Two concepts of illiberty: rethinking the left-right political spectrum through moral psychology

Abstract

By examining how three political orientations: Left-wing authoritarianism, libertarianism (subsequently divided into lifestyle and economic liberty), and Right-wing authoritarianism related to moral values, the current study found support for the notion that the standard left-right political spectrum conceals important distinctions and overlaps among political orientations. Participants (N = 155) completed self-report measures for political orientation, endorsement of moral ethics (community, autonomy, and divinity), and moral foundations, immorality ratings of moral violations, emotional reactions to moral violations (“contempt,” anger, and disgust), and punishment preferences for moral violators. Across several different sets of results (Shweder’s Ethics, moral foundations, emotional responses to moral violations, and punishment preferences for moral violators), political orientations consistently displayed a heterogeneous pattern of differences between one another. The results revealed that political orientations diverged on some moral domains but converged on others, showing that the standard left-right spectrum fails to capture some variation. Political orientation scores were linked to differential responses across contrasts that did not conform to a simple unidimensional model.