Political Compass - Definition and Overview

A Political Compass (or "political diamond") is a two dimensional political grid that seeks to label or organize political thought on two dimensions rather than the one (left versus right) that has been traditional since it was invented in France over two centuries ago; see glossary of the French Revolution.

An organization named after this concept (the Political Compass Organisation) runs an on-line questionnaire which will rate your political views on two axes: Economic (Left-Right) and Social (Authoritarian-Libertarian). The site also includes an in-depth explanation of the two-axis system they use, a few charts showing the alleged positions of various past and present political figures, and reading lists for each of the main political orientations.

See also

• Political spectrum (discusses the dimensionality concept at length)
• Nolan chart

External links

• The Political Compass Organisation (http://www.politicalcompass.org/)
• Explains the concept (http://www.digitalronin.f2s.com/politicalcompass/analysis2.php)
• Discussion of the Nolan chart (http://civilities.net/CommonPoliticalGrid)