The Psychology of Left-Wing Authoritarianism
Why Read This
What Makes This Article Worth Your Time
Summary
What This Article Is About
Psychologist Robert J. Cramer examines left-wing authoritarianism (LWA), a psychological construct far less studied than its counterpart, right-wing authoritarianism (RWA). While decades of research document RWA’s embrace of traditional values, hierarchy, and status quo alongside support for aggression and prejudice, emerging science reveals LWA encompasses distinct characteristics: favoring punishment of dissenters, desiring forceful overturning of hierarchies, expecting ideological uniformity, believing in singular moral perspectives, and requiring rigid certainty. Research identifies three core LWA dimensions—antihierarchical aggression (forceful system overthrow), anti-conventionalism (moral absolutism and viewpoint intolerance), and top-down censorship (using group power to suppress dissent)—that together define individuals who struggle with perspective-taking, flexible thinking, and engaging across belief systems.
Large-scale studies across 74,000 participants reveal troubling LWA correlates: perceiving threats ubiquitously, demanding political correctness, holding prejudiced views toward certain groups, and demonstrating mental inflexibility. Personality research links LWA’s antihierarchical aggression with narcissism and psychopathy while showing no relationship with altruism or social justice motivations. Machine learning analyses connect LWA with schadenfreude toward political opponents, autocracy support, partisan dehumanization, chaos-seeking, institutional distrust, and violent protest endorsement. Though LWA’s harms manifest more subtly than RWA’s overt violence—through bullying, shunning, and censorship—the pattern emerges from emotional reactivity, grievance-holding, and associations with anxiety and depression symptoms. Cramer concludes by invoking George Orwell’s warning about ideological recklessness, suggesting psychology apply lessons from addressing RWA-related hate to mitigate LWA’s potential damages.
Key Points
Main Takeaways
Understudied Political Psychology
While decades of research document right-wing authoritarianism comprehensively, left-wing authoritarianism remains far less understood despite representing distinct psychological patterns.
Three-Dimensional Construct
LWA comprises antihierarchical aggression (forceful system overthrow), anti-conventionalism (moral absolutism), and top-down censorship (suppressing dissent through group power).
Dark Personality Correlates
Research links LWA’s antihierarchical aggression with narcissism and psychopathy, showing no relationship with altruism or genuine social justice motivations.
Mental Inflexibility Patterns
Studies across 74,000 participants reveal high LWA individuals perceive threats ubiquitously, demand political correctness, and demonstrate cognitive rigidity alongside prejudiced views.
Subtle Social Control
Rather than overt violence, LWA manifests through bullying, shunning dissenters, and censorship—subtle harms rooted in threat perception and ideological dogmatism.
Mental Distress Associations
LWA correlates with emotional reactivity, grievance-holding, anxiety and depression symptoms—driven by seeing omnipresent threats and dogmatic ideology adherence.
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Article Analysis
Breaking Down the Elements
Main Idea
Asymmetric Research Demands Attention
The article’s central argument contends that political psychology’s decades-long focus on right-wing authoritarianism has created knowledge asymmetry requiring urgent correction through systematic LWA study. Cramer emphasizes emerging research reveals LWA as psychologically distinct rather than simply RWA’s mirror image—characterized by unique combinations of antihierarchical aggression, moral absolutism, censorious behavior, and mental inflexibility. The convergent evidence across large samples, personality assessments, and machine learning analyses demonstrates LWA associates with dark personality traits, emotional dysregulation, grievance-holding, and subtle interpersonal violence through social control mechanisms like bullying and shunning, warranting serious scholarly and practical attention to prevent potential harms.
Purpose
Scientific Synthesis and Warning
Cramer writes to synthesize nascent LWA research into accessible overview for educated audiences while sounding cautionary notes about extremism’s psychological dangers regardless of political valence. The article serves dual functions: documenting empirical findings that challenge assumptions about authoritarianism existing solely on the political right, while advocating for balanced scholarly attention to both RWA and LWA. By concluding with Orwell’s warning and calling for applied interventions modeled on hate-behavior mitigation strategies, Cramer positions LWA research as both theoretical necessity and practical imperative—arguing that understanding authoritarian psychology across ideological spectrum enables more effective responses to extremism’s varied manifestations.
Structure
Conceptual Foundation → Empirical Evidence → Harm Assessment → Forward Direction
The article begins by establishing authoritarianism’s dual nature (personal characteristic and regime quality) and acknowledging RWA research dominance before defining LWA’s core features and three-dimensional structure. It then systematically presents empirical evidence: large-scale studies documenting threat perception and mental inflexibility, personality research linking narcissism and psychopathy, machine learning findings revealing schadenfreude and dehumanization, and European social media research showing grievance and prejudice patterns. The harm section examines LWA’s subtle social control through bullying and censorship driven by emotional reactivity and mental distress. Cramer concludes by invoking Orwell, synthesizing findings showing dark traits and poor mental health correlations, then proposing applying RWA intervention lessons to LWA contexts—creating complete argumentative arc from conceptual grounding through evidence accumulation to practical application.
Tone
Scholarly, Measured & Cautiously Alarmed
Cramer maintains academic objectivity through careful qualification—”the science on this question is fairly limited,” “emerging science,” “possible links”—while progressively building concern about LWA’s implications. The tone balances measured scientific reporting with growing unease, evident in shifts from neutral presentation of findings to more evaluative language about “dark personality traits,” “poorer mental health,” and “subtle interpersonal discrimination and violence.” The Orwell quotation injection represents tonal pivot toward explicit warning without abandoning scholarly register. Throughout, Cramer employs accessible explanations of technical constructs while maintaining professional distance appropriate for Psychology Today’s educated lay audience, concluding with pragmatic optimism about intervention possibilities that tempers earlier alarm with constructive forward focus.
Key Terms
Vocabulary from the Article
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Tough Words
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Opposed to hierarchical systems or structures; advocating for the overthrow or dismantling of established orders of rank, authority, or power.
“Antihierarchical Aggression: Desiring forceful overturning of existing systems.”
A personality disorder characterized by persistent antisocial behavior, impaired empathy and remorse, and bold, disinhibited, egotistical traits; lack of conscience.
“The anti-hierarchical aggression aspect of LWA is positively related to narcissism and psychopathy.”
Selfless concern for the well-being of others; actions motivated by genuine desire to benefit others without expectation of personal gain or reward.
“The attitude was also unrelated to altruism and social justice motivations.”
A system of government in which one person possesses unlimited power; rule by a single individual with absolute authority; dictatorship.
“Multiple aspects of LWA were linked with positive feelings about autocracy.”
Rejections or refusals that are abrupt, blunt, or unkind; acts of snubbing or spurning someone; sharp dismissals or criticisms.
“These interpersonal rebuffs may be rooted in seeing threats everywhere and dogmatic adherence to one’s ideology.”
To make less severe, serious, or painful; to moderate the intensity or force of something harmful; to lessen negative impacts or consequences.
“We can apply psychology, education, policy and other solutions to mitigate potential damage inflicted by LWA.”
Reading Comprehension
Test Your Understanding
5 questions covering different RC question types
1According to the article, research shows that the antihierarchical aggression aspect of LWA is positively correlated with narcissism and psychopathy.
2According to the article, what are the three dimensions that comprise left-wing authoritarianism (LWA)?
3Select the sentence that best captures how LWA differs from overt interpersonal violence in its harmful manifestations.
4Evaluate whether each statement accurately reflects research findings reported in the article.
Studies across 74,000 people found high LWA individuals tend to see threats in multiple aspects of everyday life.
Machine learning studies linked multiple LWA aspects with finding joy in suffering of political partisans and dehumanizing opponents.
European social media research found LWA correlates with positive views of men and dismissiveness toward claims of sexism or White privilege.
Select True or False for all three statements, then click “Check Answers”
5Based on the article’s conclusion invoking George Orwell and proposing intervention strategies, what can be inferred about the author’s view of LWA research’s current state and future direction?
FAQ
Frequently Asked Questions
The article notes “Decades of psychological science have been devoted to right-wing authoritarian (RWA) beliefs” while “We know far less about its counterpart: Left-wing authoritarianism.” This research imbalance likely stems from multiple factors: historical focus on fascism and right-wing extremism following World War II shaped early authoritarianism research; methodological challenges in distinguishing genuine left-wing authoritarianism from progressive activism; and potential researcher bias given psychology academia’s predominantly liberal composition. The article suggests recent thought increasingly recognizes “right and left have their own distinct versions of the characteristic” rather than authoritarianism existing solely on the conservative extreme, motivating corrective research attention to LWA’s unique psychological profile and manifestations.
The article describes LWA attitudes as characterized by “expecting everyone to hold the same left-wing views, believing there is only one correct moral perspective, focusing solely on one’s own norms and boundaries, and needing rigid certainty.” These cognitive patterns translate into behavioral manifestations including bullying or shunning those with differing viewpoints, demanding political correctness from others, and pushing attitudes through censorship. The research documents “mental inflexibility” as a consistent finding, suggesting high LWA individuals struggle adapting to multiple moral frameworks or entertaining alternative perspectives. This rigidity contrasts with psychological flexibility—the capacity to recognize validity in competing viewpoints while maintaining one’s own values—resulting in absolutist thinking that treats ideological disagreement as moral failure requiring correction through social pressure.
Research reveals high LWA individuals simultaneously “See threats in multiple aspects of everyday life” and “Hold prejudiced views of African American and Jewish persons,” while also “see sexism and White privilege in everyday life, as well as holding negative views of men.” This apparent contradiction resolves when understanding LWA’s psychological mechanisms: threat hypersensitivity creates hypervigilance to certain injustices (sexism, racism against minorities) while the same rigid moral absolutism that detects these patterns also generates new prejudices against outgroups defined through ideological lenses. The article notes antihierarchical aggression shows “no relationship with altruism or social justice motivations,” suggesting concerns about discrimination may stem from grievance and threat perception rather than genuine egalitarian commitment, enabling selective moral outrage that reproduces prejudice patterns while claiming anti-prejudice stances.
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This article is rated Advanced difficulty. It demands sophisticated comprehension abilities to navigate complex psychological constructs, synthesize evidence across multiple research methodologies (large-scale surveys, personality assessments, machine learning), and evaluate nuanced arguments about politically sensitive topics. Readers must understand technical terminology (authoritarianism, antihierarchical aggression, anti-conventionalism, narcissism, psychopathy), track distinctions between LWA and RWA while resisting partisan interpretation, and recognize implicit arguments about research bias and knowledge gaps. The text assumes substantial background in psychology and political science, requiring ability to distinguish between empirical findings (what research shows) and theoretical interpretations (what findings might mean), while critically evaluating claims about correlations, causation, and harm without definitive conclusions about complex phenomena.
This finding challenges assumptions that left-wing political orientations necessarily reflect compassion or egalitarian concern. The article reports antihierarchical aggression—the desire to forcefully overturn existing systems—”was also unrelated to altruism and social justice motivations” while positively correlating with narcissism and psychopathy. This suggests revolutionary impulses may stem from self-focused personality traits, resentment, or chaos-seeking rather than genuine solidarity with disadvantaged groups. The implication is profound: not all opposition to hierarchies or injustice reflects prosocial motivation; some may represent projection of personal grievances onto political targets or narcissistic desires for disruption and attention. This distinguishes authentic social justice activism rooted in empathy and fairness from authoritarian ideology that appropriates justice language while serving psychological needs for dominance, moral superiority, or retribution against perceived opponents.
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