• We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.
We don't need semantic discussions about the true name of the communism, the ideology matrix is fine just how it is now ok?.
 
a small change which i'm thinking about:

PA (actual dictatorship)--> Presidentialistic System
FA (actual fundamentalist)--> Dictatorship
NS (actual extremist)--> Extremist (untouched)

What do you think?

THe fundamentalist countries would be extremist of course.
 
Kretoxian said:
a small change which i'm thinking about:

PA (actual dictatorship)--> Presidentialistic System
FA (actual fundamentalist)--> Dictatorship
NS (actual extremist)--> Extremist (untouched)

What do you think?

THe fundamentalist countries would be extremist of course.

Both a dictatorship as well as an extremistic system, could be either right, left, up or bottom at the ideologic matrix... I don't like it, because it limits the ideological view and would indeed make it very hard to categorize ministers after that scheme...

Just my five cents :)
 
Yeah, what he said.
Furthermore, I actually don't think that the right-radical/third-position ideologies need much change from the HOI2 standard.
Would it trouble you if post-revolutionary Iran was described as National-Socialist? I think this description fits rather well the ideology of that state. Sure, it's more religious-socialist than national, but the difference is not that great - both nations and religions are artificial gangs, branded with various symbols and texts and songs etc.
Approaching NS status - fascist, could work rather well for Spain1960, Greece1970, Chile1975, Indonesia1975 and several other states in south America and elsewhere.
Paternal autocrat? A whole bunch of those states all over the place. From Saudi Arabia to Guatemala, from Congo (although Congo may be fascist) to South Africa, and many more.
I don't think there is a major reason to change the naming.
 
Last edited:
kami888 said:
Would it trouble you if post-revolutionary Iran was described as National-Socialist? I think this description fits rather well the ideology of that state. Sure, it's more religious-socialist than national, but the difference is not that great - both nations and religions are artificial gangs, branded with various symbols and texts and songs etc.

Well, and not only iran perhaps Afghanistan's Talibans to
 
I don't agree... National Socialism is a bit different than Religious extremism. I quite like the MDS ideology matrix, with free market as "free trade" and the other extreme as nationalism. It freed up the National Socialist tag for Religious Extremism. In a way, the Religious extremism is more or less like a milder form of National Socialism, since the countries actually had voting, at least on the lowest levels.

I agree with your system... to an extent, I think of Taliban, for instance, as worst than the Shah. Talibani tribalism allows for a larger class of bigoted zealots. I, myself, wouldn't put the Shah and Osama Bin Laden in the same category.

PA (actual dictatorship)--> Presidentialistic System
FA (actual fundamentalist)--> Fundamentalist (Untouched)
NS (actual extremist)--> Extremist
 
It doesn't.
Your humble opinion is wrong from my humble perspective.

In a way, the Religious extremism is more or less like a milder form of National Socialism, since the countries actually had voting, at least on the lowest levels
If you are equating national socialism with Hitler's NSDAP then yes, religious extremism of Iran is certainly less radical. I see NS as a general way to describe an extremist third-way movement. In that case it works rather well. And it doesn't have much to do with voting.

I quite like the MDS ideology matrix, with free market as "free trade" and the other extreme as nationalism.
Separating nationalism from the main two axis altogether might look like a good idea in general, except that unlike the main two axis, all others do not affect relations between nations AFAIK. Eg, relations between Democratic Kampuchea and USSR. Plus I find it to be just more confusing. If "nationalism" replaces "central planning", then how in hell would you describe USSR, which had a centrally planned economy but was neither "nationalist" nor "free-trade"?

Talibani tribalism allows for a larger class of bigoted zealots. I, myself, wouldn't put the Shah and Osama Bin Laden in the same category.
Agreed with that. I'd put Talibs as NS, Shah's Iran as PA.

I hope your all know that it is possible to edit the ideology_matrix.csv file
Yeah, but what concrete propositions would you make?
 
Last edited:
kami888 said:
Separating nationalism from the main two axis altogether might look like a good idea in general, except that unlike the main two axis, all others do not affect relations between nations AFAIK. Eg, relations between Democratic Kampuchea and USSR. Plus I find it to be just more confusing. If "nationalism" replaces "central planning", then how in hell would you describe USSR, which had a centrally planned economy but was neither "nationalist" nor "free-trade"?

Hmm... I think you confuse the economic nationalism and the political nationalism. Sure, Russia and China were planned centrally, but they still nationalized, in other words, owned through the state the means of production otherwise owned by corporations within a free market. For instance, the difference I think you make here is that Communist Russia had no formalized idea, and the BIGGEST difference between nationalism and central planning, of a corporation. While the Shah held control over the economic strings, he controlled still corporations and not the means of production directly. While in the Soviet Union groups were formed that resembled corporations, but were more of a leftist ideal of cooperatives, thus the state controlled the means to produce, therefore could plan directly what was to be produced. I don't know, other than perhaps a few clicks toward free trade, to express this in Iran without changing the matrix.

kami888 said:
If you are equating national socialism with Hitler's NSDAP then yes, religious extremism of Iran is certainly less radical. I see NS as a general way to describe an extremist third-way movement. In that case it works rather well. And it doesn't have much to do with voting.

It does have to do with voting to an extent, in that, there is a resemblance of a parliament and a democracy, in which one can be elected, to a local position. Although, early within the political formation of the Iranian state, which I've been careful not to generalize with later developments, I'm not sure there was a president or one at least with any power to speak of. Therefore, yes elections had little to do with it, though now I would call Iran an Extremist or Theocratic Democracy, like many of the other countries in the Middle East are becoming, such as Saudi Arabia, though its still a monarchy.
 
I think you confuse the economic nationalism and the political nationalism
I also think that you are confusing something.
Placing "nationalism" as the extreme opposite of "free trade" basically implies "protectionism", not necessarily state ownership of production at all. Although in cases of extreme nationalism the State does usually aim to nationalize certain major industries to hold off foreign influence, it doesn't work vice versa. State nationalization of means of production does not necessarily imply protectionism, as in case of USSR.

If the slider had the same meaning as what you described, then it would be no different from standard HOI2 free-market vs central planning. In that case we would have to assume that no changes have been made at all?

In either case, this only serves to illustrate my point that separating nationalism from left-right axis increases confusion.

It does have to do with voting to an extent, in that, there is a resemblance of a parliament and a democracy, in which one can be elected, to a local position.
I meant to say that the ideological alignment is not explicidly tied with voting. Nationalist and religious radicals tend to be anti-parliamentary and anti-democratic, but I don't think this is always the case. Just because Iran has some sort of elections doesn't make it less radical. In fact even if the present Iranian government was truly democratically elected, it still wouldn't make Iran less radical from ideological point of view.

However, the game uses the democratic-authoritarian slider to set ideology, so I guess the game makers agree with you.
 
kami888 said:
If the slider had the same meaning as what you described, then it would be no different from standard HOI2 free-market vs central planning. In that case we would have to assume that no changes have been made at all?

Isn't that what I had said?


kami888 said:
I meant to say that the ideological alignment is not explicidly tied with voting. Nationalist and religious radicals tend to be anti-parliamentary and anti-democratic, but I don't think this is always the case. Just because Iran has some sort of elections doesn't make it less radical. In fact even if the present Iranian government was truly democratically elected, it still wouldn't make Iran less radical from ideological point of view.

However, the game uses the democratic-authoritarian slider to set ideology, so I guess the game makers agree with you.

I remind you that on the other side of the spectrum we are representing democratic countries, with Market Liberal and Social Liberal, those seem to only come about if a country is democratic, at least in my experience. Therefore, it matters within the context of the matrix. A hardcore theocracy, like Afghanistan, has less freedoms, like the ability to vote in a legislature or a president, therefore they are Extremists. But, at the same time, you have the Shah and a president next to him who is elected, you can only account for that as being "less" extreme then Afghanistan and has more freedom. Therefore, Iran would be Fundamentalist, which makes sense to me.

They have a Shah, a spiritual leader, and a president, along with an elected legislature. All this is centered around their religion, who is represented as the Shah, while he practices no power over the micro-management and the policy of the country, he is the face and sovereign of the state. Its as much of a democracy as the parliamentary system, hence why I frequently call it a parliament, within England. Where the head of state is the monarchy and the head of government is an elected official. I see no reason why that is not simply explained, actually.
 
Isn't that what I had said?
Well you said the following: "I quite like the MDS ideology matrix, with free market as "free trade" and the other extreme as nationalism. It freed up the National Socialist tag for Religious Extremism."
And it sounded as if there is a substantial difference in the market<->central-planning slider that allows for modifications of the left-right slider.
I guess I misread something.

Therefore, it matters within the context of the matrix.
Of course it does, unless the "democracy-authoritarianism" slider is renamed to something else, but I'm not sure if going that far is a good idea. After all, my original statement was that the HOI2 standard naming for authoritarian far right was the best one.

Therefore, Iran would be Fundamentalist, which makes sense to me.
So, FA then? Fine with me, let Iran be FA. However, if Iran is not radical enough to be NS, then I'm not too sure if there will be any NS countries in the game at all. Taliban doesn't come about until 1995 I think, and that is way beyond the time frame we are currently looking at. Are there any countries besides Taliban's Afghanis, which, according to you are radical enough to qualify as Extremists/NS?
I just want to make sure we don't end up wasting an ideology tag.
 
kami888 said:
So, FA then? Fine with me, let Iran be FA. However, if Iran is not radical enough to be NS, then I'm not too sure if there will be any NS countries in the game at all. Taliban doesn't come about until 1995 I think, and that is way beyond the time frame we are currently looking at. Are there any countries besides Taliban's Afghanis, which, according to you are radical enough to qualify as Extremists/NS?
I just want to make sure we don't end up wasting an ideology tag.

Due to the small amount of countries "taggeable" as NS (although in vanilla there's only one country tagged with that ideology), is why i'm thinking about changing the ideology matrix and replace it with "independentism" it would be betwen LWR and SD to represent the ascent to power of these parties in some puppet states.

However i'm not very convinced about it.
 
kami888 said:
Your humble opinion is wrong from my humble perspective.
Iran is many things but it is not National-Socialist or otherwise fascist. This is not a matter of degree of "radicalism" or "nationalism" but the simple fact that Nazi Germany and Islamic Iran share very few of the same core ideals or policies. If you think that this is not the case then please provide points where you see a convincing overlap between the two ideologies.
 
independentism
That's a funny name :)
All right for puppet states, but I'm not sure what it will signify for non-puppets.

This is not a matter of degree of "radicalism" or "nationalism" but the simple fact that Nazi Germany and Islamic Iran share very few of the same core ideals or policies.
If you read above you will see that I'm not equating NS to NSDAP. In fact, many if not most present day NS supporters accuse Hitler and his gang of deviating and betraying original NS ideas. You know, kind of like Trotskyists accuse Stalin of not being a true communist.

I think I already gave the reasons why I think NS ideology fits the IRI, but if you wish I will repeat them:
-Strong aggressive nationalism/religious fundamentalism
-Spiritualism
-Militarism
-Social conservatism
-Protectionism
-Slight socialist and populist tendencies
-Declared ideological opposition to both capitalism and communism

Contrary to the popular belief formed after WW2, the third-way ideologies do not necessarily include ideas of racial or national supremacy or anything of that sort. In fact both old and new national-socialists speak of multi-national empires in which nations maintain their distinct characteristics and respect each other. This applies even to Jews - the true NS are not anti-semitic. In fact, they sometimes admire the State of Israel for certain policies.
 
Last edited:
Some words, terms and expressions have their one value.

I my (humble) opinion, the concept o National Socialism is too much historical related too one party and its clones that grow in Germany (and Europe) in the 30’s and beginnings of the 40’s, of the last century, and should not be used to denominate any other regimes that can be nationalist or even socialist. So, in this perspective, it would be at least peculiar to call the Iranian regime… National Socialist.

Of course that concept changed since then… but, even today, some right wing parties that call themselves neo-nazi, claim for racism and racial discrimination. We can see that in Western Europe with the crescent immigrant integration problems.

Just my 2 or 3 cents…
 
I my (humble) opinion, the concept o National Socialism is too much historical related too one party and its clones that grow in Germany (and Europe) in the 30’s and beginnings of the 40’s, of the last century, and should not be used to denominate any other regimes that can be nationalist or even socialist. So, in this perspective, it would be at least peculiar to call the Iranian regime… National Socialist.
Perhaps. But "Extremist" just doesn't do it for me - extremists are all different. There's got to be a better name than that.