Marxian Communism Is Impossible.
Chapter 6.3: More problems with dividing economic and personal freedom
Why this book | Title Page | Table of Contents
Preface | Introduction
PART 1
Chapter 1 (1.1) (1.2) | Chapter 2 (2.1) (2.2) (2.3) | Chapter 3 (3.1) (3.2) (3.3) (3.4) (3.5) (3.6)
PART 2
Chapter 4 (4.1) (4.2) (4.3) (4.4) (4.5) | Chapter 5 (5.1) (5.2) (5.3) (5.4) (5.5) (5.6) (5.7) (5.8) (5.9)
Chapter 6 (6.1) (6.2) (6.3)
PART 3
Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12 | Chapter 13 | Chapter 14
PART 4
Chapter 15 | Chapter 16 | Chapter 17 |
PART 5
Chapter 18 | Chapter 19 | Chapter 20 | Conclusion
Appendix | Works Cited
Note: This is an installment of The Freedom Scale: An Accurate Measure of Left and Right. See here for installments of The Distributed Nation: A Plan for Human Independence.
6.3 Problems with the Nolan Chart, 2
Null areas
Null areas
In spite of its shortcomings, the Nolan Chart has enjoyed something of a recent renaissance, and is even held by some as the gold standard of political spectrums. This has vivified the use of two-axis charts for diagramming political movements, resulting in myriad adaptions. Some use “left” and “right” to represent economic freedom and “libertarian” and “authoritarian” for personal freedom, but the concept is the same.
A number of these adaptations reveal (with cleverly irreverent wit) another one of the deficiencies of the Nolan approach: the near-impossibility of anything existing in two of the corners.
(NB: The charts discussed directly below placed "authoritarian" (low personal freedom) at the top of the y-axis, so we will continue with that pattern for these examples.)
economic freedom = low | personal freedom = low
There is no problem with the northwest corner, which everyone recognizes as the home of totalitarian communism and all the other full manifestations of the left. One chart described this corner perspicuously: “1984 was an instruction manual.” Another was even pithier: “Save us, Papa Stalin.”
economic freedom = high | personal freedom = high
The southeast corner is just as easily understood. One designated it as the home for “People who really like Ayn Rand.” Another was rather more disdainful: “Autistic Rothbard worshippers born with no capacity for empathy.” Libertarians might quibble with this characterization, but the overall takeaway is that things can exist in this corner, and everyone knows what they are.
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