A shift from the right to the left as an indicator of value change: A battle for the climate of opinion

Starting with observations about the abandonment of bourgeois values in the late 1960s and early 1970s, a shift of political orientations towards the left, and a correspondence of left-right orientation with certain values, t he article identifies basic components of both orientations and pursues the question of how self-placement on the left-right scale and the priorities attached to equality and social justice on the one hand, and decision-makin g freedom on the other, have developed in Germany since the mid-1970s. Resu lts indicate that a leftward shift in the climate of opinion, such as occur red in Germany, will have a serious impact on the value system of a society . The fundamental contrast between the values of freedom and equality is id entified as being at the root of the left-right division and its correspond ing value systems.