The phrase "'''right wing" ''' is often equated with "[[conservative]]." However, in communist countries, the "conservative" position has been occupied by traditionalist communists, who are extremely "left wing." Furthermore, the great social psychologist Robert Altemeyer, whose books such as (1996) The Authoritarian Specter, and (1988) Enemies of Freedom, reported the most extensive studies ever done of political orientation, found that traditionalists in both capitalist and communist countries share a great deal in common: They hold to the alleged inerrancy of some Scripture, which in capitalist nations might be the Torah, the Bible, or the Quran, but in communist nations is Karl Marx's Das Kapital. Altemeyer found that this fundamentalistic approach toward some Scripture as being the ultimate source of Truth is at the root of all forms of traditionalism or conservatism, both "right wing" and "left wing."
"Right wing" conservatism, in this light, would be theistic, as opposed to atheistic, conservatism. Unlike communism, its allegedly inerrant Scripture refers not to some supernatural god as The Almighty, but instead to historical inevitability rooted in the natural laws of society, culture, and the economy, as being the all-powerful equivalent to the theistic The Almighty.