For a while, labels such as “conservative” didn’t mean much, or at least they didn’t have much analytic value. People were willing to label themselves, but the labels did not have real content. When asked what she meant by calling herself a conservative, one respondent said, “Well I don’t go out much and I dress pretty conservatively.” Such was the state of ideology in America that many offered such interpretations.

For a while, labels such as “conservative” didn’t mean much, or at least they didn’t have much analytic value. People were willing to label themselves, but the labels did not have real content.When asked what she meant by calling herself a conservative, one respondent said, “Well I don’t go out much and I dress pretty conservatively.” Such was the state of ideology in America that many offered such interpretations.In recent years, though, that has changed. Conservatism represents an increasingly coherent set of ideas, though not necessarily the ones you might think.Think-tankers often seem to assume that attitudes toward government regulation separate conservatives from liberals. By and large, they don’t. Conservatives and liberals both want more spending for education and health, and both favor a ban on military-style assault weapons.So what beliefs do differentiate conservatives from liberals? My list is hardly exhaustive, but I would nominate three categories of belief as primary.