The Social & Cultural Axis (Progressive ↔ Traditional)

Measures your attitude toward change in family life, identity, and social norms.

What this axis measures

The social and cultural axis asks something the economic axis does not: should social norms change, or should they be held? One side sees existing norms as having excluded particular groups, which makes revising them progress. The other sees long-surviving customs as carrying tested functions, which makes rapid revision costly in ways that are hard to see in advance. Political scientists study much the same dimension under the name GAL-TAN.

Questions this axis asks

How far legal recognition should extend for LGBTQ rights and same-sex marriage
What effect immigration and cultural pluralism have on a society
How much weight traditional family forms and customs should carry
Whether contested moral questions — abortion, drugs, speech — are matters of individual choice

The two poles

Social Progressive

Holds that existing norms have excluded particular groups, so changing institutions to widen who is included counts as progress.

Social Progressive

Social Traditionalist

Holds that long-surviving customs carry tested functions, so abrupt change produces costs nobody accounted for.

Social Traditionalist

Reading your score

Reading this axis as a generation gap will mislead you. Positions vary widely within any age group, and it is extremely common for the same person to sit at different points on different issues. Supporting change on one question and urging caution on another is the normal pattern, not a contradiction.

Curious where you land?

Take the 16-question version (about five minutes) or the 40-question detailed version to see your position on all four axes. Nothing is stored — answers are calculated in your browser and never leave it.

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This page neither endorses nor opposes any position. Each position is described the way its own supporters would describe it, and criticisms are given equal weight across all of them. Political disagreement is often less about who is right than about what each side weighs most heavily.