UNDER CONSTRUCTION

All information on this page is a draft subject to change.

What do you mean by "centrist?" And why "21st?"

By "centrist" we are talking (mostly in an American context) about a political orientation that seeks to honor and balance the core values of both left and right.†  These two sets of values seem so opposed,  but if taken together, are simply the original core values championed by the American Founding Fathers: the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, political equality and justice for all.   Right and left merely emphasize some of these over others.  The right generally emphasizes life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, while the left emphasizes equality and justice – including social, enviro and economic justice – for all.

So by “centrist” we are talking about a philosophical grounding in core American Revolutionary values – but ALL those core values, not just some of them.  When core values conflict, and they sometimes do, we should try to find solutions that preserve all core values.  To prefer some core values over others – say justice over liberty, or vice versa – produces bad laws, lopsided governance, and diminishes the fundamental rights of Americans.

“21stCentrist” is, to state the obvious, a play on “21st Century.”  That is so because the goal is to help shape a new political center, and hopefully a new consensus, for the 21st Century, a consensus that values liberty as much as social justice or compassion. Less obviously, the name suggests the historical evolution whereby America has moved from the consensus of 19th Century Liberalism, through the 20th Century age of extremes, and now – maybe – we stand poised at the rebirth of the old consensus, reinvented to cope with the challenges of the 21st Century.  For a fuller explanation, see the post What is a 21stCentrist? 

There are, of course, many flavors of centrism, all of which are useful in crafting centrist solutions. 21st Centrist is inspired by several ancient centrist philosophies: the Middle Way of Buddha, Apollonian moderation, the Golden Mean of Aristotle, the Confucian Doctrine of the Mean, and others.  More modern influences include the developing field of mediation and conflict resolution, and Aikido, a strategic martial art which studies the power of moving from one's center, blending with an attacker and shaping the center of a conflict.   Maybe you have your own ideas about centrism.  All that is up for discussion here at 21st Centrist.

When the issues are more cultural or global, the 21st Centrist approach would be to find solutions that balance the core values of different cultures. 

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