The Top 10 Most Unusual Political Ideologies

10 - Technocracy

Starting with a simple one - technocracy. Technocracy, at first, might sound more futuristic than it actually is. In fact, it is actually a very simple but unusual ideology: it is a theoretical form of government run by experts in science and technology. Though, at first, it might not sound too crazy, the concepts pushed by technocracy are actually very different from those pushed by the most common form of government present today in the West (representative democracy). Despite the fact that a technocratic government would not need to necessarily exclude the possibility of its representatives being voted, it would still limit the possible candidates, hence reducing its democratic possibilities by a lot. Regardless of this, the ideology of technocracy was popular in North America in the 1930s, and is pushed by some people to this day.

9 - Kleptocracy

Continuing with another form of government, a kleptocracy is a form of government controlled by corrupt politicians. I said what I said. The idea is a literal country run by politicians who use their power to steal land and wealth, in order to use it for their own good. This has also evolved, within some more anarchist communities, into the legalization of theft for the purpose of increasing personal gain. Now, it is important to say that, historically, kleptocracies have existed but weren’t (obviously) supported by the population, and it is also very rare to meet people who support such types of government. It is still useful, though, to recognize that there are definitely people out there who support kleptocratic governments, and that, in the future, it is highly likely that kleptocratic governments will form again, as scary as that may sound (a reminder that some kleptocratic governments still exist to this day - Vladimir Putin’s Russia is considered as one by many political scientists, one being including Russian Politics major Karen Dawisha).

8 - Corporatism

Corporatism may sound like a capitalistic, libertarian and corporation-ran government at first, but it is actually extremely different from what the name may indicate today. Its name, in fact, comes from the latin corpus, which means body. Its main idea is to divide the general population into different associations, each with a designated job, all working together in order to achieve a peaking society. An example of associations that would exist in such a government would be farmers, scientists, military and such groups. What is most ironic about this ideology is that, despite its name leading it to be confused for a highly capitalistic ideology, it is an actually pretty economically left wing and authoritarian ideology, with its theoretical government having the control over these different associations and the economy. Many countries today, such as China, Russia and Ireland have been associated with this ideology, although it has never been the main ideology of a single country.

7 - Neo Reactionism

Last, but not least, is an ideology so absurd and out of the box, that it has become a staple representation of dystopian ideologies: English Socialism. English Socialism, or EngSoc, as it is defined in Orwell’s 1984, is the political ideology of 1984’s Oceania, and it is everything you would want your totalitarian state not to be. With every party member devoted to Big Brother, leader of Oceania, its main ideas include extreme censorship, control of citizen freedom and extreme indoctrination, it is the dystopian version of an extremely totalitarian and dystopian society. It was originally inspired by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union (even though the level of freedom and privacy the citizens of Oceania possess in 1984 is much less than what their real counterparts had), and it has, thankfully, never been applied in real life. I will not go further into explaining it, as the best way to learn about it is to directly read 1984, which, in my opinion, is a must read for anyone interested in political science and philosophy.