I see a lot of politico links in this sub and I’d just like to say:
POLITICO Europe is a subsidiary of Axel Springer SE.
That’s a right leaning and pretty unethical publisher and politico has already been caught several times spreading reactionary propaganda. I also suspect they publish undisclosed opinion pieces as news. Like some fossil fuel investor explaining how wind turbines could be hacked by China without providing any compelling evidence. Many articles are well written so it’s hard to spot the grift sometimes. Just stay vigilant.
Neoliberalism.
Because part of neoliberalism is to weaken welfare so that people are pressured into accepting exploitative labour conditions.
Wait, do you think chistian democrats are pro welfare? Do you think, neoliberalism is a left leaning ideology?
I might be wrong but your comment reads as if you think a political opinion automatically aligns with political parties (which would be massively oversimplifying the process of opinion making and political procedure).
I’m fairly sure you won’t dispute that Christian democracy is a right wing ideology. What commonalities to neoliberalism do you see between both? You probably won’t find much so it makes little sense to group them together as „right wing”. I’m beating the drum here again so that people wake up and recognise who the centrists really are.
I’m not a conservative by any means but I don’t mind true right wing ideology. It can be a compassionate philosophy that focuses on common good. True right wing is very rare these days because they were replaced by populists who can’t be even categorised as conservatives. They’re just bullies. Liberals are bullies very often too.
Axel Springer isn’t centrist. They are openly right wing and call out progressive positions as “woke bullshit” and stuff like that. They openly say that they are right wing.
You can be a neoliberal and against wokeness. Neoliberalism is about money. You don’t need to accept their label, they are using it because it serves their needs at the moment. Look at what they do rather what they say.
One day people will connect dots between „centrism” and far-right, it’ll be too late then based on what I’m seeing here though ;)
Do you know the general difference between progressive and conservative or “left” and “right” wing policies? Both see differences in people most of which are innate. Progressivism (left wing) generally aims to level the playing field so that these differences do not affect your chances to be a member of society and live the life you want. Conservativism (right wing) infers hierarchies due to said differences and aims to build a society based on those hierarchies. Religious groups (like christian democrats) work with their religion, often arguing with “god’s plan” or divine punishment, neoliberalism works with money and hustle culture.
No, it doesn’t. It’s the opposite of that.
So now we have one axis, progressivism. You can have a progressive right wing (Tories legalised gay marriage arguing it’s for families), progressive neoliberals (Democratic party) and progressive left (like Zapatero in Spain). How do we differentiate between them? Their attitude towards wealth inequality, authoritarianism etc. That’s why liberals are distinct from left or right, there’s as much difference between a liberal and a conservative as between a liberal and a leftist, but those are differences on other axis. There are other dynamics at play but boiling things down to progressivism is why poor were abandoned and are now turning to fascists.
Don’t treat your opponents as evil caricatures. They might be smarter than you while being wrong and they’ll win because you let them.
Yes, it’s more complex than an on-off-switch. Congratulations. Different liberal movements focus on different aspects. Neoliberalism is a radical economic movement building hierarchy on wealth and ability. Some liberal movements focus on individual freedoms (and when everyone is to have the same individual freedoms, differences must be compensated).
But this isn’t about liberalism, it’s about how neoliberalism is a right wing ideology. And that is because it builds and enforces hierarchies.
You make neoliberalism sound like fringe movement in a bazaar of liberal ideas when it is the mainstream ideology that dictates how the world works.
I’d like to urge more good-faith argumentation from your side here. Whether or not neoliberalism is “fringe” was not the question.
This discussion was about Politico = Axel Springer = neoliberalism = right-wing.
First, that’s your reading. I never commented on the spread of any ideology.
Second, what do you want to argue about? I answered your question about bow neoliberalism is a right wing ideology (that you framed as center-left btw).
Incidentally, all the Christian Democratic parties morphed into fervently neoliberal parties. So there does appear to be a connection between the ideologies, no?
Quite honestly – is there a person or historical system to exemplify this?
Yes and no. Conservatives lost relevance in a world of meritocracy, most of their points were on a losing side eventually. People who come to power now, on the backs of conservative voters, don’t even try to be factually correct and therefore offer a way to continue ideological left-right war (hence the post-truth moniker used by some people). The hard pill to swallow about this is that maybe extreme meritocracy is not sustainable, or at least not sustainable in a system that doesn’t benefit the largest possible majority in practice. And maybe that politics can’t be means of changing societal norms as those have to happen naturally. A political force attempting such thing would need to have high legitimacy and current elites don’t have it because they usually prioritised interests of the largest businesses over regular people.
What I’m trying to say is that no matter which perspective you use to try to look into the future, there’s no positive outcome if neoliberalism is involved. I’m arguing with people online in an effort that sometime in the future they’re not deceived by neoliberals pretending to be right or left wing politician and that’s why I insist on making the distinction.
Christian democrats in Western Europe adapted many things from social democrats, mostly on welfare state which is critical element of societal cohesion. Those parties were since then eaten from the inside by neoliberalism that corrupted both right and left but for a time whole world aspired to European quality of life. We might not agree on societal norms with Christian democrats but things like Catholic social teaching is solid stuff to build upon.