A clear view of the method
How My Political Matrix works
My Political Matrix is publicly available. You respond to concrete political decisions, and the product organizes those responses into a profile across 14 dimensions. The measurement model continues to be evaluated and improved.
What is My Political Matrix?
It is a way to explore how your priorities line up across different institutional and policy tradeoffs. The current Core has 34 questions and takes about ten minutes. You can use the result to notice patterns and tensions in your own answers.
The Matrix describes your responses in this version of the instrument. It does not assign a party, candidate, or definitive ideology.
Why isn’t politics represented as one line?
People can combine views that a single line would place far apart. Someone may prefer stronger privacy safeguards and also prefer more local control, for example. Showing several dimensions keeps those combinations visible instead of compressing them into one score.
What does the assessment measure?
Each question presents a situation, names the relevant constraints, and asks which response is closest to your view. The questions cover institutional authority, rights, economic coordination, social rules, territorial control, and international choices.
They measure patterns in your answers to those choices. Party identity, self-description, knowledge, and current events can help explain a response, but they are not shortcuts to a Matrix position.
The 14 dimensions
Every dimension has two poles. Neither pole is presented as morally better. A position shows which consideration your answers favored in this set of questions.
Public Voice vs. Elected Judgment
Elected judgmentDirect public voice
How directly should people affected by a decision shape the final choice?
Evidence: answers about the institutional choice and tradeoff described here, across related questions.
It does not necessarily imply: a party, candidate, ideology, intelligence, morality, or agreement with every policy associated with either pole.
Experts vs. Public Judgment
Public judgmentExpert judgment
When experts and the public disagree, who should have more influence over the final decision?
Evidence: answers about the institutional choice and tradeoff described here, across related questions.
It does not necessarily imply: a party, candidate, ideology, intelligence, morality, or agreement with every policy associated with either pole.
Checks on Power
More room for elected actionStronger independent checks
How much should courts and independent institutions be able to limit elected governments?
Evidence: answers about the institutional choice and tradeoff described here, across related questions.
It does not necessarily imply: a party, candidate, ideology, intelligence, morality, or agreement with every policy associated with either pole.
Markets vs. Public Coordination
More market choiceMore public coordination
How should essential goods and services be organized when markets and public systems pull in different directions?
Evidence: answers about the institutional choice and tradeoff described here, across related questions.
It does not necessarily imply: a party, candidate, ideology, intelligence, morality, or agreement with every policy associated with either pole.
Shared Floor vs. Unequal Outcomes
Raise and share the floorKeep more outcome differences
How much should public policy guarantee a basic standard of living and narrow large differences in outcomes?
Evidence: answers about the institutional choice and tradeoff described here, across related questions.
It does not necessarily imply: a party, candidate, ideology, intelligence, morality, or agreement with every policy associated with either pole.
Privacy vs. Preventive Security
Preventive securityPrivacy and due process
How should public safety measures weigh privacy, due process, and prevention?
Evidence: answers about the institutional choice and tradeoff described here, across related questions.
It does not necessarily imply: a party, candidate, ideology, intelligence, morality, or agreement with every policy associated with either pole.
Shared Norms vs. Private Choice
Shared public normsPrivate choice
How far should public institutions encourage common social norms while leaving private life to individuals?
Evidence: answers about the institutional choice and tradeoff described here, across related questions.
It does not necessarily imply: a party, candidate, ideology, intelligence, morality, or agreement with every policy associated with either pole.
Common Rules vs. Accommodation
Reasonable accommodationCommon rules
How should common rules make room for durable religious, cultural, or group differences?
Evidence: answers about the institutional choice and tradeoff described here, across related questions.
It does not necessarily imply: a party, candidate, ideology, intelligence, morality, or agreement with every policy associated with either pole.
National Choice vs. Shared Rules
Shared rulesNational choice
When problems cross borders, how willing should countries be to follow binding common rules?
Evidence: answers about the institutional choice and tradeoff described here, across related questions.
It does not necessarily imply: a party, candidate, ideology, intelligence, morality, or agreement with every policy associated with either pole.
Force Threshold
Quicker use of forceHigher threshold
How much evidence and authorization should be required before force is used abroad?
Evidence: answers about the institutional choice and tradeoff described here, across related questions.
It does not necessarily imply: a party, candidate, ideology, intelligence, morality, or agreement with every policy associated with either pole.
Long-Term Cooperation
Sustained cooperationSelective involvement
How consistently should a country stay involved beyond its borders when benefits may take time?
Evidence: answers about the institutional choice and tradeoff described here, across related questions.
It does not necessarily imply: a party, candidate, ideology, intelligence, morality, or agreement with every policy associated with either pole.
Local vs. National Control
National consistencyLocal choice
How much freedom should states and local governments have to make their own rules?
Evidence: answers about the institutional choice and tradeoff described here, across related questions.
It does not necessarily imply: a party, candidate, ideology, intelligence, morality, or agreement with every policy associated with either pole.
Equal Population Voice vs. State Voice
Equal population voiceState or regional voice
How should regions participate when a national decision affects people with very different population sizes?
Evidence: answers about the institutional choice and tradeoff described here, across related questions.
It does not necessarily imply: a party, candidate, ideology, intelligence, morality, or agreement with every policy associated with either pole.
Direct Input vs. Negotiated Compromise
Direct public inputNegotiated compromise
How much should organized groups help competing interests negotiate a workable public decision?
Evidence: answers about the institutional choice and tradeoff described here, across related questions.
It does not necessarily imply: a party, candidate, ideology, intelligence, morality, or agreement with every policy associated with either pole.
How do answers become a Matrix?
The current scoring model (v0.5.3) ties each question to a specific political construct. An answer can provide directional evidence for that construct. Each question contributes at most one observation, so longer option lists do not carry extra weight by themselves.
The result is assembled from the evidence available in your completed responses. Not sure, Skip, and an unanswered question remain separate states. None is silently treated as a neutral political position.
Some answers describe a distinct mechanism, such as a particular way to allocate responsibility or add a safeguard. Those mechanism-only responses are retained as evidence and may improve coverage without being forced into an arbitrary number.
What does the shape mean?
Each spoke corresponds to one political dimension. Your position along a spoke is the current estimate for that dimension. The combined positions create the Matrix shape, a compact view of a multidimensional profile.
No single point or area means good, bad, moderate, or extreme. Read a point with its poles, interpretation, evidence, and uncertainty.
What do uncertainty and evidence mean?
Evidence coverage tells you how much relevant response information is available for a dimension. Uncertainty is the product’s current signal that an estimate has limited resolution; it is not presented as a statistical confidence interval.
More relevant answers can improve resolution. Skipped, uncertain, and missing responses reduce what the current instrument can infer. A central position and an uncertain position are different: one describes the estimated direction, while the other describes how much information supports it.
Why can a Matrix change?
You changed: a retake may produce different answers. We learned more about you: a future Go Deeper module may add evidence. The model improved: a later methodology version may estimate or display the profile differently.
Historical result snapshots keep their question-set, scoring, and baseline versions. A newer baseline can provide a new display context without rewriting the historical result.
What does the 3D Explorer show?
The Complete Matrix represents your profile across all available dimensions at once. The 3D Explorer selects three of those dimensions so you can inspect their relationships in an interactive view. It is a view into the larger profile, not the full political model.
What this version can and can’t tell you
- This is a versioned measurement system, with a 34-question Core and 14 consumer-facing dimensions.
- Formal validation work is ongoing. The current result is useful for exploration and research learning, with limited resolution in some areas.
- The Matrix is not a diagnosis or a definitive ideological identity.
- It does not determine which party, candidate, or ideology someone “really” belongs to.
- Matrix respondents are self-selected and are not automatically representative of the U.S. population.
Want the technical details?
See the versioned scoring, evidence rules, baseline contract, and validation roadmap on the technical methodology page. Political answers are used to calculate the Matrix; general product analytics do not receive their answer content. Read the privacy details.