opposition is an important social fact, one of those “things like money,
sovereignty, and rights, which have no material reality but exist only
because people collectively believe they exist and act accordingly.”^18
Social facts can be broadly defined as sets of shared memories and
narratives that shape individual and collective behavior. Abstract and
constructed socially though they may be, social facts are nonetheless
real and influential, and they should not be discarded lightly, as vague
or hopeless notions.
Understood as a social fact, the left–right distinction can make
sense, even though its specific contours change over time and across
space. Such variations are indeed the hallmark of long-lasting and
widespread collective representations, which endure precisely because
they are flexible. The power of the left–right division, explains Marcel
Gauchet, lies in its indefinite capacity to be enriched and renewed.
This cleavage functions as a memory tool because it is open. It creates
continuity in histories that are discontinuous and unites political
families through time and space, in society-wide conflicts that can
appear perennial and meaningful.^19 This analytical perspective implies
that we need not worry too much about essentialism, the second point
raised above. Whether a cultural representation exists is a question
that can best be assessed with empirical evidence. It cannot be
affirmed uncritically, but neither should it be ruled out a priori, by an
epistemological skepticism that would “be just as dogmatic as appeals
to occult essences.”^20 History provides the best safeguard against
loose essentialist arguments. Indeed, the left–right distinction has a
well-established genealogy, anchored in the travails of the French
Revolution and in the development of democracy and socialism in
Europe.
Before turning to this genealogy, some clarification about antece-
dents needs to be offered. First, social dichotomies featuring the left
and the right are much older than the modern, democratic distinction.
“Wherever one looks,” writes psychologist Chris McManus, “on any
continent, in any historical period or in any culture, right and left have
(^18) Martha Finnemore and Kathryn Sikkink, “Taking Stock: The Constructivist
Research Program in International Relations and Comparative Politics,”
19 Annual Review of Political Science, vol. 4, 2001, 391–416, p. 393.
20 Gauchet, “La droite et la gauche,” p. 416.
Alexander Wendt,Social Theory of International Politics, Cambridge
University Press, 1999, pp. 63–64.
12 Left and Right in Global Politics