Is Sinn Féin left wing or right wing?

On economic organisation Sinn Féin scores −05 on a scale from −10 (common ownership) to +10 (private property and markets). On social and cultural order it scores −04. A single left–right figure combines these and four further measurements that move independently, which is why the atlas reports six.

Is Sinn Féin authoritarian?

On the organisation of power, which measures whether authority is dispersed among institutions that can stop each other or concentrated in a single centre, Sinn Féin scores −02. Parliamentary in both jurisdictions; power-sharing under the Good Friday Agreement.

Atlas / Organisations / Sinn Féin

Sinn Féin

1905– · Ireland · Left Nationalist · Electoral party · coding confidence medium

−05ECcollective

−04CUpluralist

−02AUpluralist

−01SClocal

+04IDascriptive

−03CHlawful

Each axis runs from −10 to +10, with zero a genuine mixed or balanced position rather than an absence of opinion. A score describes a stated position and a governing record; it is not a judgement of merit. What each score means →

Core principles

Irish reunification by referendum, housing and health investment, workers' rights.

Economic model

Public housebuilding, rent freezes, higher taxes on high earners and wealth, retained low corporate tax.

Organisation of powers

Parliamentary in both jurisdictions; power-sharing under the Good Friday Agreement.

Reading note

Formerly linked to an armed campaign and now the largest party in the Northern Ireland Assembly — a documented transition from the coercive to the constitutional end of the method axis.

Check a claim about Sinn Féin. The interactive atlas measures the distance between any two organisations across all six axes and shows which ones carry the disagreement.

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The evidence for every score

All six cells are sourced. A rationale explains what the score is measuring and each artefact is something a third party can check without taking anyone's word for it.

EC · Economic organisation · scored −05

Coded −5: public housebuilding, rent freezes and higher taxes on wealth.

Programme textProgramme commitments to build 20,000 homes a year and to a wealth tax, with the low corporate rate retained.

CU · Social and cultural order · scored −04

Coded −4: socially liberal on both sides of the border.

Documented act or statuteCampaigned for marriage equality and abortion access in both jurisdictions.

AU · Organisation of power · scored −02

Coded −2: power-sharing under the Good Friday Agreement.

Documented act or statuteHolds the office of First Minister in Northern Ireland under mandatory coalition.

SC · Scale of decision · scored −01

Coded −1: reunification by referendum with devolved institutions in the interim.

Programme textProgramme commits to a border poll under the Agreement's own mechanism.

ID · Rule of membership · scored +04

Coded +4: an Irish national community defined partly by tradition.

ScholarshipThe party's frame is national reunification rather than civic state membership.

CH · Method and tempo · scored −03

Coded −3: a documented traverse from an armed campaign to constitutional politics.

Documented act or statuteThe IRA declared a ceasefire in 1994 and decommissioned in 2005.

How it moved

Positions are recorded at dated anchor points tied to a documented moment — a programme adopted, a government formed, a reversal. Nothing is interpolated between them, because nothing is known between them. Figures in amber moved by two points or more from the previous anchor.

Anchor	EC	CU	AU	SC	ID	CH	What it is tied to
1981	−06	−01	+04	−02	+06	+08	Armalite and ballot box: electoral participation alongside an armed campaign.
1998	−05	−03	+01	−01	+05	+02	Good Friday Agreement signed; ceasefire in place since 1994.
2010	−05	−04	−01	−01	+04	−02	Decommissioning completed in 2005; power-sharing normalised.
2024	−05	−04	−02	−01	+04	−03	Largest party in the Northern Ireland Assembly and holder of the First Minister's office.

Net movement, 1981 to 2024: CU −3, AU −6, ID −2, CH −11. A trajectory records where an organisation has been. It does not forecast, and several organisations in this corpus moved a long way with no warning available in advance.

Where it came from, and what came after

succeededEH Bildu
Two movements that completed the same transition from armed struggle to constitutional politics.

Nearest organisations by measured distance

Straight-line separation across all six axes, out of a maximum of 49.0. Proximity means similarity of stated position, not endorsement and not resemblance in outcome.

Countries

Ireland

Cite this page

Scores are revised on evidence, so a citation should carry the version it refers to. Version 4.3.1 is current; the revision log records every change.

McGrath, K. (2026). Sinn Féin. The Political Atlas, version 4.2. https://thepoliticalatlas.com/organisations/sinnfein/ (accessed 2026-08-01).

Free to quote and reproduce with attribution. This is a synthesis rather than a peer-reviewed dataset — where an authoritative figure is needed, cite the Chapel Hill Expert Survey, the Manifesto Project or V-Dem.