How different was the world in 1997? That was the year when the Runnymede Trust published its landmark report on Islamophobia, drawing attention to the then growing threat of anti-Muslim prejudice, discrimination, and violence in western societies. The late-1990s was the time of peak-liberal illusions about the capacity of the new world system to guarantee… Continue reading “Islamophobia, racism and the far-right … and the right … and the left …”
©AP PHOTO/LYNNE SLADKY They arrived by the thousands in the mid-1750s, immigrants from Württemberg, the Palatinate, and Switzerland. Often, they were so poor that they had been obliged to sell their children. Wretchedly sick and destitute, they flooded into the city of Philadelphia in search of a new home. The local Anglo-Protestant establishment was anything… Continue reading “Banking on the “Deplorables”: Nativism and the Radical Right”
Twenty-five years after the conclusion of the Branch Davidian standoff near Waco, Texas — the compound burned on 19th April 1993 — propagandists and activists on the radical right are once again turning to Waco. Waco, they say, shows what the government will do to those Americans who have heterodox religious or political views, especially… Continue reading “Twenty-Five Years After Waco: Popular Imaginings of the Siege and Aftermath”
©Michalis Karagiannis/Reuters On 20th April 2015, a trial began against the neo-Nazi party, Golden Dawn – one of the largest and most controversial trials in post-dictatorial Greece. A total of 69 Golden Dawn members are accused of leading and participating in a criminal organization and are at the same time charged for several different legal… Continue reading “3 years on: What the trial against Golden Dawn tells us about Greek society”
The radical right marches on The radical right is on the march throughout Europe. In France, Marine Le Pen’s Front National (FN – National Front) gained 33.9 % of the popular vote (10,638,475 votes) in the second round of the French presidential election in 2017. In short, the FN had doubled its vote total compared… Continue reading “The radical right and its faith in ethnic nationalism”
I teach modern literature, and I try and teach it with an eye to the political and social environments out of which it emerges. Two years ago, I introduced some extracts from Ezra Pound’s Radio Rome broadcasts into a university seminar discussion of modernist literature and politics. Students were, in turn, shocked, embarrassed and aghast… Continue reading “The Fascist in the Classroom: Teaching Pound, Race and Radical Right Politics”
©Radek Pietruszka/European Pressphoto Agency Some weeks ago, Charles A. Kupchan (2018) wrote in the New York Times, that the “Battle Line for Western Values Runs Through Poland”.[1] He argued, that since coming to power in 2015, Poland’s government “has sought to control the news media, purged and politicized the civil service, and intimidated intellectuals and… Continue reading “Poland: A Special Case of Radical Right Mobilizations”
©Roberts Vicups Radical nationalism has long been a state ideology in some of the countries that once comprised the Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc. The ideology of the radical right is becoming increasingly popular across Europe. In the West, one key reason is the rapid change in the demographic picture as a result of… Continue reading “Right-Wing Radicalism in the Post-Soviet Space”
In October 2017, up to 30,000 people demonstrated on the streets of London in response to the terror attacks in Manchester and at London Bridge earlier that year. The second demonstration of its kind in the capital, it was organised by the Football Lads Alliance (FLA). Its third demonstration took place in Birmingham last month.… Continue reading “The Football Lad’s Alliance: the latest far-right street movement?”
This month Facebook banned Britain First from its platform, saying the group had “repeatedly posted content designed to incite animosity and hatred against minority groups”. This follows Twitter’s ban in December 2017 of the organisation’s leaders, Paul Golding and Jayda Fransen, from its platform. Similarly, at the end of March 2018 it was announced that… Continue reading “What does banning individuals and organisations from social media platforms mean for efforts to counter extremism in the U.K.?”