The transnationalization of the extreme right and the use of the Internet

Like many other political actors, the extreme right is currently expanding beyond national borders, and, as with any civil society organization, the Internet is assuming a growing role in achieving this goal. To date, however, this topic is understudied. In this article, aiming to empirically filling this gap, we shall explore the new tactics of the extreme right in Europe and the USA in the context of transnational politics. Namely, we investigate the degree and forms of extreme right transnationalization (in terms of mobilization, issues, targets, action strategies, and organizational contacts) and the potential role of the Internet in these developments. The analysis combines qualitative and quantitative data derived from 54 interviews with representatives of extreme right organizations in six European countries (Austria, France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, and Spain) and the USA with a formalized Web content analysis of 336 right-wing websites. We will compare different types of right-wing groups which compose the radical right family (from political parties to associations), underlining the main differences and similarities across groups and across countries.     

当前个人极端暴力事件研究分析———以“失意群体”为视角简

在社会转型的特殊历史时期,“失意群体”已成为当前我国个人极端暴力事件的主要制造者。“失意群体”制造的个人极端暴力事件背后,是社会结构剧烈变动所造成的一系列社会失范现象,以及由此引发的个人心理、行为的失调及社会控制功能的弱化,并在此基础上产生背离性越轨行为。基于默顿的越轨社会学理论,对“失意群体”的疏导与调控亟需从根本上消融“失意群体”产生的社会基础,即对收入调节制度、社会流动机制、社会保障制度、利益表达机制、法律救济途径等进行再建构,以达到利益的均衡、社会的稳定和谐。同时,要充分发挥社会控制的综合协作功能,强化多元社会控制,并采取更有针对性的化解策略,以逐步减少此类事件发生的概率。     

Anti‐immigrant,politically disaffected or still racist after all? Examining the attitudinal drivers of extreme right support in Britain in the 2009 European elections

The elections to the European Parliament (EP) held in June 2009 marked a breakthrough for the extreme right British National Party (BNP), while in other European states extreme right parties (ERPs) similarly made gains. However, the attitudinal drivers of support for the BNP and ERPs more generally remain under‐researched. This article draws on unique data that allow unprecedented insight into the attitudinal profile of ERP voters in Britain – an often neglected case in the wider literature. A series of possible motivational drivers of extreme right support are separated out: racial prejudice, anti‐immigrant sentiment, protest against political elites, Euroscepticism, homophobia and Islamophobia. It is found that BNP support in the 2009 EP elections was motivationally diverse, with racist hostility, xenophobia and protest voting all contributing significantly to BNP voting. The analysis suggests that the BNP, which has long been a party stigmatised by associations with racism and violent extremism, made a key breakthrough in 2009. While racist motivations remain the strongest driver of support for the party, it has also begun to win over a broader coalition of anti‐immigrant and anti‐elite voters.     

From Imperium to Internet: the National Alliance and the American extreme right

Led by William Pierce, a former officer in the National Socialist White People's Party, America's National Alliance has achieved particular notoriety as a result of Pierce's authoring of a genocidal political thriller called The Turner Diaries. Pierce argues, both in his fiction and elsewhere, for the recruitment of an elite that will one day lead to an armed struggle against The System. The argument of others on the extreme right in the United States, however, that only individuals or at most small cells can successfully overthrow the state represents a grave challenge to the Alliance's groupuscular logic.     

Extreme-right Parties in Eastern Europe

Abstract

From the moment the Berlin Wall came down scholars and politicians around the world expressed concern about an upsurge of extreme-right politics in Eastern Europe. Dramatic events like the Yugoslav conflict and even the so-called ‘velvet split’ of Czechoslovakia only strengthened this fear. Despite these many general warnings about the rise of extreme right parties (ERPs) in Eastern Europe very little empirical work has appeared on the subject. Mudde's article provides an analytical tool which will help to further understanding of the extreme right in the region. It presents and applies a fairly straightforward typology of ERPs in Eastern Europe based on the (ideological) character of the parties. The pre-Communist ERP locates the origin of its ideological identity in political parties and ideas of the pre-Communist period, generally harking back to national-conservative, monarchist, or indigenous or foreign fascist ideals. The character of the party might be expressed in the open espousal of pre-Communist ideas or by using the associated ‘folklore’, while in some cases there might even be continuity in personnel or organizations (often through the émigré community). With the notable exceptions of Croatia and Slovakia, pre-Communist ERPs have remained marginal in post-Communist political life. The Communist ERP looks for ideological inspiration in the Communist period and includes nationalist splits of the (former) Communist parties as well as new parties that combine a nationalist ideology with a nostalgia for Communist rule. They are mainly successful in countries where the Communist regime had a strong nationalist undercurrent and the party is still in the hands of hardliners (e.g. Romania and Russia). Post-Communist ERPs, finally, locate the source of their identities in the post-Communist period: these organizations are new and their focus is on current political issues. They harbour no feelings of nostalgia, either for the pre-Communist or the Communist period. Post-Communist ERPS have developed in most East European countries but, although some have achieved remarkable electoral successes, in general they have been only moderately successful (similar to ERPs in Western Europe).     

Transnationalism and the French Nouvelle Droite

ABSTRACT

Born in 1968, the French Nouvelle Droite (ND) is a ‘cultural school of thought’. It created a sophisticated European-wide political culture of the revolutionary right in an anti-fascist age; it helped to nurture the discourse of ‘political correctness’ among extreme right-wing political parties, and turned former French ultra-nationalists into pan-Europeanists seeking to smash the egalitarian heritage of 1789. Bar-On argues that the ND world-view has been shaped by transnational influences and that the ND has, in turn, shaped a decidedly more right-wing political culture in Europe in a transnational spirit. The transnational impact of ND ideas is a product of three key factors: first, the intellectual output and prestige of ND leader Alain de Benoist; second, the ‘right-wing Gramscianism’ of the ND's pan-European project that mimicked earlier attempts to unite interwar fascists and post-war neo-fascists into the revolutionary right; and, finally, the political space opened up by the decline of the European left after the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. Bar-On concludes by considering the influence of the ND on contemporary European politics, as well as the implications for the struggles against racism and the extreme right.     

Revitalizing and de-territorializing fascism in the 1950s: the extreme right in France and Italy,and the pan-national (‘European’) imaginary

ABSTRACT

In this article Mammone explores a still relatively neglected story in the history of post-war neo-fascism, notably the attempts by some French and Italian right-wing extremists to revitalize fascist ideology after the war by means of two interconnected strategies, namely, radicalization (rejection of the democratic system) and ‘de-territorialization’ (in the sense of converting narrow fascist nationalism into pan-European nationalism). Mammone describes these project(s), as well as the influence of thinkers such as Julius Evola and Maurice Bardèche, and their location in the wider ideological context of the extreme right in the 1950s. The immediate outcome of this ‘de-territorialized fascism’ was the creation of an extreme-right international association, the Mouvement Social Européen, in which French and Italian activists played a central role. Mammone breaks new ground regarding the non-national dimension of extreme-right thought, a topic too often studied within the boundaries of a given geographical territory and nationalist ideological landscape. By utilizing a transnational framework, he also shows the continuous connections and interactions between the Italian and the French extreme rights.     

Conspiracism In and Around Libya

Abstract

The idea that there is one cohesive Islamist movement with a clearly defined plan to conquer power in Libya is a deeply flawed argument. It is one that, among other causes, is at the basis of the current divisions in the country and its civil strife. The Islamist movement in Libya, on the contrary, is a highly heterogeneous reality. Understanding this divisiveness is fundamental to the elaboration of a strategy for reunification and the establishment of law and order. Such a strategy should be based on the principle of incorporating those Islamists who accept the democratic process and isolating the more extremist ones.     

Fiscal Decentralization and Natural Disaster Mitigation: Evidence from the United States

How decentralized government structure influences public service delivery has been a major focus of debate in the public finance literature. In this paper, we empirically examine the effect of fiscal decentralization on natural disaster damages across the U.S. states. We construct a unique measure of decentralization using state and local government expenditures on natural resources, which include investment in flood control and mitigation measures, among others. Using state‐level panel data from 1982 to 2011, we find that states that are more decentralized in natural resource expenditures have experienced more economic losses from floods and storms. This effect is only pronounced in states that are at higher risks of flooding. Our findings suggest that fiscal decentralization may lead to inefficient protection against natural disasters and provide implications for the assignment of disaster management responsibilities across different levels of government in the U.S. federal system.     

Hitting the saturation point: unpacking the politics of bureaucratic reforms in hybrid regimes

How do the survival incentives facing incumbents in hybrid regimes affect the engineering of bureaucratic reforms? This article tackles this question by departing from the literature on competitive authoritarianism and with the help of detailed empirical evidence from Georgia’s public administration reforms (2004–2012). It first argues that in order to preserve their hold on power, dominant parties have to tilt the political playing field, while still upholding popular support. I posit that this dual incentive structure leads the incumbents to promote efficiency of public service, but to also curb these policies at a point that would jeopardize their ability to use administrative resources for partisan ends. Consequently, bureaucratic reforms reach a saturation point, beyond which no more reforms can be endured.