Was Ted Kaczynski a conservative or a liberal?

(My answer on Quora).

Having read Ted Kaczynski’s Unabomber Manifesto I don’t believe that he falls into either camp. If anything he is a small group anarchist. Some would say an anarcho-primitivist.

Ted Kaczynski’s famous mugshot - History.com

Kaczynski opens the manifesto with a full on attack against the Left. Points 6–9 in the Manifesto are actually entitled THE PSYCHOLOGY OF MODERN LEFTISM. He later blames modern leftism for the way that it oversocializes humanity making the individual less of an Autonomous being.

Kaczynski clearly detests what he sees as the Left’s tendency to make up problems. This is expressed in point 22 of the manifesto

‘If our society had no social problems at all, the leftists would have to INVENT problems in order to provide themselves with an excuse for making a fuss.’

For Kaczynski, those on the left are plagued with low self-esteem and he believes that this has negatively impacted society.

However he also views the power process as all important. In a sense some of his writing has a undertone that would resonate with Arthur Schopenhauer or Friedrich Nietzsche. He would like it if human beings rise above the fray and throw off the yoke of oversocialization. It is through the creation of our own goals that we truly live with purpose in his world.

Technology for Kaczynski is destructive force in that it pulls people away from a self-sufficiency that is in tune with nature. It is in this context that his primitivism comes out. He would like a return to some type of traditional value system that emphasizes stability.

Nevertheless Kaczynski has harsh words for Conservatives. In point 50 he says this:

The conservatives are fools: They whine about the decay of traditional values, yet they enthusiastically support technological progress and economic growth. Apparently it never occurs to them that you can’t make rapid, drastic changes in the technology and the economy of a society without causing rapid changes in all other aspects of the society as well, and that such rapid changes inevitably break down traditional values.

So he throws scorn on both sides as he sees each as enabling the malice of a technological society that he believes has been a disaster for our species.

Where does that place him on the political spectrum? Certainly far from the moderate center. One could argue that his political worldview falls into an anarchist camp whether that is part of the extreme right or left is open to interpretation.

Source:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/longterm/unabomber/manifesto.text.htm