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Old Left

Pre-1960s left-wing ideology in the Western world

  • 8 min read
  • 4 chapters

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Unlike the New Left, the Old Left puts less emphasis on social issues such as identity politics, intersectionality, abortion, drugs, feminism, LGBT rights, environmentalism, immigration and the abolition of capital punishment; some Old Leftists outright oppose the New Left positions on these issues.

While some parties within the Old Left embraced gay rights, influenced by movements like Eurocommunism, others focused on advocating for the working class alone.

The emergence of the New Left, which initially originated in the UK, witnessed a shift away from the focus on class struggle and Marxist views of labor. New Left theorists like Herbert Marcuse emphasized the liberation of human sexuality rather than class struggle.

Origins

The Old Left originated in the 19th century during the Industrial Revolution. At a time when few countries even had universal suffrage, the Old Left focused primarily on labor unions and social class. Their stances were economically left-wing, but largely ignored issues commonly linked to cultural liberalism.

Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels published The Communist Manifesto in 1848, during the Revolutions of 1848. They proposed the following policies: the abolition of private property in land and inheritance; introduction of a progressive income tax; confiscation of rebels' property; nationalization of credit, communication, and transport; expansion and integration of industry and agriculture; enforcement of universal obligation of labour; and provision of universal education and abolition of child labour. The text ends with three decisive sentences, reworked and popularized into the famous call for solidarity, the slogan "Workers of the world, unite! You have nothing to lose but your chains".

The first Communist state was the Soviet Union, led by Vladimir Lenin and the Bolsheviks.

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