this post was submitted on 24 Jul 2024
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Nationalized industry (or healthcare) is neither a leftist idea nor a collectivist one. It's merely bog-standard nationalism and perfectly compatible with concepts of "social democracy," which, if you know your history, you already understand isn't leftist at all - it was literally invented by Otto von Bismarck as a way to protect against socialist revolution.
A leftist accepts that state-control of services is still a lot better than privatized control... but it is still a very, very distant second-best to socialized control.
Yeah, nationalization can be a right-wing thing but it generally isn't. Also, I wouldn't say that control by the state is less left-wing than control via worker collectives; that's just the difference between authoritarian and libertarian socialism.
Social democracy, as it is typically understood, is absolutely leftist since it is based around government regulation, social justice, economic equality, and a strong welfare state.
Bismarck also didn't "invent it"; his government was more just a welfare state. Social democracy itself came about through various 19th Century thinkers, such as Eduard Bernstein.
Control by the state is still anti-socialist - it doesn't matter how much Marxist-Lenninists protest otherwise. There is only one type of "worker's state," and that is one where the means of production is actually democratically controlled by the working class - not a pack of bureaucrat party-parasites pretending to "represent" the working class by waving little red flags at every occasion.
There is nothing leftist about social democracy - it's warmed-over liberalism that serves no other purpose other than protecting the liberal order from working class revolt. And, like all forms of liberalism, it's proponents will happily hold hands with fascism as soon as it's precious status quo is threatened from below.
"Invent" is a strong word, I suppose... but it's a question of six of one and half-a-dozen of the other. They both serve the exact same purpose and deliver the exact same result. The truth about this ideology remains the same - it is thoroughly ant-socialist and pro-capitalist... and there is nothing leftist about it except in the minds of those whose brains have been addled by "red scare" and "free market" propaganda.
Ok, so if we agree to define Leftist strictly as anti-capitalist, then fine. I was using it to mean more "left-of-centre".
If you are pro-capitalist you are a right-winger - no ifs, ands or buts. Not "centrist" or "left-of-center."
There is no debate to be had here.
So what's in the centre then?
There is no centre - there never was. Not in a "left-vs-right" conception, anyway - there is no such thing as "half-a-socialist" or "half-a-capitalist." You're either for it or you're not.
There is a way of visualizing a "centre," though... if you imagine the status quo as a "centre" (which also signifies institutionalized political, economic and social power) and draw a circle around it, everything inside that circle will be right-wing - everything outside it will be left-wing. This would actually be somewhat more accurate than the silly "political compass" infographics which does more miseducating than anything else.