Nothing fuels online discourse like fights over language. New terms will popularize in a subculture then trickle into the zeitgeist until they lose universal meaning if it was ever there to begin with. Terminology such as “weaponize,” “virtue signal,” “identity politics,” “moral panic,” “bad faith,” and “cancel culture” gets diffused so widely and unsystematically that it feels impossible to pin down what someone means without a litany of qualifiers and caveats.
But one reason we fight over language is that we are after clarity. It’s not the only reason people have terminological disputes — sometimes, as Oliver Traldi puts it, those disputes are forms of gatekeeping. But it’s also true that clearly defining our terms gets us closer to being able to figure out whose arguments are strongest.
This piece aims to clarify a framework that is ubiquitous in online discussion — the definitional disconnect between liberal and leftist. These terms — and the broader political spectrum they belong to — are contested, seeing as their meaning has varied historically and around the world. Because they continue to be so widely used (and misused), and because they continue to function as the very categories we use to understand people’s political identities and associations, it’s crucial for their meanings to be as widely, uniformly accessible as possible.
Defining Labels with Positions and Ethos
When determining what makes someone a liberal or leftist there are two key models we can use.
The first looks at an individual’s positions. What policies do they support? Do they prefer incrementally reforming our healthcare system or shifting to a single-payer approach? Do they support prison abolitionism? Abolishing the police? Do they support the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement? Do they generally favor universalistic provisions over means-tested ones? Do they favor policies designed to redress class-based inequities? This model uses policy preferences as an instrument to determine where one falls on the political spectrum.
The second looks at an individual’s ethos. This model is slightly harder to pin down, but has to do with political behaviors that don’t pick out one policy or another. For example, what “side” or ideological community does an individual critique more? What media do they consume? Which views do they think fall outside the bounds of reasonable debate? What slogans do they use — or, perhaps better, what slogans do they criticize? (“#Resist” and “eat the rich” reliably pick out two different groups.)
Both models — positions and ethos — are important. But it would seem people focus more on ethos. This makes sense, since most discussions aren’t over the technical specifications of one policy versus another. Rather, we pay more attention to elements like what a discourse participant tends to regularly emphasize or what they consistently fail to address. We look at things like who their audience is, who they most regularly associate with. Since people can easily claim to be politically this or that (“I’m a progressive but…” or “Although I’m a conservative, I think…”), many observers find it more illuminating to look at what these discourse participants spend most of their time discussing or defending. This can seem more representative of their political positioning than their nominal political affiliations.
Some broad binaries that illustrate common differences in ethos between liberals and leftists are reform vs revolution, pragmatism vs idealism, and compromise vs demands.
What’s In A Liberal?
In the U.S., liberals are standardly seen as social liberals rather than as some other form of liberal, such as classical liberals. One confusing aspect is rival ideological groups situate liberals in quite different positions on the political spectrum: liberals are seen as center-left or centrist by leftists, but seen as just generally-on-the-left by people on the right. So those to the left of social liberals see them as center-left, centrist, or even on the right, whereas those to their right see them as just being on the left.
Complicating things further is that “liberal” varies around the world. The Liberal Democratic Party of Japan (LDP) is considered conservative and Liberal Party in Canada is considered center-left, for example. In Europe, liberalism is usually understood to be something closer to neoclassical liberalism, or, as it might be known in the U.S., bleeding-heart libertarianism — favoring free-markets, softer borders, global commerce, and a focus on humanitarian concerns.
There is yet another meaning for “liberalism”: some use it to refer to the political philosophy centered around civil liberties, the social configuration usually tethered to democracy and capitalism due to its emphasis on robust private property rights and the belief that its inhabitants are free and equal members of society.
I’ll stick to social liberalism as the working understanding of liberalism, since that’s the group that most gets associated with the “liberal” label in the U.S. today.
Through an economic lens, liberals support capitalism with varying degrees of regulation and social programs to alleviate market inadequacies. This can range from a center-friendly neoliberal approach (favoring more markets and globalization) to a left-leaning social democratic approach (favoring a more muscular welfare regime and statist intervention). At times, and under different analyses, the economically neoliberal approach can be closer to a classical liberal or libertarian conceptualization of liberalism, whereas an economically social democratic approach can veer towards leftism or socialism. But even though economic liberalism can sometimes appear libertarian on the one hand or leftist on the other, liberalism is big enough to accommodate both the neoliberal and social democratic approach. In other words, it doesn’t have to be the case that implementing a more austere safety net (as historic iterations of neoliberalism have preferred) or very high marginal tax rates (as social democracies require) takes one away from being a liberal on economic grounds — again, this is a range of positions that liberalism can accommodate.
Through a social lens, liberals can be moderately progressive to radically progressive. Frameworks like feminism or intersectionality are frequently used by liberals to analyze issues through identity traits like race, gender, class, and geography. That said, there are also reactionary liberal contingents, such as gender-critical feminists and cultural critics who pump the brakes on what they perceive to be excesses of progressivism, without going as far as conservatives in their rejection of identitarianism. Democrats on the center-left often align with conservatives on issues like foreign policy, policing, or fracking as well. Though it sounds paradoxical, there are even illiberal liberals, or perhaps it would be more accurate to say liberals who are illiberal about certain fundamental elements of liberalism, e.g., social liberals who favor restrictions on speech to an extent that it complicates their ability to genuinely maintain that they believe in the importance of free speech.
In terms of ethos, liberals embody incrementalism, reform, pragmatism, and compromise. Their antithesis is the revolutionary or accelerationist impulse. Liberals emphasize gradual progress, they typically value consensus building, and they base policy decisions on what’s popular or feasible at a given time. Liberals are likely to applaud corporations, institutions, and media for increasing their inclusivity of minority groups, though they are perhaps the least capable of detecting that the symbolic gestures these entities offer are only just marketing ploys or PR campaigns. Inspirational messaging like Obama’s “Yes We Can” is meaningful to liberals because an underlying tenet of liberalism of the current variety is that progress doesn’t merely — or even principally — come about via systemic change, but rather follows cultural attitudes.
This is why some liberal rhetoric may sound revolutionary, or carry with it a tinge of moral urgency, only to later get dialed back during the actual processes of governing and legislating. This sets up a recurring rhetorical battle with leftists who expect revolutionary campaign promises to be fulfilled by revolutionary legislation — and when that doesn’t happen, rather than support the liberal candidate on at-least-they’re-better-than-the-right-wing grounds, leftists denounce the liberal in power just as strongly as the right, which frustrates liberals.
Although liberals at times appear aspirationally utopian, in practice they are interested in altering the status quo, not replacing it. Liberals, much like leftists, view our institutions as fragile, but unlike leftists, believe fixing them is a better solution than uprooting them.
What’s In A Leftist?
Leftists, a group mainly comprised of socialists, communists, and anarchists, are usually anti-capitalist. Liberals sometimes see themselves as leftists, or view themselves as being “on the left,” since liberals are likely to place themselves as left-of-center on the political spectrum — but leftists typically reserve “left” and “left-of-center” for people whose political orientation is to the left of liberalism. Those who lean right tend to use “the left” and “leftist” as a way of picking out anyone to their left, which includes the vast swathe of liberals.
Just as with “liberalism,” what counts as “leftist” varies around the world. The Socialist Party of France is considered center-left and Communist Party of India is considered far-left, for example. Historically, the term “left-wing” has been used to describe dozens of leftist philosophies including Marxism, Leninism, Maoism, Trotskyism, and Anarcho-Syndicalism, just to name a few. Some also define social democrats as leftists, as well as left-leaning liberals with a substantive critique of capitalism or those who participate in labor movements.
Through an economic lens, though leftists sometimes share goals with liberals — such as when leftists and social liberals or social democrats want more socialized programs — leftists go further than liberals. Even in its most moderate forms, leftism supports actions undermining the capitalist superstructure in society, such as incentives for democratizing workplaces with unions and co-ops, or supporting mutual aid and communes. Radical leftists, going further, support a wholesale overthrow of capitalism, which can take the form of workers forcibly seizing the means of production, the abolition of private property, the nationalization of all industries with a view to full collective ownership, or even violent revolution. Within leftism, the end goals sometimes vary, but all forms of it situate capitalism at the core of our social malaise.
Through a social lens — which, under leftism, cannot meaningfully be separated from the economic lens — leftism’s goals sometimes overlap with progressive forms of liberalism. Not always, though — leftists and some socially progressive liberals might agree on, say, criminal justice reform, but they will tend to disagree on whether class or race is the most salient analytical input for advancing justice. Focusing on building class consciousness as opposed to engaging in what they sometimes deride as “performative activism,” leftists prefer to address material conditions rather than whatever symbolic changes end up being prescribed by a concern over racial “identity politics.” This is because leftists believe racial identity politics can be easily addressed without oppressed people gaining much of anything at all; corporations and institutions are able to play-act as though they are pursuing social reform but, according to the leftist, in the end it’s just a vacuous branding exercise. Minority representation doesn’t mean much if the system is exploitative through and through. There are also reactionary leftists such as parts of the “dirtbag left,” areas where left-wing and right-wing populism overlap, as well as authoritarian contingents that are pejoratively referred to as tankies.
In terms of ethos, leftists fundamentally view the world through the frame of power dynamics, such as anti-imperialism, anti-colonialism, anti-hierarchy, and class conflict between workers and owners. They believe the systems in place are corrupted by capital. This totalizing framework is why ideas on this side take on a similar form: like “ACAB” (all cops are bastards) or decrying “lesser of two evils” reasoning during elections. They believe the clock is ticking on addressing matters like climate change, economic devastation, and the forward march of fascist regimes — liberals sometimes do too, but leftists see a greater urgency, which is one reason why they push for more immediate, more radical, solutions. If we’re operating with a simple binary of liberal or illiberal social configuration, many leftists will endorse tenets of philosophical liberalism (such as democracy), but they’ll believe social liberalism on its own will inevitably fail to defend them. Leftists believe in philosophical liberalism’s commitment to equality, but they think that this way of ordering society can easily fall into oligarchy and produce widespread social alienation. Some leftists also reject the liberal ethos of civil discourse or so-called respectability politics. To them, certain ideas that serve the goals of capitalists, fascists, and racists shouldn’t be debated and instead should be mocked, deplatformed, or violently fought — since to treat them politely is to grant them respectability, which in turn is to pave the way for their ability to harm.
Since there’s no prominent left-wing party in America today, leftists often ally with liberals in hopes to either reshape the Democratic Party or influence culture enough to start their own. Some leftists are big-tent advocates, while others prefer fracturing into niche communities.
What about Social Democrats and Progressives?
Social democrats have historically been part of the reformist wing of the socialist tradition, but social democratic policies fall within the economic parameters of capitalism so liberals embrace the label as well. Even some leftists call social democrats liberals because they argue their model maintains the status quo and is only sustainable by relying on developed countries for support and exploiting developing countries for resources — arguments that some social democrats reject, citing that not all global trade deals are de facto imperialist exploitation and that their model is a demonstrable transition to forms of leftism, or in some cases, sustainable on its own. More radical leftists believe social democratic reforms — such as FDR’s New Deal — act as mere bandages to the wounds inflicted by capitalism, wounds needing surgery rather than cosmetic changes.
Just as “social democrat” is a common economic label that has historically been a source of tension between liberals and leftists, “progressive” is a common social label between them. Progressives are colloquially seen as people wanting to move society forward on a number of social issues, in contrast to conservatives more in favor of retaining the status quo. Though it mainly picks out a social program, “progressive” can describe economic views as well, but the economic views are in service to the philosophy’s socially progressive aims.
Most prominent non-right-wing figures are characterizable as either liberal or left. Some have their places on the spectrum contested. For example, some liberals believe Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are leftist given their rhetorical openness to “socialism” and their preference for policies like Medicare-for-All; while some leftists see them as basically just liberals slightly to the left of most other liberals given factors like Ocasio-Cortez’s affiliation with the Democratic Party and Sanders’s endorsement of liberal candidates. Going beyond political figures and looking at people in the discourse more broadly, Noam Chomsky and ContraPoints have each run into the same critiques. Chomsky may be considered far-left by many in the mainstream, but some leftists consider him a moderate compared to more radical figures like Michael Parenti. ContraPoints was one of the first leftist creators to break through on YouTube in 2017 with video essays critiquing capitalism, yet has faced accusations of not furthering leftist ideas enough. Some figures may not want the baggage of the leftist label to begin with; some may wish to see socialism in the future but currently only care about social democratic goals; some may be more focused on social issues than theory; and others may simply not fit so neatly into leftist spaces. That’s why even though most people not on the right can be categorized as either liberal or left, there exists a substantial grey area between the two.
The U.S. is a mixed economy in a capitalist system, which is similar to most countries to varying degrees. Liberalism is the predominant political philosophy of the land, and conservatism is an ever-present orientation against most forms of rapid social change, making “liberal” and “conservative” the most commonly used labels. Leftism is growing in the U.S. today, but its more radical forms remain on the fringes. So whenever you see leftism, it’s usually the sort that has some overlapping elements with some of the least moderate forms of liberalism. All this makes it difficult to reach universally agreed upon labels, especially since political spectra are measured differently around the world.
Some people are strict in their label definitions, some avoid them all together, and others use several in combination. There’s no hard line between liberals and leftists that acts as a catch-all, which is why analyzing someone’s positions and ethos in tandem can help with loose categorization. Everybody wants belonging and identity, but there’s a limitation to labels when they mean something different to so many groups. Most people aren’t ideologically consistent and don’t fit neatly within a political compass quadrant. As the saying goes, ask 10 people in a group to define the group’s beliefs and you’ll get 11 answers. But as long as there are competing ideologies, there will always be worthwhile fights over the language to describe them in the discourse. If nothing else, these fights bring us closer to a place where we can evaluate which perspective, seen as a package, is closest to being correct.
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