Understanding the left

The progressive schema

What the right gets wrong

One of the frequent illusions on the right is to see politics as the management of the “City”, whose main aim is to improve how it concretely works. This illusion rests on several misunderstandings of left-wing actors and of the measures they take. Progressivism is not merely a down-to-earth wish to bring about a society in which life is better: it is also a spirituality substituting itself for the Christian religion, whose political influence has today been reduced to practically nothing in Europe.

What progressivism inherits

As a substitute for Christianity, progressivism takes up certain aspects of the religion once dominant in our society.

The aspects of Christianity most important to grasp in order to dissect progressivism are:

The construction of the moral framework (which includes, among other things, the definition of the noble and the base).
The legitimacy of the political order.

The moral framework and political legitimacy

The progressive moral framework borrows from Catholicism the injunction to be noble, to take part in a project greater than oneself — and, fundamentally, to accomplish the Good. The legitimacy of the political order, by contrast, in a progressive order rid of a king “by the grace of God”, rests on a logic radically different from that of Christianity. The following diagram tries to illustrate, in simple terms, the progressive psychology: the one that shapes the worldview shared by most left-wing ideologues.

Categorisation: in the eyes of progressives, society contains two major blocs: the oppressed and the privileged.
Among the privileged is also what may be called the enlightened fringe, which believes it accomplishes the Good by taking part in the liberation of the oppressed.
The liberation of the oppressed aims to break their chains and to integrate them fully into a new, more egalitarian society meant to answer their expectations better.

oppression: what must be abolished (inequalities, hierarchies) liberation: what progress is duty-bound to achieve

The privileged

Defined by what they hold: positions, codes, wealth. Progressivism paints them as the haves: they lack for nothing — except regard for the oppressed. Their abuses reveal an unacceptable domination.

The enlightened fringe

Born of the privileged — it has their education, resources, positions —, its virtue is proven by its affront to the system that privileges it: it sides with the oppressed. In defending them, it seeks to secure their loyalty to power in the next period.

The oppressed

Defined as those who endure: codes, rules and hierarchies written without taking their demands into account. That they have no say is the moral proof that the codes in place must be deconstructed; defending them is the source of all legitimacy.

fig. 02 — the justification in each era

The same moral justification, reincarnated in each era

The alliance of the enlightened fringe and the oppressed needs to be just to be followed. In each era, the narrative names the privileged, displays the oppressed, and entrusts liberation to the fringe: joining its camp becomes a moral act.

French Revolution

the privileged

Nobility and clergy: fiscal privileges, the tithe, seigneurial courts — the order made unequal by birth.

the enlightened fringe

Reforming Crown, liberal wing (La Fayette, Noailles), philosophers of the royal courts (Voltaire, Diderot, d'Alembert): privileged men who take the side of the Third Estate.

the oppressed

The Third Estate — bourgeoisie, peasants, sans-culottes, Protestants: the nation that bears everything and decides nothing.Progress takes shape in equality before the law — abolishing hereditary and ecclesiastical privileges.

Marxism

the privileged

Employers and notables, the episcopate: industrial property and authority over workers, made possible in the 19th century; the husband and his authority over his wife.

the enlightened fringe

Trade unions, the “black hussars” of the secular school, committed intellectuals (Zola, Sartre, Anatole France): the products of free and compulsory schooling.

the oppressed

Workers and women: labour without rights, half of society without the vote.Progress takes shape in social justice — protecting the worker and emancipating the woman.

Nowadays

the privileged

White privilege, cis-hetero people, the established French: beneficiaries of the 20th-century social revolution. They enjoy preferential treatment over the oppressed.

the enlightened fringe

Academic vanguard of deconstruction and white privilege (Derrida, Foucault, Éric Fassin), the associative sector, mass media and the magistracy: the products of universal access to university.

the oppressed

Populations from the Third World, minorities, LGBT, immigrant suburbs: victims of the privileged’s ignorance, intolerance and abuses.Progress takes shape in the new France, rid of those responsible for systemic racism.

three eras — one same drama: name the privileged, defend the oppressed, integrate the margin

Mapping power

The structure of political power

Political power breaks down into three strata — a centre, intermediary bodies, a margin. These are not social classes: they are structural roles, identified by their position in society, each divided into a top and a bottom. In each era the interpreters change; the geometry remains.

This mapping rests on the observations of Bertrand de Jouvenel — a French political philosopher (1903–1987) who, in On Power (1945), traced the centuries-long growth of central power.

Dynamic: central power, by nature, seeks to grow — it bypasses the subsidiary powers to rally the margin to its camp. The centre of power forges an alliance with the populations at the margin to fight the subsidiary powers.
This alliance is presented as a liberation, a correction of inequalities, the end of an oppression.

alliance over the subsidiaries turbulent boundary — permanent conflict

Central power

By nature, it seeks to grow: to swell its ranks, to impose itself on ever more sectors. Two faces — symbol of the community and ambition for itself. Its means of expansion: bypass the subsidiaries and court the margin, describing the integration of that population as emancipation. Like every stratum, it splits into a top that decides and a bottom that executes — and, in every stratum, the top claims to be in solidarity with the bottom even as it makes its life hard.

The subsidiary powers

Intermediary bodies, guardians of the inherited codes. Their nature is to resist the centre's expansion; they reproach the margin for not playing by the rules. Their “petty tyrannies” irritate the margin as much as they constrain the centre: the common enemy is found. It is here that the top / bottom division is decisive: the top, sensitive to the vanguard's prestige, ends up rallying to progressivism while the bottom rejects it in the name of the old order.

The populations at the margin

Those who were not in the equation when the codes, institutions and official values were defined. Insignificant alone, decisive once rallied to the vanguard: the centre brings them resources, exposure, protection — and gains in exchange a moral warrant and ranks to swell. They too have their top — figures risen to the fore — and their bottom — the precarious mass. The alliance is always called inclusion and emancipation.

fig. 04 — the rotation of interpreters

The profiles and postures change within a similar schema in each era

If the successive waves of progressive ideas seem to contradict one another, it is because they change according to society. Each order redistributes the same four roles — central power, vanguard, subsidiary powers, populations at the margin — to new interpreters. In each era, a vanguard adapts the legitimate narrative, central power allies with a new margin population over the intermediary bodies of the moment — depicted as privileged parties mistreating the populations at the margin. Only the interpreters change.

French Revolution

The abolition of the Ancien Régime order

central power

topthe reforming Crown (Turgot, Necker), the King's Council, the intendants — then the revolutionary State, which inherits its position and completes the work (departments, civil constitution of the clergy) — reformers, then patriotsbottomjurists and lawyers of the Third Estate, clerks of the bureaus, mass-levied armies — patriotsThe Crown has already built everything — permanent taxation, army, administration — and pensions the philosophers it censors for show: Malesherbes protects the Encyclopédie.

the vanguard

topphilosophers and encyclopedists pensioned by the courts, salons, royal academies — the “philosophical party”bottombriefless lawyers and gazetteers (Brissot, Desmoulins), pamphleteers, clubs and lodges — advanced patriots, future JacobinsThe legitimate narrative: the sovereign nation, equality before the law — “What is the Third Estate? Everything.” (Sieyès)

the subsidiary powers

tophigh nobility, bishops, parlements blocking the royal tax — liberal wing (La Fayette, Noailles)bottomsquires, refractory priests, guilds and corporations, seigneurial courts — counter-revolution (Vendée, Chouans, émigrés)The top, won over by the prestige of the Enlightenment, abolishes its own privileges on the night of 4 August; the bottom tries in vain to reject equality before the law and demands a return to throne and altar.

the populations at the margin

topthe bourgeoisie of the Third Estate — merchants, financiers, commoner proprietorsbottompeasants burdened with seigneurial dues and the tithe, urban sans-culottesJoined by the Protestants (1787); mobilised in the name of equality.

Marxism

The social revolution, by stages

central power

topthe republican State — prefects, Conseil d'État, the Bloc des gauches then the Popular Front, planning at the Liberation (nationalisations, Social Security) — Radical Party, then SFIObottomthe “black hussars” of the secular school, civil servants, postal workers, nationalised railwaymen — radical-socialistNo storming of the palace: each step — secular laws, 1936, 1945, Grenelle 1968 — transfers to the State the protections others used to provide.

the vanguard

topsocialists — the ENS and the Sorbonne (Herr, Jaurès), then Sartre and Beauvoir. Committed intellectuals — Zola, Anatole France, the League of Human Rightsbottommilitant press (L'Humanité), reviews, popular universities, teachers' unionism — SFIO, then PCFThe social question and feminism become the legitimate morality — SFIO at the forefront, up to May 68.

the subsidiary powers

topthe general staff, the episcopate and congregations (dissolved 1901–1904), employers and banks (de Wendel, Schneider, Comité des forges) — liberal right (Alliance démocratique, Fédération républicaine)bottomnotables, small employers, parish priests, mutual societies and charities depicted as tutelage — nationalist right (Action française, Croix-de-Feu)The top fights nationalisations and labour laws — the “wall of money” against the Cartel des gauches (1926), campaigns against the Popular Front — before accepting each gain (the Ralliement of 1892, social Catholicism); the bottom tries in vain to reject social equality and demands a return to a more paternalistic and Catholic society.

the populations at the margin

topthe labour aristocracy — skilled workers, union and mutualist cadresbottomlabourers, women factory workersTwo converging causes, mobilised in the name of equality: the social question (1936, Social Security) and feminism (the vote in 1944, the Neuwirth law in 1967).

Nowadays

Contemporary progressivism

central power

topsenior administration, the magistracy (Syndicat de la magistrature), public broadcasting and subsidised press (Delphine Ernotte), public funding (BPI, CNC) — leftbottomcivil servants, public-service employees, the National Education system — leftThey respect the vanguard and apply its ideas a few years late — the Stora and Sarr-Savoy reports commissioned by the Élysée — and close ranks with it under attack (“islamo-leftism”, 2021). Overwhelmingly left-wing (Cevipof).

the vanguard

topacademia (Lordon, Piketty, Zucman), philosophers of deconstruction (Derrida, Foucault), sociologists of “white privilege” (Éric Fassin, Sarah Mazouz), successful artists, major NGOs — radical leftbottomengaged media (Mediapart, Blast, Bondy Blog), the associative fabric (SOS Racisme, the Adama committee, Houria Bouteldja's Indigènes de la République, the Soulèvements de la Terre), social workers — radical leftIt makes the anti-racist and ecological struggle the legitimate narrative — the “Zucman tax” moves from the lecture hall to the National Assembly; the NFP at the political forefront.

the subsidiary powers

topfinance and employers, the senior hierarchy of the police and army — centre-rightbottompolice officers (Alliance), retired generals (the 2021 open letter), farmers, private-sector employees, the “french dreamers” of peripheral France (Guilluy) — far right (Front National, Reconquête)The top rallies to Davos's ESG criteria — the exception remains Bolloré (CNews, JDD); the bottom tries in vain to reject anti-racism and radical ecology and demands a return to the secularism of 1905 and to the social Republic for the nation.

the populations at the margin

topstars of Southern immigrant origin — Aya Nakamura, GIMSbottomimmigrant suburbs, undocumented migrants — VTC drivers and delivery riders (Uber)Populations from the Third World, migrants, ethnic minorities, contemporary figures of the oppressed — from the 1983 March, received at the Élysée, to the Adama committee.

three castings — one single geometry: the appeal to the margin, over the bodies, in the name of equality

The rivals for power

The different classes of elites

Wanting to gain status is natural for a human being. There are several axes along which to gain it, and each axis produces its own type of elite. The two main axes are the bourgeoisie and the nobility; their major difference lies in their relationship to the economy: the bourgeois gains social status and influence through his economic position, while the noble above all obtains his economic position through his social status and influence. The nobility, for its part, divides into two very different main branches: the sword nobility, whose rank comes from force, and the robe nobility, whose rank comes from its ideas.

The billionaires and the police, denounced as a power by the left, are in reality not the origin of today's evolution of political ideas. Progressivism does not go the way of law enforcement, the army or the economic bourgeoisie: they are competitors of the intellectual caste, adversaries in the conquest of power.

Two methods: the bourgeoisie obtains recognition through the material wealth it possesses; the nobility obtains material wealth through the recognition it has acquired.
Since the need for recognition carries far more social weight than wealth, the nobility despises the bourgeoisie — forced to buy the recognition it enjoys.
And the robe nobility does not exist in the state of nature: it is the elite that central power manufactures, endows and salaries — generation after generation.

the sword nobility: subject to political power the nobility of the robe: anchored to influence, reaches down to the street the bourgeoisie: the richest, never the highest — only half subdued

The sword nobility

Its status comes from force: blood, arms, martial valour — wealth (land, pensions, honours) follows rank. Once the centre's rival, it is today completely neutered: strictly in the service of the political order through the law, confined to execution, it no longer has any credibility to claim positions of power in the 21st century.

The nobility of the robe

Its status comes neither from war nor from capital: it flows from its cultural and ideological domination. Its intellectual baggage or its moral superiority grants it a certain respectability. Manufactured to bypass the sword nobility and to supervise society, it is the chief adviser to the power that sources its political ideas from it: it is the robe nobility that produces the legitimate narrative. Its spectrum reaches down to the street: its worst-placed members protest with megaphones or glue their hands to the tarmac. The enlightened fringe of figs. 01–03 is a nobility of the robe.

The bourgeoisie

It obtains recognition through the material wealth it possesses. Entrepreneurs and moguls do not convert into academics, judges or journalists: their money buys them honours and respectability — a bought recognition, which the nobility despises, and never the production of the narrative.

fig. 06 — what sets the three elites apart

Three elites, three respectabilities, three status signals

Each elite is recognised by the source of its respectability, the signal that displays it, and its relationship to the economy. The currencies do not mix: one does not become noble by getting rich, nor rich by publishing, nor learned by fighting.

Sword nobility

Martial respectability

its source

Force: blood, arms, valour in combat — rank is proven on the battlefield.

its status signal

The uniform, the rank, the decoration — bearing and physical courage.

its relationship to the economy

Rank procures wealth: lands, pensions and honours follow the grade.It gains importance in extreme crises, when history summons military force. Napoleon obtained the legitimacy of his power by the sword: a victorious general in Italy and Egypt, it was his military prestige that made Brumaire possible. So did De Gaulle: general of Free France, the man of the appeal of 18 June, brought back to power in 1958 by the Algiers crisis and the army's pressure.

Robe nobility

Cultural and moral respectability

its source

Cultural and ideological domination: intellectual baggage and moral superiority — rank is proven through legitimate knowledge.

its status signal

The book: knowledge and the intellectual, academic, cultural and religious patrimony — the library, the degree, the chair, the sermon yesterday, contemporary art, cinema and music today. Never economic performance, never martial genius.Luxury beliefs: displaying opinions that are costly to hold is its way of standing apart from the common people — and from the bourgeoisie, which distinguishes itself through basely material status signals.

its relationship to the economy

Rank procures the salary: paid by the centre that ennobles it.It is the elite that supplies the enlightened fringe — from the top of its spectrum down to the activists at the bottom.

Bourgeoisie

Economic respectability

its source

Commercial success: rank is proven by the fortune one has built.

its status signal

Visible spending: property, brands, patronage — showing that one lacks for nothing.

its relationship to the economy

Wealth precedes rank: it buys recognition — never the production of the narrative.Despised by both nobilities: its recognition is bought.

three elites — three currencies: force, the book, money