General Political Test

A political compass test
built for nuance.

100 ideological statements answered on a six-point scale. Every position is asked twice with opposite framing, so your results show where you land, which ideologies you match, and how much wording bends your answers.

100
Ideological statements in the full test
50
Framing pairs that measure your cognitive bias
11
Ideologies matched, from communism to monarchism

Statements, asked twice

You take a position on sharp political and ideological statements using a six-point agreement scale. Key positions appear twice with opposite framing, once sympathetic and once critical. How much your answer shifts between the two framings becomes your framing bias score.

Alignment, not loyalty

The result shows how closely your answers match each position across all issues, not just the ones you feel strongly about. You might find you align with a party or ideology you didn't expect, or that you're genuinely split between two.

Reading your result without a national frame

This is the general version of the test. It asks about the arguments that recur in almost every democracy, such as how much the state should redistribute, how far personal freedom should extend, who belongs to the political community, and how much authority institutions should hold. Because it is not tied to one country, it places you on the two axes without mapping you onto a specific ballot paper.

What the two axes mean

The economic axis runs from collective provision to private allocation. Toward one end sit public ownership, progressive taxation, and a broad welfare state; toward the other sit private property, market pricing, and a smaller state. The governance axis runs from individual liberty and pluralism to collective order and central authority. It captures how much a state should be able to constrain behaviour in the name of security, tradition, or social cohesion.

The two are genuinely independent. Someone can want extensive redistribution alongside strong civil liberties, or free markets alongside restrictive social policy. A single left-to-right line cannot describe either person, which is why the compass uses two dimensions.

Why country versions exist

The same words carry different meanings across borders. Liberal describes a centre-left position in North America and a market-liberal, often centre-right one across much of Europe and Australia. A policy that is uncontroversial in one country, such as universal healthcare or compulsory voting, is a live partisan fight in another.

The country tests are therefore built separately, against the parties and the actual arguments of each system, rather than translated from a single master version. If one covers where you live, it will place you more precisely than this one can. If none does, this test gives you the underlying position without the national mapping.

What the result is and is not

Your position is a summary of how you answered a finite set of questions on one day. It is a starting point for reflection, not a label or a diagnosis. Read it alongside the ideology guides to see which traditions your answers sit closest to, and why those traditions argue the way they do.

Choose your test length

Select how deep you want to analyze your political alignment and cognitive framing bias.

Quick
Short Test
15 questions

Provides a fast estimation of your political coordinates and general alignment.

Thorough
Long Test
100 questions

Deep ideological dive. Analyzes edge cases, complex policy tradeoffs, and full bias metrics.

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Almost there.

A few quick questions before your results. Everything is anonymous.

Age
Gender (optional)
Nationality (optional)

This is never linked to your answers. It helps us understand who takes the test.

Mapping your answers

This will only take a moment.

Your General political alignment
Democrat
Your answers most closely align with the Democratic Party platform.
Party alignment
Political compass position
Authoritarian Libertarian Left Right
Economic
LeftRight
Governance
LibertarianAuthoritarian
What this means
Policy Topic Stances
Your average ideological stance broken down by policy topic area.
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Framing Bias Score
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Political Alignment Comparison
User A vs User B
Compare coordinates, party alignments, and framing bias.
Political compass alignment
Authoritarian Libertarian Left Right
User A
User B
Cognitive Profiles
User A Profile
πŸ”¬ The Analyst 22% bias
Description...
User B Profile
πŸ”· The Axiom 8% bias
Description...
Party Alignment Comparison
Topic-by-Topic Breakdown
Side-by-side stance comparisons across core issues.
Comparison Analysis
Ready to find your position?
Explore Political Ideologies
Ideology Matrix
Interact with the political compass to explore the core values, axioms, and historical thinkers of major political philosophies.
Political Compass Map
Authoritarian Libertarian Left Right State Socialism National Conservatism Conservatism Centrism Social Democracy Democratic Socialism Libertarian Socialism Libertarianism National Socialism Communism Monarchism
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