It’s where I think you find the roughly median opinion in a modern, industrialised democratic society…if that democracy is not being distorted by disenfranchisement or money.
In Australia, the centre-left party (the ALP) is officially a Reformist Democratic Socialist party, but tends to be more SocDem in practice. Left of them are the smaller Greens, who are a mix of Reformist and mildly Revolutionary DemSocs.
The centre-right party in Australia are the Liberal Party of Australia; they began as Gladstonian Liberals with an anti-Communist focus, now they range from Liberal to Reactionary Conservative. At present, the leader is a Liberal but the party is dominated by the Conservatives.
Our politics are distorted slightly to the right of centre due to the influence of US hegemony and Murdoch’s media dominance, but a strong-until-twenty-years-ago union movement has historically kept the country relatively centred between labour and capital. We’re drifting right now.
In the Nordic countries, the major parties focus on the range from SocDem to DemSoc. Even their self-described Conservatives support social programs that the US Democrats would consider dangerously socialistic.
France etc. have large and influential Socialist parties. Mélenchon etc.
In the USA, if you poll on the issues rather than on tribal identity, you generally find that majority opinion is roughly in line with the policies advocated by the Berniecrats. If you include the opinions of the functionally-disenfranchised American working class, that opinion shifts even further left.
The Democrats and the Republicans do not represent the American people. They represent the competing factions of the American ruling class. The centre of American political opinion does not lie halfway between the two parties.
