]<\/p>\n

The Multi-Dimensional Nature of Liberty<\/h2>\n

The full richness and complexity of the nature of Liberty is not well appreciated by most observers, especially mainstream media journalists and political scientists.<\/p>\n

In other posts I have explored the relationship between the main components of a CL or Libertarian theory of Liberty which I will not repeat in detail here, only to assert that it is \u201cmulti-dimensional\u201d in nature, consisting of at least three, and possibly four different threads or streams:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. political liberty<\/li>\n
  2. economic liberty<\/li>\n
  3. individual\/personal\/social liberty<\/li>\n
  4. and sometimes legal liberty (if I don\u2019t want to conflate this with the category of \u201cpolitical\u201d liberty)<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    (See these posts<\/a> for more information.)<\/p>\n

    In this post on \u201cThe Key Ideas of Classical Liberalism: Foundations, Processes, Liberties\u201d<\/a> I discuss the meaning of this \u201cconcept map\u201d of CL which I created:<\/p>\n

    <\/p>\n

    <\/p>\n

    Note<\/strong>: I have an updated version of these mind maps from April 2022 which is not yet online.<\/p>\n

    One can do the same for other political ideologies, determining what their position is on what they consider to be the proper power of the state, how much this power should be used to intervene in the affairs of the ordinary person, and how this might impinge upon the three kinds of liberty outlined above. This comparison can be done \u201cqualitatively\u201d (or \u201crelatively\u201d) by means of a \u201cspectrum\u201d (in one dimension) or a \u201cpolitical compass\u201d or \u201cmatrix\u201d (in 2 dimensions) which shows visually whether a society is more or less free in very general terms; or it can be done \u201cqualitatively\u201d by giving a score (say out of 10 or 100) for each of these liberties (perhaps in 2 or 3 dimensions) and then ranking the different regimes according to how much or how little freedom their citizens are able to exercise as measured by these scores.<\/p>\n

    I will discuss here some of the attempts to measure how much freedom a society \u201cenjoys\u201d (or \u201callows\u201d its citizens to enjoy) and how successful I think these measurements are. Most are \u201cqualitative\u201d or \u201crelative\u201d in nature, such as<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. the traditional Left-Right political spectrum with its 1 dimension<\/li>\n
    2. my own \u201cnew political spectrum\u201d between Liberty and Power (also 1 dimensional)<\/li>\n
    3. David Nolan\u2019s \u201cLibertarian Spectrum\u201d (1969) in 2 dimensions – Left (\u201cliberal\u201d) vs. Right (conservative) and Libertarian vs. Authoritarian<\/li>\n
    4. a \u201csimplified\u201d Nolan chart in two dimensions and four quadrants – \u201cSocial\u201d freedom and \u201ceconomic\u201d freedom<\/li>\n
    5. the \u201cPolitical Compass\u201d which also uses \u201cquadrants\u201d and 2 dimensions, this time \u201cLeft\u201d vs. \u201cRight\u201d and \u201cAuthoritarian\u201d vs. \u201cLibertarian.\u201d<\/li>\n
    6. David Boaz\u2019s \u201cFour-Way Matrix\u201d in 2 dimensions – \u201csocial liberalism\u201d and \u201ceconomic conservatism\u201d – which results in 4 quadrants of Populist, Liberal, Conservative, and Libertarian<\/li>\n
    7. my own version of the \u201cFour-Way Political Matrix\u201d revised for Australia politics – economic and social freedom – with the 4 quadrants of Conservative, Libertarian, Populist, and Socialist<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      My last example is a much more ambitious attempt at the \u201cquantification\u201d of the amount of \u201cHuman Freedom\u201d by a team from Cato and the Fraser Institute. In their Human Freedom Index<\/em> they try to quantify the amount of liberty (from 0-10) enjoyed in 165 countries across 82 different \u201cindicators\u201d of personal and economic liberty (thus using 2 dimensions). The results are then ranked by combining the individual scores of \u201cpersonal liberty\u201d and \u201ceconomic liberty\u201d into a \u201cHuman Freedom\u201d total. One of the very interesting measurements they also provide is to show how different countries have risen or fallen in the rankings over time, giving the index a dynamic aspect which other political spectra or compasses do not.<\/p>\n

      The Traditional \u201cLeft-Right\u201d Political Spectrum (1 dimension)<\/h2>\n

      What is wrong with this picture?<\/h3>\n

      <\/p>\n

      This is the most common depiction of the Left-Right Political Spectrum with \u201ccommunism\u201d and \u201csocialism\u201d on the far \u201cLeft\u201d and Fascism on the far \u201cRight\u201d. However, there are many serious problems with depicting in this fashion the different political ideologies and the regimes they give rise to. For example,<\/p>\n