[wheels]

I'd actually say the US is moving in the direction of Europe -- historically "left" in the US was social-democratic, whereas "right" was classical liberalism (again, these labels get wonky across cultures -- what Americans call libertarianism). That US picture does at least point to two different ends of something that's basically the same spectrum.

In Europe "left" mostly means socialist, and "right" mostly means nationalist. But socialism and nationalism aren't opposites, and can often go together, so you see things like the author of this article pointing out that the "right" doesn't want to completely dismantle the social safety net.

The US is, however, in the process of realigning to the European style.

[Wytwwww]

Historically most countries Europe had generally been "tripartite". With progressive and/or classical liberals in a weird spot between left-right. But even then I think it get's very messy when we leave Britain.

Traditionally in most continental countries you usually had two major (social-capitalist/paternalist) Christian Democrats and some Social Democrat style parties. But in reality they often shared more with each other than with various fringe left(Communist, radical-socialist), right(reactionary conservative but almost (pseudo-modernist) Fascists) parties all of which usually had some weird-missmash of traditionally left and right policies.

e.g. Weimar Germany was an extreme example republic where it was Christian Democrats + Socialists + Liberals vs everyone else regardless of exact social/economic policies. But modern France, Italy and Germany are kind of similar (of course both the fringe and the centrist parties are still thankfully a lot more moderate).

I guess you can fit all of the on a single left-right axis if you squint hard enough but you'd really need 2-3 axes to get a somewhat accurate/meaningful picture.

[jltsiren]

In Europe, "right" usually means EPP, or center-right. Their member parties may call themselves conservatives, christian democrats, the national coalition, or something like that. They tend to be economically similar to US Democrats but often less progressive.

Then there is S&D, or center-left, with their members typically calling themselves social democrats or socialists. They are another big traditional mainstream group. And even the ones who call themselves socialists are more like social democrats.

The third traditional mainstream group is currently called Renew Europe, which consists mostly of various centrist / social liberal parties. Some of which are socially quite conservative.

Then there are usually two center-left to left, mostly progressive / liberal, mostly environmentalist parties. The differences between them vary from country to country. Their current groups at the EU level call themselves Greens and The Left. Some actual socialists exist within these groups, but they tend to be mostly harmless weirdos who didn't get the message that the 80s already ended.

The conservative / nationalist right mostly emerged in the last ~15 years. They often resemble US Republicans. Their EU level groups tend to split and merge all the time, because they often make very different conclusions from the same ideological positions due to historical and geopolitical reasons. Such as whether Putin is a good guy or a bad guy.