Having forgotten my limited Greek, I had a struggle to find a definition of Frank Furedi's word "demos"; it's almost impossible to break through modern word usage to get back to the original "demos". If I hadn't known what I was looking for I suspected (due to context) that he was referring to "common people" but I wanted a definition. Otherwise your quote from Furedi is filled with wise words.
Moving on, I sympathise with the need to rein in modern "legacy" media, which has assumed roles for which it has no mandate: an unofficial political opposition.
Your post provides much food for thought: thanks again.
"It's muddled thinking to simply describe the likes of the British National Party as "extreme right". The truth is that on issues like health, transport, housing, protectionism and globalisation, their economics are left of Labour, let alone the Conservatives. It's in areas like police power, military power, school discipline, law and order, race and nationalism that the BNP's real extremism - as authoritarians - is clear.
This mirrors France's National Front. In running some local governments, they reinstated certain welfare measures which their Socialist predecessors had abandoned. Like similar authoritarian parties that have sprung up around Europe, they have come to be seen in some quarters as champions of the underdog, as long as the underdog isn't Black, Arab, gay or Jewish! With mainstream Social Democratic parties adopting - reluctantly or enthusiastically - the new economic libertarian orthodoxy (neo-liberalism), much of their old economic baggage has been pinched by National Socialism. It's becoming the only sort of socialism on offer. Election debates between mainstream parties are increasingly about managerial competence rather than any clash of vision and economic direction."
Quire right! Welfare state policies in continental Europe tended to come from conservatives such as Bismarck who were wanting to forestall the rise of social democracy and to tie workers' loyalty to the State rather than internationalist socialism. The identification of welfare state's origins with the Left is more of an Anglo-American thing, including NZ and Oz.
Mainline centre-Left parties need to get back to basics, and it doesn't necessarily mean pandering to bigots who always vote for real reactionist parties over pretend ones. It's entirely possible to grab the Centre & pull it Left, instead of moving hard to the Centre which has been the norm since Bill Clinton/Tony Blair & is fast running out of steam.
Good point it's not as simple as left right, the political compass at least adds the authoritarian / libertarian axis. I suspect their are more axis or inflections
Increasing inequality is the big driver isn't it. A recent post by Branko Milanovic largely looks at neoliberal globalist matters but include this "It is not by accident that 77 million people voted for Trump nor is it accidental that similar movements are currently taking place and politically destabilizing large Western countries like Germany and France. This internal aspect and the role of neoliberalism in increasing inequality, reducing social mobility, increasing morbidity and mortality among the middle classes in the US, dissociating interests of the rich from the rest of the society, have been extensively documented in both economic and political science literature."
Hi Andrew. I like that piece by Milanovic, thanks. And yes it is about inequality – though I'd say economic inequality and a kind of 'unequal' social recognition are driving this. Cheers.
Austria's a weird one. I used to travel there to Carinthia which is on the Slovenian border' There's a population of 45.000 there called (by the Germans) the 'Windisch'- indigenous speakers of Slovenian dialect that actually pre-date the 'Volkswanderung' that took the German language to those parts. They live in villages that are primarily Slavic speaking and the German population consider them to be hostile agents, since Slovenian forces occupied the entire district after both world wars and had to be forcibly expelled. This antagonism was a large part of the grift of of former FPO leader and Governor of Carinthia, the late Jorg Haider. My German-speaking GF's parents said of the Windisch "they are a big problem to us", my GF said "they are no problem at-all".
On a more general note: This most recent Right-shift is an outcome of the abandonment of class-based politics by social democrats and its substitution with identitarian social-justice concerns in ever-expanding realms of irrelevance. Starting with the highly relevant matters of race, gender and disability, ending with the magical appearance of high levels of 'gender dysphoria', the great majority of which is, I suspect, cosplaying 'being oppressed', since one cannot reasonably change the colour of ones skin, change ones birth-gender, or wantonly give oneself a disability (though this was of course a thing in the middle ages so that the person could be 'put to beg'). Like some elements of medicine, this is attempting to cure a disease by treating the symptoms, and is ultimately doomed to fail.
Because both the corporate business-class and the bureaucratic 'Professional Managerial Class' are highly motivated to prevent the re-emergence of class-based politics to deal with the greatest oppression- that of poverty and insecurity- we have to put up with a situation that, in rebelling against the machinations and obfuscations of the most recent manifestations of 'social democracy', workers and small business-folks have to take on board the entire smorgasbord of proto-fascism simply because there's nothing else on the table that's 'alternative to status-quo'. For the so-called 'social democrats' this is actually less threatening than a re-emergence of the socialism that was the impetus for their foundation a century ago.
"This goes against the neoliberal tide of global free trade and open borders – which incidentally had its intellectual roots in 1920s Austria."
If you mean the 2 Vons, Mises & Hayek, then the neoliberal tide is effectively in late-stage.
"But to what extent could the likes of Furedi’s trenchant critique lend intellectual support to extremists who hate Muslims and subscribe to the “great replacement” theory, such as the terrorist gunman who attacked mosques in Christchurch in 2019? Is it normalising some genuinely worrying trends?"
Before the Christchurch attacks, there was the 2011 Utoya shooting in Norway, which didn't target migrants/refugees, but youth members of the Norwegian Labour Party the perpetrator perceived to have let them in. Further back, there was the Paris Massacre of 1961, which was ordered by Vichy collaborator Maurice Papon (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_massacre_of_1961).
It's too soon to tell if the new reactionist politics in Europe will be "moderate" like Meloni's Italy, or something more unsubtle like Xinjiang/Guantanamo Bay, or even an outright Reconquista or Srebrenica. One bright spot is that Syrian refugees might feel it's safe to return following the downfall of the Assad regime.
Not a comment but a question. Why do some political parties include the word christian in their party names and what does it mean? So many of their actions and policies are antithetical to christianity as I understand it. I am not a christian but was taught the tenets as a child.
It's traditional in continental Europe. The Italian CD party got wiped out in the 90s. But in Germany they have 2: the CD and the Bavarian Catholic CSU. There's a different sense of relationship between church and state. Something to do with the Reformation!
Great post. Really got me thinking - 'conservative nationalists' rather than “neo-fascists” works. Captures the shift that we are seeing with anti-global populist leaders who are filling the gap left by social democrat parties who have largely abandoned a class focus on redistributing wealth and providing social services to the vulnerable and prioritised identity. Don't share your view that "fascist policy would mean the glorification of war and the expansion of the nation’s borders, rather than protection or isolation". This may have been the case with the Nazis but the British Union of Fascists (set up by Oswald Mosley in the 1920s) had no interest in expanding borders (Britain already had the world's largest empire) and they did not want war - they saw the 'Great War' as a betrayal of the youth of Britain by the old elites. While anti semitic and authoritarian, they also shared many of the policies of the left which reflects that many of their members - including Mosley - had originally been Labour.
Hi Mark. The terms far right and neofascist have some justification, but they're accusatory, and distract us from understanding why so many people are now voting for those parties, often to the extent that they're winning pluralities of votes (in Austria, France, Italy, Netherlands etc). They tend to have strong family welfare policies for nationalist reasons. Fair point about Mosley. Cheers.
These days the Left Right model seems pretty simplistic. There is the authoritarian / libertarian angle and I think that could extend to a measure of how truly representative (of voters) each approach is.
This is another cracking good post, Grant.
Having forgotten my limited Greek, I had a struggle to find a definition of Frank Furedi's word "demos"; it's almost impossible to break through modern word usage to get back to the original "demos". If I hadn't known what I was looking for I suspected (due to context) that he was referring to "common people" but I wanted a definition. Otherwise your quote from Furedi is filled with wise words.
Moving on, I sympathise with the need to rein in modern "legacy" media, which has assumed roles for which it has no mandate: an unofficial political opposition.
Your post provides much food for thought: thanks again.
The Political Compass might have put it best in 2005 when it described the BNP:
https://web.archive.org/web/20050830000109/http://www.politicalcompass.org/
"It's muddled thinking to simply describe the likes of the British National Party as "extreme right". The truth is that on issues like health, transport, housing, protectionism and globalisation, their economics are left of Labour, let alone the Conservatives. It's in areas like police power, military power, school discipline, law and order, race and nationalism that the BNP's real extremism - as authoritarians - is clear.
This mirrors France's National Front. In running some local governments, they reinstated certain welfare measures which their Socialist predecessors had abandoned. Like similar authoritarian parties that have sprung up around Europe, they have come to be seen in some quarters as champions of the underdog, as long as the underdog isn't Black, Arab, gay or Jewish! With mainstream Social Democratic parties adopting - reluctantly or enthusiastically - the new economic libertarian orthodoxy (neo-liberalism), much of their old economic baggage has been pinched by National Socialism. It's becoming the only sort of socialism on offer. Election debates between mainstream parties are increasingly about managerial competence rather than any clash of vision and economic direction."
Quire right! Welfare state policies in continental Europe tended to come from conservatives such as Bismarck who were wanting to forestall the rise of social democracy and to tie workers' loyalty to the State rather than internationalist socialism. The identification of welfare state's origins with the Left is more of an Anglo-American thing, including NZ and Oz.
It seems when New Deal-style economics is only available as a package deal with cultural reactionism & bigotry, people will still vote for it regardless. See my previous post about FDR's quote about "sacrificing liberty in the hope of getting something to eat" (https://grantduncanphd.substack.com/p/luxon-said-hed-grow-the-economy-is/comment/79184287?utm_source=activity_item).
Mainline centre-Left parties need to get back to basics, and it doesn't necessarily mean pandering to bigots who always vote for real reactionist parties over pretend ones. It's entirely possible to grab the Centre & pull it Left, instead of moving hard to the Centre which has been the norm since Bill Clinton/Tony Blair & is fast running out of steam.
Further reading...
https://www.salon.com/2025/01/13/why-the-legacy-media-suddenly-sound-like-bernie-sanders/
True, they should get back to basics. Let me know if you see any signs of it in NZ.
Good point it's not as simple as left right, the political compass at least adds the authoritarian / libertarian axis. I suspect their are more axis or inflections
Increasing inequality is the big driver isn't it. A recent post by Branko Milanovic largely looks at neoliberal globalist matters but include this "It is not by accident that 77 million people voted for Trump nor is it accidental that similar movements are currently taking place and politically destabilizing large Western countries like Germany and France. This internal aspect and the role of neoliberalism in increasing inequality, reducing social mobility, increasing morbidity and mortality among the middle classes in the US, dissociating interests of the rich from the rest of the society, have been extensively documented in both economic and political science literature."
https://open.substack.com/pub/branko2f7/p/how-the-mainstream-has-abandoned?r=2vxgf&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
Hi Andrew. I like that piece by Milanovic, thanks. And yes it is about inequality – though I'd say economic inequality and a kind of 'unequal' social recognition are driving this. Cheers.
Austria's a weird one. I used to travel there to Carinthia which is on the Slovenian border' There's a population of 45.000 there called (by the Germans) the 'Windisch'- indigenous speakers of Slovenian dialect that actually pre-date the 'Volkswanderung' that took the German language to those parts. They live in villages that are primarily Slavic speaking and the German population consider them to be hostile agents, since Slovenian forces occupied the entire district after both world wars and had to be forcibly expelled. This antagonism was a large part of the grift of of former FPO leader and Governor of Carinthia, the late Jorg Haider. My German-speaking GF's parents said of the Windisch "they are a big problem to us", my GF said "they are no problem at-all".
On a more general note: This most recent Right-shift is an outcome of the abandonment of class-based politics by social democrats and its substitution with identitarian social-justice concerns in ever-expanding realms of irrelevance. Starting with the highly relevant matters of race, gender and disability, ending with the magical appearance of high levels of 'gender dysphoria', the great majority of which is, I suspect, cosplaying 'being oppressed', since one cannot reasonably change the colour of ones skin, change ones birth-gender, or wantonly give oneself a disability (though this was of course a thing in the middle ages so that the person could be 'put to beg'). Like some elements of medicine, this is attempting to cure a disease by treating the symptoms, and is ultimately doomed to fail.
Because both the corporate business-class and the bureaucratic 'Professional Managerial Class' are highly motivated to prevent the re-emergence of class-based politics to deal with the greatest oppression- that of poverty and insecurity- we have to put up with a situation that, in rebelling against the machinations and obfuscations of the most recent manifestations of 'social democracy', workers and small business-folks have to take on board the entire smorgasbord of proto-fascism simply because there's nothing else on the table that's 'alternative to status-quo'. For the so-called 'social democrats' this is actually less threatening than a re-emergence of the socialism that was the impetus for their foundation a century ago.
Great comments, thanks Kevin. The FPO's platform recognises those traditional minorities. Cheers, Grant
Interesting that they've chosen to acknowledge those minorities. Progress of a sort I suppose.
"This goes against the neoliberal tide of global free trade and open borders – which incidentally had its intellectual roots in 1920s Austria."
If you mean the 2 Vons, Mises & Hayek, then the neoliberal tide is effectively in late-stage.
"But to what extent could the likes of Furedi’s trenchant critique lend intellectual support to extremists who hate Muslims and subscribe to the “great replacement” theory, such as the terrorist gunman who attacked mosques in Christchurch in 2019? Is it normalising some genuinely worrying trends?"
Before the Christchurch attacks, there was the 2011 Utoya shooting in Norway, which didn't target migrants/refugees, but youth members of the Norwegian Labour Party the perpetrator perceived to have let them in. Further back, there was the Paris Massacre of 1961, which was ordered by Vichy collaborator Maurice Papon (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_massacre_of_1961).
It's too soon to tell if the new reactionist politics in Europe will be "moderate" like Meloni's Italy, or something more unsubtle like Xinjiang/Guantanamo Bay, or even an outright Reconquista or Srebrenica. One bright spot is that Syrian refugees might feel it's safe to return following the downfall of the Assad regime.
Great thoughts, thanks!
Not a comment but a question. Why do some political parties include the word christian in their party names and what does it mean? So many of their actions and policies are antithetical to christianity as I understand it. I am not a christian but was taught the tenets as a child.
It's traditional in continental Europe. The Italian CD party got wiped out in the 90s. But in Germany they have 2: the CD and the Bavarian Catholic CSU. There's a different sense of relationship between church and state. Something to do with the Reformation!
Great post. Really got me thinking - 'conservative nationalists' rather than “neo-fascists” works. Captures the shift that we are seeing with anti-global populist leaders who are filling the gap left by social democrat parties who have largely abandoned a class focus on redistributing wealth and providing social services to the vulnerable and prioritised identity. Don't share your view that "fascist policy would mean the glorification of war and the expansion of the nation’s borders, rather than protection or isolation". This may have been the case with the Nazis but the British Union of Fascists (set up by Oswald Mosley in the 1920s) had no interest in expanding borders (Britain already had the world's largest empire) and they did not want war - they saw the 'Great War' as a betrayal of the youth of Britain by the old elites. While anti semitic and authoritarian, they also shared many of the policies of the left which reflects that many of their members - including Mosley - had originally been Labour.
Hi Mark. The terms far right and neofascist have some justification, but they're accusatory, and distract us from understanding why so many people are now voting for those parties, often to the extent that they're winning pluralities of votes (in Austria, France, Italy, Netherlands etc). They tend to have strong family welfare policies for nationalist reasons. Fair point about Mosley. Cheers.
These days the Left Right model seems pretty simplistic. There is the authoritarian / libertarian angle and I think that could extend to a measure of how truly representative (of voters) each approach is.