Is Three Principles of the People left wing or right wing?

On economic organisation Three Principles of the People scores −03 on a scale from −10 (common ownership) to +10 (private property and markets). On social and cultural order it scores +01. A single left–right figure combines these and four further measurements that move independently, which is why the atlas reports six.

Is Three Principles of the People 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, Three Principles of the People scores +03. Five-power constitution adding examination and control branches to the Western three; an explicit authoritarian transition phase.

Atlas / Organisations / Three Principles of the People

Three Principles of the People

Sun Yat-sen · 1905–1925 · China · Nationalist / Republican · Doctrine / school · coding confidence medium

−03ECcollective

+01CUtraditional

+03AUmonist

+06SCcentral

+04IDascriptive

+06CHcoercive

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

Nationalism, democracy and people's livelihood, delivered through a period of party tutelage before full self-government.

Economic model

Land value taxation borrowed from Henry George, state ownership of natural monopolies, capital regulation.

Organisation of powers

Five-power constitution adding examination and control branches to the Western three; an explicit authoritarian transition phase.

Reading note

Claimed as founding doctrine by both the Kuomintang and the Chinese Communist Party, which have occupied opposite coordinates for a century.

Check a claim about Three Principles of the People. 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 −03

Coded −3: land value taxation and state ownership of natural monopolies.

Programme textThe principle of people's livelihood borrows Henry George's land value tax explicitly.

CU · Social and cultural order · scored +01

Coded +1: modernising and anti-Manchu, without a settled social programme.

Documented act or statuteThe queue was abolished and footbinding banned after 1911.

AU · Organisation of power · scored +03

Coded +3: an explicit period of party tutelage before self-government.

Programme textThe Fundamentals of National Reconstruction specify military, tutelary and constitutional phases.

SC · Scale of decision · scored +06

Coded +6: a unitary republic against warlord fragmentation.

Documented act or statuteThe Northern Expedition of 1926–28 was fought to unify the country by force.

ID · Rule of membership · scored +04

Coded +4: a nationalism initially anti-Manchu and later framed as five peoples in union.

Documented act or statuteThe five-races-under-one-union flag replaced the earlier anti-Manchu framing after 1912.

CH · Method and tempo · scored +06

Coded +6: revolution as the founding method.

Documented act or statuteTen failed uprisings preceded the successful one in 1911.

Where it came from, and what came after

takes its doctrine fromRomantic Nationalism
Sun's nationalism was formulated in exile in Japan and Europe on the Mazzinian model.
becameKuomintang
The party he founded, continuous through the republic, the civil war and the Taiwanese transition.
gave doctrine toMaoism
The Chinese Communist Party was founded inside the united front with the Nationalists.

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

China

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). Three Principles of the People. The Political Atlas, version 4.2. https://thepoliticalatlas.com/organisations/sunyatsen/ (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.