There is an increasing tendency in politics for people to identify as an ‘-ist’ following a particular ‘-ism’ without doing significant research into what that ideology stands for and what the merits are of its values and ideas. This is partly a product of increased political polarization: when your relationships and popularity would be threatened by not explicitly identifying yourself with a certain movement, it’s natural to signal which camp you’re in. Despite the instinctive nature of such self-classification, this behavior is damaging to intelligent political discourse and, by corollary, democracy across the world.
The first issue is that this trend has contributed to increased dogmatic thinking and refusal to question one’s ideas. When someone is comfortably within a certain camp, they become less inclined to seek answers to questions independently and in an unbiased manner, and more likely to search for what adherents to their chosen ideology typically believe in. Less people search for opinions of multiple sources, empirical evidence, and a theoretical basis when trying to understand a complex issue – many of the ’-ist’s tend to look for what their favorite columnist or theoretician has said, and then place blind faith in their opinion without trying to form their own assessment of the issue. This type of andhbhakt thinking is scarcely better than that of religious fanatics who go running to a cleric any time they have a doubt over a social or political issue, e.g. the place of women in society: neither the political nor the religious andhbhakt approaches social and political issues with an unbiased mind, neither bothers to think about their opinions, and both have a negative impact on the quality of political discourse.
Continuing on this theme of poor thinking, there is also a mindset
that if you agree with propositions X,Y, and Z, then you should be
classified as a something-ist, and therefore you also agree with
propositions A,B, and C. Both sides of the political spectrum are guilty
of this. For example, the news site Reason.com identifies
itself as fully libertarian, which often leads to problematic video
titles such as “Debate: Should libertarians Love or Hate Pope Leo’s AI
Letter?” – despite calling itself a debate, the video’s title implies a
certain degree of groupthink through its presumption that all
libertarians should either love or hate the Pope’s stance on AI; rather
than accommodating a multiplicity of viewpoints among libertarians,
videos like this seek to prescribe what libertarianism is about and what
libertarians should believe in. The very idea that you should support
something solely because of what “-ism” you believe in discourages
independent thinking and arguments grounded in reason, despite the
website’s title and professed goal of “free minds, free markets.” While
this title might itself be indicative of bad wording rather than
mal-intent, the general style of reporting on the site indicates a
larger problem. By identifying themselves with the ideology of
libertarianism and rigidly defining it as unconditional love for the
market and opposition to any kind of regulation, the authors at that
site, along with many other self-identifying libertarians, weaken their
ability to adopt nuanced viewpoints that integrate elements of different
ideologies, e.g. the ability to both support free markets and the need
to control rent-seeking behavior and negative externalities created by
large corporations.
A possible objection to the above analysis is that the video title refers to a hypothetical set of axioms (read: ideology) rather than a prescriptive approach to political discourse, i.e. that it supposes if a person supported X,Y,Z values fully, then they should take a certain stance, but without explicitly advocating for people fully supporting those values; however, these videos don’t specifically list the axioms assumed and instead directly link their policy prescription with adherence to an ideology that is presented as the only correct one. My detailed analysis of that video title doesn’t stem from a particularly strong hate for one video, but rather because it’s an illustrative example of the broader problem and a neat way of discussing my working theory of ideologies. I used the word “axiom” above to describe differences between two ways of treating political ideologies; although this term isn’t frequently used to discuss ideologies, it is an apt description for the process at work.
An ideology is a belief system like any other: you begin with a set of core values and propositions you assume to be true, and you arrive at a set of policy proposals based on them. Just as religious belief systems depend on assuming the absolute truth of a religious text (or multiple), so too does complete adherence to political belief systems depend on the absolute truth of certain propositions. Doctrinaire Marxists have an unshakeable faith in the truth of what is written by Marx, while doctrinaire Marxist-Leninists add State and Revolution to the holy scriptures, and these tribes justify most of their beliefs solely through quoting their scriptures; on the other side of intellectual laziness, the most dogmatic of libertarians have a fervent belief in the virtue of free markets and the evil of government regulation, and this is the basis for all their opinions. I repeatedly used qualifiers like “complete adherence” and “doctrinaire” here to emphasize that this article, and the behavior it criticizes, is not talking about the ’-ist’s who have the intellectual integrity to challenge core tenets of their ideology and arrive at their own conclusions – I am referring to those who blindly treat certain values, ideas, or texts as solemn truth without clearly defining or understanding what these assumptions even are.
Political ideologies are useful as a set of axioms, where you treat it as a hypothetical that X,Y, and Z axioms are true, and you see where that takes you. The problem is that we have stopped treating these axioms as hypothetically true and are instead taking them for granted, and even ceasing to explicitly define what axioms we are using. People declare themselves as a “socialist” without defining what specific values that entails beyond “social ownership of the means of production,” or a “libertarian” with only the vaguest idea of being in favor of “free minds and free markets.” Declaring oneself as an ‘-ist’ is nowadays often a euphemism for letting an established community and body of work do your thinking for you, and thus avoiding the productive thinking that used to be more compatible with subscribing to an ideology.
Compare this to where political ideologies took root, and the level of rigor present in those foundational texts. Marx’s Das Kapital clearly defined the most foundational concepts he utilized, starting with the different kinds of value and building up to a complex theory of labor exploitation as a result of capitalists keeping surplus value as profit. Marx did not start with broad generalizations as his axioms, he began with atomic, fundamental concepts as axioms, justified with independent thinking and extensive knowledge of existing literature on political economy. He was completely aware of what axioms (e.g. the labor theory of value 1) were necessary to arrive at some of his conclusions and willing to engage in debate on the factuality of them. How many of his self-proclaimed followers today can claim the same level of intellectual rigor? Very few people have read Das Kapital, let alone attempted to seriously think about the prior assumptions upon which their own ideology rests. The same goes for most of today’s enthusiastic ‘-ists’ when compared to the foundational thinkers of their ideologies. Ideologies like Marxism, libertarianism, or democratic socialism were meant to be schools of thought centered around an initial set of thinkers’ ideas, aimed at promoting constructive political discourse, rather than the echo chambers and breeding grounds for lazy thinking that they have become today.
The above analysis proved two dangers of over-eagerness to adopt an “-ism”: a tendency to prescribe what positions a person should support based on their chosen ideology, rather than encouraging unbiased searches for answers, and a failure to clearly define or debate the axioms upon which the validity of an ideology rests, leading to muddled thinking.
Another serious danger of this rise in self-identifying ‘-ist’s is that people are committing themselves to a political camp, with a loyalty similar to those of sports teams’ fans, at an increasingly young age. By their middle age, most people are firmly committed to some set of values, which is a natural consequence of having spent more time thinking on political issues and having a stronger idea of what one believes in; however, it’s worrying that many kids in high school and even middle school have begun to identify as ‘-ist’s before they’ve even taken the time to explore what their’-ism’ stands for and be introduced to different ideologies. This premature identification with an ideology is harmful to the type of dynamic thinking that is enabled by youth and essential to proper intellectual development. Although the young have always been a bit more brash in believing the rightness of their beliefs, the blind faith in an ‘ism’ is much stronger than the ‘arrogance of youth’ because the existence of a large community around one’s dogma and the support of reputed scholars help people justify it to themselves in a way they otherwise couldn’t.
People doing intellectually rigorous studies of political questions were always a minority of the population – most of us just don’t have the time or motivation; however, the increased early adoption of ’-ism’s has further shrunk the number of people giving themselves a solid education in different ideologies and views on politics in their youth. People declaring themselves staunch socialists at the age of 15 are unlikely to ever interact with libertarian ideas and introduce necessary nuance and depth to their belief system, and this is the core issue. At the age of 40, if someone has already interacted with lots of different ideas, there is less harm in announcing that, after all that reflection, one feels the closest affinity towards one particular ideology – young people, however, are sabotaging their intellectual development through this kind of thinking.
People’s ideas should be dynamic and always subject to scrutiny, revision, and internal cringe a few months later when they’ve completely recanted. I remember being a fervent libertarian in 8th grade while reading Ayn Rand, and then within a few months almost feeling embarrassment at some of the ridiculously naive ideas I’d held; then at the start of 9th grade, I swung in the completely opposite direction of naivety and started dreaming of a wealth cap and redistribution of all wealth people held in excess of a billion dollars, with Noam Chomsky being a key intellectual influence. After spending time on both extremes of the political spectrum, I slowly arrived at what I hope is today a somewhat more balanced, rational approach to politics and understanding the world. However, even now, nothing I think, say, or write is with complete confidence, and I might find even this blog post a product of shoddy thinking five years down the line.
Self-doubt, and skepticism in general, are necessary to avoid dogmatic thinking and becoming overly comfortable with one’s preexisting beliefs. The habit of young people to fully subscribe to an ideology, without accommodating for doubt or the need to study other belief systems, undermines their capacity for intellectual rigor and productive political discourse.
There’s also the well-known tendency to only talk to or read the writings of people sharing your ideology, yet another danger of subscribing to an ‘-ism’ with too little self-doubt. As with all the problems listed above, this tendency worsens people’s thinking by reducing their exposure to conflicting ideas and removing the possibility for depth or nuance in their belief system.
And, leaving aside all the practical problems resulting from ‘-ist’s and’-ism’s, the idea itself is a bit ridiculous. Most people’s belief systems are far too complicated to be summarized by a single word. Granted, these classifications are useful for a quick summary and first-glance evaluation of where someone lies on the political spectrum, but associating these labels with anything deeper is often counter-productive. The Political Compass test tells me I am far down in the bottom-left corner, even though I am at odds with many of the policies backed by other people in that part of the Compass; shared values and morals, a large part of what the test assesses, do not imply complete agreement on all matters of policy, but many people treat ideological classifications as if they truly were the end-all-be-all of what one believes in. A simple ‘socialist-or-libertarian’ classification would have a hard time accommodating for many people’s belief systems, including mine, especially when they incorporate an appropriate degree of self-doubt and constantly changing ideas.
This isn’t a vendetta against thinking about politics in terms of ideologies: they’re a useful shorthand and thinking framework, and don’t deserve to be entirely scrapped. However, we do need to seriously reconsider how we are using them and what impact they are having on our thinking. To promote better political discourse and strengthen democracy, we need to fight harder against ‘-ist’s and’-ism’s being used as a path towards dogmatic thinking and intellectual laziness.
The treatment of the labor theory of value as an axiom rather than a provable matter of fact will draw the ire of many, but I think it is the most reasonable interpretation. Marx’s justification of the labor theory of value is exactly that: more of a justification than a full proof. Chapter 13 of Amartya Sen’s memoir “Home In The World” provides an especially interesting perspective on how to view the labor theory of value, and I’ll quote from it a bit for the curious reader: > Production can thus be described in many different ways. Concentrating on the labour involved is certainly one legitimate way, and it can be seen as appropriate depending on the purpose and context of the description. In presenting his characterization of feudalism, Marc Bloch did not have to apologize, or confess to some error, when he chose a particular aspect on which to focus – to wit, hard labour – the fact that feudal lords ‘lived on labour of other men’. Marx did not have to confess to any blunder – nor did Dobb. The relevance of the labour theory of value depends on which perspective we are trying to highlight
Sen drew on Maurice Dobbs’s interpretation of the labor theory of value and summarized the core conclusion as follows:
Dobb argued that the labour theory is ‘a factual description of a socio-economic relationship’. The fact that this description focuses on human labour in particular does not make it false: it reflects a particular – and important – perspective in which to see the relation between different social agents – workers, capitalists and so on.
Sen’s view aligns well with my own, so I relegated the task of explaining to him. Returning to my own viewpoint – I don’t think any serious thinker should view the labor theory of value as a proveable statement of reality. Rather, it is an axiom that provides a perspective through which to view the world when you ask “what conclusions could one draw if this axiom were assumed to be true?”↩︎