Dont give up on left right! Chrck out this excellent new book on the topic.

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http://www.mqup.ca/left-and-right-products-9780773545793.php

would agree with the above, don't drop left/right divide

communists & fascists may be 'statist' as you say but that does not make the politics equivalent

Yes, there were other scales tried, and a number of scholars challenged the left-right scale as... well, one-dimensional. Inglehart's work on postmaterialist values essentially follows same criticism. However, with regard to communists and fascists both being "statists" it is quite superficial. It's like saying anarchists, conservatives and alt right are all sort of "liberal individualists."  Fascists are very much pro-capitalist, pro-private ownership of the nation's productive capital. Communists are very much against private ownership on any productive capital; exceptions being made for self-employed artisans, writers etc. Fascists are typically nationalist, communists are ostensibly internationalist. Fascists typically group around a single paramount leader, communists may or may not follow the same organizational pattern (a vast difference between Stalin's cult of personality and Brezhnev's bureaucratic Politburo-Secretariat machine). Regarding control or no control, the only "no control" society I can think of is a free-for-all brawl in a bar until cops arrive. The degree of control exercised in a modern western society via politcorrectness, corporate media, schools, clubs, "work ethics" and so on is no less, if not more, than in the former Soviet Union circa 1980s (and yes, I lived and worked in both systems). Perhaps, individualism vs collectivism might work as at least one dimension? Anyways, good luck!

Searching for "valid measure for ideology that are unbiased" strikes me as futile because ideologies by definition are normatively charged. The left - right distinction has from early days been associated with one's position on capitalism. As critiques of capitalism or its neoliberal form are rightly as prevalent today as formerly, the idea of the left remains as salient as ever. But that doesn't mean that every policy issue/ grievanvpce should be viewed from

Left  and Right are French late 18th c terms. Today we may add a third, vital axis which is neither Left or Right ie  environmental justice. Communists and Quakers, Greens and anarchists prefer first peoples' rights to imperialism or colonialism, but differ along other axes. Fascism is not really pro capitalist- cf the nazis  saw capitalism as a Jewish plot. We have a Senator in Australia  who thinks the banks are communist run. He  seems to be a world Jewish conspiracy devotee. ..

Corporatism in the 30s was supposed to be a third way between fascism and socialism. Greens today are  variously pro immigration or  call for population limits; but   rarely support coercion. However some Nazis were Greens- nature worship - same thing among New Age/Gaia Californian cultists.  Anarchist and co-oporative supporters see communists as   to their Right, while conservatives think anarchists  are to their Left.

Thus I do not think Left and Right are much use; rather use the axes environment, individualism, plus social  versus individual rights;   security could be an axis too: state violence on the one hand, pacifism on the other ....  Just thoughts..in sum, . left and right are in the eye of the beholder- they are shifting signifiers. To classify ideologies as in toto  left or right is essentialism.

In the US Congress, many organizations rank members on the basis of votes on particular issues.  For example, the League of Conservation Voters does it on environmental votes.  For each vote, a member voting for environmental control is given one and a member voting against such control is given zero.  The scores are aggregated year by year.  Similar metrics exist on other issues.

I agree with Richard Sandbrook's comments about the deadend search of an un-biased measure of ideology. It forgets in particular historicity and even the historical dimension of this battle. Ideologies are always moving as the historical contexts. For the French case, a main issue for example is the division among right wing parties and at the same time the division among left wing partie's (look at the Philip Manow's work for example). Another aspect is the porosity between part of the left and part of the right and the permanent reconfiguration of the battle. It is the current question for the moment in our country with Socialist party's leader who is considered as implementing right wing policies. My suggestion could be to read this right and left divide historically and to look carefully to the changing processes. Right and left is not a unique line, neither readable by distinguishing social issues and economic issues. Potentially every public problem could be an occasion of repositionning the right/left divide. One could also distinguish the 3 levels polity, politics and policies to split the simple x to y right to left or the contrary. Best

Claude

There are no ideologically neutral criteria (of anything).  The best we can do is try to be fair to people who disagree with us and (inevitably in our own judgment) deserve a serious answer.  And the left-right distinction is mouldy -- as should be expected of one based on the seating arrangements in the French Revolutionary Assembly.

At least we must distinguish between the political left (fighting wealth polarization) and the cultural left (smashing partriarchy, not to mention cissexuality).  Unfortunately there are devil's alliances between the political and the cultural left, and between the political and the cultural right

Well....yes for sure 'no ideologically neutral criteria' we can all agree

but then a big leap to talk about a 'devil's alliance' between cultural and political wings (is this correct?) of right and left isn't it?

For Foucault, on  the other hand, the whole emphasis on ideology/truth/right and wrong was going nowhere so we just need to study the discourses and their contradictions

But I fear this discussion has strayed far from the original purpose??

I would recommend checking out Daniel Kahan's  "Cultural Cognition Project" at Yale University Law School.  I fear I can't point you toward a single website that will help you, but the general idea is locating people on 2x2 matrix that can then be used to predict (with very high accuracy) how people will answer a range of other questions.  His work draws heavily on grid-group matrix developed by Mary Douglas.  Various political typologies have been developed from her work.  I think Kahan is the first to develop a model that generates accurate predictions.   The key variable in Douglas (and perhaps in Kahan) is how individuals think about risk.  It encompasses libertarians and statists, but much more.

Thank you, I found it. I have both Westlaw and Lexis-Nexis.

The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Politics defines "ideology" as "Any comprehensive and mutually consistent set of ideas by which a social group makes sense of the world...", so Catholicism, Islam, Liberalism and Marxism are good examples of "ideologies". The term "ideology" is extremely controversial. In order to find empirically reliable and valid measures to study political culture I instead elaborate and used the term "political representations", based on social representations (SR) theory. I worked with results of a national survey and, through factor analysis, I constructed "ideal types" related to political beliefs, behaviors, attitudes, etc. For me, SR theory is a very good theorethical approach to measure political beliefs, ideas and behaviors,because is a middle range theory: a theory that is close to the empirical world. SR theory, also admits many methodological strategies. Cfr. Serge Moscovici, Denise Jodelet and others.

https://books.google.co.ve/books?isbn=9800017380