<p>To broadly overgeneralize, it’s heavily liberal with a good dose of libertarianism. Chicago is notoriously progressive (among other things, the school was home to an underground abortion clinic before abortion was legalized). The student body is largely made up of young, academically-oriented people, and it’s located in a major city, so it’s naturally going to be quite liberal in makeup.</p>
<p>Chicago’s economics department also means that a lot of people walking around are going to lean free-market (“conservative,” in a word). Bear in mind that this is very different from being a “conservative” in the traditional sense, and most of these people would be considered socially liberal. </p>
<p>The school has a sizeable homosexual population, and people couldn’t be more accepting. You’d have a much harder time coming out in favor of the Iraq war than you would as a gay person.</p>
<p>The nice thing about Chicago is that people are tolerant of others no matter what their viewpoints, which fosters a huge diversity of opinion on campus (and isn’t that what college is all about?). It’s liberal, but not so hyperliberal as to be obnoxious, and prevent you from actually hearing different points of view every once in a while.</p>