Atlas / Claim checks / Is anarchism left wing
Is anarchism left wing? The claim, measured
“Anarchism is a left-wing ideology.”
Measured against Anarcho-Communism and Anarcho-Capitalism
Strongest case for the claim
The historical anarchist movement is overwhelmingly a movement of the left: the First International, the CNT, the Makhnovshchina, the Zapatistas and Rojava are all collectivist in economics and were all built by workers' and peasants' organisations.
Strongest case against
The individualist tradition running from Stirner and Tucker to Rothbard is equally anarchist by the defining test — rejection of the state as such — and sits at the opposite economic extreme. Both traditions reject the state; neither can be reduced to the other.
What the coordinates show. Anarcho-communism scores −09 on economics and anarcho-capitalism +10, nineteen points apart. Both score −10 on authority. They are 38.4 apart overall. Two positions that share the defining commitment of a tradition and sit at opposite ends of the axis the question asks about is exactly what it looks like when the question is malformed.
The six measurements
| Axis | Kropotkin | Rothbard | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| EC · Economic organisation | −09 | +10 | 19 |
| CU · Social and cultural order | −07 | +01 | 8 |
| AU · Organisation of power | −10 | −10 | 0 |
| SC · Scale of decision | −10 | −10 | 0 |
| ID · Rule of membership | −08 | −02 | 6 |
| CH · Method and tempo | +06 | +03 | 3 |
Both cases are stated because the atlas does not settle arguments by assertion. Where the underlying dispute is conceptual rather than factual, that is said plainly rather than resolved.
Full comparisonCheck it yourself
The interactive atlas holds 319 organisations on six independent axes with the evidence for every score. Paste any claim that equates two political things and it will find them and report the measurement.