Conspiracy theories have frequently played a significant role in radical right ideologies, narratives, and agendas. In recent years, conspiracism linked to the radical right has made a striking and often deadly comeback. During his 2016 presidential campaign, Donald Trump peppered his rally speeches with conspiracist claims, such as the assertion that Barack Obama founded ISIS.… Continue reading “The Hydra of Suspicion: Conspiracy Theories and the Radical Right”
The separatist conflict in Catalonia saw VOX emerge to stardom overnight, just by arguing for Spain’s monolithic National Us. VOX is the most impactful radical right political party in Spain for decades. It has been energetically rejecting the label of ‘far’, ‘extreme’ or ‘radical right’ since its birth in late 2013. Key representatives of VOX… Continue reading “Spain’s radical right VOX party in their own words”
How should we study, present, and represent the radical right? Some from among the hitherto quiet observers speak up, in the interests of a broader conversation. A few weeks ago, part of the academic community on Twitter got into a heated discussion on the normalisation of radical right discourse. It all started when two much-followed… Continue reading “Reflections on the ‘open letter’ debate: a middle way to approaching the radical right?”
To fully understand the rapid growth in the appeal of radical right politics to so many people, we also need to look at their moral and ethical worlds. Most explanations for the recent growth of the radical right rely upon some combination of structural concerns, ideological positions and emotional desires. No single category works on… Continue reading “The Moral World of the Radical Right”
“Data mining” is a catch-all term for using techniques from computer science, information retrieval, and statistics to help extract knowledge from large amounts of raw data. Data mining techniques can be used to make predictions and find hidden patterns that might not be readily apparent to a human analyst. I have several decades of experience… Continue reading “Data Mining the Radical Right: Using Social Network Analysis Online”
Queer politics and queer interests occupy different, dynamic, and tense spaces in the radical right. Talk about LGBTQ+ issues have been consistently part of the conversation, sometimes through blatant homophobia, sometimes through accusations of “their” homophobia. The former speaks to the conservative roots of radical right groups, and reflects what is ultimately nostalgia, and a… Continue reading “‘Pinkwashing’ and Homonationalism in the Radical Right”
As white supremacist ideologies proliferate globally, an analysis of the racist pseudoscience that fuels their beliefs 1920s eugenics poster the bottom of which says “Check The Seeds Of Hereditary Disease And Unfitness By Eugenics” (Wellcome Library, London) Last May, British journalist and conservative commentator Toby Young attended what he called a “secretive” conference on intelligence… Continue reading “Eugenics: White Nationalists Continue To Turn To The False Theory Of Genetic Supremacy”
Three years to the day after the murder of nine black churchgoers by a Confederate enthusiast provoked a national reckoning with the symbols of the Old South, neo-Confederate ideology is alive and well in America. It’s true, of course, that in the aftermath of the Dylann Roof massacre, two Deep South states; cities including Memphis… Continue reading “Three Years After U.S. Massacre, Confederate Ideas Are Resurgent”
The European International Tolerance Centre in Riga has recently published, “Contemporary Far-Rights. Right Radicalism in Europe: Ideology, Social Basis, Prospects”. The Editor in Chief and Project Head of the report is Dr. Valery Engel, Chairman of the Expert Council of the European Centre for Tolerance. Dr. Engel is also a Senior Fellow at CARR. Find the… Continue reading “REPORT: “Contemporary Far-Rights. Right Radicalism in Europe: Ideology, Social Basis, Prospects””
An eternal fight between Good and Evil fuels the imaginaries of the European Radical Right (ERR) in a psychology of continuous panic-mongering. Is Europe the bulwark and pinnacle of Western civilization, the safe haven of Christianity, tradition and family values or has it turned into a dystopian oppressive dictatorship of ‘globalist’ Eurocracy? The imminent end… Continue reading “Manichaean Manipulation – Europe between Apocalypse and Redemption in the Imaginary of the Radical Right”