Ideology and theory can often be woefully inadequate to explain complex phenomena. We hoped the 21st century would be an age of greater enlightenment, enriching society through ideas, action, and a return to core principles of autonomy, universalism, and humanism. With ideas and ideologies losing their illustrious pedigree and philosophy in retreat, we are moving towards the demise of critical thinking. Ideas and ideologies seem to be losing their illustrious pedigree. The battle of ideologies threatens to become a battle of leaflets.

The left-right metaphor has generated a blizzard of jargon. Yet, it doesn’t adequately explain why the right is on a winning spree and the left and democratic parties continue to lose elections across the globe. Latin America seems to be the only exception.

The right is today leaning into what is being described as “new fascism”. Despite their homophobic, misogynistic, transphobic, and White supremacist discourses, the neo-fascist groups are winning. On the other hand, the left, increasingly less rigid ideologically, fails to capture the imagination of the masses.

Has the world changed, or have left-democratic ideologies lost their moorings? It is even more puzzling that the right parties and coalitions should win while social democrats should lose when inequality is rising. Winning and losing are part of the electoral game. But the left parties are in danger of losing the battle of ideas as well.

Political scientist Max Lerner says that ideas are weapons, but ideology is a loose cannon. The left intellectuals broadly agree that the great dialectical processes that had helped drive........

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