Mapping the Extreme Right in Contemporary Europe: From Local to Transnational 0415502640, 9780415502641

Table of contents :
Cover
Title
Copyright
CONTENTS
List of tables
List of figures
List of contributors
INTRODUCTION: Mapping the ‘right of the mainstream right’ in contemporary Europe
PART I Local and Regional Perspectives
1 BACKLASH IN THE ‘HOOD’: Exploring support for the British National Party (BNP) at the local level
2 AFTER COLONIALISM: Local politics and far-right affinities in a city of southern France
3 PLACING THE EXTREMES: Cityscape, ethnic ‘others’ and young right extremists in East Berlin
4 EXTREME-RIGHT DISCOURSE IN BELGIUM: A comparative regional approach
5 REGIONALISM, RIGHT-WING EXTREMISM, POPULISM: The elusive nature of the Lega Nord
PART II The Southern European Extreme Right after Dictatorships
6 THE PORTUGUESE RADICAL RIGHT IN THE DEMOCRATIC PERIOD
7 THE SPANISH EXTREME RIGHT: From neo-Francoism to xenophobic discourse
8 LAOS AND THE GREEK EXTREME RIGHT SINCE 1974
PART III The Extreme Right in a Post-Communism Context
9 THE EXTREME RIGHT IN CROATIA, BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA AND SERBIA
10 EXTREME-RIGHT PARAMILITARY UNITS IN EASTERN EUROPE
11 EXTREME-RIGHT PARTIES IN ROMANIA AFTER 1990: Incumbency, organization and success
12 ANTI-SEMITISM AND THE EXTREME RIGHT IN CONTEMPORARY UKRAINE
PART IV National and Comparative Perspectives: A Challenge to ‘Exceptionalism’?
13 CHALLENGING THE EXCEPTIONALIST VIEW: Favourable conditions for radical right-wing populism in Switzerland
14 TURKISH EXTREME RIGHT IN OFFICE: Whither democracy and democratization?
15 SCANDINAVIAN RIGHT-WING PARTIES: Diversity more than convergence?
16 DOWNSIDE AFTER THE SUMMIT: Factors in extreme-right party decline in France and Austria
PART V From ‘Local’ to ‘Transnational’
17 RIGHTS, ROOTS AND ROUTES: Local and transnational contexts of extreme-right movements in contemporary Malta
18 CROSS-NATIONAL IDEOLOGY IN LOCAL ELECTIONS: The case of Azione Sociale and the British National Party
19 THE TRANSFER OF IDEAS ALONG A CULTURAL GRADIENT: The influence of the European New Right on Aleksandr Panarin’s new Eurasianism
20 TRANS-EUROPEAN TRENDS IN RIGHT-WING EXTREMISM
INDEX

Citation preview

MAPPING THE EXTREME RIGHT IN CONTEMPORARY EUROPE

In recent years the revival of the far right and anti-Semitic, racist and fascist organizations has posed a significant threat throughout Europe. Mapping the Extreme Right in Contemporary Europe provides a broad geographical overview of the dominant strands within the contemporary radical right in both Western and Eastern Europe. After providing some local and regional perspectives, the book has a series of national case studies of particular countries and regions including: Austria, Belgium, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Eastern Europe, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Malta, Portugal, Romania, Scandinavia, Serbia, Spain, Switzerland,Turkey, Ukraine and the United Kingdom. A series of thematic chapters examine transnational phenomena such as the use of the Internet, the racist music scene, cultural transfers and interaction between different groups. Drawing together a wide range of contributors, this is essential reading for all those with an interest in contemporary extremism, fascism and comparative party politics. Andrea Mammone is an Assistant Professor of Modern History in the School of Social Science at Kingston University London, UK. Emmanuel Godin is Principal Lecturer in French Politics in the School of Languages and Area Studies at the University of Portsmouth, UK. Brian Jenkins is a Senior Research Fellow in the Department of French at the University of Leeds, UK. He co-edits the Journal of Contemporary European Studies.

Routledge Studies in Extremism and Democracy Series editors: Roger Eatwell, University of Bath and Matthew J. Goodwin, University of Nottingham Founding series editors: Roger Eatwell, University of Bath and Cas Mudde, University of Antwerp-UFSIA

This new series encompasses academic studies within the broad fields of ‘extremism’ and ‘democracy’.These topics have traditionally been considered largely in isolation by academics. A key focus of the series, therefore, is the (inter-)relation between extremism and democracy. Works will seek to answer questions such as to what extent ‘extremist’ groups pose a major threat to democratic parties, or how democracy can respond to extremism without undermining its own democratic credentials. The books encompass two strands: Routledge Studies in Extremism and Democracy includes books with an introductory and broad focus which are aimed at students and teachers.These books will be available in hardback and paperback. Titles include: Understanding Terrorism in America From the Klan to al Qaeda Christopher Hewitt Fascism and the Extreme Right Roger Eatwell Racist Extremism in Central and Eastern Europe Edited by Cas Mudde Political Parties and Terrorist Groups (2nd Edition) Leonard Weinberg, Ami Pedahzur and Arie Perliger The New Extremism in 21st Century Britain Edited by Roger Eatwell and Matthew J. Goodwin New British Fascism Rise of the British National Party Matthew Goodwin The End of Terrorism? Leonard Weinberg

Mapping the Extreme Right in Contemporary Europe From local to transnational Edited by Andrea Mammone, Emmanuel Godin and Brian Jenkins Routledge Research in Extremism and Democracy offers a forum for innovative new research intended for a more specialist readership. These books will be in hardback only. Titles include: 1. Uncivil Society? Contentious politics in postcommunist Europe Edited by Petr Kopecky and Cas Mudde 2. Political Parties and Terrorist Groups Leonard Weinberg and Ami Pedahzur 3. Western Democracies and the New Extreme Right Challenge Edited by Roger Eatwell and Cas Mudde 4. Confronting Right-Wing Extremism and Terrorism in the USA George Michael 5. Anti-Political Establishment Parties A comparative analysis Amir Abedi 6. American Extremism History, politics and the militia D. J. Mulloy 7. The Scope of Tolerance Studies on the costs of free expression and freedom of the press Raphael Cohen-Almagor 8. Extreme Right Activists in Europe Through the magnifying glass Bert Klandermans and Nonna Mayer

9. Ecological Politics and Democratic Theory Mathew Humphrey 10. Reinventing the Italian Right Territorial politics, populism and ‘post-fascism’ Carlo Ruzza and Stefano Fella 11. Political Extremes An investigation into the history of terms and concepts from antiquity to the present Uwe Backes 12. The Populist Radical Right in Poland The patriots Rafal Pankowski 13. Social and Political Thought of Julius Evola Paul Furlong 14. Radical Left Parties in Europe Luke March 15. Counterterrorism in Turkey Policy choices and policy effects toward the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) Mustafa Coşar Ünal

MAPPING THE EXTREME RIGHT IN CONTEMPORARY EUROPE From local to transnational

Edited by Andrea Mammone, Emmanuel Godin and Brian Jenkins

First published 2012 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2012 Andrea Mammone, Emmanuel Godin and Brian Jenkins, selection and editorial matter. Individual contributions, the contributors The right of Andrea Mammone, Emmanuel Godin and Brian Jenkins to be identified as the authors of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Mapping the extreme right in contemporary Europe: from local to transnational / edited by Andrea Mammone, Emmanuel Godin and Brian Jenkins. p. cm. – (Routledge studies in extremism and democracy; 16) Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Political parties – Europe. 2. Radicalism – Europe. 3. Right-wing extremists–Europe. 4. Right and left (Political science) – Europe. I. Mammone, Andrea. II. Godin, Emmanuel. III. Jenkins, Brian, 1944JN50.M36 2012 324.2’13094 – dc23 2011041922 ISBN: 978-0-415-50264-1 (hbk) ISBN: 978-0-415-50265-8 (pbk) ISBN: 978-0-203-12192-4 (ebk) Typeset in Bembo by Cenveo Publisher Services

CONTENTS

List of tables List of figures List of contributors Introduction: mapping the ‘right of the mainstream right’ in contemporary Europe Andrea Mammone, Emmanuel Godin and Brian Jenkins

x xii xiii

1

PART I

Local and Regional Perspectives

15

1 Backlash in the ‘hood’: exploring support for the British National Party (BNP) at the local level Matthew J. Goodwin

17

2 After colonialism: local politics and far-right affinities in a city of southern France John Veugelers

33

3 Placing the extremes: cityscape, ethnic ‘others’ and young right extremists in East Berlin Nitzan Shoshan

48

viii

Contents

4 Extreme-right discourse in Belgium: a comparative regional approach Jérôme Jamin

62

5 Regionalism, right-wing extremism, populism: the elusive nature of the Lega Nord Giorgia Bulli and Filippo Tronconi

78

PART II

The Southern European Extreme Right after Dictatorships 6 The Portuguese radical right in the democratic period Riccardo Marchi 7 The Spanish extreme right: from neo-Francoism to xenophobic discourse José L. Rodríguez Jiménez 8 LAOS and the Greek extreme right since 1974 Antonis A. Ellinas

93 95

109

124

PART III

The Extreme Right in a Post-Communism Context 9 The extreme right in Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Serbia Veˇra Stojarová 10 Extreme-right paramilitary units in Eastern Europe Miroslav Mareš and Richard Stojar

141

143

159

11 Extreme-right parties in Romania after 1990: incumbency, organization and success Gabriela Borz

173

12 Anti-Semitism and the extreme right in contemporary Ukraine Per Anders Rudling

189

Contents

ix

PART IV

National and Comparative Perspectives: A Challenge to ‘Exceptionalism’?

207

13 Challenging the exceptionalist view: favourable conditions for radical right-wing populism in Switzerland Damir Skenderovic

209

14 Turkish extreme right in office: whither democracy and democratization? Ekin Burak Arıkan

225

15 Scandinavian right-wing parties: diversity more than convergence? Marie Demker

239

16 Downside after the summit: factors in extreme-right party decline in France and Austria Michelle Hale Williams

254

PART V

From ‘Local’ to ‘Transnational’

271

17 Rights, roots and routes: local and transnational contexts of extreme-right movements in contemporary Malta Mark-Anthony Falzon and Mark Micallef

273

18 Cross-national ideology in local elections: the case of Azione Sociale and the British National Party Andrea Mammone and Timothy Peace

288

19 The transfer of ideas along a cultural gradient: the influence of the European New Right on Aleksandr Panarin’s new Eurasianism Marina Peunova

303

20 Trans-European trends in right-wing extremism Michael Whine

317

Index

334

TABLES

2.1 Voting for the Front National/Jean-Marie Le Pen in France and Toulon (per cent of valid votes, 1984–2008) 5.1 Feelings of geographical belonging of Italian right-of-centre parties’ supporters in Italy (per cent) 5.2 Self placement on the left–right axis in Italy (per cent) 5.3 Percentage of Italian respondents who: (a) agree with more freedom for companies to fire their employees; (b) agree with limitations on access of women to the labour market; (c) disagree with introducing legislation rights for non-married couples 5.4 Percentage of Italian respondents who: (a) perceive immigration as a threat to employment; (b) would prohibit the building of mosques on Italian territory; (c) would prohibit gypsies from having camps in Italian towns 5.5 Percentage of Italian respondents who: (a) do not see any difference between left and right governments; (b) think most politicians are corrupt; (c) think the Italian ruling class has failed in the last twenty years 7.1 1977 elections in Spain 7.2 1982 elections in Spain 8.1 Results in Greek parliamentary elections, 1974–2007 (per cent) 8.2 Social profile of LAOS voters (N = 273) 9.1 The Croatian extreme right – specific features 9.2 Western Balkan political scene – extreme right features 11.1 Voters’ trust in parties and party leaders in Romania 11.2 Evolution of party membership in Romania

37 85 86

87

88

89 113 115 125 133 145 153 181 182

Tables

13.1 Results of radical right-wing populist parties in national council elections, 1967–2007 in Switzerland 15.1 Swedish attitude towards immigrants, 1993–2009 (per cent) 15.2 Attitudes towards refugees among boys and girls (15–19 years old) regarding ideological attitude in 1999 (per cent) in Sweden 17.1 Taxonomic sketch of activity and ideology among the contemporary Maltese extreme right

xi

211 244 246 274

FIGURES

11.1 PRM electoral mandates by region, 1990–2004 11.2 PUNR electoral mandates by region, 1990–2004 15.1 Swedish attitudes to receiving more/fewer refugees to Sweden, 1987–2007 (percentage thinking more/fewer is a good suggestion) 16.1 Trajectory comparison of the FPÖ and FN

184 185 244 267

CONTRIBUTORS

Ekin Burak Arıkan is an Assistant Professor of Politics in the Faculty of Arts and

Social Sciences at Sabancı University, Istanbul (Turkey). Gabriela Borz is a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow in the Department of Politics and International Relations at the University of Aberdeen (UK). Giorgia Bulli is a Researcher in the Department of Political Science and Sociology at the University of Florence (Italy). Marie Demker is Professor in Political Science at the University of Gothenburg

(Sweden). Antonis A. Ellinas is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of

Cyprus (Cyprus). Mark-Anthony Falzon is a Social Anthropologist and Head of Department of

Sociology at the University of Malta (Malta). Emmanuel Godin is Principal Lecturer in French Politics in the School of Languages

and Area Studies at the University of Portsmouth (UK). Matthew J. Goodwin is Lecturer in Politics at the University of Nottingham

(UK). Jérôme Jamin is Professor in Political Science at the University of Liège

(Belgium).

xiv

Contributors

Brian Jenkins is a Senior Research Fellow in the Department of French at the

University of Leeds (UK). He co-edits the Journal of Contemporary European Studies. José L. Rodríguez Jiménez is Professor in Contemporary History in the Faculty of

Communication Sciences and the Centro Ramón Carande of Social and Juridical Sciences at the Rey Juan Carlos University, Fuenlabrada and Madrid (Spain). Andrea Mammone is an Assistant Professor of Modern History in the School of Social Science at Kingston University London (UK). Riccardo Marchi is a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at the Institute of Social

Science, University of Lisbon (Portugal). Miroslav Mareš is a Head of the Section of Security and Strategic Studies,

Department of Political Science of the Faculty of Social Studies, Masaryk University, Brno (Czech Republic). Mark Micallef is a News Editor with The Times of Malta (Malta). Timothy Peace is a Post-Doctoral Fellow at the University of Edinburgh (UK). Marina Peunova is a PhD Researcher in International History and Politics at

the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva (Switzerland). Per Anders Rudling is a Post-Doctoral Fellow at the Department of History at Lund University (Sweden). Nitzan Shoshan is a Professor of Anthropology in the Centro de Estudios Sociológicos at El Colegio de México (Mexico). Damir Skenderovic is Professor of Contemporary History in the Department of Historical Sciences at the University of Fribourg (Switzerland). Richard Stojar is a Lecturer and Researcher in Military Science and Security

Studies at the University of Defence in Brno (Czech Republic). Veˇra Stojarová is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Political Science of

the Faculty of Social Studies, Masaryk University, Brno (Czech Republic). Filippo Tronconi is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at the Department of

Political Science at the University of Bologna (Italy).

Contributors

xv

John Veugelers is Associate Professor of Sociology in the Department of Sociology,

University of Toronto (Canada). Michael Whine is Director, Government and International Affairs at the Community

Security Trust and Director, Defence and Group Relations at the Board of Deputies of British Jews (UK). Michelle Hale Williams is an Associate Professor of Political Science in the

Department of Government at the University of West Florida (USA).

INTRODUCTION Mapping the ‘right of the mainstream right’ in contemporary Europe Andrea Mammone, Emmanuel Godin and Brian Jenkins

I Why should we still bother with the extreme, radical, neo-fascist, neo-Nazi or populist right? Why yet another manuscript when most already seems to have been said? Since the first significant breakthrough of the phenomenon on French soil in the 1980s, acres of print have been dedicated to analysing, scrutinizing, labelling, and at times, warning against this (ultra-)rightist galaxy, from a national or comparative, and recently also from a transnational or anthropological perspective. Yet, right-wing extremism remains a hot topic for the media and public opinion, and a key subject across the social sciences, as it continues to appear, reappear or progress in virtually every European democracy and in the remotest corners of the continent. When a few years ago we, the editors of this volume, launched a Call for Papers with a view to selecting half a dozen papers for a special issue on the far right in contemporary Europe to be published by the Journal of Contemporary European Studies (JCES), we had every reason to hope that our project would prove timely and productive. The scale of the eventual response nevertheless surpassed all our expectations. Proposals came in from more than 60 scholars based in 25 different countries, exploring every conceivable aspect of the subject across the whole of the European continent. As a consequence, the JCES agreed to publish two special issues, the first in December 2008 (‘The Extreme Right in Contemporary Europe: Cultural and Spatial Perspectives’, vol. 16, no. 3), the second in August 2009 (‘The Extreme Right in Contemporary Europe: History, Interpretation and Performance’, vol. 17, no. 2). Some of the papers published in JCES are reproduced in revised form in this volume (and we are grateful to Dr Jeremy Leaman for allowing their reproduction). Overall, three dozen of the initial papers received will now appear in this two-volume collection. This first volume, Mapping the Extreme Right in Contemporary Europe, will be followed by a second edited book, Varieties of

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A. Mammone, E. Godin and B. Jenkins

Right-Wing Extremism in Contemporary Europe, which will set out to challenge the existing literature on the populist nature of right-wing extremist parties, will open the ‘black box’ of extremist militancy and review how old and new figures of hate ( Jews, Muslims, the European Union and globalization) have been reworked to galvanize passions.

II Interest in the extreme right is thus not on the wane. Our present volume therefore aims to offer something more, something ‘broader’, that other recent works on this topic – whatever their quality – are not offering: we aspire to map the wider far-right universe without confining the analysis to a given country, or academic ‘school’, discipline or method. On the contrary, this volume attempts to provide readers, students as well as non-specialists of the extreme right, with a wide range of case studies in many different geographical areas and relying on different methodological and conceptual perspectives. Our ‘mapping’ thus stresses the diversity of the ways in which the phenomenon has been studied while appraising – and sometimes questioning – the diversity of the phenomenon itself. Admittedly we, as editors, had initially considered imposing a common lexicon on contributors focussing on 24 different countries (and we do prefer, as readers will observe, the label ‘extreme’ to denote the right of the political right): in the initial phase of this project, the variety of terms used to describe and analyse parties and movements seemed a perfect illustration of the enduring ‘war of words’ analysed (and lamented) by Mudde (1996) more than 15 years ago. Some contributors underline the difficulty of using the appropriate label: for instance, in the context of the Ukraine, where nostalgia for a strong Communist state competes with ultranationalist tendencies, Rudling argues that different terms like ‘conservatives, fascists or fundamentalists are inadequate to describe … groups which belong on both extremes of the political spectrum’. Jamin prefers to draw readers’ attention to the ‘acute notional fuzziness’ characterizing such labels and warns, as most contributors do, against essentialist definitions of such parties and movements. Others, echoing the early Mudde, indicate that finding the right label is not the most urgent task for the researcher. For instance, with reference to the Lega Nord, Bulli and Tronconi argue: ‘Searching for the most perfect label might have deflected attention from the object itself. And this is much more likely if the object … is characterized by contradictory features, complexity and frequent shifts, or real U-turns, in policy positions and alliance strategies’. Finally, others, like Mammone and Peace, make it very clear that the use of labels is not entirely neutral and has significant political implications. The widespread use of the label ‘populist’ today, they argue, serves to mask the enduring fascist nature of extreme-right parties and plays a role in their legitimization.1 It is certainly not the objective of this volume to engage in such debates about definitions and labels, but it seemed important to remind the reader that the diversity of terms used throughout this volume may reflect different local interpretations, different intellectual traditions and maybe different political

Introduction

3

perspectives that the editors, in the end, were reluctant to erase. Now, we do have our own views on the classification of extreme-right parties, as our second volume will reveal. But, in Mapping the Extreme Right, we are much more interested in the empirical dimensions of the rightist phenomenon. While this may invite some criticism, our aim is not to provide fixed definitions or to discuss generic forms of extremism/radicalism. To borrow from Robert Paxton’s thoughts on the problems of identifying a satisfactory and useful definition of fascism (probably a thornier task than defining the post-war extreme right), definitions and classifications are static and inherently limiting, and they fail to reflect process and complexity (Paxton 2004: 14–15). As our contributors have amply demonstrated in this volume, extreme-right parties – perhaps more than other parties – are prone to internal ideological conflicts, change their positions over time, sometimes quite dramatically, and above all, do not always seek to achieve ideological coherence, if only to maintain an electoral advantage or to avoid the creation of splinter parties. The lesson is clear: definitions and classifications may be useful as a starting point if they help delineate some of the most general traits of a phenomenon but they may well prove too crude to account for the phenomenon’s complexity and dynamism.

III Our rationale here is to conceive the extreme right as a European, and a transnational, phenomenon with some common and basic features cross-nationally shared. This, as will be discussed shortly, makes the many parties and movements analysed in this volume immediately ‘comparable’ to each other: indeed, within their own political and national culture, they represent the different permutations of a wider (transnational/European) ‘extremism’. It has become clear over recent decades, as sociologist Alain Bihr (2000) pertinently suggests, that in the era of globalization – where nation-states are often perceived to be inoperative and powerless and thus partly contested and delegitimized – decisions seem to be made ‘elsewhere’, by ‘others’, whether by anonymous global markets or remote and faceless supranational bureaucracies. In this context, the resurgence of ‘nationalist movements which put the nation at the centre of their worldview as a key element in the construction of their political rhetoric and the development of their policy agenda is the false paradox of the post-national age’ (Bihr 2000: 10). Naturally enough, many of our contributors pay particular attention to this point: ‘nations’ did not become neutral containers with the dismantling of geographical borders, and nationalism, admittedly in various guises, remains a particularly attractive political option for extreme-right parties. Yet, Bihr also points to another important, if seemingly contradictory, political dimension of extreme-right parties and movements: in different ways and in varying degrees, they claim to be committed to a genuine and distinctive European agenda, which regards the (white) European continent (but not the EU) in the same way as it regards the nation, that is, as an imagined (and racialized) homeland.2

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A. Mammone, E. Godin and B. Jenkins

When discussing the extreme right’s enthusiasm for a certain type of Europe, it is worth remembering that this is not, by any means, a new theme. The history of post-war Europe is littered with attempts to build up stronger links between extreme-right parties in Europe: from the Rome (1950) and Malmo (1951) summits which led to the creation of the European Social Movement, to the ephemeral formation in 2007 of the Identity, Tradition and Sovereignty group in the EU Parliament, several extreme-right parties felt the need to move away from narrow interwar nationalism. Immediate national interests were redefined in the light of a common international agenda, in an attempt to break the national isolation into which such parties could easily sink. Thus they promoted a supranational ideal of Europe, or more precisely a ‘European nationalism’, where ‘Europe’ was generally perceived as a bastion against both Americanization and Communism and, more recently, against globalization, US hegemonic power, multi-ethnicity and Islam. Since the 1950s, there have been many attempts to build neo-fascist or neo-Nazi international organizations and networks (Mammone 2011) – including those promoted by the French Alain de Benoist and Maurice Bardèche, the Belgian Jean-François Thiriart (founder of the Jeune Europe), Oswald Mosley, the American-born Francis Parker Yockey (leader of the European Liberation Front), and the Italian Julius Evola – which sought to promote a supranational political vision.3 Political theorist Tamir Bar-On provocatively calls this a ‘quest’ for – or ‘dream’ of – a pan-European empire (Bar-On 2008). Naturally, in terms of attitude towards the EU, extreme-right parties remain critical. Some of them call for a ‘Europe of Fatherlands’ (which is part of classic neo-fascist rhetoric): they do not seek to reject the nation as a major frame of reference, but argue that a strong Europe can only rest on the confederation of self-assured European nations (a model not too dissimilar to the Swiss Confederation). In any configuration, extreme-right parties insist on the importance of European civilization and cultures as a redemptive solution to the decadence ushered in by a variety of enemies, ranging from American materialism to political Islam. This type of political philosophy has historical roots in the much-studied Nazi New Order (i.e. a völkisch pan-Europe) and in (probably less well-known) Italian fascist Europeanism. Indeed, historically, some fascist currents did not object to defining the ideal political community as a non-national one: and in some cases, it was even defined as ‘universal’ (Cuzzi 2005, 2006; Leeden 1972). Transnational and even transatlantic links were quite common (Finchelstein 2010; Larson 2001; Thorpe 2010). This led some scholars to argue for the existence of a global, universal or transnational fascist ideology able to adapt and change shape in different geopolitical contexts. Given this conceptual framework, to identify post-war, extreme-right transnational networks and explain their similarities and connective structures has become a major task for historians (Mammone 2008). Their work reveals that the contemporary extreme right has already had a ‘long history’ of ‘commonality’, enhanced by a wide array of exchanges across borders and an intense cooperation well above and beyond the strict borders of the nation-state.

Introduction

5

IV As suggested above, the nation has certainly not disappeared from party ideology. However, it is true that some activists may feel part of a larger community, as some of our contributors have shown. We argue that this led to the creation of a transnational political space – a ‘transnational European space’ in this specific case – and we will shortly explain how different contributors have defined its characteristics and dynamics and highlighted the ‘connective tissues’ which make possible the creation of such a transnational space. In a globalized world, a political space is not necessarily a national or local space per se: Political space does not inevitably correlate with nation-state borders and territories. In a world characterized by the permanent crossing and transformation of borders and boundaries, the political, stripped of large parts of its territorial connotations, is characterized by a heterogeneity and flexibility which is related to particular spatial conditions, junctions and disjunctions. However, the transnational character of the political is not a particular phenomenon of the ‘global age’ …, but can be observed throughout the existence, and in a certain sense, already before the emergence of the nation-state. (Albert et al. 2009: 7) This volume is grounded in the idea that the extreme right is at the same time a national, a European and, as indicated further below, a local phenomenon. In other words, even when it is observed locally, the extreme right can still pertinently be analysed as part of a large whole. However, can this ‘larger whole’ be rigorously defined according to any (usual) social science categorization/classification? In order to ‘map’ the right of the right, it would seem appropriate to take into consideration the ‘transnationality’ of rightwing extremism, the exchange and circulation of ideas and strategies across state borders, and those key features that are shared (albeit to a different extent at different times) by all movements, cultures and activists analysed in this volume. To be more precise, as Jérôme Jamin discusses it in Varieties of Right-Wing Extremism in Contemporary Europe, the doctrine of the extreme right is based on three pillars: (a) the idea of inequality and hierarchy, (b) an ethnic form of nationalism linked to a mono-racial community and, finally, (c) the adoption of radical means to achieve aims and defend the imagined community. In Mapping the Extreme Right these extremist ‘traditions’ and ‘permutations’ are examined. The insistence on the defence of a holistic and mono-ethnic community is today one of the most evident ‘links’ among the different extremist groupings. Racism in particular – whether seen as a new variation or as a resurgence of an old (European) tradition – is a question that is clearly ‘imposed on us by reality, in forms that vary somewhat from one country to another, but which nonetheless suggest a transnational phenomenon’ (Balibar 1997: 27). In this way, racism and nationalism are

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A. Mammone, E. Godin and B. Jenkins

closely linked (i.e. extreme-right ethno-nationalism).4 Immigrants – in particular coloured migrants from developing countries – obviously challenge the ‘values’, ‘traditions’ and millenarian ‘cultures’ of the fatherland, as understood by the extreme right. As the anthropologist Verena Stolcke rightly pointed out more than a decade ago: In effect, the political right in Europe has in the past decade developed a political rhetoric of exclusion in which Third World immigrants, who proceed in part from its ex-colonies, are considered as positing a threat to the national unity of the ‘host’ countries because they are culturally different. (Stolcke 1995: 1) This reflects the usual extreme-right obsession with the decline of homogeneous pan-European or Western identities (see also Bar-On 2008), where ‘biological’ is replaced by ‘cultural’, ‘Jew’ by ‘African’, ‘immigrant’ or ‘Muslim’, where racism is sometimes hidden, watered down, or given a different name. It is this ‘new rhetoric of exclusion’ (to use again Stolcke’s expression) that immediately characterizes the extreme right in the eyes of many Europeans. As will be discussed in our second volume, Islamophobic campaigns, for instance, have become the new xenophobic flag of the extreme right throughout Europe and such campaigns not only highlight the existence of common values among activists, but also provide them with opportunities to further their cooperation across borders, via Internet sites, music festivals, sporting events and other rallies (Rosenberger and Hadj-Abdou, 2012). Indeed, throughout this volume, contributors recognize that the nature of extreme-right parties is often inferred from what they have to say (‘differentialism’) rather than from their concrete actions. Several of our chapters deal precisely with these actions, from the exclusionary cultural policies implemented by the FN in Toulon (Veugelers) to the sinister support for violent paramilitary actions in Eastern Europe (Mareš and Stojar). This raises some important questions about how to study the extreme right and in particular the credence which should be given to its public utterances. Not all our contributors agree on how to tackle this issue. Some point out that the search for respectability has become a major part of the electoral strategy of those parties which are serious about contesting elections and has led such parties to tone down what once appeared to be a radical, often overtly racist and inflammatory rhetoric and to revise their programme accordingly. Whether this alone is sufficient to ascertain their conversion from a neo-fascist to a new populist agenda (Ignazi 1997; Rydgren 2005; Mudde 2007) is debatable, and indeed contested by some contributors. They point out that the nature and content of their discourses still vary greatly from one public to another: potential voters and party activists are clearly not exposed to the same reasoning, and the arguments presented to the press are often at odds with those which are commonly discussed on Internet forums or staged during ‘choreographed events’ for the benefit of enthused followers (Falzon and Micallef; Whine). For instance, Arıkan in his study of the Turkish Nationalist Action Party demonstrates how the party’s discourse on democracy remains highly

Introduction

7

ambiguous, if not contradictory, in order to appeal to different constituencies, while Mammone and Peace unravel the apparent, but fragile veneer of respectability that the Italian Azione Sociale and the British National Party sought to achieve in local elections. Conversely, other contributors, such as Skenderovic, Demker and Hale Williams argue that new and strong populist tendencies are clearly at work today on the right of the right. Whether populism is conceptualized as a political, rhetorical style, with no precise content other than an emotional appeal to the common people to challenge the legitimacy of the political establishment (Taggart 2000; Abt and Rummens 2007), or as a fundamentally anti-liberal, authoritarian and nativist ideology whose conception of a virtuous and homogeneous people opposed to a corrupt, cosmopolitan, self-serving elite is not incompatible with the formal principles of democracy (Betz and Johnson 2004; Mudde 2007), it remains an important, sometimes essential component of most parties presented in this volume. None of our contributors, however, argue that the object of their research can be easily defined and conceptualized. As Bulli and Tronconi remind us, parties on the right of the right are better understood as ‘multifaceted parties’ where different components co-exist and where the weight of each component often changes over time.

V The objective of this volume is therefore to provide the reader with a multi-dimensional map of the extreme right in contemporary Europe. In terms of geographical coverage, we have included parties and movements from a large number of countries and we have done so for three reasons. First, we wanted to provide readers with rich, varied and very often new empirical data: the ‘usual suspects’, such as the French Front National (FN) or the various representatives of the Italian extreme right, are not at the forefront of this volume; when they do appear, contributors have presented their findings from innovative perspectives, such as an insightful local study of the French FN in the city of Toulon (Veugelers) or an original ‘localistic’ as well as cross-national approach between the lesser known Italian Azione Sociale and the British National Party (Mammone and Peace). Likewise, this volume offers a wealth of information about the extreme right in the Balkans, Central and Eastern Europe, as well as in less-studied countries such as Portugal, Greece and Malta. Taken together, the chapters included in this volume provide a vivid, complex and often original illustration of the core issues identified by the literature on the contemporary extreme right: its ideological nature, its ambiguous relations with a fascist; Stalinist or communist past, its internal organization, its electoral performance, its political, intellectual and cultural influence, including on policy-making, its changing relations with the conservative right and the uncertain effects of incumbency on its trajectories. Second, our wide geographical coverage enables us to exemplify how different spatial perspectives have been used to decipher European right-wing extremism: local studies are complemented by – and often interlinked with – transnational analyses, while comparative research often nuances – and sometimes refutes – the

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tendency to overemphasize the exceptional features displayed by national case studies. As such, this volume introduces new methodologies in the study of the extreme-right phenomenon. This is certainly the case with local, cross-national and supranational analyses. However, some effort has also been made to embed localist and national case studies into a wider European context. These different geographical levels of analysis do not solely reflect researchers’ methodological preferences: they also offer possible avenues to understand how the extreme right itself conceptualizes its identity in relation to a given territory. Under different ideological guises, the space delineated by the nation-state certainly occupies a primeval and sanctified place in extreme-right ideologies. Yet, as evidenced in many chapters, other territories have also been invested with quasi-mythical values: at sub-state level, the Padania of the Lega Nord’s imagery (Bulli and Tronconi), the ethnicized Flanders promoted by the Vlaams Belang ( Jamin); at supra-state level, Panarin’s Eurasia as an alternative to Western decadence (Peunova), or the virtual and global territory created on the Internet by racist, white supremacist groups in order to energize and coalesce their dispersed communities across and beyond Europe (Falzon and Micallef; Whine). The extreme right is also well aware that the mobilizing power of the nation is often better felt when strongly embedded in the local fabric (Goodwin; Veugelers; Shoshan). Local history and local cultures convey in tangible and emotional terms grand but sometimes distant national narratives, whose overt political logic is not always attractive to the younger generations, as Shoshan’s anthropological study reveals. Goodwin and Veugelers stress the importance of local cultures, embedded in a specific local history and set of circumstances, in providing a more or less fertile terrain for the development of such parties. Our collection of chapters demonstrates how complementary (even intricately linked) these different spatial approaches are and how a change of scale can raise distinctive research questions. Thus, the geographical map presented in this volume offers different points of entry into the relations between right-wing extremism and territory, be it from the methodology selected by the researcher or from the way the extreme right in Europe articulates its relations with a given territory. As such, this volume includes different levels of analysis and mobilizes different disciplines to account for the extreme right in contemporary Europe: the richness of the phenomenon is assessed through different disciplines and, as previously suggested, is by no means restricted to a political science approach. For this reason, we hope that this volume breaks away from narrow parochialism and, when possible, highlights the aforementioned cross-fertilization and cross-national interactions. Similarly, in Mapping the Extreme Right in Contemporary Europe we have been careful to avoid an approach which would solely consider the extreme right in its party dimension. As such this volume includes a number of chapters which focus on the diverse intellectual and cultural expressions of these movements and on forms of organization beyond the strict remit of the party (see below). Third, our geographical coverage is large because we wish to illustrate the porous nature of the continent’s borders. A major theme which runs across many chapters

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is the way in which ideas, people and sometimes financial resources circulate from one extreme-right party or movement to another.The reader will note, for instance, the varying influence of the French Nouvelle Droite and its leader Alain de Benoist on extreme-right parties and movements as diverse as those in Portugal (Marchi), Ukraine (Rudling), Russia (Peunova), Italy and the UK (Mammone and Peace). Personal contacts and institutional support both provide invaluable support for ideological cross-fertilization: for instance, Ellinas shows how personal contacts between the leaders of the Greek extreme right and the French Front National helped to redefine, with a degree of success, the ideological orientation of the Greek National Party, while Rodríguez Jiménez explains how the Círculo Español de Amigos de Europa (CEDADE, the Spanish Circle of Friends of Europe), an international network of extreme-right parties and movements, long served to disseminate neo-Nazi propaganda well beyond Spanish borders until its dissolution in 1994. Rudling offers examples of financial support between the Ukrainian extreme right and Syria, motivated by unremitting anti-Semitism, while Mareš and Stojar reveal how some German and Russian neo-Nazi paramilitary groups have extended their physical support to their Croatian and Serbian brethren by fighting on their side during the Balkan wars. Many more examples can be found throughout the chapters presented here, but Peunova, Whine, Falzon and Micallef, Mammone and Peace have made such transnational exchanges the core of their argument. Falzon and Micallef show the links and interactions of the extreme right in geographically isolated Malta with their fellow European movements through the use of the Internet and ‘transnational’ cyber-communities. Peunova charts the paradoxical eastward transmission of Western European ideas into a type of Russian ultranationalism which violently opposes Western decadence. Whine illustrates how on each side of the Atlantic extreme-right groups, which had previously failed to develop a common agenda, are now finding in information technology a powerful medium to sustain their exchanges and promote virtual communities based on shared lifestyles rather than strict ideological obedience. As such,Whine also reminds us that extreme-right transnational trends exist both within and outside Europe.

VI One of the recurring arguments concerning extreme-right parties is the way authors have tried to evaluate what is specific to a particular party and what seems to be a set of common features shared across Europe. This tension between, on the one hand, what is specific and exceptional and, on the other hand, what is commonly shared is played out and resolved differently in several chapters. Demker, for instance, shows that the term ‘Scandinavian’ extreme right is problematic and demonstrates that different opportunity structures explain the relative electoral failure of the Swedish party when compared with its Danish and Norwegian counterparts. A comparative analysis leads her to insist on what is specific to Sweden and to explain how a common issue across Scandinavia – a rising level of immigrants – has not provided the Swedish extreme right with the same opportunity for electoral success

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as has been the case in neighbouring Scandinavian countries. (It is nonetheless worth noting that the main reason explaining different electoral performance between Sweden, Denmark and Norway is not to be found in the nature of these parties’ ideology or in their programmatic orientation). Likewise, Stojarová questions whether it is possible to study the extreme right in the Balkans using the tools which have been primarily devised for the analysis of Western extreme-right parties. Whereas her comparative analysis of party ideology has led her to identify a number of converging points between the West and the Balkans, she is not convinced that it is possible to downplay the specificities of the region – the conservative political culture, the instability of the party system and the existence of strong local cultures in the Balkans. On the whole, Bulli and Tronconi reach a similar conclusion: the Lega Nord naturally shares similar points with other extreme-right parties across Europe, but it is the ‘cultural, social and economic peculiarities of the north-eastern regions of Italy’ which best ‘explain the success of the leghismo’. Similar questions are also raised about the right-wing extremist phenomenon in Romania (Borz) and in Turkey (Arıkan). Borz presents a nuanced assessment, arguing that the extreme right in Romania shares many common points with its Western counterparts, but argues that the transition from communism to democracy has produced a set of specific circumstances which have modulated – rather than significantly altered – the logic of extreme-right success: in Borz’s analysis, the figure of the modernization loser, so common in the West’s imaginary, has morphed into one of a ‘transition loser’. Arıkan’s assessment is even less ‘exceptionalist’: the ideological core of the Turkish extreme right, its tactical attempt to present a more respectable façade, its conflictual and difficult relations with conservative forces, even its overt politicization of religion echo many themes that are familiar across Europe at large. Skenderovic devotes his entire chapter to challenging the idea that Switzerland and its ‘local’ variety of extreme-right politics is exceptional in Western Europe and concludes that Switzerland, like other European countries, is by no means immune from this ‘ultra-right virus’ (and, similarly, that the Swiss version of this ‘virus’ is very much much like the variants to be found in other countries). Likewise, Hale Williams, comparing the electoral fortunes of the Freiheitliche Partei Österreichs (Austrian Freedom Party) in Austria and the French Front National, concludes that their trajectories reveal ‘common factors despite different circumstances’. Overall, a number of contributors to this volume see a degree of commonality between extreme-right parties, groupings and cultures in Europe, confirming our editorial position.This is further illustrated by Mammone and Peace: comparing the political discourse of the Italian Azione Sociale and the British National Party, they demonstrate that the two parties are united by a transnational ideology: ultranationalism and xenophobia. They conclude that this degree of transnationalism indicates that the extreme right today is a ‘truly European phenomenon, just as interwar fascism was’. Such transnational perspectives invite the reader not only to assess the circulation of extreme-right ideas and cultures, as exemplified by the contagion of Nouvelle Droite doctrine from West to East (Peunova) or the transnational exchanges ‘in and beyond’ national borders in the case of Malta (Falzon and

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Micallef), but also to consider their mutation from one context to another and their capacity to graft themselves, successfully or otherwise, onto local or national cultures (Ellinas; Marchi; Rodríguez Jiménez; Borz).

VII Most contributors agree that the political weakness of the extreme right is often offset by its cultural influence. For instance, Rudling explains in detail the leading role played by the Mizhrehional’na Akademiia Upravlinnia Personalom (MAUP, Inter-Regional Academy of Personnel Management), the largest private university in Ukraine, in propagating anti-Semitism through a wide range of publications, conferences and international research seminars. As Rodríguez Jiménez reminds us, bookshops and publishing houses sponsored by CEDADE disseminated antiSemitic pamphlets, posters and brochures denying the Holocaust well beyond Spain. Similarly, Marchi contrasts the Portuguese extreme right’s cultural vivacity with its political impotence since 1974: reviews (such as Futuro Presente), publishing houses (such as Nova Arrancada) and more recently the use of the Internet have helped sustain the presence of the extreme right in Portuguese society, a presence which goes well beyond its political capability. Peunova shows the interesting (ideological) trajectory of one of the most important thinkers in post-Soviet Russia, Aleksandr Panarin. His ‘anti-liberal nationalism of the extreme Right’ did not stop him becoming a maître-penseur of new Eurasianism: a public intellectual and influential speaker as well as Professor and Chair of the Department of Political Science at Moscow State University with many followers among his students. Peunova implicitly shows how the influence of the extreme right may extend well beyond the usual ‘tiny’ circles of sympathizers. However, as Ellinas notes in the case of Greece, this cultural vivacity is not without political benefits: the Greek extreme right is well aware that access to mass media is key to its electoral success. Throughout this volume the reader will find many examples of significant organizations gravitating, sometimes uneasily, around extreme-right parties: veterans’ associations in Spain (Rodríguez Jiménez), Portugal (Marchi), Southern France (Veugelers) and across the Balkans (Stojarová); radical student organizations in Greece (Ellinas), Portugal (Marchi) and Belgium ( Jamin); specific groups such as European settlers from Algeria in and around the French Mediterranean city of Toulon (Veugelers) or loosely connected skinhead communities across Europe and across the cyberspace (Whine; see also Falzon and Micallef ). Whether, and to what extent, these various organizations and communities gravitating around extreme-right parties can or will help the extreme right to gain more votes and respectability is still a matter of debate. However, as some of our contributors show, it is at least clear that the extreme right has (at least partially) escaped from its political ghetto and has become embedded into the social and cultural fabric of European societies. Despite a clear desire to appear respectable and to dissociate itself from blatantly unsavoury individuals and organizations5, the extreme-right galaxy is still rife

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with violence. One of the most striking features of the extreme right in Europe today is the plethora of paramilitary and vigilante groups particularly active in central and Eastern Europe. In this volume, their presence is felt in many chapters, but Mareš and Stojar provide an empirically rich account of such organizations. They remind the reader of the inherently violent nature of the extreme right throughout the European continent. Of course, as Peter Merkl correctly points out, ‘it would be difficult to overlook the vast preponderance of the unorganized, unpolitical, and less political outrages against asylum-seekers and other visible foreigners’ (Merkl 1995: 114) – violence often perpetrated by skinheads, football supporters, youth gangs, or ‘uncontrolled’ neo-Nazis: in this volume, Shoshan’s chapter on young right extremists in East Berlin conveys the feeling of a latent violence – verbal and physical – which permeates young extremists’ daily lives: ‘daily friction with “Turks and Arabs”; a fight at the shopping mall, threats at a court-mandated antiviolence seminar, or various incidents at the vocational school’.6 Extreme-right parties (and sometimes, paradoxically, mainstream media) have strongly contributed to creating a climate of hostility, racial hatred and radicalized ethnic tensions. If it frequently denounces the rise in crime and more generally the growing sense of insecurity, extreme-right culture across Europe also promotes the cult of violence and values physical confrontation. Thus, for example, vigilante squads (the so-called ‘ronde’) to protect citizens against ‘crime’ have been emerging recently in Italy (some led by an extreme-right group called Guardia Nazionale Italiana close to the new Movimento Sociale Italiano-Destra Nazionale).7 Similarly, a undercover investigation by The Guardian into the English Defence League (EDL) revealed that this new movement: which has staged a number of violent protests in towns and cities across the country this year, is planning to ‘hit’ Bradford and the London borough of Tower Hamlets as it intensifies its street protests; … the group’s decision to target some of the UK’s most prominent Muslim communities was a blatant attempt to provoke mayhem and disorder. According to the newspaper, the EDL is the most active and important far-right street movement since the National Front, and there are ‘a number of known rightwing extremists who are taking an interest in the movement – from convicted football hooligans to members of violent rightwing splinter groups’ (Taylor 2010: 1).8 This also shows that not all extreme-right movements have been involved in a process of democratization. To summarize, Mapping the Extreme Right can be read at different levels: it certainly contains unusual, often original empirical data about extreme-right parties and movements across Europe and each chapter, taken on its own, provides a complex and fascinating insight into the dynamics of the extreme right. However, taken together, the chapters project a different image: contributors have used different disciplines and methodologies to demonstrate the complexity of the phenomenon under study. This complexity is what we have sought to map.

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Notes 1 For a more detailed criticism of the use of the term ‘populism’, see the first part of the second volume of this book as well as Mammone (2009b). 2 Obviously these transnational trends (which have similarly influenced other party families and national political systems and policies) are not strictly confined to the European space, as regards the rise of the extreme right. An interesting development is ‘the appearance of a right-wing extremist movement that transcends national boundaries and, indeed, crosses the Atlantic with as much ease as do E-mail messages on the Internet’ (Kaplan and Weinberg 1998: 7). 3 Along with the previously mentioned European Social Movement and the Identity, Tradition and Sovereignty group, it is worth remembering the 1951 Nouvel Ordre Européen, the World Union of National-Socialists in 1962, the 1962 Conference of Venice, Europafront in 1963, the 1979 Euro-Right group at the first EU elections, and the 1987 Manifeste pour la Nation Europe. 4 Interestingly Étienne Balibar suggests that ‘racism is simultaneously universalist and particularist. The excess it represents in relation to nationalism brings an added dimension to that nationalism, which tends both to univeralize it, or to correct its lack of universality, and at the same time to particularize it, to correct its lack of specificity’ [‘le racisme figure à la fois du côté de l’universel et du côté du particulier. L’excès qu’il représente par rapport au nationalisme, et donc le supplément qu’il lui apport, tend à la fois à l’universaliser, à corriger en somme son manque d’universalité, et à le particulariser, à corriger son manque de spécificité’] (Balibar 1997: 38). 5 In April 2011, Marine Le Pen expelled from the FN Alexandre Gabriac, a young FN regional councillor who appeared on a photo making the Nazi salute. Having declared that the FN was not a racist party, she made it clear that there was no room within the party for skinheads and other ‘nazillons’. Bruno Gollnish, the FN’s second in command, as well as Jean-Marie Le Pen, the FN honorary president, have publicly condemned her decision. 6 On racist violence in Europe, see also Bjorgo and Witte (1993). 7 For a brief analysis of the racialist and neo-fascist climate in contemporary Italy, see Mammone (2009a). 8 In August 2011, during the riots in the UK, EDL members were singled out by Tom Godwin, Acting Metropolitan Police Commissioner, as having successfully infiltrated vigilante groups in Eltham, south-east London and Enfield, north London in order to exploit the situation and inflame racial tensions.

Bibliography Abt, K. and Rummens, S. 2007. ‘Populism versus Democracy’. Political Studies, 55: 405–24. Albert, M., Bluhm, G., Helmig, J., Leutzsch, A. and Walter, J. 2009. ‘Introduction: The Communicative Construction of Transnational Political Spaces’, in M. Albert, G. Bluhm, J. Helmig, A. Leutzsch and J. Walter (eds), Transnational Political Spaces: Agents – Structures – Encounters. Frankfurt: Campus Verlag, pp. 7–34. Balibar, É. 1997. ‘Y a-t-il un “néo-racisme”?’, in É. Balibar and I. Wallerstein, Race, Nation, Classe. Les Identités Ambiguës. Paris: La Découverte, pp. 27–41. Bar-On, T. 2008. ‘Fascism to the Nouvelle Droite: The Dream of Pan-European Empire’, in A. Mammone, E. Godin and B. Jenkins (eds), ‘The Extreme Right in Contemporary Europe: Cultural and Spatial Perspectives’, special edition of the Journal of Contemporary European Studies, 16(3): 327–45. Betz, H.-G. and Johnson, C. 2004. ‘Against the Current – Stemming the Tide: The Nostalgic Ideology of the Contemporary Radical Populist Right’, Journal of Political Ideologies, 9(3): 311–27.

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Bihr, A. 2000. Le Crépuscule des États-Nations. Transnationalisation et Crispations Nationalistes. Lausanne: Editions Page Deux. Bjorgo, T. and Witte, R. (eds) 1993. Racist Violence in Europe. London: Macmillan. Cuzzi, M. 2005. L’Internazionale delle Camicie Nere. I CAUR, 1933–1939. Milan: Mursia. –––– 2006. Antieuropa. Il Fascismo Universale di Mussolini. Milan: M&B Publishing. Finchelstein, F. 2010. Transatlantic Fascism. Ideology,Violence, and the Sacred in Argentina and Italy, 1919–1945. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Ignazi, P. 1997. ‘The Extreme Right in Europe. A Survey’, in P. L. Merkl and L. Weinberg (eds), The Revival of Right-Wing Extremism in the Nineties. London: Frank Cass, pp. 47–64. Jamin, J. (forthcoming). ‘Two Different Realities: Notes on Populism and the Extreme Right’, in A. Mammone, E. Godin and B. Jenkins (eds), Identity and Passions: New Perspectives on Western European Right-Wing Extremism. London: Routledge. Kaplan, J. and Weinberg, L. 1998. The Emergence of a Euro-American Radical Right, New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press. Larson, S. (ed.) 2001. Fascism outside Europe.The European Impulse against Domestic Conditions in the Diffusion of Global Fascism. New York: Columbia University Press. Ledeen, M.A. 1972. Universal Fascism: The Theory and Practice of the Fascist International. 1928–1936. New York: Howard Fertig. Mammone, A. 2008. ‘The Transnational Reaction to 1968: Neo-Fascist National Fronts and Political Cultures in France and Italy’, Contemporary European History, 17(2): 213–36. –––– 2009a. ‘The Reality of Racism in Modern Italy’, Tribune, 20 March, pp. 14–15. –––– 2009b. ‘The Eternal Return? Faux Populism and Contemporarization of Neo-Fascism across Britain, France and Italy’, Journal of Contemporary European Studies, 17(2): 171–92. –––– 2011. ‘Revitalizing and De-territorializing Fascism in the 1950s. The Extreme Right in France and Italy, and the Pan-national (“European”) Imaginary’, Patterns of Prejudice, 45(4): 279–302. Merkl, P. 1995. ‘Radical Right Parties in Europe and Anti-Foreign Violence: A Comparative Essay’, Terrorism and Political Violence, 71(1): 96–118. Mudde, C. 1996. ‘The War of Words: Defining the Extreme Right Family’, West European Politics, 19(2): 225–48. —— 2007. Populist Radical Right Parties in Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Paxton, R. 2004. The Anatomy of Fascism. London:Vintage. Rosenberger, S. and Hadj-Abdou, L. (forthcoming). ‘Islam at Issue: Anti-Islamic Mobilisation of the Extreme Right in Austria’, in A. Mammone, E. Godin and B. Jenkins (eds), Identity and Passions: New Perspectives on Western European Right-Wing Extremism. London: Routledge. Rydgren, J. 2005.‘Is Extreme Right-Wing Populism Contagious? Explaining the emergence of a new party family’. European Journal of Political Research, 44: 413–437. Stolcke,V. 1995.‘Talking Culture: New Boundaries, New Rhetorics of Exclusions in Europe’, Current Anthropology, 36(1): 1–24. Taggart, P. 2000. Populism. Buckingham: Open University Press. Taylor, M. 2010. ‘Inside the Violent World of Britain’s New Far Right’, The Guardian, 29 May, p. 1. Thorpe, J. 2010. ‘Austrofascism: Revisiting the “Authoritarian State” 40 Years On’, Journal of Contemporary History, 45(2): 315–34.

PART I

Local and Regional Perspectives

1 BACKLASH IN THE ‘HOOD’ Exploring support for the British National Party (BNP) at the local level1 Matthew J. Goodwin

Hurrah for Barking’s ancient town, And fishing population: May ample gains Reward their pains, And help enrich the nation (Verse from The Song of the Ice, John Frost 1849; cited in Curtis 2006)

Introduction The extreme right in Britain is typically considered a failure. In contrast to the performance of similar parties in several other European states, extreme-right parties in Britain have seldom appeared as more than a minor irritant in the party system. The failure of parties like the National Front (NF) in the 1970s and more recent British National Party (BNP) have been traced to several factors: a national tradition of tolerance, deference to authority and anti-fascism; an electoral system that hinders minor parties; the positioning of the centre-right Conservatives who have offered a more credible brand to citizens anxious over immigration; and an agency-based approach that emphasizes the nature of the extreme right itself. Seen from this latter perspective, one explanation for the historic failure of this movement in Britain has been the nature of extreme-right parties themselves and their overt allegiance to neo-Nazi ideology, namely radical xenophobia, biological racism and an outright rejection of democracy, parliamentarism and pluralism (Carter 2005). These features have arguably been especially pronounced in the absence of strong and charismatic leadership, which might otherwise have minimized electoral losses. It is important, however, not to lose sight of an alternative perspective that takes as its starting point the observation that while the extreme right has failed to achieve

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a national breakthrough, in particular local enclaves it has rallied significant levels of support. Despite its extremist origins and organizational weakness, in some areas in Britain the BNP has built on a longer tradition of public support for exclusionary campaigns, and among communities that appear especially susceptible to perceptions of intergroup competition and threat. At the same time, however, the wider literature on the extreme right in Europe devotes only limited attention to these ‘local breakthroughs’, and the way in which they are often embedded in a specific local history and set of circumstances (though see Mudde 2007; Veugelers in this volume). This explorative chapter aims to sharpen our understanding of the importance of local context to the emergence of extreme-right parties by investigating the rise of the BNP in two case studies (and doing so prior to the party’s setbacks that followed the general election in 2010). While a focus on the local level limits the level of generalizability, the potential benefit is a richer and more nuanced understanding of how movements on the extreme right mobilize initial support amidst particular local environments.

Ethnic competition and local context In recent years, attempts to explain public hostility toward immigration and – by extension – support for the extreme right have often drawn on ethnic competition theory. Seen from this perspective, actual or perceived intergroup competition and threat is a core explanatory variable for the development of exclusionary behaviour, whether hostile attitudes toward immigration and asylum or a preference for more restrictive policies (Ivarsflaten 2005; McLaren and Johnson 2007; Schneider 2008; Sniderman et al. 2004). Rather than stemming from economic self-interest, these studies and others trace public hostility to a more diffuse set of concerns over perceived threats to national identity, the unity of the national community and values. Several studies of support for the extreme right have built on this literature, tracing the rise of these parties to perceptions among some citizens that resources and interests are threatened by immigration and rising ethno-cultural diversity (e.g. Gibson 2002; Goodwin 2011; Veugelers and Chiarini 2002). Confronted with these ‘threats’, citizens turn to extreme-right parties as part of an instrumental attempt to halt these demographic changes, and endorse their claim that the state should be inhabited exclusively by members of the native in-group while out-groups are threatening the national community (Mudde 2007: 21–22; also Betz 2007). In earlier decades, similar arguments were recruited to account for rising support for the extreme right in Britain. In the 1960s and 1970s, some suggested that a combination of a new phase of immigration and an economic downturn produced a strong anti-immigrant and nativist backlash that found expression in support for the maverick Conservative MP Enoch Powell and, slightly later, the National Front (Messina 1995: 694). During this period, it was argued that the Labour Party in particular was ‘vulnerable to losing voters inspired by racist and xenophobic feelings in marginal neighbourhoods and working-class districts where residents felt economically and culturally threatened by the new migrants’ (Kitschelt 1995: 246).

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Importantly, however, when seeking to explain support for the NF these studies also drew attention to the importance of idiosyncratic historical experiences and traditions in certain areas of the country, where members of the working classes appeared especially susceptible to feelings of intergroup competition and threat. Aside from the Greater London and West Midlands regions, a more specific example was the inner East End of London, where disproportionately high levels of support for the extreme right were linked to a tradition of economic insecurity and casualism, which had its roots in the old docklands. Alongside a history of ethnic homogeneity, the argument was that these local conditions had contributed to the emergence of a culture that was parochial, combative, and prone to territorial sensitivity and – when ‘threatened’ – oppositional scapegoating and racist mobilization (Husbands 1983: 143; also Stedman Jones 1971; Whiteley 1979). The National Front subsequently mobilized support in these areas by appealing to sensitivities that were deeply entrenched in sections of these working-class communities, and thus found that its appeals had a deep and historically based resonance (Husbands 1983: 140).2 These arguments in early studies of the British extreme right – and the importance of local contextual factors more generally – have largely been glossed in the recent literature on the ‘third wave’ of extreme-right parties that emerged in the 1980s and 1990s. Generally speaking, rather than undertake detailed studies of (often isolated) local breakthroughs, scholars have devoted more energy to analysing large-scale comparative datasets and aggregate macro-level data. Given recent methodological and theoretical advances (see Mudde 2007), this approach has yielded important dividends and insights. Nonetheless, by downplaying local context these studies often lack a rich and nuanced understanding of how these parties achieve their initial electoral breakthroughs. The next section summarizes the emergence of the BNP and research on its support, before investigating the party’s growth in two local areas.

The emergence of the British National Party Following the demise of the 1970s NF, the BNP was born in 1982 and for much of the next two decades remained in the electoral wilderness. Since 2001, however, the party recruited rapidly growing levels of support and became the most electorally successful extreme-right party in British history. Between 1992 and 2010, the number of BNP candidates at general elections increased from only 13 to 338. Over the same period, the number of BNP votes at these national elections increased from 7,000 to over 500,000. This electoral growth partly reflected a change of strategy, which led the party to invest in targeted and community-based campaigns. Some evidence of the more targeted strategy was the growing number of deposits that the party retained at general elections. To contest a parliamentary constituency each party candidate is required to deposit £500, which is returned only if a threshold of five per cent of the vote is met. The BNP retained seven deposits in 2001, 34 in 2005 and over 70 in 2010.

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Despite these gains in national contests, the BNP essentially remained a phenomenon of local politics. A lack of resources, an unfavourable electoral system and a strategy that sought to emulate the early local successes of the French Front National (FN) in areas such as Dreux all led the BNP to focus heavily on contesting local elections. This strategic shift paid some notable dividends. In contrast to the National Front in the 1970s, the party obtained a foothold in local government after electing councillors in areas such as Barking and Dagenham, Bradford, Broxbourne, Burnley, Epping Forest, Kirklees and Stoke-on-Trent. This momentum continued in May 2008, when the party gained one seat on the Greater London Assembly. The investment in these local contests reflected the party’s embrace of a ‘community politics’ style of campaigning, whereby it sought to cultivate an image of legitimacy and electoral credibility at the local level. This led activists to target a disparate array of local grievances: allegations of ‘anti-white’ racially motivated attacks in Pennine Lancashire; discontent over a lack of social housing in outer-east London; or local rumours that Asian gangs were ‘grooming’ young white girls in West Yorkshire. These campaigns were often delivered through intensive grassroots activism that included strong emphasis on encouraging face-to-face contact with voters. One study of BNP voting in three northern towns suggested that residents experienced more face-to-face contact with BNP activists than with their mainstream counterparts ( JRCT 2004; also Wilks-Heeg 2009).

The BNP’s social base of support Broader research on anti-immigration sentiment in Britain suggests that the citizens who are hostile toward immigrants and favour more restrictive policies are motivated less by concern over personal well-being than the perception that immigrants and minority groups threaten British culture and wider society. As noted by McLaren and Johnson (2007: 715; see also Bowyer 2009), these feelings of intergroup competition and threat ‘may be rather symbolic in nature and may stem from concerns about the loss of certain values or ways of life because of the presence of minority groups and immigrants’. In earlier years, studies of support for the extreme right similarly emphasized the importance of these concerns. The emergence of the National Front was traced to skilled manual (male) workers in regions that experienced higher than average levels of immigration, though mainly Greater London and the West Midlands, where competition for jobs and social housing was felt particularly acutely (Harrop et al. 1980; Husbands 1983; Taylor 1979; Whiteley 1979). In more recent years, a growing literature on support for the BNP has produced similar findings, highlighting the importance of immigration-related concerns to explaining this trend (Bowyer 2008; Cutts et al. 2011; Ford and Goodwin 2010; Goodwin 2011). The findings in these studies point to the conclusion that the extreme right performs strongest in areas where deprived and less well educated members of the working classes feel under ‘threat’ from immigration and, in particular, Muslim communities of Bangladeshi and Pakistani heritage. During the

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period of its early local gains, analyses of aggregate-level data indicated that the BNP recruited most of its support in areas where there were large numbers of skilled and semi-skilled workers, and higher proportions of citizens with no qualifications (Cruddas et al. 2005; John et al. 2006). Subsequent and more sophisticated analysis of BNP support at local elections suggested the party polled strongest in urban deprived areas, where education levels are low and housing markets are under strain (Bowyer 2008). This study also examined the impact of ethnic diversity, providing initial evidence that while the party was most likely to stand candidates and recruit support in local authorities that had large Muslim communities of Bangladeshi or Pakistani heritage, support was more heavily concentrated among white neighbourhoods within these more diverse areas. The first individual-level survey of BNP voters by Ford and Goodwin (2010) revealed how these supporters tended to be older working-class men who lacked educational qualifications and were profoundly pessimistic about their economic prospects. Foremost, these voters were concerned about immigration and were also extremely dissatisfied with the leaders of the three mainstream parties. Compared with support for the earlier NF, support for the extreme right had shifted northwards and was more evenly distributed among semi- and unskilled workers. While these studies shed light on the general drivers of support for the extreme right, they tell us little about how the BNP emerged in specific local areas. The next section examines the rise of the party in the two local case studies of Burnley in the North West of England, and Barking and Dagenham in outer-east London.

Two local case studies In the first decade of the twenty-first century, Burnley and Barking and Dagenham provided disproportionately high levels of support to the BNP. Interestingly, however, in both cases the party was a relatively new arrival to local politics. In Burnley, the local BNP branch was only established in 1999 and at local elections the next year kept a low profile (contesting only two wards).3 Yet despite this lack of an organizational presence, at the general election in 2001 the party polled over 10 per cent of the vote and quickly established a significant presence at subsequent local elections. In 2002, the party benefitted from lacklustre grassroots campaigns by mainstream party activists and elected three councillors, attracting considerable publicity in national media.4 At local elections the next year, BNP candidates averaged 35 per cent of the vote and, in seven of the 16 seats they contested, were elected onto the council. Albeit for a short period, the party became the official opposition group on the council. At the next general election in 2005 the BNP retained much of its support, polling over 10 per cent of the vote and despite competing with more candidates than in 2001. Though the party was later weakened by the departure of its energetic local organizer, it continued to perform well in the borough: at local elections in 2006 seven candidates averaged almost 30 per cent of the vote; and in 2007 10 candidates averaged almost 25 per cent.5

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While making progress in Burnley, the party was also advancing in the outereast London borough of Barking and Dagenham. This was especially evident at local elections in 2006, which saw 12 of 13 BNP candidates elected onto the council. As in Burnley, the party temporarily became the main opposition group on the council, despite not being especially active in the area during the preceding years. From the late 1990s onward, strategists increasingly shifted the party away from London towards more deprived areas in northern England. This was partly due to the ‘virtual collapse’ of its organization in London following the departure of key activists (Lowles 2005), but also recognition in the party that economic deprivation and evidence of community tension in northern England (most noticeably during urban disturbances in the northern towns of Bradford, Burnley and Oldham in 2001) offered new opportunities. This abandonment of the extreme right’s traditional bastions of activity in London was reflected in trends in Barking and Dagenham, where at local elections in 2002 the BNP did not contest a single ward in the borough. Seen from a broader perspective, however, longer-term voting patterns in the area told a different story. It had been a parliamentary by-election in 1994 in Dagenham in which the BNP had polled seven per cent of the vote; the first time the extreme right had retained a deposit since an election in West Bromwich in 1973. While devoting less effort to London, the party continued to perform well in the area. At the London Mayoral election in 2000, the BNP polled over five per cent of the overall vote but surpassed 10 per cent in the constituency that encompassed Barking and Dagenham (City and East). At elections to the Greater London Assembly held at the same time, the party similarly polled almost three per cent of the overall vote but polled over seven per cent in City and East. The results of the general election in 2001 likewise pointed toward fertile terrain for the extreme right in outer-east London. Despite investing little effort into the campaign, the BNP saw its share of the vote in Barking increase to over six per cent (+3.7 per cent) and in Dagenham increase to five per cent (+2.5 per cent). Activists then switched their attention back to contesting a series of local elections, which were used to build a stronger presence in the borough. At one election in 2004, a BNP candidate was elected onto the council after polling over 50 per cent of the vote; it was the first time the party polled so high, and was the first time it had contested the ward (Lowles 2005). These frequently intensive campaigns laid the groundwork for the general election campaign in 2005, after which the BNP received over 16 per cent of the vote in Barking (while polling over nine per cent in Dagenham); it was the strongest result by an extreme-right party candidate in British electoral history. Having summarized the emergence of the extreme-right in these two areas, the next sections explore the local conditions that facilitated this rise.

The case of Burnley Historically, the social and economic development of Burnley was intimately linked to its status as an important textile base.Though at one point the cotton trade could

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be described as the ‘raison d’être of North East Lancashire’ (Pearson 1976: 56), in more recent decades former mill towns such as Burnley have struggled with the onset of post-industrialism, stagnating economies and deprivation, and declining populations. For example, between 1998 and 2002 local employment in the manufacturing sector declined by almost 30 per cent and, since 1999, the population of Burnley declined by three per cent (BAP 2006). At this time, it was also estimated that one-quarter of the population resided in areas that were classified in the top 10 per cent of the most deprived neighbourhoods in England. Aside from being heavily dependent on the textile industry, towns such as Burnley also attracted an early wave of immigrants from Pakistan and Bangladesh. In earlier years, some argued that as mill towns and their surrounding communities entered into an economic downturn these newly settled minority communities were perceived by some citizens as a symbol of community decline (Miles and Phizacklea 1979: 20). Yet even before the arrival of immigrants in the immediate post-war decades, the realities of economic competition between British and Asian manufacturers may have rendered textile workers susceptible to feelings of intergroup competition and threat. As convincingly argued by Pearson (1976), local anxieties over immigration in areas that were similar to Burnley stemmed from their earlier economic experiences, in particular challenges posed by low-cost imports from India and Pakistan. Pointing towards this economic history, Pearson contends that the Pakistani migrant worker provided a ‘visible and concrete manifestation’ of foreign competition, and ‘a symbol of the problems of a troubled working-class community’ (Pearson 1976: 60).6 In more recent years, Burnley’s prestigious past and more recent economic decline has served as an important reference point for supporters of the BNP. Drawing on interviews with the party’s voters in Burnley, Rhodes (2006: 109) reveals how explanations for switching allegiance to the BNP often included references to the town’s historic status, or in the words of one voter: ‘They used to say “England’s bread hung on Lancashire’s thread” … it were a completely different era to what’s gone on now … there’s no boom around here, its one long bust.’ These qualitative accounts hint at the importance of concerns over a perceived loss of local community and way of life: ‘I just think it’s [Burnley] deteriorated. I think it’s a poor town compared to what it was and compared to what it should be … I think poor morally, economically and in every way’ (Rhodes 2006: 110). Pessimism is a notable characteristic of extreme-right supporters and is also evident in Burnley. One local survey suggested that while 75 per cent of all respondents agreed that Burnley had ‘mostly got worse’, the figure for BNP voters was over 90 per cent (Deacon et al. 2004: 14). More comprehensive and nationally representative surveys have since confirmed that economic pessimism is a notable characteristic of BNP supporters (Ford and Goodwin 2010). In these accounts, the decline of a traditional and close-knit working-class community was often associated with the arrival and growth of minority ethnic communities. Attracted by employment opportunities in the 1950s and 1960s, these minority communities established themselves primarily in inner urban wards and

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by 2001 represented eight per cent of the local population (up from 4.8 per cent at the previous census). When urban disturbances occurred in Burnley during the summer of 2001, subsequent investigations into their causes suggested that perceptions of these minority groups as threatening local resources were widespread among local communities. When asked to identify an important cause of the disturbances, 50 per cent of respondents cited ‘racism by Asian people’ and 40 per cent cited ‘white communities being treated unfairly’ (BTF 2001).7 Supporters of the BNP appeared especially concerned about the effects of rising ethnic and cultural diversity in the town; another survey of the population indicated that 88 per cent of party supporters ranked immigration and asylum as issues that were influencing their voting behaviour, compared to 36 per cent of voters overall (Deacon et al. 2004). Interviews with these supporters suggested that they tended to subscribe to a distinct exclusionary identity that was oriented around the local community, and which encouraged a view of minority groups as neither ‘belonging’ nor deserving of the town’s scarce economic resources (Rhodes 2006). There is also evidence that the citizens who would later shift behind the BNP became increasingly dissatisfied with the performance of mainstream parties in the town, though mainly the incumbent and historically dominant Labour Party. Between 1990 and 1998, turnout at local elections declined by over 20 per cent while the majority held by the local Labour Member of Parliament slumped from 17,000 in 1992 to 5,778 in 2005. Interviews with BNP supporters provide richer insight into the nature of this political dissatisfaction. One example is an activist who recalled his decision to join the BNP as follows: ‘Some would say put a red rose [Labour’s emblem] on a pig and they would vote for it.’8 Other supporters expressed their view that the local Labour group had become ‘complacent’, was no longer ‘listening’, and had ‘failed the people of Burnley’. These supporters were also more likely than other citizens in the town to disagree strongly with the statement that ‘Labour represents the interests of the working class’ (Rhodes 2006). Importantly, during the mid-to-late 1990s these local anxieties over rising diversity and intergroup competition were targeted by a local Independent politician. Alongside fellow Independent councillors, Harry Brooks proposed a series of cuts to services that supported minority ethnic communities, such as closing a translation unit and withdrawing support for a Bangladeshi welfare association. Brooks, who was a former Labour councillor, railed against the alleged ‘prodigious maldistribution of resources’ and in letters to a local newspaper talked of ‘welfare dependent newcomers’ and criticized the council’s ‘self-indulgent and feeble bureaucracy’ (Brooks 2002: 3–7). He later distributed his own pamphlet around Burnley that was entitled A Town Betrayed, and contrasted decisions by the council to fund organizations in Muslim communities with their alleged refusal to support a local hospice, services for local women and the visually impaired. In the aftermath of the urban disturbances in 2001, Brooks would later be criticized in official reports for having condoned a culture of ‘Nimbyism’ in the town (BTF 2001: 59).9 Nonetheless, under his leadership the Independents attracted considerable local support. At local elections in 1999 these candidates averaged over 40 per cent, and briefly took

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control of the council. The local popularity of Brooks remained evident at the general election of 2005, at which he polled almost 15 per cent of the vote. The campaigns by these local Independents arguably cultivated political space for the extreme right. It was not until after these activities in 1999 that a re-launched branch of the BNP began to make significant electoral gains. Led by a highly committed and innovative organizer who already enjoyed notoriety in the town, a small handful of activists began leafleting in the spring of 1999. By the end of the year, the branch claimed to have enrolled 200 supporters, a figure that subsequently increased to 350 by early 2000 (Smith 2004: 8). The party’s strategy focused heavily on targeting local issues through intensive campaigns. In the words of the local organizer, the aim was to ‘build a wall around the town’ and mobilize support by focusing on specific local grievances.10 For example, one attempt to cultivate a more favourable issue agenda in the town led activists to write anonymous letters to the ‘comments section’ of the local newspaper, in which they complained about the perceived unfair allocation of scarce resources They also sought to establish contacts with influential local opinion-makers who could provide access to wider networks, including factory workers, market stall-holders and supporters of the local football club: Public houses, shops, etc., anywhere where there were people who knew lots of other people, became targets for our literature … we knew that our core support was … for the most part working class and to a large extent selfemployed. Most, if not all, of these could be found in the Yellow Pages under the headings of builders, joiners, electricians, mechanics, etc. (Smith 2004: 53) From the perspective of those who joined the party, the emergence of the BNP was not seen merely as a vehicle through which local protest could be registered but marked an opportunity to enact change and ‘do something’ for the community. For example, activists explained their views that ‘the time were right for a change’, that the BNP ‘seemed to care for the people … in Burnley’, and that their support for the party signalled an attempt ‘to make progress and do something for the town, something for the ordinary white people who were being put down’.11

The case of Barking and Dagenham Historically, extreme-right parties in Britain such as the National Front (NF) focused heavily on the inner East End of London. Yet since 2001, and while focusing mainly on areas north of London, the BNP also redirected its efforts toward areas in outer-London such as Barking and Dagenham. Earlier patterns of migration to this borough owed much to Barking’s status as an important Victorian fishing port (Curtis 2006).Yet from the interwar period onwards employment opportunities in heavy industries such as the Ford Motor plant in Dagenham offered new opportunities.

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Combined with slum clearances in inner London, the result was an influx of former East End residents into the borough. In this way, members of working-class communities from the inner East End were effectively transplanted to outer-London areas such as Barking and Dagenham, bringing with them a strong sense of communal identity (Thames 2002). In more recent decades, however, the decline of these traditional industries was followed by increasing rates of deprivation, leaving Barking and Dagenham in the top 50 of the most deprived local authority areas in the country. In 2004, this council area was ranked the ninth most deprived in London and the twenty-first most deprived in the country (in the latter case rising to eleventh in 2007). While grappling with the effects of deprivation, the borough also experienced considerable and rapid demographic change. For example, while in 2001 white British residents comprised 81 per cent of the local population, five years later the figure had fallen to 75 per cent (ONS Experimental Ethnic Estimates 2006). In fact, areas in southern Barking saw the largest increase in the percentage of foreign-born residents in the whole of England, rising from 3.5 per cent in 1991 to over 13 per cent a decade later. It was amid these broader trends that the BNP began to recruit rapidly growing support. Local surveys suggested that perceptions of intergroup competition and threat were a key driver of this support. One survey by Goodwin et al. (2010) indicated that supporters of the party were considerably more concerned than other residents in the borough about issues of immigration and asylum; 80 per cent of BNP voters considered these issues important compared to 35 per cent overall. Supporters of the extreme right were also more likely than average to express concern over the allocation of council housing (47 per cent of BNP voters compared to 24 per cent overall) and the provision of jobs (35 per cent compared to 26 per cent overall).12 Additional findings from qualitative focus groups in the borough shed further light on the nature of these concerns. The conclusion was that a shortage of available housing combined with rapid demographic change appears to have fuelled perceptions among residents that some areas of the borough were effectively being ‘taken over’ by minority ethnic groups (Cruddas et al. 2005: 15).13 In these focus groups, residents frequently complained that local resources (though especially housing) were being unfairly distributed to favour newly arrived immigrants. Reflective of these views was one letter in a local newspaper: ‘[T]he migrants of the past ten years or more have hijacked our borough until it is hard to believe that we are still living in England.’14 Supporters of the BNP similarly stressed the importance of resource allocation when explaining why they decided to become involved with the party: ‘They [mainstream politicians] don’t know what it’s like to live cheek by jowl with a Polish person, a Lithuanian person, an African person and then fight for a job.’15 While concerned over immigration, supporters were also more likely than other residents to express dissatisfaction with the area as a place to live (Goodwin et al. 2010). This sense of community decline was frequently associated with immigration. Seen through the eyes of these residents, the high visibility of minority groups “was associated with the degeneration of the area and falling community standards”

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(Cruddas et al. 2005: 15). With various respondents saying that they had ‘taken over the area with their different culture and languages’ (Cruddas et al. 2005: 15). Meanwhile, local mainstream parties were criticized for being unable or unwilling to provide an adequate response. Supporters of the BNP were significantly more likely than other residents to express dissatisfaction with the council (48 per cent as compared to 32 per cent; Goodwin et al. 2010). The focus groups similarly revealed a feeling among residents that local Political Parties ‘had failed them’, were being dishonest about the scale of immigration and were ‘just not listening’ (Cruddas et al. 2005: 14). In this case, the BNP sought to mobilize support by linking nativist appeals to a distinct local identity and delivering its message through intensive communitybased campaigns. These campaigns often sought to amplify perceptions of intergroup competition among residents, for example by claiming that Labour intended to ‘swamp Barking and Dagenham with yuppies and newly arrived Africans’.16 BNP campaign literature similarly sought to embellish feelings of threat by associating alleged increases in cases of tuberculosis and HIV in the local area to an influx of ‘health tourists’. It was claimed that local hospitals had become so overstretched that they ‘can’t look after the native population’ who are ‘being treated as second class citizens’. In these leaflets, the party was also careful to reference local identities and traditions, for example encouraging residents to ‘celebrate and preserve our identity and unique East London/Essex culture’.17 One of the party’s newsletters that was tailored around local issues (named the Barking and Dagenham Patriot) invited residents to compare recent pictures of minority ethnic women with a picture of local (white) women at the Barking and Dagenham 1953 Coronation Party. Anti-fascists described this particular leaflet as the BNP’s ‘single most effective piece of propaganda’ (Lowles 2005).18 Similarly, through a local website the party sought to frame its campaign in a way that resonated with a distinct local identity: [W]e’d usually try to end up back on TVE [the Thames View Estate] for Saturday evening in time for tea and to walk down towards Creekmouth to the Crooked Billet. In the bar to the right as you went in was the ‘old Joanna’ on which the old pianist would rattle out all the old East End and music hall songs … ‘Is everybody happy?’, ‘My Old Man’, ‘Cockles and Mussels’ and loads of other old popular songs had everyone packed into the bar singing along by the end of the evening … everyone knew them and everyone could join in. A community spirit that was already dying (or rather, being murdered) in Hoxton and Limehouse and Bethnal Green was alive and kicking in ‘the new East End’.19 Reflective of the party’s more general embrace of community politics, activists concertedly sought to cultivate an image of legitimacy and counter portrayals of the BNP as a single-issue anti-immigrant movement. Rather than focus solely on immigration, activists targeted a disparate array of issues such as crime, anti-social

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behaviour, rubbish collection and pressures on social housing. These campaigns became increasingly professional: one election was preceded by the local branch drafting in activists from nearby areas, canvassing voters on at least three different occasions, distributing nine different leaflets and avoiding contact with Labour and minority ethnic voters so as not to inadvertently mobilize opposition (Lowles 2005: 6). These campaigns also stressed ‘positive policies’, such as plans for a ‘sons and daughters’ housing scheme and school policy that were designed to prioritize native Britons. These attempts to cultivate local legitimacy were arguably given further impetus when a local Labour MP suggested eight out of every ten local working-class families were considering voting for the BNP.20

Discussion While not achieving a national breakthrough, since 2001 the electoral rise of the British National Party (BNP) challenged the traditional interpretation of the British extreme right as a case of complete failure. In two local areas – Burnley and Barking and Dagenham – the emergence of the party owed much to a unique set of local conditions, and nativist appeals that resonated among sections of working-class communities. Burnley’s historic status in the textile industry and earlier patterns of economic competition arguably contributed to the susceptibility of residents to perceptions of intergroup competition and threat. In more recent years, these were embellished by local Independents who politicized issues of resource allocation and immigration and carved out political space for exclusionary campaigns. In Barking and Dagenham, the decline of heavy industry and subsequent demographic change appears to have unsettled a close-knit working-class community. In response, some residents fell susceptible to exclusionary appeals that were rooted in a distinct local identity and sought to embellish perceptions of intergroup competition and threat. In both of these cases, the linkages between local context, culture and politics appear integral to understanding how and why the extreme right was able to rally support. These cases also warn against a tendency in the wider literature to neglect detailed research at the local level. Like other types of social movements, those on the extreme-right wing of the spectrum are ‘necessarily rooted in places’ (Miller 2000: 67; cited in DeLeon and Naff 2004: 694). In order to explain more accurately why some movements succeed while others fail, future research would be well placed by devoting more attention to the influence of local context. This is underscored by the observation that support for the extreme right is often heavily concentrated in specific localities, such as support for the French FN in Toulon or the Vlaams Belang (VB) in Antwerp (Mudde 2007). Yet few studies examine why this is the case, or why these parties have not polled similarly strongly in areas that have similar socio-economic conditions.21 A final question concerns whether the BNP will remain, like its predecessors, as an ideological phenomenon that is concentrated in a handful of localities, or will translate these local breakthroughs into more durable electoral success. Recent research points towards a sizeable reservoir of latent support for the extreme right

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in Britain (Ford 2010; John and Margetts 2010).The increased salience of immigration, growing pubic anxiety over the role and perceived integration of Muslim communities, and dissatisfaction with the mainstream parties will continue to cultivate opportunities for the extreme right. While the BNP has not been active across the country, in some local areas it has cultivated an image of electoral credibility and attracted an influx of new recruits. Whether the party will prove able to achieve further growth will depend less on public demand than internal organization and leadership. In the immediate short term, much will depend on the ability of the party to reconcile signs of internecine conflict between, on one side, grassroots activists who desire a greater level of professionalism, and on the other, old-guard activists who remain firmly committed to the underlying ideological tradition.

Notes 1 This chapter was first completed in 2008, prior to the electoral demise of the BNP that occurred following the general election in 2010. For an earlier version see M.J. Goodwin (2008) ‘Backlash in the Hood: The Determinants of Support for the British National Party at the Local Level’, Journal of Contemporary European Studies, 16(3): 349–63. 2 Subsequent interpretations of an isolated local election victory by the BNP in Millwall in 1993 returned to the importance of a distinct local culture that rendered local citizens amenable to feelings of anxiety and threat linked, on one side, to minority ethnic out-groups and, on the other, nearby ‘yuppie’ development (e.g. Copsey 1996). 3 In the 1999 European elections the BNP in Burnley received just over three per cent and in the two local wards contested in 2000 the party received 21.5 per cent (in Fullege ward) and 5.1 per cent (in Gawthorpe). The BNP had sporadically campaigned in Burnley in the early 1990s but its efforts produced meagre results. In September 1993, the BNP contested a local by-election (Barclay ward) and received just nine votes (or 0.96 per cent). The BNP also contested two county council elections in the same year, receiving 2.1 per cent in the Burnley south west division and one per cent in the Burnley rural division. 4 In 2002 the Conservative Party contested nine of 45 seats while the Liberal Democrats fielded only 16 candidates. 5 Support for the BNP in Burnley has endured in more recent years. For instance, in 2009 the BNP elected its first seat on an English county council in Padiham and Burnley West ward in Lancashire local authority. In the 2010 general election, the BNP similarly polled a respectable nine per cent of the vote (compared to 10.3 per cent in 2005). 6 As noted by Pugh (2005: 138), even in earlier years the same protectionist sentiments of Lancashire textile workers became the target of the interwar British Union of Fascists’ ‘cotton campaigns’. 7 The Burnley Task Force (2001) questionnaire was distributed to 45,000 homes in the borough between September and November 2001. 8 Interview 1 with former BNP local activist Simon, 20 May 2007. 9 The term ‘Nimby’ is an acronym for ‘Not in my back yard’. According to the Oxford dictionary, a ‘Nimby’ is a person who objects to the siting of unpleasant developments in their neighbourhood (accessed online, http://www.askoxford.com). 10 Interview with former BNP organizer Steve Smith, May 2005. 11 Interview 1 with BNP local councillor Sue, June 2006; Interview 1 with former BNP activist Maggie, May 2005; Interview 1 with BNP local activist George, June 2006. 12 The Goodwin et al. (2010) study included research that was undertaken in Barking and Dagenham between 19 August and 18 October 2006 and included a base of 1,006 local residents (122 of whom voted or would have voted BNP at the local elections).

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13 Cruddas et al. (2005) carried out two focus groups in Dagenham in March 2005; one with residents aged 45 and over, the other with participants aged under 45. 14 ‘Our borough has been hi-jacked’, Barking and Dagenham Post, 10 May 2006. 15 Interview 1 with BNP local activist Neil, December 2006. 16 ‘Remember the “GOOD OLD DAYS”?’, available at: http://www.barkingand dagenhambnp.com (accessed January 2008). 17 Ibid. 18 BNP (2006) Barking and Dagenham Patriot (Romford: British National Party). 19 ‘Remember the “GOOD OLD DAYS”?’. 20 ‘White Voters are Deserting us for BNP, says Blair Ally’, Daily Telegraph, 17 April 2006; ‘Candidates say Hodge helped BNP win Seats’, Daily Telegraph, 5 May 2006. These comments were made by the incumbent Labour MP Margaret Hodge. 21 For some notable exceptions see, for instance, Coffé et al. (2007); Copsey (1996); and Thijssen and De Lange (2005).

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Gibson, R. 2002. The Growth of Anti-Immigrant Parties in Western Europe. Lewiston: Edwin Mellen Press. Goodwin, M.J. 2010a. ‘In Search of the Winning Formula: Nick Griffin and the “Modernization” of the British National Party’, in R. Eatwell and M.J. Goodwin (eds), The ‘New’ Extremism in Twenty-First Century Britain. London: Routledge, pp. 169–90. –––– 2010b. ‘Activism in Contemporary Extreme Right Parties: The Case of the British National Party’, Journal of Elections, Public Opinion and Parties, 20(1): 31–54. –––– 2011. New British Fascism: Rise of the British National Party. London: Routledge. Goodwin, M.J., Ford, R. and Cutts, C. (forthcoming). ‘Extreme Right Foot Soldiers, Legacy Effects and Deprivation: A Contextual Analysis of the Leaked British National Party (BNP) Membership List’, Party Politics. Goodwin, M.J., Ford, R., Duffy, B. and Rea, R. 2010. ‘Who Votes Extreme Right in Twenty-First Century Britain? The Social Bases of Support for the National Front and British National Party’, in R. Eatwell and M.J. Goodwin (eds), The ‘New’ Extremism in Twenty-First Century Britain. London: Routledge, pp. 191–210. Harrop, M., England, J. and Husbands, C.T. 1980. ‘The Bases of National Front Support’, Political Studies, 28: 271–83. Husbands, C.T. 1983. Racial Exclusionism and the City. London: George Allen and Unwin. Ivarsflaten, E.L. 2005. ‘Threatened by Diversity: Why Restrictive Asylum and Immigration Policies Appeal to Western Europeans’, Journal of Elections, Public Opinion and Parties, 15(1): 21–45. John, P. and Margetts, H. 2010. ‘The Latent Support for the Extreme Right in British Politics’, West European Politics, 32(3): 496–513. John, P., Margetts, H., Rowland, D. and Weir, S. 2006. The BNP: the Roots of its Appeal. Essex: Democratic Audit. JRCT 2004. 539 Voters’ Views: A Voting Behaviour Study in Three Northern Towns. York: Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust. Kitschelt, H. (in collaboration with A. McGann) 1995. The Radical Right in Western Europe: A Comparative Analysis. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Lowles, N. 2005. ‘Background’, in J. Cruddas, P. John, H. Margetts, N. Lowles and D. Rowland (eds), The Far Right in London. York: Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust, pp. 5–10. McLaren, L. and Johnson, M. 2007. ‘Resources, Group Conflict and Symbols: Explaining Anti-Immigration Hostility in Britain’, Political Studies, 55(4): 709–32. Messina, A. 1995. ‘Immigration as a Political Dilemma in Britain: Implications for Western Europe’, Policy Studies Journal, 23(4): 686–98. Miles, R. and Phizacklea, A. 1979. ‘Some Introductory Observations on Race and Politics’, in R. Miles and A. Phizacklea (eds), Racism and Political Action in Britain. London: Routledge, pp. 1–27. Miller, B.A. 2000. Geography and Social Movements. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Mudde, C. 2007. Populist Radical Right Parties in Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ONS (Office for National Statistics) (n.d.). Past Estimates – Population Estimates by Ethnic Group Mid-2001–2006, available at: http://www.statistics.gov.uk/pdfdir/nep0106.pdf (accessed September 2008). Pearson, G. 1976. ‘ “Paki-bashing” in a North East Lancashire Cotton Town: A Case Study and its History’, in G. Mungham and G. Pearson (eds), Working Class Youth Culture. Boston, MA: Routledge and Kegan Paul, pp. 48–81.

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Pugh, M. 2005. ‘Hurrah for the Blackshirts!’ Fascists and Fascism in Britain between the Wars. London: Jonathan Cape. Rhodes, J. 2006. Far Right Breakthrough: Support for the BNP in Burnley. Unpublished PhD thesis, University of Manchester. Schneider, S. 2008. ‘Anti-Immigrant Attitudes in Europe: Outgroup-Size and Perceived Ethnic Threat’, European Sociological Review, 24(1): 53–67. Smith, S. 2004. How It Was Done, The Rise of Burnley BNP: The Inside Story. Burnley: Cliviger Press. Sniderman, P.M., Hagendoorn, L. and Prior, M. 2004. ‘Predisposing Factors and Situational Triggers: Exclusionary Reactions to Immigrant Minorities’, American Political Science Review, 98(1): 35–49. Stedman Jones, G. 1971. Outcast London: A Study in the Relationship between Classes in Victorian Society. London: Oxford University Press. Taylor, S. 1979. ‘The National Front: Anatomy of a Political Movement’, in R. Miles and A. Phizacklea (eds), Racism and Political Action in Britain. London: Routledge, pp. 124–46. Thames, R. 2002. Barking Past. London: Historical Publications. Thijssen, P. and De Lange, S. 2005. ‘Explaining the Varying Electoral Appeal of the Vlaams Blok in the Districts of Antwerp’, Ethical Perspectives, 12(2): 231–58. Veugelers, J. and Chiarini, R. 2002. ‘The Far Right in France and Italy: Nativist Politics and Anti-Fascism’, in M. Schain, A. Zolberg and P. Hossay (eds), Shadows over Europe: the Development and Impact of the Extreme Right in Western Europe, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 83–106. Whiteley, P. 1979. ‘The National Front Vote in the 1977 G.L.C. Elections: An Aggregate Data Analysis’, British Journal of Political Science, 9(3): 370–80. Wilks-Heeg, S. 2009. ‘The Canary in a Coalmine? Explaining the Emergence of the British National Party in English Local Politics’, Parliamentary Affairs, 62(3): 377–98.

2 AFTER COLONIALISM Local politics and far-right affinities in a city of southern France John Veugelers

Introduction Among the 96 departments that make up metropolitan France, the far right has performed especially well in the Var. In this department of the south its share of the vote has been at least twice the national average since 1984. Growing to 5,000 members during the 1990s, the Var section of the Front National (FN) became the largest departmental section of any party in the country (Var-Matin République, 26 December 1999). In 1995 the prefecture for this department elected as its mayor a candidate from Le Pen’s party. With 170,000 inhabitants, Toulon thereby became the biggest city in France – and perhaps any post-war European democracy – with a municipal council under the far right. Studying the linkages between local culture and politics in Toulon is a plunge into the undercurrents of resentment against the Fifth Republic that surfaced when the FN abandoned its marginal status and penetrated the French party system. Toulon is a city of sub-cultures with an affinity towards the far right, but until the early 1980s the affinity remained latent.This chapter traces the history of these subcultures and their interaction with the success of the FN. In doing so, it investigates the connection between local politics and legacies of colonialism. My point of departure is the claim that in France ‘postcolonial issues are of vital concern to the extreme right’ (Flood and Frey 2002: 198). To examine this claim I treat the Europeans who migrated to France from colonial North Africa as the carriers (Träger to use the term of Karl Mannheim 1971 [1927]) of a far-right affinity born out of their experience of imperialism and decolonization.Yet attributing such an affinity to this category of French society alone would be mistaken. It can be found among those who served in the navy and the colonial armies that fought in Indochina and North Africa. In a form diluted into different strengths since the end of the nineteenth century, this affinity can be found within other

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social categories as well (Girardet 1972). As Aldrich (1996: 235) argues, ‘if the empire was seldom in the forefront of French life or culture, it often lay in the background’. In September 1956, nine months after he had been elected to the National Assembly as a Poujadist deputy, Jean-Marie Le Pen resigned his seat with the hope of serving with French paratroops in Algeria. Initially his unit was sent to Egypt in response to the Suez crisis, but early in 1957 it was transferred to Algeria, where Le Pen served as an intelligence officer. Upon his return to metropolitan France later that year, Le Pen founded an organization of veterans who supported the cause of l’Algérie française (French Algeria). By 1960 it became clear the government had chosen a policy that would lead to Algerian self-determination. Nonetheless, Le Pen’s sympathies remained with the soldiers and European settlers who opposed De Gaulle. When the FN was formed in 1972, activists who had fought for l’Algérie française thus provided a core of cadres for the new party (Birenbaum 1992). Since then the Pieds-Noirs (‘Blackfeet’), their grievances and their heroes from the 1954–62 war against Algerian independence have been mentioned frequently by the FN. In turn, the geography of support for the FN in the south of France coincides with the areas of Pied-Noir settlement (Perrineau 1989: 38–49). This pattern is evident in the case of Toulon.

Toulon and the navy Toulon is a city surrounded by hills and mountains on the Mediterranean coast between Marseilles and Nice. The monarchy founded a navy yard there in 1496 and during the following centuries its port and naval facilities grew. Unlike Marseilles, Toulon was never a centre for the colonial trade and during the nineteenth century it also became a garrison town as France expanded into North Africa and Southeast Asia. At the start of the Fifth Republic its economy relied on the heaviest spender in the department of the Var, the navy (République-Le Provençal, 14 February 1963). The city contained not only the most important naval base in France but also the largest dry docks on the Mediterranean. It was the main port for repairs to the French fleet and the location of a sprawling navy hospital. In addition to the 23,000 officers and sailors based at Toulon, the navy and its subcontractors employed 20,000 civilians. Toulon and nearby La Seyne-sur-Mer were also centres for shipbuilding (Livre d’or Toulon-Var, 1960). Local newspapers published regular reports of navy activity, with the Naval Prefect (as well as other high-ranking officers from the army, the navy and the Foreign Legion) treated as dignitaries in the public life of the city. Invited as guests of honour to events hosted by the mayor and his council, military men attended official receptions when politicians visited from Paris. Important events on the city’s calendar included the military parades that drew crowds on Bastille Day and the concerts by the navy orchestra at the municipal opera house. Of the 12,000 veterans who lived in the Var, three-quarters had served in the navy and most now lived in Toulon (République-Le Provençal, 14 February 1963).

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In sum, while Toulon was important for the navy, the navy – and more generally the military – had marked Toulon too. The ties between them nurtured a local culture the French call cocardière: patriotic, militaristic and chauvinistic. Feeding these sentiments were peculiarities of the navy, nicknamed ‘La Royale’. The navy embodied the ‘ethos of colonial life – the idea and practice of conquest, the ceremonial of parades and flags, the virile virtues associated with overseas life’ (Aldrich 1996: 131). Historically the naval contingent included infantry regiments for colonial defence, and some colonies were run by the navy ministry or captains who acted as local governors. Many sailors came from Brittany, a region whose reactionary politics still reflected the world of the royalist insurrectionaries (chouans) who had opposed the Revolution (Dogan 1967: 183). Anti-republicanism could also be found among the naval officers, who often came from the nobility. As a retired admiral in Toulon said only a decade ago: ‘Pétain is in no way responsible for what happened during the Second World War. He did not know what was going on outside the borders, he supposedly collaborated but he did not know. Not like De Gaulle, who instead was a coward, a traitor’ (Martin 1996: 188).

The fight for l’Algérie française The far right is like any other political sub-culture: it cultivates historical myths, the selective interpretation of facts in a way that removes them from critical scrutiny by rendering them either transcendent and sublime or subhuman and grotesque (Flood and Frey 2002: 207). By comparison with Vichy, which is largely stigmatized and thus not a compelling example of heroism, empire has provided a more workable source of myth: whereas Vichy turned its back on the Republic, which had engendered it, the defence of empire, and particularly Algeria, is easier to represent as fidelity to what had been accepted by successive regimes and nearly all currents of political opinion up to the moment when it was abandoned for reasons of expediency rather than conviction. (Flood and Frey 2002: 208) During the 1950s decolonization gave the French far right not only a new source of myth, but also a way of detaching itself from its more compromising roots in Pétainism and the movements of interwar anti-republicanism such as the fascist leagues and the Action Française (French Action). In 1958 a scission within the national association of ex-colonials from Morocco and Tunisia gave birth to the Association Nationale des Français d’Afrique du Nord, d’Outre-Mer et de leurs Amis (ANFANOMA, National Association of North African and Overseas French and their Friends), which supported De Gaulle under the illusion that he would maintain French sovereignty over Algeria. By 1961 the ANFANOMA had 3,000 members in the Toulon area alone, but differences among the partisans of l’Algérie française soon spawned yet another national

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group, the Rassemblement National des Français d’Afrique du Nord (RANFRAN, National Alliance of North African French). The leader of this group in the Var was a retired officer with ties to the Organisation Armée Secrète (OAS, Secret Army Organization), which his group supported at rallies organized with military men in Toulon and activists from the anti-Gaullist right. By 1962 the RANFRAN had branches not only in Toulon (where it attracted some 500 to 800 members) but also in nearby Bandol, Fréjus, Hyères and Draguignan (Bayle 2001: 163–72). In addition to these national organizations, the Var provided fertile ground for local groups such as the Union pour l’Algérie Française (UAF, Union for French Algeria). Founded in 1960, it viewed the Algerian conflict as part of a global struggle between Communism and the West. Likening the fight for l’Algérie française to the Resistance, the UAF also drew a parallel with the fight against Nazism: During the last war, some knew imprisonment, torture, Dachau and Buchenwald. Could they not at least take consolation from the thought that they were dealing with enemies? Today it is because of people who call themselves French, under the orders or with the complicity of a government that calls itself French, that French patriots are suffering or dying in French prisons. The Fifth Republic is jealous of the glories of the Gestapo. … The victims in Algiers, the martyrs in the Metropole, will be avenged. (Bayle 2001: 72) Just as Pétain had accepted France’s humiliation in 1940, the Evian Accords of 1962 (which set the terms for peace between France and the Algerian rebels) were said to show De Gaulle’s readiness to betray his country. Between October 1961 and March 1962, the OAS and another anti-Gaullist group were responsible for 12 bomb attacks in Toulon. Apart from Gaullists, their targets were Communists and a neighbourhood inhabited by Algerians (Bayle 2001: 97–100). Graffiti in support of the OAS covered the walls of the city, and police sweeps of the area in March and April 1962 led to the arrest of 44 Algérie française activists (République-Le Provençal, 12 April 1962; Gaignebet 1988: 364). The vitality of groups whose support for l’Algérie française made them enemies of Communism and Gaullism alike set Toulon apart from most of the country. This vitality shaped the course of local politics and made the city especially attractive to the settlers who fled from North Africa.

The European repatriates from French North Africa By the early 1960s a small community of European ex-colonials from Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria had settled in Toulon. Joining them in 1962 were thousands among the 500,000 to 600,000 Pieds-Noirs who left Algeria at the time of independence.Years later many of the ex-colonials who settled in France would say the metropole received them badly. They encountered prejudice: some Frenchmen exaggerated the wealth of the Pieds-Noirs, treating them as rich colons with

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fascistic leanings. In addition, the arrival of the Pieds-Noirs was an unwanted reminder of conflict and loss, of imperial ambitions gone bad and now abandoned. Abetted by De Gaulle – who avoided any show of sympathy towards the Pieds-Noirs – the people of the metropole remained largely indifferent towards the repatriates, if not hostile (Verdès-Leroux 2001: 381–87). Toulon was different, a city where many had supported the lost cause of l’Algérie française and sympathy came readily. Moreover, like Algeria as well as the lands of many of the Pieds-Noirs’ forebears (not only southern France but also Spain, Italy and Malta), the climate, terrain and culture of Toulon were Mediterranean. By 1968 Toulon had 20,271 repatriates (88 per cent from Algeria, seven per cent from Tunisia and five per cent from Morocco) who now made up 11.6 per cent of the city’s population and as much as one-quarter of the residents in some neighbourhoods (Bouquerel 1973: 12–22). More repatriates could be found in other cities of the metropole but in no other was their share of the population greater. The arrival of the Pieds-Noirs altered the politics of Toulon. As Table 2.1 shows, Toulon fits into a national pattern in which support for the far right has been TABLE 2.1 Voting for the Front National/Jean-Marie Le Pen in France and Toulon

(per cent of valid votes, 1984–2008) Election & year

France

Toulon

European 1984 Parliamentary 1986 Presidential 1988 Parliamentary 1988 Municipal 1989 European 1989 Parliamentary 1993 European 1994 Presidential 1995 Municipal 1995 Parliamentary 1997 Parliamentary 1998 European 1999 Municipal 2001 Presidential 2002 Parliamentary 2002 European 2004 Presidential 2007 Parliamentary 2007 Municipal 2008

11.2 9.7 14.4 9.8 – 11.9 12.4 10.5 15.0 – 14.9 – 5.7 2.0 16.9 12.2 9.8 10.5 4.3 0.9

22.3 20.3 27.0 24.2 20.3 28.3 27.0 24.6 24.0 31.0 31.2 39.7 10.7 5.6 20.8 20.3 15.1 13.5 7.4 6.6

Notes: 1. Toulon data for parliamentary elections are based on the average for the first and second electoral districts of the Var (respectively Toulon-Sud and Toulon-Nord). 2. National data on levels of municipal support for the far right are not available for 1989 or 1995. 3. The 1998 result is for a by-election in Toulon-Sud.

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stronger in regions with higher concentrations of European ex-colonials from North Africa (Perrineau 1989: 38–49). Indeed, during the first round of the 1988 presidential election the favourite candidate for the voters of Toulon was Le Pen (Var Matin-République, 26 April 1988). But in municipal politics until 1995 the far right had to contend with the loyalty that knitted many of the repatriates to Maurice Arreckx, the mayor and a politician of the moderate right. Arreckx intervened on behalf of the Pieds-Noirs when they needed jobs or housing. He backed their request that Paris provide compensation for property they had left behind in Algeria. He supported their campaign to obtain an amnesty for the army officers and OAS members now jailed, underground or in exile because of their participation in the subversive and violent campaign of 1960–62 against Algerian independence (Le Méridional, 8 October 1965). In 1966, for example, the city passed a motion calling on the government to ‘promulgate a law giving a complete and unconditional amnesty relative to offences that, for any reason and at any time, had their origin in the events in Algeria’ (Conseil Municipal de Toulon 1966). Battles for the repatriate vote thus became an established feature of electoral politics in Toulon. After Arreckx resigned as mayor in 1985 the relations of patronage he had formed with the Pieds-Noirs were upheld by his successor, François Trucy.

Preparing the ground for the far right Before it broke through at the national level during the mid-1980s, two men had led the FN in the Var: René Communal, a Pied-Noir and a veteran of the OAS, was replaced in 1984 by Bernard Mamy, a former Poujadist who later served in Algeria, joined the failed putsch against De Gaulle and then went underground. These men led a section where ‘in spite of their relative isolation, all of the early activists more or less belonged to political movements, associations, or milieus of repatriates that had actively defended the idea of l’Algérie française’ (Delmonte 1999: 74). As a result of power struggles in the Paris headquarters of the FN, in 1986 the party named a new secretary as head of this department: Yann Piat. Though not a Pied-Noir, Piat’s pedigree placed her too among the losers of decolonization. Both of her parents had served in French Indochina, with her father dying at Dien Bien Phu. Succeeding Piat in 1988 was Jean-Marie Le Chevallier, who had experience with Parisian politics – including service as the principal secretary of the Secretary of State for Repatriate Affairs – before jumping to the FN and becoming the principal secretary of Le Pen. As leader of the FN section in the Var, Le Chevallier recruited new supporters by infiltrating associations, notably those of repatriates or veterans of the colonial wars in Algeria and Indochina. He also created patriotic groups and encouraged parallel organizations that organized women or volunteers engaged in charitable activity (Delmonte 1999: 53–60). Against this background of organization and activism, the Arreckx system unravelled during 1994–95. Under the former mayor’s successor and protégé, Trucy, the city’s financial problems became so serious that plans for a new city hall and

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media centre were suspended (Martin 1996). As small businesses closed and real estate lost value, vacant shops and dilapidated buildings began to take over the city core. Another threat came from deindustrialization. The nearby shipyards of La Seyne-sur-Mer had closed in 1989, and by the mid-1990s the rate of unemployment in the Var reached an unprecedented 17.3 per cent (Var Matin-République, 29 April 1995). The naval contingent at Toulon was only slightly smaller than three decades earlier, but state plans to privatize the naval shipyards fed fears of more job losses (Var Matin-République, 29 December 1992, 25 March 1995). When the FN broke through nationally during the 1980s, politicians of the moderate right in Toulon reacted to the threat with words and actions whose paradoxical effect was to validate the party of Le Pen. When Arreckx was the mayor, he attacked immigration: ‘Toulon should not become the dustbin of Europe’ (Le Monde, 11 January 1983). For the municipal elections that year, his list included candidates from the FN (Martin 1996: 91–92). The theme of Trucy’s first news conference when he replaced Arreckx as mayor in 1986 was ‘Security, the number one problem’. He also singled out the Maghrebian population: It has reached a level far beyond what is reasonable – about 5,500 people, which means a foreign presence of about fifty per cent – so it modifies fundamentally the appearance and identity of the core of the city while compromising the conditions for a peaceful coexistence of the populations inasmuch as their customs and ways of living are so vastly different that problems that are exceedingly serious will inevitably result. (Var Matin-République, 27 March 1986) Later Trucy repeated such views: ‘At this moment there is a race that is chasing away another, it is like the red ants of Argentina, which have chased away the black ants of Provence. I am simply in favour of giving Toulon back to the Toulonnais’ (Le Monde, 2 April 1986). Between the rounds of the 1988 parliamentary elections, a moderate-right candidate in nearby Hyères agreed when Arreckx asked him to withdraw. As expected this resulted in a win for the FN candidate, Yann Piat (Le Monde, 15 March 1989). Two years later a neo-Gaullist politician in Toulon was the first to sign a neighbourhood petition against a Maghrebian couple wishing to open a grocery store. In his words: Toulon is a border city and the Mediterranean is a weak obstacle. At the end of this century, there will be one hundred million inhabitants in North Africa. All should be aware of the threat this represents. It is urgently necessary to resolve the problem of immigration. … Now is the time to take the firm steps needed to protect the French identity. (Var Matin-République, 8 April 1990) As the FN rose further it was not unusual for other right-wing politicians to join in blaming immigrants for criminality and unemployment (Martin 1996: 27–34).

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The fall of the moderate right and the victory of the far right Shortly after Piat was elected as sole deputy from the FN in the parliamentary elections of 1988, Le Pen stirred up opprobrium by coining a pun (‘Monsieur Durafourcrématoire’) that associated a prominent left-wing politician with the Holocaust. Piat made it known that she disliked this play on words. By October 1988, tensions over this and other matters resulted in her expulsion from the FN. She then moved to the same party as Arreckx and in the parliamentary elections of 1993 was re-elected as the representative for Hyères (Birenbaum 1992: 144–52). In February 1994, Piat was assassinated. Before her death she had confided to friends that probing into links between organized crime, land speculation and politics in the department was putting her life in danger. Within days of her death the police interrogated top members of the departmental council as the Minister of the Interior launched an anti-corruption campaign in the Var (Var Matin-République, 7 March 1994). Meanwhile the press published a 1993 letter in which Piat named a handful of people who might welcome her death, including Arreckx and the presumed head of organized crime in the region. Le Pen reacted quickly. Alluding at a press conference to the tangentopoli scandals across the border, he quipped that the Var needed two brigades of Italian judges. Piat’s death, he asserted, ‘is a revelation of the profound corruption of the political fabric. It also reveals an unanticipated consequence of state decentralization, which allows political elements to handle enormous flows of money’ (Var Matin-République, 16 March 1994). In the cantonal elections held later that month, Arreckx lost his seat in Toulon to the FN candidate. Five months later the former mayor was arrested and charged with conspiracy, accepting bribes, breach of trust and possession of stolen goods (Var Matin-République, 2 August 1994). With Arreckx in jail the press uncovered more examples of local mismanagement and corruption. Some now reflected badly on Trucy. A large hotel in the city’s new conference centre proved a failure and was forced to close (Var Matin-République, 26 January 1995). An official inquiry into the construction of an institute of technology raised troubling questions about how – seemingly with the cooperation of Trucy and for the benefit of people with ties to Arreckx – administrators had managed state funds and awarded public works contracts (Var Matin-République, 2 February 1995). A different inquiry revealed the manager of a communications agency with city contracts was also on the city payroll as the mayor’s principal secretary. Influence peddling and improper use of public funds were suspected (Var Matin-République, 24 March 1995). When pre-trial findings about Arreckx became public, they showed that shipbuilding and public works firms had deposited 6.5 million francs into his Swiss bank account (Var Matin-République, 6 May 1995). A few weeks later his four children appeared in court after it emerged that 4 million francs had flowed from their father’s account into theirs (Var MatinRépublique, 1 June 1995). Another court found a friend of Arreckx – who was also a former vice-president of the Var chamber of commerce – guilty of extortion, false book-keeping and improper use of public funds (Var Matin-République, 1 June 1995).

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Le Chevallier’s section of the FN prepared for the municipal elections of 1995 by sending voters regular issues of its publication, the Patriote du Var, which echoed the party line by calling for improvements in public housing ‘for those who are French’ and the restriction of social assistance to ‘French families’ (Samson 1997: 115). In turn, the national headquarters of the party promised that municipalities run by the FN would combat ‘the effects of insecurity, unemployment, immigration, taxation and state spending, misery and moral laxity’ (Davies 1999: 168). While the other candidates in the Toulon elections ignored the far right as they focused on each other or the city’s political scandals, Le Chevallier and the candidates on his list (which included aristocrats, Pieds-Noirs and retired military officers) played down the extremism of their party. The leading lists in the first round of the municipal elections of June 1995 were those of Le Chevallier (31.0 per cent), Trucy (23.2 per cent) and Christian Goux of the Socialists (21.7 per cent). Trucy’s share of the vote fell by half compared with the 1989 municipal elections, but the left lost ground too. Arguing that Trucy’s tarnished image made him unfit to defeat the FN, Goux called for the mayor to withdraw from the second round. To prevent vote-splitting within the broad segment of the electorate that rejected the FN, Parisian leaders of the Socialist Party urged the candidate from their party to withdraw instead (Var Matin-République, 13 June 1995). Neither Trucy nor Goux backed down, thereby allowing Le Chevallier to win the second round with 37.0 per cent of the vote (compared with 34.8 per cent for Trucy and 28.2 per cent for Goux). Political scandals and divisions among its opponents had allowed the FN to take over Toulon.

A city under the far right Historically the FN electorate in France has displayed an unusually high degree of disenchantment with politics. By comparison with other voters, those who support this party show the least faith in how French democracy works. Among the supporters of Le Pen in the 2002 presidential election, nine out ten agreed that ‘most politicians are corrupt’ and the politics of left and right were ‘more of the same’ (Shields 2006: 127–29). Although the FN and its leader long had the most loyal voters of any political party in France, such evidence suggests that support for the French far right stems more from a dissatisfaction with politics than a strong partisan identification. Given that negative perceptions of the ability and probity of other politicians are important motivations behind support for the far right, what happens when the far right is itself in power? Le Pen wanted the municipalities his party won in 1995 (Toulon, Orange and Marignane) to serve as showcases. Thus he asked them to cut services for foreigners as well as funding for associations his party disliked (Var Matin-République, 4 November 1995). Over the following year, however, tensions emerged as he argued with the newly elected leaders of these cities over the pace of change and the feasibility of a policy of national preference that entailed illegal discrimination. In dealing with matters such as city finances, moreover, the approach of

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the FN’s elected officials hardly differed from that of the moderate right (Davies 1999: 171–218). Finding their powers limited, by default the far-right municipalities turned to the politics of crime, culture and association funding. The municipal police force of Toulon grew from 23 to 70 officers. The Le Chevallier administration increased the grants for associations that were royalist, nationalist or catholic traditionalist while suspending grants for associations that fought poverty, racism or AIDS. After a special review, the city also blocked welfare payments to dozens of foreigners whose residency permits were not in order (Var Matin-République, 7 November 1995). At the same time, voters with nostalgia for empire appreciated the presence on their city council of Pieds-Noirs and retired military officers. As one councillor said: ‘In Algeria I started my service on 27 January 1954. I left Algeria without any animosity towards those people. But on the other hand I would like it if they were sent back to where they came from’ (Samson 1997: 64). Whether as notables or ordinary citizens, moreover, Pieds-Noirs were prominent at events organized by the new city council. Given this environment it was at Toulon that Le Pen chose to announce the FN would form a parallel organization for the military (Samson 1997: 87–95). Nonetheless, a neighbourhood theatre (Espace Comédia) and a cultural centre (Théâtre national de danse et de l’image) garnered support from artists, intellectuals and politicians in Paris by rejecting grants from the new administration (Var MatinRépublique, 22 June 1995; Pollard 2000). Toulon’s annual book fair became a cultural battleground. Citing freedom of expression, the city insisted that far-right publishers such as Présent be allowed. As Le Chevallier said, ‘It would not bother me if the memoirs of Hitler were there together with Das Kapital by Marx’ (Var Matin-République, 7 November 1995). His critics accused the city council of promoting far-right culture. Indeed, at the 1996 book fair the municipality chose to honour Jacques Trémolet de Villers, not a well-known author but a royalist and like Le Pen once an associate of Jean-Louis Tixier Vignancour (Var Matin-République, 25 November 1996). When the political slant of the 1996 book fair became obvious, one bookstore withdrew in protest (Samson 1997: 124–36). In addition, the economic situation of the city did not improve. As with urban decay, Le Chevallier had inherited serious problems that needed time to resolve. The navy remained a pillar of the local economy, but the FN could not stem job losses at the arsenal. Despite renovations to a run-down neighbourhood near the docks, stores in the centre closed and more buildings became dilapidated. Plans to transform the vacant Bourse du travail (trade union centre) into a theatre for the old town come to nothing (Var Matin-République, 7 November 1995). For a number of reasons (the departure of top civil servants, the inexperience of FN councillors, the breakdown of legislative committees, the lack of civility and compromise between majority and opposition) an experienced observer of municipal politics in Provence found the decision-making process in Toulon became clumsy: sometimes too hasty

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and inattentive to detail, other times slow and bogged down in peripheral matters (Samson 1997: 17–33). Meanwhile the FN was losing unity. Le Chevallier’s handling of municipal policy led to friction with Le Pen, who had entrusted him with a department in which their party had so much at stake (Var Matin-République, 13 November 1995). The mayor also quarrelled with a royalist on his council and eventually she and Le Pen backed each other publicly in their fights with Le Chevallier (Var MatinRépublique, 26 September 1997). Nonetheless, when Bruno Mégret (Le Pen’s lieutenant and the mayor of Vitrolles) left the FN to form his own party, the Mouvement National Républicain (MNR, National Republican Movement) in 1998, Le Chevallier chose to stay with the FN. Finally, the FN in Toulon did not escape scandal. State authorities determined that a local FN politician, Jean-Claude Poulet-Dachary, had broken an electoral law by organizing the finances for his party’s campaign before joining the city council (Var Matin-République, 13 November 1995). Poulet-Dachary became the principal secretary for the new mayor but was murdered after leaving a gay bar late one night in August 1995. When his homosexuality became public knowledge, Le Chevallier reacted by trying to shift the focus of attention: ‘This was a political assassination. Who other than a political adversary could have killed him?’ (Var Matin-République, 8 November 1995). In 1997 Le Chevallier and three councillors had to testify in a court investigating the payment of kickbacks in return for contracts with local schools. The following year an associate mayor was found guilty of rape and sexual harassment (Le Monde, 1 November 1998). The mayor’s wife, Cendrine Le Chevallier, was also a member of the city council. In 1996 a court convicted her of slander for calling the organizer of a neighbourhood festival she had tried to ban on flimsy grounds of public safety ‘an agitator in Islamic circles’ (Var Matin-République, 3 December 1996). In 1998 another court found her guilty of political discrimination: she had set aside jobs at city hall for FN supporters. A year later an association she headed was shut down for mishandling city grants. In 2001, she and her husband were found guilty of creating a municipal job that paid one of their friends for doing nothing (Libération, 20–21 January 2001). Eventually her husband was found guilty of suborning witnesses, members of the FN whom he had instructed to withhold information suggesting the murder of his principal secretary in 1995 was not politically motivated (Libération, 16 December 2005). Despite these setbacks, Le Chevallier did not fall quickly. In national elections held in 1997 he again benefited from divisions within the moderate right and its inability to cooperate with the left in building a barrier against the far right in the second round: Le Chevallier was elected to the National Assembly, where he sat as the sole FN deputy. Within a few months, however, his election was nullified due to improper campaign financing. His wife contested the resulting by-election but lost to the Socialist candidate (Var Matin, 26 December 1998). His administration also mishandled a long-awaited but financially complex real-estate project facing the city’s main square. The FN became more fragmented and Le Chevallier quit

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eventually, fighting the 2001 municipal elections as an independent whose list included candidates from the party of Mégret, the MNR (Var Matin, 3 March 2001). Replacing him as the FN’s mayoral candidate was a newcomer to the politics of Toulon who attracted only 5.6 per cent of the vote. Le Chevallier did hardly better: his share of the vote (7.8 per cent) was the smallest of any incumbent in France (Var Matin, 13 March 2001). The winner of the 2001 elections was Hubert Falco, a politician of the moderate right who had replaced Arreckx as president of the general council of the Var. One of his first decisions as mayor was to cut funding to associations with ties to the far right (Var Matin, 17 May 2001). Since then the moderate right has reclaimed its dominance over the politics of the city. Memories of how Le Chevallier and the FN ran Toulon have helped Falco, who belongs to the centre-right party of President Nicolas Sarkozy, Union pour un Mouvement Populaire (UMP, Union for a Popular Movement); see Le Monde, 2–3 March 2008. Yet in elections since Le Chevallier held power the levels of far-right voting among the Pieds-Noirs of this city have remained well above those for the rest of Toulon and more than twice the national average (Veugelers 2005).

Conclusion Although many French people disown imperialism and abhor racism, the strong traces of orientalism and ethnic stereotyping in their society suggest the cultural and psychological legacies of conquest and colonization remain alive (Tristan 1987; Orfali 1990). Apart from the Pieds-Noirs, colonialism engaged and shaped the many thousands of merchants, missionaries, civil servants and military men who went overseas. Millions more in the metropole learned about the colonies and what they symbolized by means of art, literature, photography, cinema, advertising, colonial exhibitions and their country’s educational system. Although the depth to which these images and ideas penetrated was never as great as hoped by the colonial lobby, the imperial imagination was omnipresent nonetheless (Baycroft 2004: 156–57). The Pieds-Noirs can thus be seen as the carriers of a set of beliefs about race, nation and history also found, in forms usually more diluted, elsewhere in French society. As such they resemble other carriers of nostalgia for empire: the Italian veterans and ex-colonials from Libya and the Horn of Africa whom the neo-fascist Movimento Sociale Italiano (Italian Social Movement) recruited in Italy during the 1940s and 1950s; the members of the League of Empire Loyalists who helped to found the National Front in Great Britain during the 1960s; and the retornados (ex-colonials from Angola and Mozambique) whom the far right tried to mobilize in Portugal during the 1970s. Beyond Toulon this study also offers a key to understanding the FN’s strength in other municipalities with significant populations of Pieds-Noirs; not only Nice, Marseilles, Perpignan and Aix-en-Provence but also smaller municipalities that have actually put the far right in power such as Orange, Marignane and Vitrolles. The example of Arreckx and Trucy also illustrates why politicians of the south who

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do not belong to the FN (such as Paul Alduy, a former Socialist who then became the moderate-right mayor of Perpignan between 1959 and 1993; Georges Frêche, a Socialist who was the mayor of Montpellier until 2004; and Jacques Peyrat, a former member of the FN who became the mayor of Nice in 1995) have sometimes positioned themselves on the reactionary side of the postcolonial cleavage. In addition, the connection between political scandal and FN fortunes in Toulon helps to define more precisely the role of corruption in the success of the far right. For Kitschelt (1995: 161), corruption is a key element of partocracy (‘the fusion of state, party, and economic elites in politico-economic networks characterised by patronage, clientelism, and corruption’), a syndrome that has fed support for the Northern League in Italy and the Freedom Party in Austria. Cross-national research confirms Kitschelt’s claim as well as showing a similar relationship at work in the electoral politics of Belgium and France (Veugelers and Magnan 2005: 855). However, the effect of corruption scandals is ‘not always easy to demonstrate’ (Evans 2003: 89). The example of Toulon is instructive because it not only demonstrates this effect but also suggests a jump in far-right support due to a corruption scandal may be transitory. This study confirms that extremism is hard to reconcile with power at the municipal level. Unlike interwar Europe, liberal democracy is today hegemonic. At the local level, moreover, the possibilities for deep or radical change are limited. Municipal legislation that curtails the rights of immigrants runs into barriers set by national constitutions and higher levels of government. Extremist politicians who hold power also face tasks that require good management, not a new ideological twist. As the example of Le Chevallier shows, it is easier to mount a campaign to ‘throw the rascals out of office’ when one is in the opposition. The far right faces a new difficulty when – like the FN in Toulon – it too has become an incumbent with dirty hands. Finally, this study demonstrates the value of distinguishing between the concepts of culture and politics: doing so raises the question of translation (Sartori 1969). Having a cultural affinity is not the same as voting (let alone expressing a relatively coherent set of ideas that promote vested interests). Hence, in the competition for votes the far right often operates in a hunting ground that overlaps with that of other parties (Panebianco 1988). Part of the contribution of this chapter is empirical: showing that in Toulon the competition for the support of an electorate with nostalgia for empire put the FN into conflict with the moderate right. But this chapter has also posed an analytical problem applicable to other cases: identifying the conditions under which a sub-cultural identity with more than one possible expression in electoral politics becomes translated into actual support for the far right.

Acknowledgements This chapter was written while the author was a fellow at the Camargo Foundation in Cassis, France. It is based on research made possible by funding from the

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Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. The opportunity to present a preliminary version was provided by the Department of European Studies and Modern Languages, University of Bath. Thanks also to Jean-Jacques Jordi and the late Georges Boutigny.

Bibliography Aldrich, R. 1996. Greater France: A History of French Overseas Expansion. Houndmills: Macmillan. Baycroft, T. 2004. ‘The Empire and the Nation: The Place of Colonial Images in the Republican Visions of the French Nation’, in M. Evans (ed.), Empire and Culture: The French Experience, 1830–1940. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 148–60. Bayle, M. 2001. ‘Les droites à Toulon (1958–94): De l’Algérie française au Front national’, PhD dissertation. Aix-en-Provence and Marseilles: Université Aix-Marseille I. Birenbaum, G. 1992. Le Front national en politique. Paris: Balland. Bouquerel, J. 1973. Notes et Etudes Documentaires, 3976–77. Paris: La Documentation française. Conseil Municipal de Toulon. 1966. ‘Voeu exprimé par le Conseil Municipal de Toulon au cours de sa séance publique’, 19 January. Davies, P. 1999. The National Front in France: Ideology, Discourse and Power. London: Routledge. Delmonte, F. 1999. ‘Le Front national à Toulon: de la sous-société des débuts à la contresociété de juin 1995’, Recherches Régionales – Alpes-Maritimes et contrées limitrophes, 148: 51–83. Dogan, M. 1967. ‘Political Cleavage and Social Stratification in France and Italy’, in S.M. Lipset and S. Rokkan (eds), Party Systems and Voter Alignments: Cross-National Perspectives. New York: Free Press, pp. 129–95. Evans, J.A.J. 2003. ‘Political Corruption in France’, in M.J. Bull and J.L. Newell (eds), Corruption in Contemporary Politics. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 79–92. Flood, C. and Frey, H. 2002. ‘Defending the Empire in Retrospect: The Discourse of the Extreme Right’, in T. Chafer and A. Sackur (eds), Promoting the Colonial Idea: Propaganda and Visions of Empire in France. Houndmills: Palgrave, pp. 195–210. Gaignebet, J.-B. 1988. ‘A la recherche de nouveaux rôles’, in M. Agulhon (ed.), Histoire de Toulon. Toulouse: Privat, pp. 357–79. Girardet, R. 1972. L’idée coloniale en France de 1871 à 1962. Paris: La Table Ronde. Kitschelt, H. 1995. The Radical Right in Western Europe: A Comparative Analysis. Ann Arbor: MI: University of Michigan Press. Livre d’or Toulon-Var. 1960. Toulon: Clayton Publicité. Mannheim, K. 1971 [1927]. ‘Conservative Thought’, in K.H. Wolff (ed.), From Karl Mannheim. New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 131–222. Martin,V. 1996. Toulon la noire: Le Front national au pouvoir. Paris: Denoël. Orfali, B. 1990. L’Adhésion au Front national: De la minorité active au mouvement social. Paris: Kimé. Panebianco, A. 1988. Political Parties: Organization and Power. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Perrineau, P. 1989. ‘Les étapes d’une implantation électorale’, in N. Mayer and P. Perrineau (eds), Le Front national à découvert. Paris: Presses de la Fondation nationale des sciences politiques, pp. 37–62.

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Pollard, M. 2000. ‘The Châteauvallon Affair: Culture and Political Conflict’, Contemporary Politics, 6(4): 319–29. Samson, M. 1997. Le Front national aux affaires: Deux ans d’enquête sur la vie municipale à Toulon. Paris: Calmann-Lévy. Sartori, G. 1969. ‘From the Sociology of Politics to Political Sociology’, in S.M. Lipset (ed.), Politics and the Social Sciences. New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 65–100. Shields, J.G. 2006. ‘Political Representation in France: A Crisis of Democracy?’, Parliamentary Affairs, 59(1): 118–37. Tristan, A. 1987. Au Front. Paris: Gallimard. Verdès-Leroux, J. 2001. Les français d’Algérie de 1830 à aujourd’hui: Une page d’histoire déchirée. Paris: Fayard. Veugelers, J. 2005. ‘Ex-Colonials, Voluntary Associations, and Electoral Support for the Contemporary Far Right’, Comparative European Politics, 3(4): 408–31. Veugelers, J. and Magnan, A. 2005. ‘Conditions of Far-Right Strength in Contemporary Western Europe: An Application of Kitschelt’s Theory’, European Journal of Political Research, 44(6): 837–60.

3 PLACING THE EXTREMES Cityscape, ethnic ‘others’ and young right extremists in East Berlin1 Nitzan Shoshan

Introduction A bony 20-year-old with a brash attitude, Sebastian2 belongs to a clique that congregates routinely at a small public square in an East German-era high-rise neighbourhood on the southeastern fringes of Berlin. Living with his mother and subsisting on the remittances of a mandatory welfare-for-work programme, his daily life unfolds largely in his neighbourhood, dubbed the ‘Ghetto’ and blatantly signalling post-reunification socio-economic decline. He and his friends Danny and Klaus take turns at the slot machines as we sit to chat on an August afternoon in Little Istanbul, a local Turkish restaurant-bar. Flipping through his wallet, he exposes an election sticker of the National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD, Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands) attached to its inner lining and pauses briefly, as if ascertaining that I perceive the careful provocation. The right extremist NPD and its current ally, the German People’s Union Party (DVU, Deutsche Volksunion), have scored significant electoral gains in recent years, winning a handful of seats in state parliaments and provoking anxious alarm across Germany. Their successes have crucially hinged upon young disaffected men such as Sebastian. But the cautiously placed sticker more or less summarizes Sebastian’s formal political commitments. Some three months earlier he and a friend were chased ‘with carving knives’ and banned from Little Istanbul after rioting and threatening its owners. Such incidents recur but invariably end with the renewal of amicable relations, he maintains, exchanging jokes with waiters who serve beers to our table. Before long we turn to politics. True to form, immigration and foreigners top his list of grievances: ‘I would start by prohibiting and shutting down all of their businesses,’ he declares, ‘but sooner or later all foreigners living here should leave the country.’ I enquire why, considering their views, he and his friends favour Little Istanbul over nearby ‘German’ restaurant-bars. ‘One simply gets used to it,’ he replies, ‘and besides,’ he adds in a confession all the more astonishing for coming from a German ultra-nationalist, ‘the beer here tastes better.’

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Sebastian and his peers navigate a shifting, heterogeneous landscape where, even in the Ghetto, they must constantly live out an inevitable proximity with ‘others’ they perceive as threatening. Far from isolated domains, locally situated rightextremist milieus present an ambiguous and porous field and a constant intermingling with other, equally diffuse milieus. On the streets of East Berlin it is as if the boundaries of right extremism3 dissolve into thin air, and the more emphatically so the more one attempts to fix one’s analytical gaze upon them: individuals and cliques come and go, Will Smith receives as much veneration as Edward Norton, and formal political commitments range from disillusioned indifference to extraparliamentary militancy, from the NPD or the DVU to the Christian Democrats (CDU), the Social Democrats (SPD), or even the former Greens party leader Joschka Fischer who after all ‘was also a hooligan once, no?’.4 Based on ethnographic research with young right-extremist street milieus in East Berlin, my goal in this chapter is to advance debates in the field by approaching extreme-right phenomena as intricately embedded both within German society and within broader contemporary processes. In particular, my focus will be on the growing proximity to, and proliferating encounters with, alterity in the urban everyday of Sebastian and his peers. Their senses of place and sensualities of otherness, I will argue, weave political significations about ethnic groups into geographies of difference in the tangible fabric of the multi-ethnic city. Within the contemporary ethnicization and culturalization of politics and difference at large, ultra-nationalist subjectivities in Germany crucially hinge upon the singular figure of an ethnicized collectivity of ‘Turks and Arabs’. Their constructions of this embodied alterity rely on somatic modalities – visual, auditory, olfactory – that suture stereotypifying narratives and that shape urban landscapes. My analysis will draw on semiotic approaches from linguistic anthropology,5 which will reveal the inherent emplacement of embodied alterity and explain how this emplacement incorporates a constitutive indeterminacy that allows the negotiation of everyday proximity. The ethnographic purview shows especially well how, at Little Istanbul and elsewhere, ultra-nationalists live out rather than resolve the contradictions of a bigoted politics. In doing so, it illuminates the limits of conventional approaches to European racist nationalisms that employ abstract, conceptual categories. And it shows as well how a local empirical focus – in this case on East Berlin – allows for an analytical depth and complexity that are indispensable for grasping the intricate logic of racist and xenophobic politics. As I shall discuss at the end of the chapter, the negotiation of a racist nationalism and a multi-ethnic landscape among right extremists emulates and ventriloquates far broader German and European debates on immigration and cultural toleration. This reproduction of ‘mainstream’ idioms breaches the presumed boundaries that ostensibly define right extremists as a distinct political collectivity.

Landscapes of otherness Recent worldwide transformations in processes of identity production have been linked on the one hand with reconfigurations in regimes of production, consumption

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and marketing under post-Fordist or global capitalism (Friedman 2003; Harvey 2001), and on the other with drastic transmutations in idioms of essentialization through the broad ethnicization of politics (Alonso 1994; Hale 2005).6 Whether as institutionalized discrimination or spontaneous bigotry, racism has been repackaged in cultural terms (Pred 2000). Ethnic alterity has been repeatedly encountered as the material incarnation of the abstract processes, at times with brutal consequences (Comaroff and Comaroff 2001; Holmes 2000), while throughout Europe the political terrain has realigned around the trope of immigration, and more precisely around a cluster of stereotypifications of ethnicized Muslim minorities (Asad 2003; Bunzl 2005). Back at Little Istanbul, Danny gestures towards the Turkish staff as he grumbles about ‘foreign cultures’. For him and others in his milieu, immigration stands unquestionably as the most salient political horizon, far beyond the memory of the Second World War, the eclipse of welfarism, or Jewish conspiracy theories. It provides the very yardstick by which to assess political difference. ‘Leftists are for foreigners and rightists are for Germans’ is a common rendering of the political spectrum. Karl, a fashionably dressed 18-year-old who belonged to a politically organized right-extremist clique, pronounced that ‘left and right don’t mean much … actually they’re both the same, only, out of ten opinions both sides have only one [i.e. immigration] that diverges, but otherwise they’re the same.’ The notion that idle workers abuse the resources of the welfare state haunted Karl’s world: ‘one can really throw out 95% of foreigners because, well, [only] the other 5% want to work and accomplish something here’. His take on the EU was surprisingly upbeat, yet apprehensive about its expansionary vision, and particularly about Turkey’s membership bid. Karl laid out objections based on economic, geographical and human rights considerations, yet the subtext underscoring his position quickly surfaced: ‘if Turkey became part of the EU then anyone could travel as they wished and then of course they would all come to Germany … and already more and more [Turks and Arabs] are always coming here.’ Turkey’s menace for Karl and his peers thus springs less from abstract criteria and more from situated perceptions of an ethnically heterogeneous here-and-now. Their ubiquitous talk of ‘foreigners’ expresses a careful differentiation of ethnic stereotypes. In Karl’s universe, ‘Chinese’,7 ‘Russians’ and ‘Africans’ are ‘quiet’ and ‘always work hard’, in contrast with an ethnically marked Middle Eastern population that has become the crux of political identification for German right extremists today: ‘generally it’s really just these Turks and Arabs who don’t work … [who] are outside all day … always making trouble, like robbing people or threatening or stabbing people.’

Cityscape and somatic modalities of alterity Karl and his peers encounter this population as an undifferentiated group somatically identifiable through sensual criteria.Visual regimes define for them an embodied semiotics of recognition that comprises not only such manifest indices as skin

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colour but also the architectonics of bodily demeanours, the stylistics of fashion or stereotypified perceptual hygienics. Food serves as a trope for organizing sensual indices of taste and smell, which locate alterities in specific sites in urban space. Auditory sensibilities territorialize otherness through tropes of foreign language, unfamiliar music and peculiar sounds. Even in Karl’s relatively homogeneous neighbourhood, Johannisthal, which immigrant groups and anti-racist non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have often characterized as a ‘fear zone’,8 the gazes of right extremists who congregate regularly around benches in the public park often enough encounter the figures of head-covered Muslim women strolling about. The neighbourhood’s central avenue is dotted with businesses that embed a variety of ethnicized indices into the local experience of consumption and commodified leisure. Boundaries materialize fleetingly in the arbitrary encounters of an urban everyday and then dissipate, for example at nodes in the urban fabric, such as bus and tram stops. The presence of a pair of persons of Middle Eastern appearance at a bus stop would only exceptionally draw verbal commentary. But the sensitive observer would not fail to identify the shifting gazes of bystanders who, in their own external appearance (for example via a rightist skinhead dress code), radiate a right-extremist identification. For 21-year-old Uta, who was struggling to pay long-standing debts on the tight budget of low remittances that she received for a state-funded vocational training programme, immigration or more precisely ‘those Turks and Arabs and all of that’ similarly topped the list of political concerns. Close behind her worries about ‘wide-open borders’ or foreigners’ abuse of the welfare system stood what she perceived as intolerable levels of criminality. Traceable in her view to juridical leniency and luxurious prisons, criminality conveniently merged for her with the trope of immigration in the figure of the ‘criminal foreigner’ as the embodiment of Germany’s woes. Uta complained of widespread institutional bias in favour of ‘foreigners’ and against ‘Germans’: ‘Sometimes you get treated like you’re the last piece of crap … They want to hand everything to the Turks on a silver platter and everything must be provided for them,’ she grumbled. Idle ‘foreigners’, she claimed, easily obtained inordinate amounts of welfare money while hard-working ‘Germans’ like herself had to navigate bureaucratic hurdles in order to afford basic necessities. A minor brawl won her an unusually harsh punishment in her opinion, whereas violent, drug-trafficking, multiply convicted Turks received unjustifiably lenient sentences, she said. She resented the public funding of mosques and voiced particular anger about immigrants who failed to master German and thus, according to her, created discrimination against native Germans in the labour market, where employers increasingly favoured multilingual workers. Through various stories, Uta narrated a daily friction with ‘Turks and Arabs’: a fight at the shopping mall, threats at a court-mandated anti-violence seminar, or various incidents at the vocational school. Her narratives form discursive renderings or ‘spatial syntaxes’ (de Certeau 1984) of the cityscape that authorize a geography of alterity.The schools she attended, her anti-violence seminar, or the shopping mall mark areas of the city as ethnically different and, inseparably, as dangerously threatening.

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This territorialization of difference is imbricated in and generated through a web of somatic modalities that incorporate alterity into material things: A friend of mine lives also in Neukölln and I’m happy that I have to walk only 5 minutes [from the train station] to her place and the same going back, and that’s ok, but I would never settle there, never, it stinks there so badly for me, when you enter the hallway of her building sometimes it smells like garlic, sometimes it smells stale, and here it doesn’t stink so bad, perhaps we cook with different spices, that’s possible, but the Turks, oh no, even when you walk down the street every kebab place smells differently. Such evocations of otherness reiterate across sensual domains. Karl, for example, complained that ‘there are many [Germans] who already start to talk like they always do, weird sounds like ts ts [tongue clicks] … Or, they make their own dialect, this Turkish German (Turkdeutsch), that’s quite terrible.’ Indeed, linguistic otherness seems to fuse particularly well with perceptions of institutionalized discrimination, as the case of Ole illustrates. Tall, large-bodied, and dressed in hooligan fashion, 19-year-old Ole would cite his relations with ‘foreign’ colleagues at his vocational programme or with a local kebab vendor as an alibi for his racism, or he would seek to temper the racist undertones of his laments about Germany’s immigration policy and the vices of immigrants by disavowing hostility to foreigners who work, pay taxes and speak German. But his gravest concern revolves around linguistic alterity, a problem he articulated through encounters in institutional settings of state bureaucracy (e.g. the employment or welfare offices) where people ‘should be able to talk German and not with their hands and feet, because many go there and [with] “I no understand” they already win [what they want]’. Foreign words, broken speech, bodily gestures and the incapacity to speak German fluently in institutions governing the dispensation of public resources emerge for him as enabling an unfair access to and abuse of these resources. Auditory signs interlace with visual markers of otherness in his perception of the urban landscape: ‘[I dislike Neukölln] first because of the high ratio of foreigners, many youth gangs that are not of German origin … and also because a lot [there] is dilapidated, I also see a lot of poverty, and that’s not pretty.’ The visual markers of embodied alterity intertwine here with an aesthetics of urban form in a manner that associates immigration, criminality, poverty, unsightliness and threat. At stake for Ole are not concrete negative experiences but rather a perceptual-aesthetic ordering of immaterial, yet clearly evident boundaries: ‘[it’s not that] I was assaulted or harassed there, which is something that of course could happen anywhere, it’s just that there’s a border for me there that I don’t like to cross.’ Ole protested against what he considered ‘asylum-shelter Germany’ (Asylheim Deutschland): it’s fine if people come, but it can be pushed too far … it shouldn’t stand open for everyone, which is somehow the way it appears to us right now,

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even if the law prescribes something else or says something else or equally with the statistics, but to people on the street it looks nevertheless different. His concerns thus revolve not around legal codes, government policies or statistical measures. Instead, rooted in daily experience, they hinge upon somatic modalities and decry how foreign presence ‘appears to us’, ‘to people on the street’ – not how ‘people on the street’ think about it but literally how they tangibly sense it.

The spatial configuration of strangeness For Ole, Karl and Uta, certain geographies of alterity gain life through the sights, sounds and smells that permeate the city and that become attached to streets, neighbourhoods, offices of state bureaucracy, vocational schools, restaurants, shopping malls, and so on. Their territorialization of otherness generates multi-layered spatial ordering through an intricate articulation of regions, sites, boundaries and circulations. At times it appears as a relatively stable classification of bounded territories. For example, the districts of Kreuzberg and Neukölln invariably surface as the incarnation par excellence of spatial negativity in the cityscape. Yet the territorial delimitation of strangeness must always come to terms with the inherent porosity of boundaries. We therefore find pervasive spatial aversions to areas perceived as too close to and hence already polluted by Kreuzberg and Neukölln:‘Treptowerpark is … on the edge of Kreuzberg, it already starts there that different-looking, strange people come’, says Karl. A far vaguer geographical imaginary hinges upon an elusive East–West ordering of the city. Here, Kreuzberg and Neukölln feature as emblematic of the West at large. Yet the domestication of strangeness through its spatial enclosure becomes at this point highly precarious. The political frontier once starkly marked by the Wall has evaporated into a misty, ethereal geography, its precise course a mystery to virtually all the young people I met in my research. The distinction between East and West therefore takes on a variety of different outlines that invariably trace incisions to the ‘east’ of where the Wall once stood, though just how far varies greatly. For many, the East–West boundary resurfaces within their own district, carving there a fractal recursion (Irvine and Gal 2000) of their imagination of the wider urban landscape. Hence for Axel, a clean-cut 16-year-old who used to play a key role in the local scene of militant, organized right extremists, Neukölln figured as a heart of darkness whose maladies centrifugally encroached eastward into his own district, the western fringes of which have already become in his view a nest of ‘Ghetto people’. But this seeping pollution has meanwhile percolated farther into his own neighbourhood, Johannisthal, at the district’s centre: [L]ately I see in Johannisthal too many people running around who make trouble … who provoke and harass people on the street … [they are] young bullies who think they’re some young gangsters, like for example they think

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they come from the Bronx in America, they think they have to create a ghetto here in Johannisthal. Boundaries appear here as interfaces for flows rather than as restrictive borders. The substances they filter become, as it were, diluted as they proceed away from their origin, as in the cascading progression of strangeness from Neukölln to Johannisthal. This fluidity of the East–West ordering of alterity revealed itself tellingly one unusually hot morning as we lingered outside a train-station kiosk on the very southeastern perimeter of this southeastern district: Sylvia, Robert, Meier, Norman and Martina, all some 20 years old, and Michael and Kurt, respectively in their late twenties and mid-thirties. Michael, divorced and father of three, lost his cheerful composure after Martina disclosed that his current girlfriend had been cheating on him. He ranted about his misfortunes with women, extolled his fulfilment of his fatherly duties, and finally complained of the perils of raising children in today’s dangerous social environment, pointing at the pervasiveness of drug dealing as particularly worrisome. Here Kurt, a toothless, thin and starkly unkempt regular of the kiosk, who relocated some years earlier from Berlin to a satellite town a few train stops further into the Brandenburg countryside, intervened. He described his abandonment of the city as an exile of sorts, an eastward flight from western afflictions that have steadily seeped into landscapes once familiar but meanwhile metamorphosed into alien places. This southeastern corner of Berlin’s southeasternmost district marked for him a last frontier, the western rim of his universe. The beyond materialized for him as irredeemable and insufferable, traversed by evils and overpopulated with immigrants. Nods of agreement greeted his appraisal and an exchange on the idleness, criminality and welfare-dependency of an over-sized immigrant population followed. In this interactional entextualization (Silverstein 1997) of space (an East–West ordering), of time (decline and creeping encroachment), and of difference (women, immigrants), geography and temporality intertwined with and bound together toxic social maladies: criminality, idleness, illegal drugs, violence, dependency and infidelity.

Boundaries and identities The territorialization of difference in the cityscape thus follows a general schema while revealing irregular contours. Yet how should we conceptualize the relationship between embodied forms of difference and their territorialization in the urban landscape? Are they determined as it were externally to their spatial configuration and generative in turn of boundaries that reflect their flows across the cityscape? Or else, if spatial forms already insinuate themselves into their process of becoming, how are they constituted? Such questions appear particularly thorny in the case of embodied alterity, whose corporeality grants it an irresistible – and insuppressible (Fanon 1967) – force that reifies it as material presence. The facticity of somatic

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sensibilities endows embodied alterity with an ontic compulsion that would appear to precede any spatial determination. Anthropological literature has explored the relation between identities and contexts, and recent writings have especially attended to the manners in which new regimes of legibility have generated novel uncertainties and inspired ethnic conflicts. Some authors have argued that it is through the stabilization of contextual determinations, of the elusive scenery within which indeterminate identities unfold, that alterity becomes embodied in individuals (Appadurai 1998; Feldman 1991; Hansen 2002). Others, in contrast, have viewed ethnic violence today as targeting plainly recognizable others in the struggle over increasingly elusive boundaries (Friedman 2003). While acknowledging the variety of context-dependent forms that ethnicized antagonisms take, however, I would argue that, its apparent facticity notwithstanding, the encounter with embodied alterity always entails an inherent ambiguity that can only be domesticated tentatively through a situated dialectic of body and scenery. In order to understand why this is so, let me at this point consider two moments of the social constitution of embodied alterity as a form of difference. To begin, before we encounter particular corporeal markers as alterity they must first become mobilized as signifiers of otherness and rendered perceptible to our somatic sensibilities. The tongue clicks about which Karl complains or the odours that upset Uta emerge within socially mediated processes as signifiers of some incommensurable alterity, while other differences remain imperceptible or meaningless to them. But second, the construction of embodied alterity relies upon semiotic processes of stereotypification, themselves embedded in uneven social relations, through which concrete markers, as signifiers, become attached to particular signifieds. In the constitution of this indexically iconic relation,9 appearances are collapsed into essence and take the form of an immediate somatic materiality. Yet the semiotic binding of corporeal markers (as signifiers) and stereotypified tropes (as signifieds) remains a tenuous, socially mediated and context-driven process. The contingency of embodied alterity as the enactment of an indexically iconic relation implies that stereotypification depends upon situated, sometimes interactional interpretations that invoke notions of place, senses of time and ideologies of difference. Thus, for example, not only for Ole but for many other right extremists, a particular chronotopic (Bakhtin 1998) articulation of time (working hours), place (the Turkish eatery) and social roles (an ethnic division of labour) defines ‘Middle Eastern’ alterity as welcome behind the counter of a kebab stand, where it blends, so to speak, harmoniously into the scenery. Similarly, in the exchange about immigrants at the train-station kiosk, Martina invoked the Bangladeshi owner of a cheap eatery across the railway tracks to posit a common social Darwinist distinction that hinged upon place, time and activity between abusers of the welfare system and those who worked and paid their taxes. And Karl contrasts the upright Vietnamese whom ‘one sees everywhere during the day but [not] outside in the evenings’ with the parasitical Turks who ‘are outside the whole day’, at once proclaiming that ‘really any Turk who lives here [in Johannisthal] … works, one has a kiosk,

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the other has his Internet café, a restaurant, a produce shop’. The same material markers that bind paradigmatic figures of foreigners with social ills stand in other places and times for industriousness and normativity. Inherent to recognition, then, is an interpretative gesture that encompasses contextual cues that define the terms of encounter with markers of difference. Embodied alterity emerges as thoroughly imbricated in a tenuous reciprocal constitution of signs and scenery, identities and boundaries. Borders, Étienne Balibar reminds us, constitute identities by imposing a forced definition upon them, while themselves remaining inherently equivocal (2002: 76). But if that which traces the outlines of identity remains itself always equivocal, ambiguous boundaries and indeterminate identities cannot but go hand in hand, and the very constitution of identity necessarily incorporates an inherent equivocality. So far so good: in Neukölln, we are told, Turks are idle criminals while in Johannisthal they are hard-working citizens, and immigrants who linger about after working hours cannot be up to anything good. Yet what happens when alterity appears in ambiguous borderlands or in places where it is not meant to be? The contingency of alterity upon scenery implies that its signification could become impossible under certain circumstances: the signifier (somatically perceptible alterity) could fail to attach to a signified (a stereotypified notion) and remain utterly indecipherable. Alterity may simply appear ‘out of place’ (Douglas 2002), as, for example, outside the soccer stadium of a third division team with a reputation for a right-extremist fan base, where Elsa, a German mythology enthusiast with intimate links to politically organized right-extremist milieus, myself and a few others loitered before a match. While her friends chitchatted, Elsa took note of a nearby group of men who were audibly conversing in Turkish, and I became captivated by her silent stare, her wide-open eyes and the look of disbelief on her face. ‘What was that?’ was literally all she could enunciate, loudly and with flabbergasted distress, after they had walked away. In her everyday routines there was nothing outrageous about the presence of foreigners for Elsa: they were simply there as objects of her aversion. But in this eastern corner of the city, outside the stadium and surrounded by skinheads, the Turkish fans struck her as glaringly illegible.

Talking immigration Against this out-of-placeness, Elsa’s distressed astonishment mimicked general forms of encounter with otherness in Germany and in Europe more widely. As material signs of religious-ethnic alterity, mosques seem to enter the perceptual field of broad populations as out of place within it. This became glaringly evident during the broad protests that accompanied the commencement of construction work on the first mosque in eastern Berlin in 2006, where right-extremists advocating the immediate deportation of all ‘foreigners’ mingled with mainstream conservatives, desperate to appear respectable. According to the newspaper Die Welt, the leader of the protests proclaimed himself a beacon of tolerance regarding his

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lesbian daughter or Nigerian neighbours, but ‘thought it must have been a joke when he read … in the newspaper that a mosque would be built in his neighbourhood’ because ‘no Muslim has ever lived in “his part of the city”’ (Peter 2007). For him and many others, the struggle centred not on the presence of religious alterity in the city at large, much less in Germany or Europe, but on its perception as out of place in their own district, as a sign whose illegibility within their local scenery triggered incredulous disbelief and accentuated anxieties. Sharia law, arranged marriages and women coerced into burkas were all cited as possible scenarios for the imminent future of the neighbourhood. We find analogous outlines in debates about Muslim women’s head covering as ‘out of place’ in schools or at public offices (Walzer 1997). Elsa’s astonishment thus reflects the singularly vital position that immigration has come to occupy in mainstream contemporary politics in Germany and elsewhere in Europe. Today’s young right extremists enact broadly circulating discourses that have forcefully come to the fore in heated debates on immigration and asylum policies during the 1990s (Halfman 1997).10 Regardless of their legal or policy outcomes, these contestations propagated discursive topoi that have seeped as citations into the situated politics of right extremists. Their very vocabulary already signalled the difficulties of incorporating the other, who persisted as lexical difference.11 The CDU/CSU, for instance, has especially instrumentalized the question of Turkey’s EU bid in recent election campaigns. In 2004 Angela Merkel, then opposition leader, proposed a popular petition against Turkey’s membership. The idea was swiftly and unceremoniously scrapped, embarrassingly winning its most enthusiastic praise from the DVU and the NPD, which subsequently put Merkel’s vision into practice. Karl thus cites public deliberations far broader and more articulate than the crude rhetoric of extreme-right fringes when objecting to Turkey’s EU membership, even while the stakes for him centre not on a European future but on the tangible present of his everyday life. The trope of ‘criminal foreigners’ has equally reverberated across mainstream media representations and political idioms ( Jäger et al. 1998). Paradigmatically, the recent re-election campaign of the CDU governor of the state of Hessen, Roland Koch, centred on immigrant youth crime and called for more heavy-handed approaches. Irrespective of its political results, the broad public debate that ensued already authorized the trope of ‘foreigners’ criminality’ through incessant scandalization (see, for example, Sievert and Bittner 2008; Thorer et al. 2008). Immigration has saturated public debates also through tropes of labour (and unemployment) or of demographic anxieties. Both converged marvellously in the CDU candidate Jürgen Rüttgers’ campaign slogan ‘Kinder statt Inder’ (‘children instead of Indians’) during the 2000 state elections in North Rhein-Westphalia, which was immediately picked up by the right-extremist Republican party. On the left, the WASG (Arbeit und soziale Gerechtigkeit – Die Wahlalternative, Labour and Social Justice – The Electoral Alternative) party leader Oskar Lafontaine commented on ‘foreign workers’ (Fremdarbeiter) threatening Germans’ jobs.

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The electoral value of such strategies notwithstanding, their contours, as we have seen, resurface in the discourse of young right extremists. They rest not only upon xenophobic conservatism but equally upon social Darwinist politics that seek to import hi-tech labour while accelerating the export of deported refugees, and which abandon and vilify the socially marginalized. They reflect, too, the culturalization of racism. In Germany’s belated and troubled encounter with its heterogeneity, difference has become subservient to a vital notion of a German ‘dominant culture’ (Leitkultur) as the infrastructure upon which ornamentations could be tolerated (Borneman 2002). And they echo contemporary anxieties about civilizational incommensurabilities and linguistic diversification that extend far beyond Europe (Huntington 1997, 2004).

Conclusion My argument in this chapter has been that such public debates about immigration seep not only into right-extremist rhetoric, but also into the very manners that right extremists perceive and construe as a landscape of alterity in their daily habits. As the paramount screen against which European societies formulate and perform their differences, discourses about immigration outline schemas that organize the imagination of boundaries and landscapes, and that structure both the place and the out-of-placeness of alterity in situated local contexts. Among the right extremists with whom I worked, the salient political debates about immigration inflect the daily experience of late capitalist urban heterogeneity. The bigoted political visions to which they give rise, their claims notwithstanding, do not revolve around abstract postulates of identity. Theirs is a firmly – if misguidedly – locally situated politics. It is politics as a sinister rendering – but a rendering all the same – of the everyday in which they encounter the emergent contours of ethnicized geographies. It is, hence, politics as a paranoid sense of place wherein strangeness sediments and encroaches upon the familiar. Right-extremist Political Parties and ideologues may elaborate categorical platforms and uncompromising visions, but the social milieus to which they appeal and on which they crucially rely live out in full the seismic contradictions of late capitalism in the daily negotiation of their immediate, material worlds. Analytical understandings would therefore search in vain for a practical resolution of these contradictions in the habits of right extremists, much less for a conceptual coherence to their insidious politics. It is precisely the ethnographic focus on emplaced experience that stands to question such understandings, not only in registering inter-discursive circulations between ‘mainstream’ and ‘extreme’ but also by illuminating the locally embedded unfolding of ultra-nationalist politics in today’s Europe. Back at Little Istanbul, it was perhaps not gratuitous that Sebastian railed against ‘foreigners’ while praising the beer in his favoured locale, a Turkish restaurant. He and his peers voice not a party programme but rather various amalgamations of broadly circulating idioms. These open a space of ambiguity that allows, too, for precarious modes of (co)existence.

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Notes 1 The author is grateful for the generous support provided to this project by the University of Chicago, the Social Science Research Council, the Hannah Holborn Gray Mellon Fellowship and the Josephine De Karman Trust. 2 All names have been modified to protect the confidentiality of my subjects. 3 The concept of right extremism constitutes a politically loaded and contentious notion, which I have examined in detail elsewhere (Shoshan 2008) and will not have the space to expand upon here. I employ it as a ‘local category’, following its actual usage in today’s Germany, rather than as an analytical category (for scholarly definitions, see Butterwegge and Meier 2002; Schubarth and Stöss 2001). 4 In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Fischer was involved in violent clashes with the police. 5 Informed by the work of Charles Peirce, these approaches conceive of language – or any medium of meaning – primarily as action and process thoroughly embedded in socio-cultural contexts, rather than as mere communication or as an abstract system of arbitrary relations. Salient to them is the Peircean classification of sign-relations: icons (signification by similarity), indices (signification by proximity), and symbols (signification by convention) (see Parmentier 1994; Peirce 1960; Silverstein and Urban 1996). 6 Despite its essentializing ontological claims, I view ethnicity as very much a product and construct of our time, and as a political claim rather than a descriptive category (cf. Brubaker and Laitin 1998; Calhoun 2007; Tambiah 1996). 7 A label by which he and many others designated an East Asian population, largely consisting of immigrants of Vietnamese background, who arrived in East Germany as workers and remained following reunification. 8 ‘Fear zones’ have been used in Germany to designate areas perceived as especially tainted by right-extremist violence and hence particularly threatening for groups of potential victims. 9 The notion of indexical iconicity refers to the manner in which particular features (indices) of a group, for example linguistic or cultural characteristics, become their iconic representations, ‘as if they somehow displayed a social group’s inherent nature or essence’ (Irvine and Gal 2000: 37). 10 The ‘asylum compromise’ of 1993 constituted an official endorsement of the narrative of exaggerated leniency towards refugees. The remainder of the decade witnessed intense conflicts over reforms to Kaiser-era citizenship laws and National Socialist-era laws governing aliens (Senders 1996). 11 For example as ‘foreigners with a German passport’ (Ausländer mit deutschen Pass) or, more collegially, ‘co-citizens’ (Mitbürger).

Bibliography Alonso, A.M. 1994. ‘The Politics of Space, Time, and Substance: State Formation, Nationalism, and Ethnicity’, Annual Review of Anthropology, 23: 379–405. Appadurai, A. 1998. ‘Dead Certainty: Ethnic Violence in the Age of Globalization’, Public Culture, 10(2): 225–47. Asad, T. 2003. ‘Muslims as a “Religious Minority” in Europe’, in Formations of the Secular: Christianity, Islam, Modernity. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, pp. 159–80. Bakhtin, M.M. 1998. ‘Forms of Time and of the Chronotope in the Novel’, in M. Holquist (ed.), The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays. Austin: University of Texas Press, pp. 84–258. Balibar, É. 2002. ‘What is a Border?’ in E. Laclau and C. Mouffe (eds), Politics and the Other Scene. New York:Verso, pp. 75–86. Borneman, J. 2002. ‘Multikulti or Schweinerei in the Year 2000’, German Politics and Society, 20(2): 93–114.

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Brubaker, R. and Laitin, D.D. 1998. ‘Ethnic and Nationalist Violence’, Annual Review of Sociology, 24: 423–52. Bunzl, M. 2005. ‘Between Anti-Semitism and Islamophobia: Some Thoughts on the New Europe’, American Ethnologist, 32(4): 499–508. Butterwegge, C. and Meier, L. 2002. Rechtsextremismus. Freiburg: Herder. Calhoun, C. 2007. ‘Nationalism and Cultures of Democracy’, Public Culture, 19(1): 151–73. Comaroff , J. and Comaroff , J.L. 2001. ‘Millennial Capitalism: First Thoughts on a Second Coming’, in J. Comaroff and J.L. Comaroff (eds), Millennial Capitalism and the Culture of Neoliberalism. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, pp. 1–56. de Certeau, M. 1984. ‘Spatial Stories’, in The Practice of Everyday Life, Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, pp. 115–31. Douglas, M. 2002. Purity and Danger: An Analysis of Concept of Pollution and Taboo. New York: Routledge. Fanon, F. 1967. Black Skin,White Masks. New York: Grove Press. Feldman, A. 1991. Formations of Violence: the Narrative of the Body and Political Terror in Northern Ireland. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Friedman, J. 2003. ‘Globalization, Dis-integration, Re-organization: The Transformations of Violence’, in J. Friedman (ed.), Globalization, the State, and Violence. Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press, pp. 1–34. Hale, C.R. 2005. ‘Neoliberal Multiculturalism: the Remaking of Cultural Rights and Racial Dominance in Central America’, Political and Legal Anthropology Review, 28(1): 10–19. Halfman, J. 1997. ‘Immigration and Citizenship in Germany: Contemporary Dilemma’, Political Studies, 45: 260–74. Hansen, T.B. 2002. Wages of Violence: Naming and Identity in Postcolonial Bombay. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Harvey, D. 2001. Spaces of Capital:Towards a Critical Geography. New York: Routledge. Holmes, D.R. 2000. Integral Europe: Fast-Capitalism, Multiculturalism, Neofascism. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Huntington, S.P. 1997. The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order. New York: Touchstone. –––– 2004. Who Are We? The Challenges to America’s Identity. New York: Simon & Schuster. Irvine, J.T. and Gal, S. 2000. ‘Language Ideology and Linguistic Differentiation’, in P.V. Kroskrity (ed.), Regimes of Language: Ideologies, Polities, and Identities. Santa Fe, NM: James Currey, pp. 35–83. Jäger, M., Cleve, G., Ruth, I. and Jäger, S. (eds) 1998. Von deutschen Einzeltätern und ausländischen Banden. Duisburg: DISS. Parmentier, R.J. 1994. ‘Peirce Divested for Nonintimates’, in Signs in Society: Studies in Semiotic Anthropology. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, pp. 3–22. Peirce, C.S. 1960. Collected Papers. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. Peter, F. 2007. ‘Moschee-Streit in Berlin’, Die Welt Online, available at: http://www.welt. de/politik/article1021826/Moschee-Streit_in_Berlin.html (accessed 12 July 2007). Pred, A.R. 2000. Even in Sweden: Racisms, Racialized Spaces, and the Popular Geographical Imagination. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. Schubarth, W. and Stöss, R. 2001. Rechtsextremismus in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland: eine Bilanz. Opladen: Leske + Budrich. Senders, S. 1996. ‘Laws of Belonging: Legal Dimensions of National Inclusion in Germany’, New German Critique, 67: 147–76.

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Shoshan, N. 2008. ‘From SS to Stasi and Back Again? Ossis, Wessis, and Right-Extremists in Contemporary Germany’, in A. Sakalauskaite and D. Backman (eds), Ossi/Wessi. London: Cambridge Scholars Press, pp. 241–66. Sievert, A. and Bittner, M. 2008. ‘Wenn es Nacht wird, explodiert die Gewalt’, Bild, available at: http://www.bild.de/BILD/news/politik/2008/01/09/report-teil-3/angst-nacht,geo= 3434986.html (accessed 9 January 2008). Silverstein, M. 1997. ‘The Improvisational Performance of Culture in Realtime Discursive Practice’, in R.K. Sawyer (ed.), Creativity in Performance, Greenwich, CT: Ablex, pp. 265–91. Silverstein, M. and Urban, G. (eds) 1996. Natural Histories of Discourse. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Tambiah, S.J. 1996. Leveling Crowds: Ethnonationalist Conflicts and Collective Violence in South Asia. Berkeley: University of California Press. Thorer, T., Rickmann, A. and Sievert, A. 2008. ‘Jeder 5. Schüler wurde schon Opfer von Gewalt’, Bild, available at: http://www.bild.de/BILD/news/politik/2008/01/08/ report-jugendkriminalitaet-teil-2/serie-2,geo=3425768.html (accessed 8 January 2008). Walzer, M. 1997. On Toleration. New Haven, CT:Yale University Press.

4 EXTREME-RIGHT DISCOURSE IN BELGIUM A comparative regional approach Jérôme Jamin

Introduction From the 1970s a series of constitutional reforms progressively transformed the Belgian unitary state into a federal one and today, indeed, the first article of the Belgian constitution stipulates that ‘Belgium is a federal state made up of Communities and Regions’. As the result of federal reforms, each community and region has developed a substantially different political culture: the profile of key political players, the parties in power themselves and the issues which divide them, the political alliances they formed, all have evolved in different directions. It is not surprising, then, that the place of extreme-right parties, their profiles and discourses on the Belgian political stage vary greatly depending on whether one is analysing the Dutch-speaking Flemish region in the north of the country, the bilingual Brussels capital region or the French-speaking Walloon region in the south.1 This chapter will compare and contrast the extreme right in Wallonia, Brussels and Flanders within the context of the Belgian federal state. A brief discussion of the concept of ‘extreme right’ will be used to frame a study of the main extremeright parties in southern and northern Belgium, focusing on their discourse and their ideology, as expressed in speeches and manifestos. The objective is to question the nature of their programme and to assess to what extent they can be classified as extreme-right parties. Finally, the conclusion will explore to what extent different programmes may account for different levels of electoral support.

Defining the extreme right Along with the concepts of fascism and populism, the concept of the extreme right suffers from acute notional fuzziness; yet, even if there is no absolute consensus on how this concept is to be defined (Backes 2004; Camus 2008; Mudde 2000), it is

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now usually recognized that, when taken together, some specific ideological features form an extreme-right ideal-type. Among others, there is the belief in the inequality between people, ‘races’ and cultures which is a fundamental feature of an extreme-right ideology. The belief in inequality partly justifies a form of homogeneous nationalism as a political project to separate people, ‘races’ and cultures and to establish a hierarchy between them. A strong state is also perceived to be crucial for the extreme right in the sense that it provides the nation with the necessary authority to bring together (within a territory) individuals with supposedly common cultural and ‘biological’ origins; these origins make these individuals ‘racially’ superior beings (relative to foreigners and immigrants). Thus, the extreme right’s belief in the purity and homogeneity of the national group endorses the development of racism, xenophobia and anti-Semitism. Together, they are all strategies to fight against the enemies of the homogeneous, white people. Finally, the extreme right is also characterized by its radicalism, that is to say it addresses the ‘root’ (radix) of the phenomenon it perceives as the problem, and deploys extreme solutions in its efforts to give shape to nationalism. The belief in inequality, nationalism and radicalism encompasses most of the features found in the existing literature about the extreme right ( Jamin 2009: 123, 124): as such, in this chapter, they will serve as a template to decipher the extremeright ideology in Belgium.

The extreme right in French-speaking Belgium Strictly speaking, there has been no violent, organized and active extreme-right group in French-speaking Belgium since the end of the 1980s. The lack of racial violence and the poor electoral results of the extreme right in Wallonia and Brussels undoubtedly explain why the extreme right has not attracted the same academic and political interest in this region as in the Flemish part of Belgium or indeed as south of the border, in France. Indeed, in Belgian and international academic literature, the attention devoted to the extreme right ‘refers almost exclusively to a single [Flemish] political party: the Vlaams Belang’ (Delwit 2007: 141). There is also something enigmatic and elusive about the French-speaking extreme right, which may explain both its poor electoral results and the lack of academic scrutiny: it is rife with secrecy and factionalism and its political orientation is notoriously unstable. Each election reveals squabbles and quarrels between individuals, doctrinal divergence and a flurry of condemnations of elected representatives for racism (Faniel 2009: 13–15). The shadowy atmosphere surrounding the French-speaking extreme right in Wallonia and Brussels makes it a particularly difficult object to describe and analyse. Based on the criteria set out in the first part of this chapter, the following parties are usually defined as extreme-right parties: the Front National (FN, National Front), formed in 1985 and led by its once ‘lifetime president’ Daniel Féret until 2008;2 the Front Nouveau de Belgique (FNB, New Belgian Front), a breakaway

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from the FN formed in 1996 by Marguerite Bastien; the (Flemish) Vlaams Belang (VB),3 which courts French-speaking voters in Brussels and the Hainaut region. The FN, FNB and VB have secured, in varying proportions and geographical areas, a degree of electoral support and media visibility when compared to other competing parties and small groups operating on the right of the right of the political spectrum. With the exception of Agir, an extremist Walloon party formed in Liège in 1989, which experienced a short-lived electoral success in 1994, there are numerous small extreme-right parties which are not included in this discussion as their influence is limited to very small geographical areas, such as a district, and are often unknown outside this area, as is the case in Liège, Brussels or Charleroi districts: these tiny parties include the Parti Social-Démocrate (PSD, Social Democratic Party), Intérêts Citoyens Bruxelles (ICB, Interests of the Citizens of Brussels), the Bloc Wallonie Libre (Bloc WL, Free Wallonia Bloc) and Référendum (REF, Referendum Party) (Blaise 2004: 152–55). The FN, FNB and other small district-level parties are together characterized by leadership feuds, fratricidal battles, ‘micro-disputes and micro-disagreements’, ideological and doctrinal disagreements, opportunism and lack of charismatic leadership (Delwit 2007: 148; Faniel 2009: 13–15). This means that the Frenchspeaking extreme right has no framework, no project, no organization and, while not vacuous, no coherent programme. It is also an extreme right which has no real, easily identifiable electoral base with the exception of the FN (Alaluf 1998; Delwit 2007). Sharing the same name, and the same acronym as its powerful French counterpart, the Belgian FN has managed to stand out a little from the crowd for the past ten years, and more specifically since the June 2004 regional elections. For this reason, we shall focus specific attention on Daniel Féret’s Front National. From 1995 to 2004, the French-speaking extreme right was electorally weak. Indeed, in purely electoral terms, ‘it experienced a significant downturn in the 1995 legislative elections and the 2000 local elections, followed by a sharp surge in the 2003 federal elections, despite its near-total absence from the electoral campaign’ (Blaise 2004: 174). A number of small, weak and fragmented extreme-right parties disappeared between 1995 and 2003, and Daniel Féret’s Front National has become the only extreme-right party in French-speaking Belgium not to be a splinter group, a defunct party or an empty shell. ‘Within this shifting landscape of fragmented groups, … since the end of the 1980s Daniel Féret’s Front National has constituted the leading figurehead of the French-speaking extreme right’ (Alaluf 1998: 101). The most recent figures from local, regional and national elections in 2004 and 2007 confirm the FN as the main extreme-right party in southern Belgium. With more than eight per cent at regional level in 2004, and in 2007 between five and eight per cent at the national level (lower and upper house), notably in some districts such as Liège (4.51 per cent), Hainaut (7.87 per cent) or Namur (4.97 per cent) (Service public fédéral de l’intérieur 2009), FN remains the main radical actor in southern Belgium.

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The Front National’s programme Since the party’s creation in September 1985, the Front National’s programme has been a deliberate – and confirmed as such – copy of the French Front National’s programme. The newly created party’s aim ‘was clear: to benefit from the media coverage given to the French National Front following [its electoral breakthrough in] the European elections of 1984’ (Delwit 2007: 145). Article 4 of its statutes unambiguously specifies that one of the party’s objectives is ‘to favour the dissemination of the arguments, opinions and publications of the French Front National political party’ (Rea 1995: 38). As Art explains, ‘Féret made no attempt to hide the fact that he was copying the Front National of Jean-Marie Le Pen, taking the French party’s name along with many of its symbols and slogans’ (Art 2008: 430). Indeed, the objective was to create within a united Belgium a party equivalent to the French FN. This new party, according to Alain Sadaune (Walloon FN Member of Parliament) in La Flamme (December 1995), would be able to ‘protect’ the Belgian nation and its white population not only against immigration and ‘its disastrous consequences’ in terms of security and employment, but also against ‘those traitors who are opening the gates of our beautiful, peace-loving country to the barbarian hordes who come to pillage the land of our ancestors and our grandchildren’s inheritance’ (quoted by Abramowicz 1996: 45). However, most authors who have tried to analyse the doctrinal content of the Belgian FN’s programme agree that the various versions published since 1985 have lacked precision and consistency (Alaluf 1995, 1998; Delwit 2007; Delwit and De Waele 1998; Rea 1995, 1996). It is nonetheless possible to highlight three policy sectors which provide some clues about the ideological nature of the FN. These policy sectors are immigration, security and the state of the Belgian economy (including taxation and employment policies). From the outset, according to Rea (1996: 197), ‘the FN has made the fight against immigration a policy priority and the sole answer to two social problems: the fight against abuse of welfare provisions and the fight against insecurity, in the name of a political imperative – the defence of a national identity’. Whereas anti-Semitism and revisionism are still very much prominent in the arguments developed by the FN, Rea has shown that xenophobia and racism against (nonEuropean) immigrants appear by far to be the party’s priority. He adds that the FN has put forward two solutions to respond to the perceived threat of immigration: ‘repatriation of non-European immigrants and national preference’, a simple and effective way, for the FN, of reducing unemployment, the cost of poverty, welfare spending and insecurity (Rea 1996: 197). The FN’s different policy treatment of immigrants according to whether or not they are of European origin, in particular its obsession against non-European immigrants from the Third World and ‘Muslim fanatics’, is not new and has been well documented (Brewaeys et al. 1992: 27–28). Foreigners from France, Germany or Italy have never been considered by the FN in the same way as non-European foreigners. Abramowicz argues that for the FN ‘in contrast to Italians, Spaniards etc., it is not possible to integrate extra-European

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foreigners due to their contrary culture, religion and history, and also because there are “too many of them”’ (Abramowicz 1996: 46–47). In general terms, the literature highlights that the FN’s rejection of foreigners is even stronger when they come from Africa and/or a Muslim country. Today, the party’s programme still advocates ‘a very tough stance on law and order, and never fails to denounce loudly the damaging effects of immigration and multicultural society’ (Delwit 2007: 146). Alongside immigration, law and order constitutes the second pillar – the second tangible doctrinal element – of the Belgian FN’s programme. If over the past decade or so, most mainstream parties have sought to increase the visibility of their law and order policy in their programme, as a tough stance on rising crime and violence usually brings many electoral rewards, the relationship between immigration and insecurity still remains an indisputable trademark of the extreme right. The FN always plays the ‘crime card’ in a way which deliberately associates immigration and insecurity, ‘thus maintaining the deliberate confusion between delinquency and immigration’ ( Jamin 2005: 21). From 1985 onwards, supported by dubious statistics and unproven causal links, the FN has systematically sought to demonstrate that there is a link between immigration on the one hand, and insecurity, delinquency, criminality, prostitution and drug trafficking on the other. The literature contains numerous examples of stigmatization and demonization of immigrants by the FN. On each occasion, ‘various sources are used to establish a relationship between immigration and insecurity’ and particularly to talk about the ‘Lebanonization of our country’. The 1991 violent confrontation between the police and young people from the poor district of Forest, a district with a strong Moroccan population, is often used as an example to demonstrate a correlation between immigration and insecurity, glossing over the socio-economic roots of discontent affecting all youngsters in Forest, regardless of their origins (Vandemmeulebroucke and Haquin 1991). Indeed, the 1991 riots happened in poor boroughs and have been analysed as a claim for social and political recognition by young migrants (Rea 2002). Likewise, the FN asserts that ‘it is no coincidence that the eight high-risk municipal districts (of Brussels) are those with the highest concentration of immigrants’ (Rea 1995: 44–45). The denunciation of ‘communautarisme’ by the Belgian FN – that is, a denunciation of multi-cultural policies – is made with explicit references to the assimilationist version of the French republican model. Here again, the Belgian FN follows the French FN when it asserts the French republican model is ‘under attack’. In light of the above, it is not surprising to learn that the FN proposes application of the death penalty for terrorists and criminals, emergency repatriation of criminal delinquents, ‘de-naturalization’ of immigrant delinquents and improved status for the police (Rea 1996: 198). The FN explains unambiguously how it intends to restore internal security: ‘We’re not ashamed to say that we prefer policemen to hooligans, young people to drug dealers and victims to murderers’ (quoted by Brewaeys et al. 1992: 28). The FN also devotes a substantial part of its programme to socio-economic issues, including taxation policy and the fight against unemployment. In two

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contributions to collective works on the extreme right, Alaluf (1995, 1998) focuses on the FN’s socio-economic programme. For a long time, this programme remained embryonic, poor and vague, but it has gained some substance over the years, notably as the FN intended to sharpen its profile in electoral contests (Alaluf 1998: 102). With respect to employment, Alaluf explains that for the FN, ‘it is the repatriation of immigrants that will free up jobs for Belgians and Europeans to whom priority will have been restored’ (1998: 103). Via full employment, this approach will enable the rate of income tax to be reduced; a parental salary to be established for those wishing to have children and take time off work to look after them; and, among other measures, policemen and prison guards to be better paid. Today, the FN’s socio-economic programme is still structured around those policies (Alaluf 2008). In social terms, it is the inversion of migratory flows that will enable immigrants to be sent back to their own countries and budgets intended for their integration to be used for ‘destitute compatriots only’. On this subject, the FN’s programme explains that detention centres for ‘illegal’ immigrants will make decent homes for poor Belgians. The inversion of migratory flows will also serve to put an end to unfair competition between Belgian workers and (illegal) immigrants. Ultimately, the FN proposes to implement a welfare chauvinist programme by setting up a special, separate social security fund for immigrants. Taken together, the above proposals, the FN argues, would solve the major problems of poverty, exclusion and unemployment in Belgium. Finally, with respect to taxation, the FN’s programme advocates a form of ultra-liberal protectionism (Alaluf 2008: 53), proposing to reduce taxes and free up the economy and, at the same time, to protect Belgian businesses against unfair competition from non-European countries. This supports Rea’s contention that the FN’s social and economic programme ‘reflects the party’s two ideological influences, one national-populist and the other ultra-liberal’ (Rea 1996: 198). A deep analysis of the latest version of the FN’s programme (3 September 2011) does not show a significant evolution in terms of content. If the socio-economic issues have not changed through the years, some changes need to be highlighted in the field of migration in relation to the Muslim population in Belgium. As in most of its neighbouring countries such as Holland and France ( Jamin 2011: 43–45), immigration appears in the 2011 programme through the ‘Islamic threat’. Uncontrolled immigration, ‘failed integration’, ‘fake refugees’, ‘foreign influences’ and ‘communautarismes’ are common features, but they are rehashed to reflect a growing importance of Islamophobia in the discourse of the extreme right: references to Islam as a cultural (polygamy) and security threat (terrorism and law and order) are now common and seek to alert Belgians against all forms of ‘Islamic invasion’. On numerous occasions, the FN and its members have been sued for racism by non-governmental organizations (NGOs) or public institutions. Thus it is hardly surprising that the FN intends to review the anti-racist legislation, arguing that it inherently limits freedom of speech (Programme of the Front National 2011).

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The Front National as an extreme-right party We have seen at the beginning of this chapter that the inequality between people and races, nationalism and radicalism are three useful qualities to identify the ideology of the extreme right.The inequality between races and cultures appears implicitly in the so-called incapacity of migrants from Muslim countries to integrate into Belgian culture and society. If this inequality is never described or conceptualized very clearly, the way the FN conflates in one single group migrants, Islam, fundamentalism and terrorism reveals the Manichean nature of its position. In terms of nationalism, the exclusive and emotive view of the nation and the sacrosanct status ascribed to the white race are seen in all the FN’s provisions aiming to reverse migratory flows in order to save the ‘racially superior’ Belgian people and protect its ‘ancestral’ culture. Racism, xenophobia and anti-Semitism and now Islamophobia – both as a reaction to and as a strategy against the enemies of the people – form an integral part of the FN’s programme, pamphlets and flyers. Such publications are crammed with caricatures, insults and attacks on immigrants, particularly those of African origin (from Third World and Muslim countries). Such a radical racist discourse relies on the exaltation of inequality as a means to protect the nation. Likewise, the desire to establish an authoritarian regime of ‘absolute law and order’ is another form of radicalism which is at the heart of the FN’s project: from increasing the power given to the police forces (and improving its members’ pay and working conditions) to the reintroduction of the death penalty, the FN reveals its aversion to the principles of liberal democracy and its taste for authoritarian values.

The extreme right in Dutch-speaking Belgium In northern Belgium, there is some overlap between the Flemish movement, Flemish nationalism and the Flemish extreme right (De Witte and Spruyt 2004: 127), and this often tends to cloud the analysis of what is happening on the Flemish political stage. There are, of course, some crucial differences between these three political strands. The Flemish movement seeks social, cultural and economic emancipation; it is a pluralist movement which, since the creation of Belgium in 1830, attracts members and supporters from a wide range of political, cultural and socioeconomic backgrounds. Flemish nationalism represents the political arm of the Flemish movement. Its main political demand is the emancipation of the Flemish people in the Walloon region as well as the continuous federalization of the country. Again, the defence of Flemish interests through political action accommodates a degree of political pluralism and Flemish nationalism attracts a huge variety of actors from different backgrounds and with different ideas and programmatic objectives. Both the Flemish movement and Flemish nationalism support democratic principles and practices and both seek to promote a reformist agenda to further Flemish interests. The Flemish extreme right, for its part, has historically had strong links to Flemish nationalism even if the latter cannot be reduced to this specific political

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ideology (De Witte and Spruyt 2004). As Art explains, in Flanders, ‘the postwar far right was incorporated into a mainstream nationalist movement that dates back over a century’ (Art 2008: 421). But in 1978, the Vlaams-Nationale Partij (VNP) and the Vlaamse Volkspartij (VVP), both nationalist and radical, merged to form a new party called Vlaams Blok (VB). With the years, Vlaams Blok has become a well-organized party with important electoral success. Since the 24 November 1991 general election, now remembered as ‘Dimanche noir’ (Black Sunday) which led to the emergence of the VB on the political scene when it won 10 per cent of the votes,‘there [is] no doubt that the party had consolidated its place in the Flemish party system’ (Art 2008: 429). Between 1991 and 2010, the party never stopped gaining new voters. In the 2003 general election, the VB won 11.3 per cent of the votes. In 2004 at the regional election, it raised 24.2 per cent of the votes. In 2007 during the general elections, its score reached 12 per cent of the votes (Service public fédéral de l’intérieur 2009).This rise seems likely to be arrested by the arrival of the popular and nationalist NVA (Nieuw-Vlaamse Alliantie) which gained 17.4 per cent of the votes during the general elections of 2010, recovering many electors from the VB through its effective non-racist nationalist discourse, and reducing the VB to 7.76 per cent.

Vlaams Belang’s programme While French-speaking Belgium’s Front National openly draws its inspiration from the French Front National, the situation is very different with respect to VB, whose nationalism differs radically from that of Jean-Marie Le Pen’s party. Studied by De Witte and Scheepers,VB’s ideology ‘gives priority to the conception of a nationalist organisation of the State, which views the people as an ethnic “community” with hereditary links’. In this way, ‘the concept of nationality is founded on “biological consanguinity”’ and ‘since the structure of the State must follow the “natural ethnic structure”, [the party] opts for an organically and hierarchically ordered Flanders’. De Witte and Scheepers conclude that the emphasis placed on ‘a State organisation founded on ethnic nationalism also implies that the State must be monocultural and monoracial’ (De Witte and Scheepers 1998: 100–101). Comments from VB’s main leaders, including those of former party leader Filip Dewinter, tend to confirm this analysis: ‘If we want an independent Flanders, we must ignore the laws of Belgium. I remain convinced that democracy is only possible in the context of homogeneous ethnic communities. There is no democracy in Belgium’ (Dewinter 1995). Ethnicity is perceived by VB as defined by cultural, racial, linguistic and identity characteristics. It rests on biological inequality between given ethnic groups and requires the promotion of a vigorous form of nationalism to protect the interests of the superior ethnic group. As De Witte and Scheepers point out,VB supports both ethnic nationalism and state nationalism, as revealed by its discourse and programme. First, the VB conceives the Flemish people as ‘an ethnic community with hereditary links’ united by ‘biological consanguinity’. The Flemish people is driven

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by ‘a natural ethnic structure’ which requires each member of the community to found a large family, favour monogamous marriage and categorically reject other types of relationship (De Witte and Scheepers 1998: 103). Within VB’s discourse, national interests are more important than individual ones, and everyone must submit to ‘the organic whole’. Second, the VB ascribes a specific role to the ‘nationalist State’: it exists to support the ‘natural, ethnic structure’ and to protect the Flemish ethnic group against potential enemies; it advocates an independent Flanders, rejects immigrants who threaten the cultural integrity and biological homogeneity of the Flemish people and condemns ‘the political mafia’ and traditional parties who encourage immigration and favour the development of corruption. Most authors who have tried to analyse the doctrinal content of the Frenchspeaking Belgian FN’s programme agree that the various versions published since 1985 have lacked precision and consistency. It is, however, much easier to analyse the VB’s core policies. These include opposition to immigration, an attachment to the idea of hierarchy, recognition of inequalities between ‘races’, peoples and cultures and the need to set up a system of segregation. These points have multiple consequences, particularly in relation to VB’s conception of work and the place of workers in Flemish society. On reading the party’s flyers and electoral programme, it is clear that what concerns Filip Dewinter is not so much foreigners from Eastern Europe but immigration from Africa and the Maghreb, or what is referred to in the VB’s jargon as ‘Muslim’ immigration. This immigration threatens the cultural and ‘racial’ integrity of the Flemish people by introducing into Flanders individuals who are foreigners, refugees, fundamentalists and potential terrorists. Leaders of VB have spoken out very clearly on this subject: ‘Only prostitutes leave their doors wide open. We have no wish to turn Flanders into a public brothel open to all the foreigners of Africa and Asia.’ In a country with 400,000 unemployed, as they have often explained, ‘it is irresponsible to maintain a small army of unemployed foreigners’, since immigrants ‘come to our country to take advantage of our social benefits’.4 Vlaams Belang’s programme in relation to immigration contains multiple attacks on the European Convention on Human Rights. Its discourse sets out extreme measures against immigrants and challenges some of their fundamental rights. Thus, ‘freedom of association must be restricted for foreigners, as must the right to family reunification’, the right to ownership and to (racial) non-discrimination. The programme proposes ‘separate education and social security systems’ for foreigners, restrictions on the right to family allowances and the right to collect unemployment benefit, as well as taxes on companies which hire foreigners (Swyngedouw and Ivaldi 2001: 15). The extreme right’s discourse is also built on the fundamental claim that racial and biological inequality is a structuring and hierarchical factor, conditioning access to political, economic and cultural rights and resources. The Flemish VB fits into this conception of the world, making use of a highly developed ethnic, cultural and racial hierarchy (Van Craen and Swyngedouw 2003). Within its propaganda,

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the Flemish sit at the top of the racial pyramid, followed by the Dutch, the white Afrikaners of South Africa (VB long gave its unconditional support to the South African apartheid regime), then the French-speaking Flemish of Brussels, Wallonia and French Flanders (in France), who are inferior but nevertheless share some traits with the Flemish. Foreigners of European origin are next on the hierarchical list, above foreigners of non-European origin, who no longer have any relationship to the Flemish people and are at the very bottom of the pyramid. Adamson and Johns have for their part established a list of ‘negative others’ who might complete with new examples the hierarchy and the pyramid. Those ‘others’ are to be contrasted with, and indeed set in direct opposition to, the nation in the VB ideology. The list of ‘negative others’ include Belgium, Wallonia, the European Union, bureaucracy and bureaucrats, the ‘political establishment’ and immigrants (Adamson and Johns 2008: 137). The hierarchy above and the list of ‘others’ point to the idea of inequality. According to Swyngedouw and Ivaldi,VB thinks that ‘egalitarianism is fundamentally wrong and goes against the laws of nature’ (Swyngedouw and Ivaldi 2001: 6). Inequality justifies the unequal distribution of wealth, and it is within this context that the slogan ‘our people first’ and the principle of national preference acquire a particular salience. This principle illustrates both the centrality of inequality within extreme-right discourse and the consequences of such discourse on individuals’ and groups’ access to rights and resources within the extremists’ programme. The principle of national preference postulates, and presents as legitimate, access to fundamental rights and the redistribution of wealth according to ethnic, cultural or racial criteria. In terms of the economy, Swyngedouw and Ivaldi show that the idea of ‘working humanity’ was fundamental, for VB, to human kind. For the extreme right, they explain: there is neither the right to be lazy nor homo ludens. Service is an obligation determined by each individual’s position or role within the natural community. Rights may only be obtained through productive work, and individuals need to be trained primarily on the basis of a feeling of responsibility towards the community. (Swyngedouw and Ivaldi 2001: 6) ‘The lack of a right to be lazy’, which lies at the heart of VB’s discourse, takes on particular significance within the context of the Belgian State, which is characterized not only by strong cultural and linguistic cleavages, but also by important socio-economic disparities. Indeed, while linguistic and cultural cleavages have provided the VB with a powerful political opportunity to disseminate its message and make its own part of the traditional Flemish nationalist separatist discourse, social and economic disparities over the Belgian territory have also enabled the party’s leaders to praise the resilience of Flemish workers in the (now) prosperous north of the country whose hard work is undermined by the laziness of the Walloons

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in the largely rusty, de-industrialized south, thus opposing Belgian citizens on a social and economic basis (jobs, unemployment, benefits, etc.). For Filip Dewinter, the wealth of ‘his’ people is threatened by what he perceives to be the ineffectual and largely corrupt Belgian federal state. Within VB’s rhetoric, the Flemish people is threatened by socialist, communist and leftist Walloons who run the country and distribute wealth to Muslims and foreigners (for their mosques) and to their unemployed, lazy, decadent, inactive Walloons. For a former VB leader, ‘it would be unthinkable for the Stalinist socialist party to lay down the law to Flanders. Or for [a Walloon leader of Belgium] to continue stealing billions of Euro from the the Flemish. Let’s be clear about this: it is we, the Flemish, who keep the Walloons alive’ (quoted in Le Soir 2004).

Vlaams Belang and French-speaking Brussels The Parliament of the bilingual ‘Région de Bruxelles-Capitale’ is composed of 89 regional representatives. They are elected under universal suffrage for a period of five years in a single constituency by all the voters living in one of the 19 districts composing the territory of the region. Candidates who wish to register for the elections need to apply on different lists according to language. They issue a statement which notifies in which linguistic group they want to apply and then join either the French linguistic group or the Flemish linguistic group. We saw above that the FN has no real opponent in Wallonia. The situation is different in Brussels where only the VB, through its French-speaking propaganda, is in a position to challenge the FN (Faniel 2009: 15). In terms of ideology, targeted research into the place of Islam and Muslims within VB’s French language publications between 2000 and 2004 (Alves Dos Santos 2004) reveals an increasingly systematic hounding of the Arab-Islamic community by the party. Drawing on a systematic analysis of Vérités Bruxelloises, VB’s French language magazine edited by Johan Demol (former chief commissioner of the Schaerbeek police), Alves Dos Santos has been able to show the extent to which Islam and Muslims are systematically likened to unemployed, profiteering delinquents at best, and to religious fanatics and terrorist criminals at worst. Relative to other minorities and categories of foreigners, ‘Arab-Islamics’ seem to be the monopoly target for stigmatization and demonization within VB’s discourse: ‘the recurrence of attacks against Islam is quite blatant. Over four years, there is not a single publication that fails to take up this theme.Yesterday it was immigrants who were coming to steal jobs from the Belgians; today it is Muslims’ (Alves Dos Santos 2004: 99). Likewise, recent data from the VB website show that the persistence of a ‘Muslim threat’ is a major, recurrent theme. Nevertheless, if the VB has a specific discourse about Muslims directed at French-speaking voters, articles from the VB directed at Flemish voters in Brussels reveal some differences. As an example, an issue of The Flemish Republic explained in 2008 that ‘half of the Brussels population … is no longer Belgian but foreign. Many are Europeans, others are Muslims of North African or Turkish origin, who also

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prefer French to Dutch. …The islamification of Brussels is driving many Belgians out of the city’ (The Flemish Republic 2008: 2). Since the article was written with Flemish voters in mind, the ‘Muslim’ threat appears to be two-fold: first there is the islamification of Brussels and second, Muslims are more likely to vote for French rather than Flemish parties. As such, ‘Brussels might become a French-speaking Muslim city’.

The Vlaams Belang as an extreme-right party ‘The Vlaams Belang will remain what it is: a Flemish-nationalist party defending family values and morality, standing for sound economic principles and for the introduction of direct democracy in an independent and free Flanders’ (The Flemish Republic 2008: 3). If this quotation from the new chairman of the VB, Bruno Valkeniers, sounds like a support for democratic practices, at an ideological level the VB remains a traditional extreme-right party, with strong fascist tendencies. First, the political socialization of most VB leaders and active members is instructive: historically their early career is often influenced by their involvement in the Vlaamse Militanten Orde (VMO), a private militia, the Voorpost, a paramilitary group, the Nationalistische Studentenvereniging (NSV, an extreme-right students union), and even in pro-Nazi organizations, which manage gatherings of former Second World War collaborators or their nostalgic supporters. For instance, the founder of the Vlaams Blok, Karel Dillen, openly supported the Nazi invasion in 1940 and claimed that during the German occupation, he was ‘a strong supporter of what we called l’Ordre Nouveau [New Order], because I hoped that the emancipation of Flanders was about to be finally a reality’ (quoted by Gijsels 1993: 206). Dillen, who died in 2007, is still an important symbol for the VB, as testified by the number of articles written about him and his career in the VB press.The VB’s programme also reveals an enduring nostalgia for the Second World War: proposals to secure the amnesty of former collaborators still figure prominently in the VB’s programme. The programme also encompasses themes which chime with a fascist ideology: proposals are made to promote an ethnically pure, independent Flanders (Flemish and white) while supporting strong anti-immigration policies. It praises inequality between races, peoples and cultures and it repeatedly targets foreigners, who are held responsible for criminality and insecurity. Within VB’s Brussels propaganda, stigmatized foreigners have gradually given way to immigrants from Muslim countries, and subsequently to ‘Arabs’ in a very general sense (De Witte and Spruyt 2004: 130–4). Today, because of the permanent threat of a conviction for racism, the VB representatives have significantly changed the words they use against foreigners ‘invading’ Flanders (Erk 2005). As an example, the current manifesto of the VB only talks about ‘reversing the erroneous multicultural policies’: inspired by its concern to defend and protect the cultural identity of the Flemish people, the VB rejects the tenets of the multicultural ideology. Likewise, and logically, the VB is also a strong

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supporter of the abolition of the Belgian Anti-Racism Act of 30 July 1981 which is at the origin of the permanent threat seen above.

Conclusion What are the common points and the differences between the VB and the FN in terms of ideologies and discourse today? The VB’s ethno-nationalism is the most significant feature of the Flemish extreme-right party and appears to be the most striking difference when the VB is compared to the French-speaking FN. In its introduction, the FN’s manifesto makes it clear that it intends to promote what it calls unitarism: ‘We, men and women, belong to the same nation, we share the same habits and customs, a similar way of thinking and the same essential values. We have a common heritage with its roots in the Greek and Latin but also German culture’ (FN Manifesto 2011). While the VB directs its programme against ‘unemployed lazy Walloons’ from the south, the FN’s manifesto does not seek to polarize Flemish and Walloon communities by drawing attention to potential socioeconomic disparities between the north and the south of the country or by ascribing to each community different ‘ethnic’ values. As a result, the VB and the FN do have a different perception of Islam: if both perceive Islam to be a threat, the VB’s ethno-nationalist nature compels it to reject Islam as a threat to its own quest for an ethnically homogeneous Flemish community. Conversely, the FN’s rejection of Islam is framed by an integrationist stance, inspired by the French republican model. This model claims that, irrespective of their origins, all immigrants can integrate into a given national community and repudiate their cultural values to embrace those of the community in which they intend to live. The FN argues that the prescriptions of the Qur’an make this integration process impossible, as Belgian values are incompatible with Islam. Despite such differences, the discourses of the VB and the FN also reveal some significant similarities. First, several of the VB and FN representatives have been sued for incitement to racial hate under the 1981 Act: as a consequence, both parties have readjusted their rhetoric to avoid further sanctions (Erk 2005). Today, they fight less against ‘races’ than against what they perceive as the disastrous consequences of a ‘multicultural society’, and behind it, against the danger that religion (mainly Islam) poses to a society. Both parties display a common and growing opposition to Islam and migrants from Muslim countries, and it is not without a degree of irony that both parties openly demand the abrogation of the 1981 Act in the name of freedom of speech. Second, both parties have toned down, if not stamped out, their anti-Semitic rhetoric, at least in their public discourse. For instance, the sort of revisionist arguments, once developed by Karel Dillen, and which had gained a certain visibility in the VB press have now all but disappeared (Gijsels 1993: 182–92). On the contrary, the VB is courting the Jewish vote, notably in Antwerp: as an electoral strategy, its pro-Israeli stance, for instance, is key in seeking to attract Jewish voters, as much as its insistence in denouncing Islam and the Arab worlds as the physical,

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cultural and political threat. For example, Filip Dewinter, the VB’s previous chairman, gave an interview to the New York-based Jewish Week (28 October 2005) explaining he was not racist but Islamophobe: what he intended to demonstrate was Jews and the VB shared the same fear of Islam in both Europe and the United States. The FN has also changed its rhetoric. Its huge support of Jean-Marie Le Pen’s revisionist outbursts (as was the case in 1987 when Le Pen declared that the ‘gas chambers were a detail’ in the Second World War), has now disappeared and the FN now promptly condemns such statements: when Le Pen reiterated his revisionist views in the European Parliament on 25 March 2009, the Belgian FN was quick to express its disapproval. It is also true that any anti-Semitic stance may now bear a significant political cost: in 1995, Belgium passed a law prohibiting the negation or the trivialization of the Holocaust. Is there any correlation between the discourses and programmes of each party and their respective electoral success? Why is the VB doing so much better than the FN? The classical way to explain such differences in terms of electoral support rests on the poor internal organization of the FN: behind the label, there is no real party. The FN is first of all characterized by its numerous ‘micro-disputes and microdisagreements’ between individuals and its lack of leadership, often decimated by legal actions against its main leaders. Yet, the nature of the each party’s ideology may also be an important factor in explaining diverging electoral fortunes. Nationalism is not as important in the FN’s rhetoric as it is in that of the VB. The sort of nationalism which prevails in the VB is part of a broader Flemish nationalism which lends it a degree of legitimacy both within the population and among the political elites. If nationalism is part of the FN’s programme, it does not raise the same interest among voters as it does in northern Belgium, particularly in the Flemish movement. The nature of each party’s ideology might also have had an impact on the way the FN and VB managed or failed to build strategic relations with other traditional parties. While parties in the south have clearly isolated the extreme right from all participation and ostracized its political ideas since the 1990s, parties in Flanders have isolated the extreme right by means of a political cordon sanitaire but there is a degree of porosity between the ideas and policies of the VB and that of other parties. Questions linked to Flemish identity, Islam, migrants and the refugees have become part of the public debate in Flanders whereas in the south, a consensus has led the traditional parties to avoid controversies on such issues (Delwit and De Waele 1998: 243). This difference has been reinforced by the way the media have chosen to present the extreme right: whereas in the name of democracy, the media from the north have defended the VB’s right to make its case in newspapers and on television, the media in the south have used the 1981 law, which prohibits racist rhetoric, to justify the eviction of the FN from the television studios. A final reason may explain the different electoral fortunes of extreme-right parties in Belgium. As Delwit explained, for the FN, ‘the issue of exercising responsibilities is nowhere on the agenda; neither in the party nor outside it as a theme of the programme whereas several extreme-right parties in Europe have now

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exercised responsibilities at different levels’. The FN, Delwit argues, ‘does not have either the means or any real ambition to develop possible niches of competence in local public life. It cannot even act as a Tribune in the council …, in such a context, the question of power … simply does not arise’ (Delwit 2007: 147, 152). The attitude of the FN regarding the access to and exercise of power has nothing in common with the VB and its longstanding fight to access power. This attitude might also have an impact on the choice made by the potential voters.

Notes 1 There is also a German-speaking community located within the territory of the Walloon region in the south. This community is not relevant to this chapter. 2 The FN is led today (in September 2011) by Patrick Cocriamont. 3 Once named Vlaams Blok, the party became Vlaams Belang in November 2004 within the context of a change of legal status in order to avoid legal charges for racist speeches. We will keep the new name for this chapter. 4 Extract from comments by Filip Dewinter at Vlaams Belang’s Fête de la Famille (Celebration of the Family) in 1991, in Baas eigen land (April 2000) and at the ‘Confronting the Foreign Invasion’ organized by Bruxelles-Identité-Sécurité (BIS, Brussels-Identity-Security) on 2 December 1998, respectively. Based on an assessment by the anti-fascist centre Résistances: http://www.resistances.be.

Bibliography Abramowicz, M. 1996. Les Rats Noirs. L’extrême droite en Belgique francophone. Brussels: Editions Luc Pire. Adamson, K. and Johns, R. 2008. ‘The Vlaams Blok, its Electorate, and the Ideological Articulation of “Europe”’, Journal of Political Ideologies, 13(2): 133–56. Alaluf , M. 1995. ‘Programme Social’, in H. Le Paige. (ed.), Le désarroi démocratique. L’extrême droite en Belgique francophone. Brussels: Labor, pp. 63–80. –––– 1998. ‘L’émergence du Front national en Belgique est plus redevable aux circonstances qu’à son programme’, in P. Delwit, J.-M. De Waele and A. Rea (eds), L’extrême droite en France et en Belgique. Brussels: Complexe, pp. 101–18. –––– 2008. ‘L’extrême droite nationale-libérale’, in L’imaginaire d’extrême droite. La Pensée et les Hommes. Brussels: Editions Espace de libertés, pp. 47–54. Alves Dos Santos, J. 2004. Racisme et islamophobie dans les publications francophones du Vlaams Blok à Bruxelles (Mémoire de licence en science politique). Brussels: Université Libre de Bruxelles. Art, D. 2008. ‘The Organizational Origins of the Contemporary Radical Right’, Comparative Politics, 40(4): 421–40. Backes, U. 2004. ‘L’extrême droite: les multiples facettes d’une catégorie d’analyse’, in P. Blaise and P. Moreau (eds), Extrême droite et national-populisme en Europe de l’Ouest. Brussels: CRISP, pp. 445–65. Blaise, P. 2004. ‘Belgique. L’extrême droite francophone’, in P. Blaise and P. Moreau (eds), Extrême droite et national-populisme en Europe de l’Ouest. Brussels: CRISP, pp. 149–78. Brewaeys, P., Dahaut, V. and Tolbiac, A. 1992. ‘L’extrême droite francophone face aux élections’, Courrier hebdomadaire du CRISP, 1350.

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Camus, J.-Y. 2008. ‘L’extrême droite: une famille idéologique complexe et diversifiée’, in L’imaginaire d’extrême droite. La Pensée, et les Hommes. Brussels: Editions Espace de libertés, pp. 13–30. Delwit, P. 2007. ‘Electeurs et militants’, in H. Le Paige. (ed.), Le désarroi démocratique. L’extrême droite en Belgique francophone. Brussels: Labor, pp. 81–102. Delwit, P. and De Waele, J.-M. (eds) 1998. ‘Les partis politiques et la montée de l’extrême droite en communauté française de Belgique’, in P. Delwit, J.-M. Waele De and A. Rea (eds), L’extrême droite en France et en Belgique. Brussels: Complexe, pp. 227–46. Dewinter, F. 1995. Interview with Philip Dewinter in De Volkskrant, 15 May. De Witte, H. and Scheepers, P. 1998. ‘En Flandre: le Vlaams Blok et les électeurs’, Pouvoirs, 87: 95–114. De Witte, H. and Spruyt, M. 2004. ‘Belgique. Le Vlaams Blok. Un extrémisme dissimulé sous le populisme’, in P. Blaise and P. Moreau (eds), Extrême droite et national-populisme en Europe de l’Ouest. Brussels: CRISP, pp. 127–48. Erk, J. 2005. ‘From Vlaams Blok to Vlaams Belang: The Belgian Far-Right Renames Itself ’, West European Politics, 28(3): 493–502. Faniel, J. 2009. ‘Le Front national: combien de divisions?’ La Revue nouvelle, 64(4): 13–15. The Flemish Republic. 2008. The Flemish Republic, 22 April. Gijsels, H. 1993. Le Vlaams Blok. Brussels: Editions Luc Pire. Jamin, J. 2005. Faut-il interdire les partis d’extrême droite? Démocratie, droit et extrême droite. Brussels and Liège: Editions Luc Pire and Les Territoires de la mémoire. –––– 2009. L’imaginaire du complot. Discours d’extrême droite en France et aux Etats-Unis. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press. –––– 2011. ‘Vieilles pratiques, nouveaux visages. Geert Wilders et l’extrême droite en Europe’, Vacarme, 11(55): 43–45. Le Soir. 2004. Dewinter appelle à la révolution’, 1 November, p. 4. Mudde, C. 2000. The Ideology of the Extreme-right. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Programme of the Front national 2008. Programme of the Front national, available at: http:// www.fn.be/le-manifeste.html (accessed 1 April 2009). Programme du Front National 2011. Available on www.fn.be (accessed 4 October 2011: to be relocated on Democratic Nationale. www.dnat.be after March 2012). Rea, A. 1995. ‘Immigration et racisme’, in H. Le Paige (ed.), Le désarroi démocratique. L’extrême droite en Belgique francophone. Brussels: Labor, pp. 21–61. –––– 1996. ‘Le Front national: force électorale et faiblesse organisationnelle’, in P. Delwit, J.-M. De Waele and A. Rea (eds), L’extrême droite en France et en Belgique. Brussels: Complexe, pp. 193–204. –––– 2002. Jeunes immigrés dans la cité. Brussels: Labor. Service public fédéral de l’intérieur 2009. Service public fédéral de l’intérieur, available at: http:// www.ibzdgip.fgov.be/result/fr/main.html (accessed 1 April 2009). Swyngedouw, M. and Ivaldi, G. 2001. ‘The Extreme-right Utopia in Belgium and France: The Ideology of the Flemish Vlaams Blok and the French Front National’, West European Politics, 24(3): 1–22. Van Craen, M. and Swyngedouw, M. 2003. ‘Le Vlaams Blok: du vieux vin dans de nouvelles bouteilles’, EcoRev – Revue critique d’écologie politique, available at: http://ecorev.org/ spip.php?page=imprimer&id_article=124 (accessed 1 April 2009). Vandemmeulebroucke, M. and Haquin, R.1991. ‘Forest: gérer l’après-émeutes, le ghetto, l’ennui, l’envie, la violence’, Le Soir, 13 May, p. 17.

5 REGIONALISM, RIGHT-WING EXTREMISM, POPULISM The elusive nature of the Lega Nord1 Giorgia Bulli and Filippo Tronconi

The question about the ‘real’ nature of the Lega Nord (LN) has always triggered disputes among international scholars.The LN has actually been classified according to two major criteria: (a) systemic and (b) territorial. The systemic interpretation of the party has underlined its ideological component of right-wing extremism (Eatwell and Mudde 2004), or right-wing radicalism (Minkenberg 1998; Norris 2005) on issues such as immigration, law and order and on the authoritarian traits of the party members’ personalities. The regionalist interpretation takes into account the peculiar territorial roots of the LN and its ‘obsession’ with its heartland (Taggart 2000), the so-called Padania. A further label – a sort of cross-assessment of the style and the means used by the party to exploit its most popular issues – refers to the populist nature of the LN (Betz 1994; Tarchi 2003) and to a general anti (political)-establishment character shared by a substantial number of European parties (Schedler 1996). In this chapter, we aim to contribute to the discussion about the nature of the LN by looking at it from different perspectives. As stated by Cento Bull and Gilbert, ‘there are three aspects that need to be taken into consideration when studying the LN: structural factors, the party’s programme and its evolving worldview, and the nature of its electorate’ (Cento Bull and Gilbert 2001: 65). Following the suggestion of these authors we will try to define the LN’s nature through: (1) a description of the historical evolution of the party since its first appearance in the late 1970s; (2) an investigation of the evolution of the party’s political platform, with particular attention to the elements that contributed to its electoral success: federalism, immigration, law and order, the European Union; (3) an analysis of attitudes shown by LN’s voters on a number of issues in the last available post-electoral survey, carried out by the ITANES research group in 2006.2 Our conclusion will then be that the LN is best understood as a multifaceted party, where elements of localism and regionalism are present alongside traits of

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populism and characteristics common to other European far-right parties, especially as far as immigration policy is concerned. Indeed, we believe that any attempt to characterize this party on the basis of just one of these definitions, inevitably leads to a weak and partial understanding.

The historical evolution of the Lega Nord The first successful regionalist league of northern Italy was the Liga Veneta (LV), ‘the mother of all Leagues’, which originally presented itself as a protector of the cultural traditions and dialect of the Veneto region. Though ethno-regionalism represented at that time the most visible ideological platform of the party, the LV also claimed that a new form of taxation should apply to northern regions, stopping the flow of money from the wealthier areas of Italy to the central government in Rome. The success of the LV in presenting itself as a defender of regional interests opened up the first rifts in the traditional stronghold and attracted for the first time substantial numbers of voters who were dissatisfied with the politics and policies of traditional parties. In a short time, these issues would rapidly spread to other northern regions. With the birth of the Lega Autonomista Lombarda (then Lega Lombarda, LL) in 1982, promoted by the action of Umberto Bossi, the issues at the centre of the success of the LV gained more and more support, while insistence on the use of dialect was soon abandoned. The reasons for the rise of the LV as the first expression of the phenomenon of leghismo lay in the crisis of the catholic subculture, in the secularization process of Italian society that had started in the 1960s, and in the growing distance between the changing needs of north-east regions – reshaped by an unprecedented industrial development – and the central administration in Rome. The politicization of the centre–periphery cleavage was the distinctive feature of this party from its first appearance. To be sure, the strong socio-economic imbalances along the North–South divide were not something new, as they have always been a concern for the ruling class ever since the unification of Italy in 1861. The novelty was the perspective from which the centre–periphery cleavage was seen and the claim to protect the wealthy industrial North against the Italian state. From the very first years, the defence of the northern periphery took the form of cultural protection, through a rediscovery of the dialects which later on became a real ‘invention of traditions’. All the mythology about the Celtic origins of the Padanian peoples must be read from this angle. The notion of Padania itself as a historical and geographical entity finds no confirmation in historical records (Machiavelli 2001: 131). The regionalist and localist claim of the LN was also soon defined on economic grounds. In this respect, the protection of the peripheral community assumes a negative trait: not just setting off the values of the community’s culture, but defending it against outsiders. It is at this point that the political discourse of the LN incorporates populist traits into its original regionalist ideas. The enemy, from now on,

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is first and foremost the Italian state, perceived as a corrupt and inefficient bureaucracy pouring the wealth of industrious northern workers into the pockets of southern parasites. According to this view, the territorial dimension (the North against the South) mirrors the anti-establishment one (the people against the state machinery). The LV succeeded in getting parliamentary representation (winning one seat) for the first time in 1983. Subsequent years have witnessed a constant increase in popular support for the Leghe, while the centre of gravity of the movement progressively moved from Veneto to Lombardy, under the growing influence of Umberto Bossi’s charismatic leadership. A decisive push for the electoral consolidation of the party (8.7 per cent of votes nation-wide in the 1992 general elections) must be found in the turmoil of the beginning of the 1990s that led to the disappearance of the post-war party system and to the birth of the so-called Second Republic. The shock of Tangentopoli (kickback city) and the discovery of a widespread system of corruption involving – in different measures – all governing and opposition parties and the consequent crisis made the LN a legitimate political actor. The political vacuum produced by the crisis of the elder parties opened new possibilities for the LN. The entrance into politics of Silvio Berlusconi and the birth of Forza Italia (1994) contributed to changing the situation. On the one hand, the new party launched by the television tycoon represented a competitive alternative for the disillusioned and frustrated Italian electorate, not only in the centre and southern Italian regions, but also in the northern cities where the Lega had its strongholds. On the other hand, the success of Forza Italia obliged the Lega to open a political dialogue with it. This is why, notwithstanding its inherent scepticism towards centralistic parties, the party entered a coalition with Forza Italia in the 1994 general elections.The campaign strategy of the new party led by Berlusconi was centred on the idea of a variable coalition: in the North Forza Italia was allied with the LN, in the South with the successor of the MSI, the Italian post-fascist and strongly nationalist party Alleanza Nazionale (AN). Having obtained a very favourable distribution of candidates in pre-electoral negotiations with Forza Italia, the LN, with a stable 8.4 per cent of the votes, got an unprecedented 19 per cent of the seats and highly visible positions in the following Berlusconi cabinet. The wide governing coalition in which the LN was included – Forza Italia, CCD (Centro Cristiano Democratico, which had split from the Christian Democrats) and AN, which in principle disagreed with federalism – was a short-lived one. In fact, the cohabitation with Forza Italia and AN soon proved to be very difficult for a party that had always presented itself as the real incarnation of opposition to the traditional party system. The tensions among the allies in the government became so deep that, after only eight months, LN announced its withdrawal, condemning the first Berlusconi government to failure. The general elections in April 1996, with the LN deciding to run alone after the troubled coexistence in the centre-right coalition, represented the best result ever

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(10.1 per cent), though this success had no influence in determining the composition of the centre-left government coalition. The years between 1996 and 1998 were also important for the strengthening of the party as an organization, with the birth of the main instruments of propaganda: the party newspaper (La Padania) and the party television and radio stations (Telepadania and Radio Padania). Beyond this, a number of initiatives were undertaken aiming to reinforce the linkage between the leadership and militants. Among these were the establishment of the ‘parliament of the North’ in Mantova, the annual rallies in Venice each September since 1996 and a self-organized referendum on secession in May 1997. The exclusion from government, and the possibility of presenting itself once again as the only alternative to centralized power, put the LN in a favourable position to exploit issues ranging from immigration and law and order to territorial claims. As a matter of fact, immigration and security represented at this point core issues for the party. In 1999 the LN organized a referendum against the centre-left government law on immigration, which, in the opinion of the party, opened up Italian frontiers to an ‘invasion’ of illegal immigrants. It is these hard-line campaigns on immigration, along with occasional contacts with representatives of the European radical right, that convince scholars and observers of the extremist nature of the party. On the other hand, the LN expressed in the years 1996–2000 the strongest ever opposition to the Italian state. Not only did the party focus its initiatives on the issue of secession, but, in order to give substance to this utopian exit, it set much store by the creation of a sort of paramilitary force designed to protect the territory of Padania. The insistence on secession proved to be unsuccessful. Although the party had tried to exploit this ultimate aim, secession did not represent a real option for a large part of the northern population (Cento Bull and Gilbert 2001: 116–17). Padania thus seemed to be an imaginary, rather than imagined community (Albertazzi 2006: 23). In the 1999 European elections, the party received only 4.5 per cent of the votes. This result, along with other disappointing performances at the local level, showed the necessity of abandoning the secessionist strategy and forced the party to re-open cooperation with its former ally, Forza Italia. The LN accepted the alliance in the regional elections 2000 and in the general elections 2001. Here, the 3.9 per cent of votes represented the lowest result ever for the Lega. But this time ‘the Lega did not only manage to survive in the second Berlusconi government, but it also succeeded in presenting itself simultaneously as both the opposition in government and a driving force behind high profile areas of government policy’ (Albertazzi and McDonnell 2005: 953). During five years of government (2001–6) the LN was not able to realize the federal reform the party had always aimed at. The constitutional revision that was supposed to modify the previous federal reform of the centre-left government (with the opposition of the LN) did not pass the confirmative referendum to which it had been submitted in October 2006.

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Despite this, the party succeeded in being perceived by the electorate (even through the framing action of the media) as the main proponent of severe legislation on immigration and law and order. The approval of the new law on immigration (the so-called Bossi-Fini law, after the two party leaders most interested in the restriction of immigration flows) was presented as a step forward in the fight against illegal immigration. The end of the centre-right legislature left the LN with an unclear balance. Despite this, after the short and troubled experience of the centre-left government led by Romano Prodi, the general elections of 2008 represented a real electoral triumph for the party. With 8.3 per cent of votes at the Chamber of Deputies and 8.7 per cent at the Senate, the LN almost doubled its previous electoral result (4.6 per cent, 2006), confirming itself to be essential for the centre-right to win the northern constituencies. In the XVI legislative term, the party was thus back in government. A federal reform of the fiscal system was again the flagship of the government’s programme. This was finally achieved in 2011, but its full implementation would certainly require many years, making it unlikely that the LN would obtain immediate electoral returns on this issue. In the meantime, in 2010, regional elections were held in thirteen of the twenty Italian regions. The result was once again an excellent one for Bossi’s party, and to a certain extent even a historic one. The LN overcame the already brilliant performances of 2008, becoming the most voted-for party in Veneto and consolidating its presence in the other northern regions and in the leftist strongholds of Emilia-Romagna and Toscana. More importantly, and for the first time, its representatives won the executive leadership in two influential northern regions (Piedmont with Roberto Cota, and Veneto with Luca Zaia). By virtue of these results, a re-balance in the rightist alliance in favour of the ‘minor’ coalition partner was thus evident: while in 2008 there were 3.9 PDL voters for each LN one, in 2010 this ratio decreased to 2.2 to 1. If we consider only the three main northern regions, the two parties are more or less equal: there are 1.1 PDL voters for each LN voter. Highs and lows are frequent in the electoral history of this party, and even this time no one would bet that these levels of support will be confirmed in the near future. However, the 2001–10 decade will certainly be remembered as a golden age of the LN, in which it moved from a situation of possible decline (surviving the illness of its charismatic leader in 2004, which took him away from politics for about one year) into one of unprecedented relevance in the Italian political system. We can now turn our attention to the main issues covered in the manifestos of the party, before looking at some characteristics of its electorate.

Party platforms The most striking feature of the party’s manifestos3 is their territorial dimension. Most of the proposals contained in the party programmes refer to a sub-national level composed of the northern regions (sometimes indicated as Padania, some others actually lacking any territorial identification).

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The introduction of the 1996 party manifesto underlines its regionalist and antisystemic attitude. It comprises six paragraphs,4 which directly or indirectly refer to the northern economic situation and to possible ways to improve it. However, the party is not just interested in the economic scenario. Immigration is the next fundamental topic. What stands out in the programme is the LN attempt not to be perceived as a racist party. In the party’s interpretation, the northern regions have a limited capacity to absorb immigrants. Furthermore, immigrants must have ‘normal access to our cultural forms’.5 This formulation reveals a form of anxiety related to the preservation of the cultural traits of the northern community, namely Padania. Such anxiety is more evident in the 2001 party programme, where the party affirms that ‘the crisis of the family (…) has weakened our societies, over which immigration waves can have a destructive effect until its definitive transformation and destruction’.6 Immigration is interpreted as the cause for the collapse of the traditional values of family and marriage.7 The same perspective is evident in the 2001 party programme, where the centre-left government law on immigration is severely criticized. Immigrants are described as lazy people living on the back of the state. This particular description underlines a welfare chauvinist attitude, which is a typical feature of 1990s right-wing populism. With regard to immigration, the 2008 party manifesto has two pillars. The first is the refusal of the idea that immigrants should be given a right to vote in the administrative elections. The second is strong opposition to the amendment of the law on citizenship, which would allow immigrants to be granted citizenship after five years of residence. Moreover, the manifesto opposes the possibility of turning the right to citizenship from ius sanguinis to ius soli. The LN actually proposes to maintain the ius sanguinis principle and the ten-year-term citizenship request. In order to highlight the necessity of preserving a homogeneous community in the northern regions, the party stands for the introduction of the so-called citizenship test, which would verify the basic knowledge of immigrants on subjects such as the Italian language, culture, history and institutions. In keeping with its anxiety to preserve Western values, the LN totally rejects the entry of Turkey into the European Union, underlining the necessity of introducing a specific reference to ‘Christian roots’ in the European Treaty,8 and strongly opposes the building of mosques on Italian territory. Immigration is not only perceived as a threat to the integrity of the community (Padania), but as a vehicle of criminality and disorder. In the 2008 party manifesto, the LN states its firm opposition to the ‘pardon law’ allowing the liberation of prisoners for specific crimes or a reduction of their sentences. In the party’s opinion, this decree does not represent a solution to overcrowded Italian jails. It is actually perceived as the parties’ traditional refusal to listen to the ‘chorus of the honest people victim of criminality’.9 There is no doubt, in the LN’s view, as to the

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sources of such criminality. Since 38 per cent of detainees are immigrants, the LN asks for their repatriation into prisons in their own countries.10 An ambivalent position emerges from the study of the LN manifestos in relation to the European Union. In the years prior to the introduction of the Euro, the position of the party towards the EU was not negative, though the LN was mainly interested in the economic development that could have been promoted through regional integration. At this time, the party defined itself as the ‘most pro-European among all the parties’ (Tarchi 2007: 190). In the 1996 party manifesto, the party speaks of a ‘Europe of the peoples’ as an antidote to the emergence of a European bureaucratic state. The EU should promote the right to selfdetermination for all peoples and the defence of local autonomies. The creation of a ‘Senate of Regions’ as the second Chamber of the European Parliament is also suggested. When Italy made its entrance into the Euro-zone, the situation changed dramatically. LN scepticism towards Europe became evident. The European Union is now described as the seat of a parasitic bureaucracy. The 2004 party manifesto for the European elections goes further as the party asks for the protection of the northern community from the threat deriving from the European Union: the economic enlargement to Eastern countries, the Euro, the opening of a dialogue with Turkey. The party refuses the idea of a ‘super neo-centralistic State, led by politically irresponsible technocrats’. The party’s populist nature clearly emerges from the statement that the People must consciously express the will of their own destiny: an imposition of choices such as the institution of the Euro is not tolerable. A European Union that does not consider how to protect its people from external attacks (be they terrorism or forms of commerce leading to the failure of local business) is not acceptable.11 The LN thus proposes a new European Union as the ‘Europe of the sovereign peoples, of the valorisation of territories as the inalienable seat of identities, cultures, values and traditions’.12 The position of the LN on immigration and its attitude towards the European Union do not automatically make it an extreme-right party. The party’s economic platform reveals the differences more clearly. Since the 1996 party manifesto, the LN has called for reforms in terms of fiscal federalism. This is by far the most dramatic sign of their opposition to the unitary conception of the state (normally an article of faith for extreme-right parties). This fiscal federalism, sometimes violently expressed, does not refer to the entire country, but exclusively to the rich and hardworking regions of the North. The 2004 party manifesto keeps the economic interests of Padania as a crucial feature of its policy profile. This time, though, the LN identifies another enemy for the northern territory: the Eastern European countries and China as producers of

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low-cost goods (the cost being low because of disloyal ‘practices’) invading the domestic markets. The LN thus demands protectionist measures such as antidumping laws, a general strategy for the defence of local goods, and the introduction of custom duties.13

The attitudes of supporters Survey data give us a perspective on the ideological positioning of the LN that is linked to, but at the same time distinct from, the one we get from party official documents. The opinion of party supporters is obviously influenced by the party leaders’ positions on a variety of issues, but not necessarily identical. In the following pages we will analyse some of the answers to a post-electoral survey conducted in April 2006 by the ITANES research group through a systematic comparison between LN voters and the supporters of the other two main right-of-centre parties, Alleanza Nazionale and Forza Italia. Through this comparison we will bring the abstract debate over the ideological positioning of the party back to a more concrete dimension, anchoring it to a comparison with the closest competitors (and allies) of the LN. On the regionalist dimension, as one could easily predict, there are few doubts about the location of the LN. The percentage of supporters showing a strong local identity is about 12 per cent higher than the overall Italian average, and about 10 per cent higher than the two other rightist parties. These figures do not change dramatically when we refer to ‘local identity’ in a broader way, summing up municipal and regional identities (Table 5.1). When it actually comes to the most debated dimension, the left–right one, the picture is more blurred. When asked to locate themselves on this axis, most LN voters choose the right side of the spectrum, but this figure is lower than the corresponding one for FI and AN voters (78 per cent against 87 per cent and 94 per cent respectively). Even if one considers only those who define themselves as extremeright, the LN scores halfway between FI and AN. One could look at the problem from the opposite perspective: if we accept the position of those claiming that

TABLE 5.1 Feelings of geographical belonging of Italian right-of-centre parties’ supporters

in Italy (per cent)

Lega Nord Forza Italia Alleanza Nazionale Italy

My town

My region

Italy

Europe The World

Don’t Total (N) know/NA

36.6 26.9 25.4 24.0

12.2 16.9 11.5 13.3

39.0 42.9 46.7 42.1

4.9 3.7 9.0 6.6

0 0.5 0.8 1.4

7.3 9.1 6.6 12.7

100 (41) 100 (219) 100 (122) 100 (1,258)

Question wording: To which of the following communities do you feel to belong most: the town where you live, the region where you live, Italy, Europe, the whole world?

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the LN cannot be located on this dimension, because it competes on the centreperiphery one, we should find an outstanding number of party supporters refusing to position themselves as rightist or leftist. This option is in fact chosen by some 10 per cent of party supporters, significantly more than for FI and AN supporters. On the other hand, the LN figure is strikingly close to the overall national average (Table 5.2). Summing up, from the question about auto-collocation of voters on the left– right dimension, we do not find any clear evidence to answer our initial question, one way or the other. LN supporters can certainly be classified as right-of-centre individuals, but this positioning is, if anything, less clear than the positioning of AN and FI supporters, and certainly does not, on its own, allow us to define the LN as a far-right party.14 This technique of party positioning, though very straightforward, is not exempt from methodological shortcomings. The first objection is that people attach different meanings to the terms ‘left’ and ‘right’. Thus respondents positioning themselves in the same category might actually be referring to very different values and policy orientations. The second objection is specific to Italy and to the derogatory meaning that many people associate to the term ‘right’, as a long-standing legacy of the fascist dictatorship. It is, without any doubt, a decreasing phenomenon since the legitimization of the AN as a governing party, but still it is plausible to think some respondents are reluctant openly to declare themselves as rightist. This is why it is advisable to turn our attention from a general and necessarily generic left–right positioning to more specific issues, choosing the ones that are generally thought to characterize organizations belonging to the extreme-right party family. In his influential 1995 volume, Herbert Kitschelt points out some defining characteristics of an ideal-typical ‘master case’ of a New Radical Right political party. These include a strong pro-market orientation, a paternalistic view of family and gender relations and an exclusionary definition of citizenship rights based on cultural homogeneity of the people residing in the considered territory (Kitschelt 1995: 19–21). In Table 5.3 we look at the first two dimensions. As far as the labour market is concerned, the voters of the LN show by far the most extreme position,

TABLE 5.2 Self placement on the left–right axis in Italy (per cent)

Left

Lega Nord Forza Italia Alleanza Nazionale Italy

0 0 1.6

Centre-left Centre Centre-right Right None Don’t Total (N) know/NA 0 1.4 0

12.2 4.6 0.8

43.9 66.5 52.5

34.1 20.6 41.8

9.8 5.5 2.5

0 1.4 0.8

100 (41) 100 (218) 100 (122)

14.7 30.7

9.9

22.8

11.0

9.0

2.9

100 (1,257)

Question wording: From a political point of view, how would you position yourself: on the left, on the centre-left, on the centre, on the centre-right, on the right, or none of these definitions fits you?

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TABLE 5.3 Percentage of Italian respondents who: (a) agree with more freedom for companies to fire their employees; (b) agree with limitations on access of women to the labour market; (c) disagree with introducing legislation rights for non-married couples

Lega Nord Forza Italia Alleanza Nazionale Italy

(a)

(b)

(c)

N

75.6 56.9 66.1 36.5

32.5 47.7 40.1 36.4

30.0 47.2 38.0 35.9

41 218 121 1,256

Question wording: I will now read some common statements about economics and politics. For each one of them, please tell me how much you agree or disagree: (a) Companies should have more freedom in hiring and firing employees; (b) In conditions of scarcity, men should have more right to get an employment than women do; (c) Some couples decide not to get married and stably live together. Bills have been presented in Parliament to extend to these couples some of the rights married couples enjoy. Would you favour or oppose such a law? Note: Figures report the sum of those responding ‘agree’ and ‘strongly agree’ (columns a and b), and the sum of those responding ‘somewhat oppose’ and ‘strongly oppose’ (column c).

with three respondents out of four supporting more freedom for companies to fire their employees, while the same position is held by about two-thirds of AN and even fewer FI voters. These data are even more impressive if we bear in mind that, according to many researches, a sizeable share of LN supporters are to be found among blue-collar workers and even among union members (Mannheimer 1994; ITANES 2006). On family issues we observe a completely different picture. In this case the LN displays attitudes that are far less extreme than the other two right-of-centre parties. Only around 30 per cent of LN voters are in favour of limitations on women’s access to the labour market in conditions of labour scarcity, a percentage that is even lower than the overall national average. By contrast, 40 per cent and 48 per cent of AN and FI voters respectively support such a position. Similar findings can be observed on the hypothesis of introducing legislation specifically targeted to the protection of non-married couples,15 even though this time the figures must be read in the opposite direction: 30 per cent of LN supporters oppose more liberal legislation on family relations, a percentage that is significantly lower than the other two parties, and even lower than the national average. In Table 5.4, where we reach the third of Kitschelt’s dimensions, the crucial issue of immigration and multiculturalism is addressed from different perspectives. The first question points to opinions about immigrants as competitors on the labour market, the second and the third refer to Muslim and Roma communities, and to the issues of cultural homogeneity and security. The answers, however, are both straightforward and nuanced. They are straightforward in the general and uncompromising perception of immigration as a threat: in all of the three aspects considered here the LN shows the highest percentages of respondents displaying negative attitudes towards immigrants. The distance separating LN values from those of

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TABLE 5.4 Percentage of Italian respondents who: (a) perceive immigration as a threat to

employment; (b) would prohibit the building of mosques on Italian territory; (c) would prohibit gypsies from having camps in Italian towns

Lega Nord Forza Italia Alleanza Nazionale Italy

(a)

(b)

(c)

N

78.1 58.7 57.1 48.5

78.5 75.3 68.4 61.9

92.8 85.4 88.4 78.5

42 219 120 1,257

Question wording: I will now read some common statements about economics and politics. For each one of them, please tell me how much you agree or disagree: […] (a) Immigrants are a threat to employment; (b) It is right to allow Muslims to build Mosques in Italian territory; (c) It should be forbidden for gypsies to have their camps in our towns. Note: Figures report the sum of those responding ‘agree’ and ‘strongly agree’.

the other two conservative parties, however, is not constant. On the labour market issue, the percentage of those feeling worried about immigration is some twenty points higher among LN voters than among FI and AN voters. This distance is reduced to less than ten points on the other two issues. This difference could reasonably be attributed to a sort of ‘ceiling effect’, namely the more figures approach the theoretical maximum of 100 per cent, the more they are inevitably flattened around an average value. On the other hand, it is also possible to hypothesize that the different occupational profile of the respective electorates plays a role here, and that a prevalence of non-specialized workers among the LN voters is more sensitive to this issue than other social strata might be. It has been claimed in political science literature that ‘populism’ is a keyword in understanding the political discourse of the LN (Tarchi 2003, 2007), and our previous analysis of party official documents has contributed to reinforcing this belief. In Table 5.5, we present more evidence in the same direction. This is not the place for a detailed discussion of the defining features of populism. However, most interpretations of this elusive phenomenon point more or less explicitly to the minimum denominator of a society fundamentally divided between the ruling class and the ruled. The latter are the ‘common people’, described as honest, industrious and virtuous; the former are the holders of power, inevitably corrupt, selfish and inept. Furthermore, populist discourse does not leave space for any distinction within the members of the ruling class; on the contrary, ideological divisions are seen as a façade behind which politicians are always ready to find agreement when it comes to defending their own interests and privileges. The questions we analyse in Table 5.5 concern the degree of agreement with respect to three beliefs about the ruling class: the distinction between left and right, corruption, and an overall judgement about political élites in the last two decades. In all three cases the result is unquestionable, the LN supporters emerging as the

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TABLE 5.5 Percentage of Italian respondents who: (a) do not see any difference between

left and right governments; (b) think most politicians are corrupt; (c) think the Italian ruling class has failed in the last twenty years

Lega Nord Forza Italia Alleanza Nazionale Italy

(a)

(b)

(c)

N

78.1 58.7 57.1 48.5

78.5 75.3 68.4 61.9

92.8 85.4 88.4 78.5

42 219 120 1,257

Question wording: Can you tell me how you would comment on each of these statements: (a) No matter who is in government between the left or the right, things do not change; (b) Most politicians are corrupt; (c) In the last twenty years, the Italian ruling class has completely failed. Note: Figures report the sum of those responding ‘it is quite true’ and ‘it is absolutely true’.

most resolute detractors of the whole political class. If we cannot consider this a surprising finding in absolute terms, the comparison with the other two parties, and especially with Berlusconi’s Forza Italia is once again remarkable.

Conclusion: the elusive nature of a multi-faceted party What is finally the image, or what are the images, emerging from party manifestos and from the attitudes of LN supporters? The most immediate conclusion is that this party does not easily match up with the classical attributes of right-wing extremism. To begin with, the regionalist nature of the party, and the paramount importance of this territorial reference throughout its history, is a fact that can hardly be questioned. Our analysis confirms, from this point of view, the claims of a wide literature (among others: Diamanti 1993, 1996; Cento Bull and Gilbert 2001) insisting on the cultural, social and economic peculiarities of the north-eastern regions of Italy to explain the success of the leghismo.The growing distance between this area and a central government incapable of understanding its needs and meeting its expectations is often underlined. In this sense the LN has made its fortunes from understanding (well before the collapse of the old party system in 1992) that the Christian Democrats were losing their function of linkage between this periphery and the centre of the system in Rome. On the other hand the LN shows, both in its electoral platforms and in the views of its supporters, clear traits of a xenophobic party, and this is the major single reason to assimilate it into the far-right party family. The key words that describe the party’s position on immigration can be found in the formulation ‘Everyone must be the master in his own house’ contained in the 2001 party manifesto. These words identify in the document the relationship between the state and the northern regions, but they also underline the prevalence

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of the ‘homogeneity principle’ intended as the typical protection of the heartland (Taggart 2000), which the party labels Padania. Immigrants, mainly immigrants from Asia and Africa, are perceived as at the roots of unemployment, of the breakdown of traditional values, and of criminality. The main interest of the party lies indeed in the protection of the traditional values of community and of its prosperity. From this point of view it is interesting to note that it is exactly in those regions where small and medium business thrives and the LN has its own strongholds that the necessity of immigrant labour is strongest. This somewhat paradoxical situation reflects what has been called the hysterical attitude of Italy towards immigrants: it needs them in order to make industry and other economic sectors work, but it does not want to see them walking around. Bossi’s party strategy clearly reflects this attitude. With the rejection of any kind of multicultural society and the proposal of the introduction of a citizenship test, the LN stresses its selective exclusion principle. Integrated, or rather, assimilated immigrants can become part of the productive community. Other forms of immigration, on the contrary, are not tolerated. Populism – or identity populism (Tarchi 2008: 89), an expression underlying the relentless reference to its geographical and cultural roots – is another inescapable perspective for understanding the nature of the LN. The survey data we have presented are clear enough on this point. Appeals to the ‘people’ (as an idealized community of honest and virtuous individuals, opposed to the vices contaminating the ruling class) are frequent and likely to take root in a fertile soil of generalized distrust in institutions and politicians. A distrust, to be sure, that is not unique to the LN voters. On the contrary, negative sentiments towards democratic institutions and the way democracy works are widely diffused and long lasting in Italy’s ‘dissatisfied society’ (Morlino and Tarchi 1996), but they reach their peak in the northern areas of the country and, as shown, among the followers of the Lega. For its part, since the mid-nineties Bossi’s party has continuously invested in the issue of defending the interests and values of the ‘peoples of Padania’ against internal and external aggressors, at different times identified with southern immigrants, Muslims, European Union bureaucrats, the Italian state and its Roman cliques. For these reasons, taking sides in the never-ending ‘war of words’ (Mudde 1996) about the labelling of the LN and its position in the constellation of European party families, does not appear to be the most urgent concern. Searching for the most perfect label might have deflected attention from the object itself. And this is much more likely if the object, as in this case, is characterized by contradictory features, complexity and frequent shifts, or real U-turns, in policy positions and alliance strategies.

Notes 1 This chapter is the result of a joint effort of the two authors. For bureaucratic purposes only, the final draft of sections 1 and 2 may be attributed to Giorgia Bulli, and the final draft of section 3 to Filippo Tronconi. The Introduction and Conclusion have been written jointly.

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2 ITANES (Italian National Election Studies) is a network of scholars promoting a research programme on voting behaviour in Italy since the early 1990s. We thank the coordinators of the research group for kindly allowing us to use the ITANES dataset. ITANES data are available upon request through the website http://www. itanes.org. 3 We will analyse the party manifestos for the 1996, 2001 and 2008 general elections, as well as the 2004 European elections. In the 2006 elections, the LN did not issue a real manifesto, but only a document containing generic indications of the themes (defence of Christian roots of Europe, fiscal federalism, fiscal bonus for traditional families, fight against illegal immigration, explicit commitment to the support of the referendum on constitutional territorial reform) which should be incorporated in the wider programme of the Casa delle Libertà (the coalition in which the party was included). It is important to underline that these documents differ from each other in terms of length, specificity and ‘radicalism’. The 1996 manifesto is the longest and most articulate one, while the 2001 programme represents, in the party’s words, only a ‘guide for candidates’. The 2004 manifesto is the short programme for the European elections and the 2008 programme is called ‘The ideas of the Lega Nord’. 4 (1) Mantova (referring to the ‘Parliament of the North’ that is based there); (2) Economics and debit balance: the North can do it; (3) The enterprise in the economics; (4) Federalism; (5) Immigration: the Lega is not racist; (6) Occupation and old-age pension. 5 Lega Nord party manifesto 1996. 6 Lega Nord party manifesto 2001. 7 ‘Multi-cultural and multi-religious society generates cases which seriously damage the institutions of family and marriage’, Lega Nord party manifesto 1996. 8 Lega Nord party manifesto 2008, ‘Le idee della Lega. Le nostre radici cristiane’. In the same document, the LN asks for a binding referendum to decide upon the acceptance of Turkey in the EU, wishing to ‘give voice to the people’. 9 Lega Nord party manifesto 2008, ‘Le idee della Lega. Certezze della pena e atti di clemenza’. 10 Lega Nord party manifesto 2008, ‘Le idee della Lega. Penitenziari’. 11 Lega Nord party manifesto 2004. 12 Ibid. 13 Lega Nord party manifesto 2008, ‘Le idee della Lega. Le misure anti-dumping’. 14 Other comparative studies adopt a different research strategy to position parties on the left–right continuum, by means of surveys among ‘experts’, which normally means political science scholars. The most recent ‘expert surveys’ were conducted by Marcel Lubbers in 2000 and by Kenneth Benoit and Michael Laver in 2004. In the first case the LN got an average score of 7.5 in a scale ranging from 0 to 10 (Lubbers 2000). In the second case it was scored 16.9 in a 0–20 scale (Benoit and Laver 2006). From this evidence it is equally difficult to label the LN as an unquestionably extreme-right party. 15 During the past legislature this issue has been at the centre of vehement debates for months, after the Prodi cabinet had passed a bill (which was in turn the result of endless negotiations between the catholic and secular components of the majority coalition) introducing some benefits for non-married couples, following the model of the French Pacte civil de solidarité.

Bibliography Albertazzi, D. 2006. ‘“Back to Our Roots” or Self-confessed Manipulation? The Uses of the Past in the Lega Nord’s Positing of Padania’, National Identities, 8(1): 1–39. Albertazzi, D. and McDonnell, D. 2005. ‘The Lega Nord in the Second Berlusconi Government: in a League of its Own’, West European Politics, 28(5):952–2. Benoit, K. and Laver, M. 2006. Party Policy in Modern Democracies. London: Routledge.

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Betz, H.G. 1994. Radical Right Wing Populism in Western Europe. London: Macmillan Press. Cento Bull, A. and Gilbert, M. 2001. The Lega Nord and the Northern Question in Italian Politics. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan. Diamanti, I. 1993. La Lega. Geografia, storia e sociologia di un nuovo soggetto politico. Roma: Donzelli. —— 1996. Il male del Nord. Roma: Donzelli. Eatwell, R. and Mudde, C. 2004. Western Democracies and the New Extreme Right Challenge. London: Routledge. ITANES 2006. Dov’è la vittoria? Il voto del 2006 raccontato dagli italiani. Bologna: Il Mulino. Kitschelt, H. 1995. The Radical Right in Western Europe. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Lubbers, M. 2000. Expert Judgement Survey of Western European Political Parties 2000. Department of Sociology, University of Nijmegen. Machiavelli, M. 2001. ‘La Ligue du Nord et l’invention du “Padan”’, Critique internationale, 10(1): 129–42. Mannheimer, R. 1994. ‘La natura composita dell’elettorato leghista’, in R. Mannheimer and G. Sani (eds), La rivoluzione elettorale. Milano: Anabasi, pp. 117–48. Minkenberg, M. 1998. Die neue radikale Rechte im Vergleich. USA, Frankreich, Deutschland. Opladen – Wiesbaden: Westdeutscher Verlag. Morlino, L. and Tarchi, M. 1996. ‘The Dissatisfied Society: The Roots of Political Change in Italy’, European Journal of Political Research, 30(1): 41–63. Mudde, C. 1996. ‘The War of Words Defining the Extreme Right Party Family’, West European Politics, 19(2): 225–48. Norris, P. 2005. Radical Right:Voters and Parties in the Electoral Market. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Schedler, A. 1996. ‘Anti-Political-Establishment Parties’, Party Politics, 2(3): 291–312. Taggart, P. 2000. Populism. Milton Keynes: Open University Press. Tarchi, M. 2003. L’Italia populista. Dal qualunquismo ai girotondi. Bologna: Il Mulino. —— 2007. ‘The Conflicting Foreign Agenda of the Alleanza Nazionale and the Lega Nord’, in C. Schori Liang (ed.), Europe for the Europeans. The Foreign and Security Policy of the Populist Radical Right. Burlington: Ashgate, pp. 187–208. ——. 2008. ‘Italy, a Country of Many Populisms’, in D. Albertazzi and D. McDonnell (eds), Twenty-first Century Populism.The Spectre of Western European Democracy. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 84–99.

PART II

The Southern European Extreme Right after Dictatorships

6 THE PORTUGUESE RADICAL RIGHT IN THE DEMOCRATIC PERIOD Riccardo Marchi

Introduction In May 2007, Antonio Jose de Brito, Portugal’s most renowned fascist intellectual, bitterly defined the national radical right as ‘residual’, part of ‘folklore’ (Brito 2007). It has, in fact, proved itself incapable of conquering space in the young Portuguese democracy’s institutional political life, just as in Spain and Greece, where the legacy of authoritarianism has also proved fatal (Casals 1998: 143–47). The tactics chosen by the Portuguese radical right during the period of democratic consolidation have also shown themselves to be significant in respect of its current marginalization.

The years of transition to democracy Inaugurating the third wave of democratization in Europe, the military coup d’état of 25 April 1974 put an end to almost half a century of authoritarianism. The political longevity of Antonio de Oliveira Salazar (1932–68), the swift deterioration of Marcelo Caetano’s consulate (1968–74) and the lightning success of the military initiative meant the regime change was one of rapid rupture. The part played by the armed forces in this process is as much a consequence of the weakness of civilian anti-Salazarist forces as it is of the inability of the New State’s political class to find a solution to the difficult problem of the wars in Africa. The almost complete absence of any resistance to the coup was symptomatic of the New State’s decomposition, as the regime’s political police (PIDE-DGS) remained inert, just like its paramilitary organization (the Portuguese Legion) and the Salazarist ultras. Thus, 25 April 1974 became the watershed separating the ‘before’ from the ‘after’. All that was identified with the former regime was politically labelled ‘of the right’, while all that was recognized in the revolution is identified as ‘not of the right’ (Pinto 1996: 235). Stripped of their political citizenship during the period

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of transition, the members of the elite most compromised with the deposed regime were subjected to the first wave of purges. The New State’s paramilitary and repressive structures were quickly dismantled and their leaders imprisoned. The Salazarist barons were forced into exile by the Junta de Salvação Nacional ( JSN, National Salvation Junta), which was headed by General António de Spínola, and which did not wish to subject them to revolutionary justice (Pinto 1998: 1682). The sudden disappearance of the former regime’s leaders was the first serious blow to the radical right, as it lost the personalities around whom it could organize. They were thus forced to unite around secondary figures of the deposed regime. In the most heterodox area of the Portuguese radical right, the role of protagonist was taken by a young generation of nationalist students of the 1960s and 1970s who had experienced their political awakening and had been radicalized following the outbreak of the wars in Africa (1961) and during the wave of anti-Salazarist protests in the universities of Lisbon and Coimbra (1962 and 1969). Grouped in small combative organizations, which were relatively autonomous from the New State, these radical students demonstrated their militancy through their intransigent defence of the Portuguese empire that was being contested by the domestic extreme left, the international community and by African guerrillas. These young rightwing radicals did not represent orthodox Salazarism. Since 1945 the Portuguese radical right had always demonstrated a degree of frustration with the New State’s cultural and ideological conservatism. With the rise of Marcelo Caetano, however, it began openly to criticize the neo-liberal reformers and technocrats in the new government, accusing them of wanting to end Portugal’s presence in Africa. Defining themselves as national revolutionaries (with sympathies for French and Italian neo-fascist movements), these students formed a ‘right-wing opposition’ to Caetano’s government, in alliance with the purist fascist intellectuals of the first post-war generation, gathered around the review Tempo Presente (1959–61), the Salazarist catholic traditionalists of the review Resistência, and the monarchists and anti-Salazarist republicans – all of whom were engaged in the integrationalist battle to defend the empire (Marchi 2009). In the first few hours following the coup, this variegated front came together to analyse the situation and to determine a common strategy. There was an immediate breakdown that centred around two different approaches to the new political panorama. The minority view, supported by the more openly fascist intellectuals Florentino Goulart Nogueira and Rodrigo Emílio, rejected any form of adherence to the new political situation, either in terms of the legitimacy of the constituted powers or through an acceptance of the values proclaimed by the revolution. This group founded the Movimento de Acção Portuguesa (MAP, Portuguese Action Movement). The majority group, however, accepted the coup as a consummated and irreversible fact, and rejected any utopian a priori ‘restorationist’ temptations. The protagonists of this strategy were the neo-fascist leader José Valle de Figueiredo, who was a link between the civilian right and the Spínolist military right, and the national-revolutionary leaders from Coimbra’s law faculty, united around

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the anti-Salazarist nationalist, Fernando Pacheco de Amorim. On 3 May 1974, this group registered the Movimento Federalista Português (MFP, Portuguese Federalist Movement), the most important radical-right party in the aftermath of the revolution. Despite divisions over the acceptance of the revolution, both factions agreed on the over-riding need to save pluri-continental Portugal. The success of the revolution, which was confirmed by the popular support it received, meant the African question remained open. The programme of the Movimento das Forças Armadas (MFA, Armed Forces Movement), the group that had planned the coup, supported the principle of self-determination for the African populations, without excluding the possibility of retaining institutional links with Portugal. During this phase, however, the radical right had some room for manoeuvre in the battle for the future institutional structure of Portuguese Africa. The federalist option adopted by the MFP proved to be more realistic than the integralist purism of the MAP, particularly since the former group’s position enjoyed the legitimation offered by General Spínola, who had been appointed president of the republic in May 1974. The MFP and MAP were the most durable radical movements from the doctrinaire political point of view. However, between May and July, other parties, less structured and less radical, emerged on what may be considered the extreme right of the political spectrum by virtue of their overt anti-Marxism and their support for Spínola in the defence of ‘African Portugal’. The Salazarist catholic radical right founded the Partido da Democracia Cristã (PDC, Christian Democratic Party), while the catholic traditionalists of António da Cruz Rodrigues established the Movimento Popular Português (MPP, Portuguese Popular Movement). The right-wing monarchists formed the Partido Liberal (PL, Liberal Party), while the Partido Trabalhista Democrático Português (PTDP, Portuguese Democratic Workers’ Party) and the Partido Social Democrata Independente (PSDI, Independent Social Democrat Party) assumed the guise of social-democratic anti-Marxism. Finally, the Partido Nacionalista Português (PNP, Portuguese Nationalist Party) was founded by a small group of former members of the Portuguese Legion. At the same time several decidedly right-wing party newspapers appeared, such as the MFP’s Tribuna Popular, the PL’s Tempo Novo and the independent Bandarra. It will be superfluous to highlight the ideological differences that existed between all these small right-wing parties, which were largely the product of initiatives by small groups of friends, often active before 25 April, but without any territorial roots or representation. With the exception of MAP, these parties attempted to win legitimacy by declaring themselves faithful to the liberal, democratic and Western political project of the revolutionary military’s moderate wing, which was struggling against the Marxist faction for control of the MFA. This resulted in the production of an often surrealist political discourse, in which convinced Salazarists declared themselves to be anti-fascists or even leftists. This leftist syndrome infected all of the parties to the right of Mario Soares’s Partido Socialista (PS, Socialist Party), which led them to present political

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programmes that were to the left of their leaders, who in turn were more to the left than their electorate (Pinto 1996: 237). The Partido Popular Democrático (PPD, Popular Democratic Party), which was founded by the New State’s Liberal Wing (Ala Liberal), attempted to capitalize on the reputation of this semi-opposition to Caetano’s government by presenting itself as a centre-left party that was engaged in constructing socialism in Portugal. To correct the inequality on the left of the political axis, the anti-Marxist faction of the MFA had no faith in the extreme right as a viable interlocutor. Instead, it concentrated its efforts on the more moderate elements of the deposed government, those who were least compromised with the dictatorship, sponsoring the birth in July 1974 of the Centro Democrático Social (CDS, Social Democratic Centre). The CDS described itself as a moderate, liberal-conservative, social-catholic and anti-Marxist party of the centre. With the panorama of parties existing in the summer of 1974 complete, the embryos of the radical right engaged in the establishment of their respective party structures with a view to competing in the elections to the constituent assembly in April 1975: the guarantee of their definitive institutionalization. To this end, in July 1974 the MFP transformed itself into the Partido do Progresso (PP/MFP, Party of Progress), which, with the PL and the PTDP, promoted an electoral coalition named the Frente Democrática Unida (FDU, United Democratic Front). The central thesis of the FDU’s programme was to support Portuguese Africa’s selfdetermination, as was proposed in the MFA programme, but which was threatened by the independentist offensive of Marxist officers allied to the PCP. Conscious of their marginal status, the radical right attempted to strengthen its role by becoming the political arm of the Spínolists in the internal political struggles of the MFA. Thus, on 28 September 1974, anti-communist officers appealed to the ‘silent majority’ to support President Spínola against the PCP’s maximalism. With the exception of the anti-Spínolist MAP and the PP/MFP, which thought the demonstration would give the PCP its chance to denounce the fascist threat and to justify repression, the organizations of the ‘extreme right’ all supported the appeal. The PS, PPD and CDS immediately dissociated themselves, judging that this was an attempt to recreate in Lisbon, under the noses of the military, De Gaulle’s late May 1968 manoeuvre in Paris, when he successfully confronted the prerevolutionary movement, with the support of the armed forces and the mass mobilization of the centre-right. Both the PCP and the civilian and military extreme left made easy work of neutralizing the Spínolist faction, accusing it of being counter-revolutionary. On 28 September the headquarters of the PP/MFP, MAP and MPP were occupied and the parties dissolved, along with the PL and PTDP, with hundreds of the members of these organizations being arrested. This was the second coup against the Portuguese radical right. Only the PDC survived and, in order to ensure its continued existence during the months that followed, it appointed to its leadership José Sanches Osório, one of the leaders of the 25 April coup and a member of the first provisional government. The leadership of Sanches Osório made the PDC the only party of the right able to compete in the election campaign to

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the constituent assembly. He managed to obtain for the PDC observer status in the European Union of Christian Democrats (EUCD), guaranteeing it international protection. The success of the February 1975 rallies gave the impression that the PDC’s electoral campaign could unite the more conservative anti-communist voters. Many former Salazarists and supporters of the radical right joined the party. Fearing the PDC’s electoral competition, the CDS asked the EUCD to pressurize Osório into forming a coalition (Amaral 1995: 333). The role that the Salazarists demonstrated they could still play on the right wing of the CDS provoked an extreme-left reaction. On 11 March 1975, rumours of an imminent communist attempt to eliminate active right-wing groups resulted in a coup attempt by a group of Spínolists, which was easily defeated by the MFA. Sanches Osório’s involvement in this attempted coup and his subsequent flight into exile led to the PDC being banned, leaving scorched earth to the right of the CDS. The 11 March 1975 uprising represented the third and final coup in the strategy for the institutionalization of the radical right. At the first democratic elections (25 April 1975), the extreme-right electorate – which included between 1 per cent declared fascists and 2 per cent conservatives, with perhaps a further 8 per cent of potential voters from the moderate right (Bacalhau 1994: 34) – had no official representation, and gave its ‘useful vote’ to the CDS, the PPD and the PS, which were considered the most secure bulwarks against the PCP’s advance (Jalali 2007: 73). For the radical right this opened, once more, the road to exile or clandestine action. In neighbouring Francoist Spain, the Salazarist, neo-fascist and Spínolist factions reorganized themselves into two clandestine formations: the Movimento Democrático de Libertação de Portugal (MDLP, Democratic Movement for the Liberation of Portugal) and the Exército de Libertação de Portugal (ELP, Portuguese Liberation Army). The MDLP was led by Commander Alpoim Calvão and presided over by General Spínola. The radicals from the PP/MFP played an important role in this organization, forming its political commission. The ELP had a more clandestine structure, constructed by elements from the Portuguese Legion, the PIDE and former regime supporters, assisted by members of the Spanish secret service and European neo-fascist refugees who were living in Spain, such as the Italians of the Avanguardia Nazionale (AN, National Vanguard). Through these two autonomous and clandestine movements, the Portuguese radical right developed its anti-communist campaign between May and November 1975 with propaganda activities – including armed actions – in Portugal.The north of Portugal was the most fertile territory for their activities, due to the general insurrectional and anti-communist climate that during the ‘hot summer’ of 1975 resulted in a number of assaults on, and the destruction of, the offices of the PCP and other left-wing organizations. The ‘northern revolts’ were led by the catholic hierarchy and by old caciquista networks that had profound social roots in the north, a part of the country that consisted of small farmers, artisans and shopkeepers who were increasingly concerned with the extreme left’s collectivization policy. The parties of the anti-communist front (PS, PPD and CDS) were the chief

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political beneficiaries of this offensive. The operative role played by the clandestine MDLP and ELP was remarkable, but absolutely secondary from the political point of view.

The years of normalization The anti-communist offensive ended on 25 November 1975 when the dynamics of coup and counter-coup led to the defeat of the PCP and the extreme left. One important Portuguese radical-right intellectual notes how from that day a climate of instability, reminiscent of the German Weimar Republic, hung over Portugal (Pinto 1996: 239–40); a climate that could have offered some opportunities to the radical right: the permanent state of PCP revolutionary mobilization, despite the events of 25 November; the political and psychological reinforcement of the anti-communist front; the presence of a large group of people who were unhappy with the revolution, and who mainly comprised victims of the political purges, those who had been economically expropriated and the almost one million returnees from the former colonies. The gradual normalization of the revolutionary process enabled the return of many radical right-wing exiles, who once more wondered what they could do given their extremely limited margin for manoeuvre. From the political point of view, the anti-communist struggle became a definitive attribute of the PS-PPDCDS front, whose strongly pro-April and anti-fascist discourse blocked any possibility for radical-right expression and legitimation. From the military point of view, the obvious inability of the military right (both MFA and Salazarist) to lead a counter-revolutionary project rendered any praetorian pretensions unthinkable from 1976. For a number of reasons, the more lucid of the radical-right groups did not believe the creation of a political party was a viable option. Any such party was highly likely to be banned (the PCP retained a powerful presence in the state apparatus); there was a shortage of economic and political support; the electorate was marginalized owing to the propensity of the sociological right to cast their anti-communist vote for the PPD and the CDS; the Salazarist barons were unwilling to lead a radical party; the centre-right parties (PPD and CDS) had co-opted the most promising of the young radicals who had passed through prison and clandestinity. The only sensible option seemed to be the formation of a pressure group that, through cultural activities, could influence the non-Marxist parties. The room for manoeuvre in the cultural arena was, in fact, greater. Since 1976, the ‘left syndrome’ of the anti-communist actors of the transition was considerably reduced. The PPD gradually positioned itself in the centre of the political spectrum, supporting the creation of a Western, liberal and free-market democracy. Consequently, the CDS moved to occupy the moderate and liberal-conservative right that was inspired by social-catholicism. In the media, there emerged two right-wing publications, Rua and Diabo, which enjoyed good circulation and public support. Militants of the radical right united around these two weekly newspapers according

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to their editorial stance. Diabo was noted for its denunciations of the excesses of the revolutionary period, and for its outspoken support for the centre-right coalition, Aliança Democrática (AD, Democratic Alliance) formed in 1979 by the Partido Social Democrata (PSD, Social Democratic Party), the new name for the PPD since 1977, CDS and the Partido Popular Monárquico (PPM, Popular Monarchist Party).1 The radical right that supported this operation opted for a strategy of ‘entryism’ into the institutional party system. This strategy guaranteed a remarkable capacity of action also in radical right-wing youth circles, represented by students from the Progress Party, from clandestinity and from the violent confrontations with the extreme left in the schools and universities. In 1976, these youths organized themselves into the Movimento Nacionalista (MN, Nationalist Movement), the most important of the radical right-wing youth movements until the beginning of the 1980s, which was famous mainly for its 10 June commemorations (the anniversary of the restoration of Portuguese independence from Spain in 1640), which was also a day of nationalist and anti-communist pride for the centre-right. The weekly newspaper Rua was founded by Manuel Maria Múrias, a New State journalist and anti-communist polemicist during the transition, who became the spokesperson for the most anti-revolutionary, anti-systemic and pro-Salazarist radical right. Rua was constantly critical of the centre-right, and of the CDS in particular, despite the CDS having sponsored the newspaper in order to free itself from the sensitive accusation that it represented the extreme right of the political spectrum. At the beginning of 1977, a new right-wing anti-system movement made its appearance: the Movimento Independente para a Reconstrução Nacional (MIRN, Independent Movement for National Reconstruction). MIRN was founded by General Kaúlza de Arriaga, an important figure among Salazarist officers, who had been chief of the armed forces in Mozambique during the colonial wars and had been the organizer of the illusory coup d’état of March 1974 that sought to overthrow Caetano and move the regime to the right. Arrested on 28 September 1974, Arriaga spent sixteen months in prison where he assumed in right-wing circles the image of a martyr of the revolution. Arriaga immediately demonstrated his limits as a political leader, introducing himself as a man of the ‘social-democratic right, antiMarxist and anti-extremist’, interested in creating a consensus in the national interest that would extend from the extreme right to non-Marxist social democracy. In this way, MIRN managed to appeal to one part of the ultra-nationalist militant youth that was on the lookout for new stimuli, but it held no appeal for the more mature sections of the radical right. The marginality of the radical right was demonstrated by the constant refusal of the AD to include it in the centre-right coalition. This ostracism impelled the radical right towards electorally disastrous strategies. The PDC, while reformed with some difficulty after 11 March 1975, stood alone in the 1976 legislative elections, winning only 0.54 per cent of the votes (29,874 votes). In the 1979 elections the PDC lists included six extreme-right independents, headed by Manuel Maria Múrias, and the party share increased to 1.21 per cent (72,514). Despite having

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existed for two years, MIRN did not participate in the 1979 elections. In the run-up to the October 1980 elections, and in order to undermine the AD’s ostracism, the PDC, MIRN (which, for the occasion, renamed itself the Partido da Direita Portuguesa (MIRN/PDP, Party of the Portuguese Right) and the Frente Nacional (FN, National Front), which was an ad hoc creation of Múrias and the businessman Bernado Guedes da Silva, decided to contest as an independent coalition called the Direita Unida (DU, United Right). However, the coalition was never able to create a right-wing consensus. The DU’s results were disastrous, obtaining 0.4 per cent of the votes (23,819). In electoral terms, the coalition received one-third of the votes won by the PDC in 1979 (which was considered a foundation upon which the right could build) which was also less than it had received in 1976. The frustration within the radical right was well expressed by Múrias who said, ‘the right has ceased to exist (or it never even existed)’ (Múrias 1980). The 1980 elections were to be the radical right’s final electoral foray for many years. Only the PDC retained a presence during the subsequent years, with its support ranging from 0.69 per cent (39,180) in 1983, to 0.72 per cent (41,831) in 1985 and 0.56 per cent (31,667) in 1987.2

The years of democratic consolidation With the electoral failure of the coalition, the radical right dispersed into a galaxy of small militant youth groups, the most important of which at the beginning of the 1980s were the MN and Ordem Nova (ON, New Order), which was founded by Zarco Moniz Ferreira, a leading figure in Portuguese neo-fascism since the 1960s.3 During this period, the radical right’s most notable results were achieved in the ‘cultural struggle’. In 1980 the magazine Futuro Presente, edited by Jaime Nogueira Pinto, first appeared. The editorial staff was made up of 1960s militants, activists who had straddled both regimes, and youths who had been radicalized in the universities during the transition and who mainly belonged to the MN. The publication aimed to be the Portuguese mouthpiece of the European new right that, at that time, was enjoying some success in the international media. The model that it followed was Alain de Benoist’s Nouvelle Droite in France and its ‘gramscism of the right’ project that sought to modernize the imagination and the political vocabulary of the radical right. To this model, however, Futuro Presente added its interest in the Anglo-Saxon new right led by Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan. Through these two antithetic currents of right-wing thought, Futuro Presente sought to combine the tradition of conservative realism with the attempts at neo-fascist renewal, translating them into a Portuguese formula that rejected both Anglo-American hypercapitalism and French paganism. Despite achieving a certain degree of success, and admiration from its adversaries, during its first years of publication, Futuro Presente did not manage to realize its project for cultural hegemony. After almost thirty years of existence, the magazine has lost its impetus, despite some of its founders now being important Portuguese opinion-makers. However, the magazine

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still remains to this day the radical right’s most striking cultural experiment in democracy and represents the boundary between the old and the new radical right in Portugal.

The boundary between old and new radicalism In the mid-1980s Portuguese radical nationalism experienced changes in line with the transformations of the European extreme right.4 In 1985 a group of youths from the Lisbon suburb of Amadora founded the Movimento de Acção Nacional (MAN, National Action Movement) (Marchi 2010). This movement rejected democracy (which it labelled ‘partyocracy’), liberal-capitalism and communism; it was based on an organic conception of justice and of order in the nation-state, and called for an anti-systemic ‘third way’. During the first two years of its existence, MAN developed an ethno-nationalist identity, based on the defence of racial homogeneity against the dangers of immigration (which was increasing from the former colonies) and miscegenation. This ethno-nationalism broke with the traditions of the Portuguese radical right that always emphasized the empire’s multiracialism and multiculturalism. From 1987 MAN’s membership increased, primarily as a result of the influx of skinheads, a movement that had only recently arrived in Portugal and which was being watched by the media. MAN sought to attract, organize and politicize neo-Nazi fashion through its own publications, Acção and Ofensiva, and through other more outspokenly racist publications, such as Ultimo Reduto, and the skinhead fanzines Combate Branco (White Combat) and Vento do Norte (North Wind). Its ever closer links with the skinhead movement gave MAN a much wider territorial appeal that extended beyond Lisbon and into the north of the country. The increase of its activity during 1989 and 1990 corresponded with an increase in political violence that the Portuguese media blamed on MAN’s neo-Nazi members that its leaders could not control. It was largely because of the acts of violence registered during this period, which culminated in the death of an extreme-left leader, in October 1989, that the authorities mounted a series of interceptions, house searches and interrogations that led to an official hearing into the organization under article 46 of the 1976 constitution, which deals with the legality of fascist organizations. The media and judicial campaigns against the movement and the consequent tensions within its membership convinced MAN’s leadership to dissolve the organization at the beginning of 1991. The process dealing with its non-constitutional nature continued until January 1994, when the Constitutional Court noted the movement’s self-dissolution. It was the first, and so far only, case in Portugal of an investigation into a political movement based on legislation dealing with fascist parties. Thanks to the increase in ultra-nationalist mobilization that MAN encouraged, the radical right refocused on its objective of creating a true political party. Some initiatives that were set in motion in this respect did not achieve the 7,500 signatures required by law. One of the main figures in this initiative was António da Cruz Rodrigues, a historic leader of the ultra-Salazarist catholic traditionalists.

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In 1995 he founded the Aliança Nacional (AN, National Alliance), which was supported by the publishing house Nova Arrancada. Its aim was to reactivate some of the radical right’s moribund parties, such as the PDC. It was not until 1999 that the operation had any success, thanks to the support of José Luís Paulo Henriques, the former leader of MAN and now member of the AN, who, with militants from across the radical galaxy, took control of the Partido Renovador Democrático (PRD, Democratic Renewal Party) that had been founded in 1985 around the figure of the country’s then president, General Ramalho Eanes, and which at its launch had registered strong electoral success, followed by rapid electoral decline. Reduced to a ghost party, the PRD fell easily to the radical right who appointed Rodrigues as its leader. The party was restructured during 2000 and given a new name (Partido Nacional Renovador (PNR, National Renovation Party)), new statutes and a new symbol (a red and blue flame).

The radical right’s new beginning The PNR’s creation brought into focus the problem of control, with a clear division existing between the old ultra-Salazarist nationalists who supported Rodrigues and the more recent and much more radical ultra-nationalist and neo-fascist elements. The victory of the latter in June 2005 resulted in José Pinto Coelho (a former member of MN and Futuro Presente) becoming the party’s leader. Coelho’s leadership opened a new phase in the life of the party that aligned itself with the more recent evolution of the European radical right. From the point of view of the radical right’s roots, the PNR reclaimed the anti-revolution nationalism of the Portuguese radical right without, however, its nostalgic and revanchist aspects. It recognizes the legitimacy of the democratic system, while also defending the New State’s contribution to the defence of traditional Portuguese values and the figure of Salazar as the greatest Portuguese statesman of the twentieth century. In this way, it has succeeded in translating the historical radical nationalism with neo-fascist tendencies into a discourse and a political image consistent with the national populism and radicalism of the most modern parties of the European extreme right. While accepting the need for strengthened economic links between European states, the PNR rejects any project, such as European Union (EU) political integration, that diminishes national sovereignty. It recognizes Europe as Portugal’s natural cultural setting insofar as it is synonymous with the catholic West. Thus it has abandoned the Euro-African inclinations of the older Portuguese nationalism, opposed Turkey’s accession to the EU and called for Portugal to leave NATO, which it viewed as an instrument of the United States. It blames most of the problems currently affecting the country – from the crises in key economic sectors (agriculture, fisheries and small and medium enterprises) to the recent massive wave of immigration – on Portugal’s acession to the EU in 1986. The party’s discourse on immigration is ethno-nationalist, describing it as an ‘invasion’ which threatens cultural identity, jobs, national commerce and public safety.

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For this reason, it has called for the suspension of the Schengen Treaty, the repatriation of illegal immigrants, a block on family reunifications and it also opposes, in the name of jus sanguinis, the principle of jus soli that inspired the socialist government’s 2006 nationality law. Defence of the national community is, for the PNR, achieved by protecting the traditional family as the nucleus of society threatened by the depenalization of abortion and the gay rights movement (Zúquete 2007: 183–86). In recent years, the PNR has become very active in the media, the attention of which has been stimulated by the radical, anti-system identity it has claimed for itself and for its polemical anti-immigration initiatives, such as the adverts on billboards in central Lisbon inviting immigrants to return to their countries (April 2007 and October 2008) and the Internet-promoted June 2005 demonstrations that were attended by more people than the radical right had been able to attract since the 1970s. However, its high media profile has also raised some problems, mainly as a result of the links the party maintains with the Portuguese Hammerskin chapter, whose leaders (some of whom are leading members of the PNR) are frequently arrested and imprisoned. The PNR’s public face is the result of the careful restructuring of its hierarchy and their competences, and in the promotion of Coelho as the ‘party’s official face’, despite his lack of personal charisma (Zúquete 2007: 189). Despite its continual appearance in the mass media and in the political debate, the party has yet to obtain appreciable results at the electoral level. In its first electoral competition, the 2002 legislative election, it managed only 0.09 per cent (4,712 votes), 0.16 per cent (9,374 votes) in 2005, 0.20 per cent (11,503 votes) in 2009 and 0.31 per cent (17,548 votes) in 2011. At the European elections it obtained 0.25 per cent (8,405 votes) in 2004 and 0.37 per cent (13,214 votes) in 2009. The party failed to attract the protest vote that contributed to the high level of abstentionism (42 per cent) in 2011. While the PNR’s status as a ‘non-system party’ may be a point in its favour as far as the anti-system electorate is concerned, its willingness to open up to the more extreme right – both nationally and internationally – does not seem likely to attract the ‘mass of discontented’ who have not yet rewarded the most moderate populist party Nova Democracia, which was founded by the CDS’s former leader Manuel Monteiro, and which obtained only 0.21 per cent (11,806) in the 2011 elections. The Portuguese system of proportional representation appears not to help small parties, as evidenced by the fact that only five parties have parliamentary representation, and only two of these, the PS and PSD, with 70 per cent of the electorate, will ever form a government. The PNR also suffers from a lack of territorial roots. In local elections in Lisbon – which are an important indicator in a highly centralized country such as Portugal, in which Lisbon has a large proportion of the country’s population and, hence, political power – the PNR obtained 0.09 per cent (877 votes) in 2001, 0.17 per cent (1,641 votes) in 2005 and 0.13 per cent (1,204 votes) in 2009. Despite the considerable increase in its media exposure and the more moderate increase in its electoral results, we are far from being able to speak of a ‘Le Pen’

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effect in Portugal. Symptomatic of this is the fact that the PNR has recently escaped being dissolved on account of its having fewer than the legally required 5,000 members – it was saved only as a result of the Constitutional Court’s intervention to protect small parties.

Conclusion The roots of the Portuguese radical right’s weakness can be found in its elitist nature, obvious since the beginning of the twentieth century and confirmed during forty-eight years of authoritarianism. Integralismo Lusitano (IL) (1914–32) was the first coherent expression of rightwing radicalism and was the fruit of the intellectual abilities of a small group of traditionalist monarchists who had no interest in creating a mass movement during the turbulent years of the First Republic. In turn, the groups influenced by the fascist revolution during the 1920s and 1930s were late in expressing a common political project (1933) – National Syndicalism – a project that was swiftly crushed by Salazar. The radical right’s expressions remained, therefore, minority realities, marginal, when they were not marginalized, within Salazarism, the pillars of which have to be sought in authoritarian conservatism, in social catholicism, in counter-revolutionary monarchism and in conservative republicanism rather than in the radical and revolutionary proposals of the right.The radical right survived in the shadow of Salazarist paternalism and the New State’s main currents of thought. The relationship varied between declared opposition to the New State during its early years, through critical collaboration during the consolidation of Salazarism to pseudo-opposition during Caetano’s government. The price of this dependence was extracted following the regime’s downfall. The Salazarist right evaporated politically: if on the one hand they could not reclaim the authoritarian practice of Salazarist government as a doctrine per se (Pinto 1996: 185), on the other hand, they did not want to assume the legacy of a regime that had fallen into decadence a long time before. Consequently, they were diluted into the parties of the centre-right upon which the model of Christian democracy, liberal conservatism and the Bonapartism of some of the leaders compensated, under democracy, for the absence of Salazarist paternalism. For its part, the radical right that was, between 1945 and 1974, animated by a few intellectuals and student organizations united around the myth of the empire, had neither the consistency, the experience nor the equipment with which to play an important role in the new political milieu. As a result they fragmented into small groups of hard-liners, who denied legitimacy to the new political actors, and soft-liners, who attempted to capture the sociological right’s consensus on the new rules of the game and thus to participate in it (Pasquino 1993: 54; Morlino 2003: 150). The political inconsistency within the radical right revealed itself both in its tactics and in its aims. In terms of aims, these were wrapped around the monothematic struggle to defend the empire, which lost all reason with the conclusion of

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the decolonization process (Pinto 1996: 235). In terms of tactics, the network of different attitudes resolved into self-subordination to the military (the Spínolist faction of the MFA) and the civilian apparatus (the PS-PPD-CDS anti-communist front), which resulted in a negative cost–benefit balance for the radical-right and the dissipation of its ability to act independently, as was demonstrated in the immediate post-25 April period. From the beginning of the 1980s to the end of the twentieth century, the Portuguese radical right can be characterized thus: its more active memberships, born politically during the former regime, moved from being ‘functional democrats’ to ‘cultural democrats’ (Pridham 2000: 179). On the one hand, this enabled them to obtain visibility within the young Portuguese democracy, while on the other, it removed from the radical right its capacity for political expression, both at the electoral and at the extra-parliamentary levels – a position of marginality that has not been resolved by its indisputable, albeit limited, successes in the cultural field. A politico-cultural fracture enabled a new generation of activists to emerge, militants who introduced both the radical youth sub-cultures and the racist discourse of the more extreme movements of the European right. Despite this, however, it did not lead to any ideological or cultural renovation in Portugal to compare with what was achieved by similar groups elsewhere in Europe, reinterpreting themes that belonged to the New Left, to the Latin American ‘third-way’ or to national-Bolshevism and so on. The PNR’s attempt to exploit the crises of post-industrial societies (mistrust of politics, immigration, precariousness of employment, pauperization of the middle class), eventually introduced the innovations of the European radical right, but this has yet to produce any appreciable results. The new course upon which the party has set is too recent for us to be able to reach any conclusion; however, the signs that have emerged (strategy and electoral feedback) suggest the radical right in Portugal at the dawn of the new millennium faces a difficult future.

Notes 1 PPM was founded by anti-Salazarist monarchists and led by Rolão Preto, the former leader of the fascist-inspired Nacional-Sindicalismo (NS, National Syndicalism). 2 In 2004 the PDC was wound up by the Constitutional Tribunal for inactivity. MIRN was wound up in 1997. 3 Zarco Ferreira was the leader of the most important neo-fascist organization of the 1960s: Jovem Portugal (Young Portugal, 1961–65). 4 However, there remained active formations of the traditional right, such as New Monarchy National Force (FN/NM, 1983–91), which split from the PPM.

Bibliography Amaral, D.F. 1995. O antigo regime e a revolução: memórias políticas (1941–75). Lisbon: Bertrand. Bacalhau, M. 1994. Atitudes, opiniões e comportamentos políticos dos portugueses (1973–93). Lisbon: MTD.

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Brito, A.J. 2007. ‘O fascista desiludido com a extrema-direita’, Diário de Notícias, 12 May, pp. 8–9. Casals, X. 1998. La tentación neofascista en España. Barcelona: Plaza & Janés. Jalali, C. 2007. Partidos e democracia em Portugal, 1974–2005. Lisbon: ICS. Marchi, R. 2009. Império, Nação, Revolução. As direitas radicais portuguesas no fim do Estado Novo (1959–1974). Lisbon: Texto. —— 2010. ‘At the Roots of the New Right-Wing Extremism in Portugal: the National Action Movement (1985–91)’, Totalitarian Movements and Political Religions, 11(1): 47–66. Morlino, L. 2003. Democrazie e democratizzazioni. Bologna: Il Mulino. Múrias, M.M. 1980. ‘A derrota da direita’, Rua, 9 October, p. 24. Pasquino, G. 1993. ‘Party Elites and Democratic Consolidation: Cross-national Comparison of Southern European Experience’, in G. Pridham (ed.), Securing Democracy. London: Routledge, pp. 42–61. Pinto, A.C. 1998. ‘Dealing with the Legacy of Authoritarianism: Political Purge in Portugal’s Transition to Democracy (1974–76)’, in S. Larsen (ed.), Modern Europe after Fascism, 1943–1980s. New York: SSM, pp. 1679–717. Pinto, J.N. 1996. A direita e as direitas. Lisbon: Difel. Pridham, G. 2000. The Dynamics of Democratization. London: Continuum. Zúquete, J.P. 2007. ‘Portugal: A New Look at the Extreme Right’, Representation, 43(3): 179–98.

7 THE SPANISH EXTREME RIGHT From neo-Francoism to xenophobic discourse José L. Rodríguez Jiménez

The division of the political class in the Francoist crisis: the emergence of neo-Francoism As is well known, General Franco proclaimed himself the winner of the Civil War that ravaged Spain between 1936 and 1939. His victory implied a change of regime, the liquidation of political democracy and the start of a personal dictatorship. The revolt against the Second Republic was promoted by a coalition of monarchists and the authoritarian Catholic right who were charmed by fascism. For this reason, and because of the help given by the fascist powers to the rebel government during the Civil War, the first Franco governments were composed of a coalition of different factions from the anti-liberal and fascist right. Although Franco was not a fascist, his regime had fascist characteristics during its first stage (one-party state with a fascist party, Falange; Rodríguez 2000; Thomàs 1999) and collaborated with the fascist powers during the Second World War. However, Germany’s defeat obliged Franco to tone down its totalitarian impulses and to reduce the areas of power allocated to the fascists in favour of the authoritarian Catholic right and the monarchists. Like other Mediterranean states in Europe, Spain was a backward country in comparison with Western and Northern European states. Moreover, Francoist economic policy was a failure. It was not until the 1950s that recovery began. At the end of that decade, the regime changed its economic policy, replacing autocracy with the partial liberalization of economic activity. This change, in a context of pronounced growth in Western Europe, gave rise to an accelerated modernization and a highly marked, albeit very unevenly distributed, increase in material welfare. In return, this economic development during the 1960s provided the regime with new social support.

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In contrast to the civic groups that had upheld the military uprising of July 1936, the new middle classes did not identify with the thinking of the extreme right. However, at the outset, they scarcely showed any interest in questioning the political system. Part of them even identified the economic development with Franco’s leadership. Nonetheless, the process of industrialization and development opened the door to a series of cultural changes and shifts in mentality.These changes eroded the hegemony of national Catholicism, which was the ideology imposed by the political groups making up the Franco regime and by the two institutions supporting the dictatorship, the Army and the Catholic Church. This development was important, because it had the potential of favouring a democratization process (Capistegui 2006). Then, during the 1970s, two very important questions emerged. First, there was the division of the pro-Franco political class into reformists or soft-core supporters (called blandos) and hard-liners (called duros); these latter were to form the basis of the future extreme right-wing parties. Second, there was the question of succession in the leadership of the state, since Franco turned 78 in 1970. These were related questions. The division of the political class of a regime has a lot to do with the crisis of succession that rears its head at a given moment in time, as well as with other situations that arise in that context. In the Spanish case, these situations were as follows: increased rejection of the regime as the result of economic and cultural changes; an upsurge of social conflict; the growing strength of the forces of the opposition; and the deterioration of relationships between the Catholic Church and the state (Maravall and Santamaría 1985; O’Donnell et al. 1989). The reformists then backed the opening up of the political system and attempted to win support from the moderate anti-Franco opposition. Gradually, and as they felt increasingly besieged by the hard-liners, they showed themselves willing to run greater risks: to negotiate with a part of the left-leaning opposition and accept a reform that would lead to a democratic regime. On their side, the hard-liners felt that the increase in social conflict was eroding the regime. As a result, they accused the reformists of being traitors and demanded an energetic reaction against the opposition groups from the government – that is, an out-and-out defence of the dictatorial system. It should be borne in mind that the hard-liners were represented in government, and that in many matters they had the support of the Head of state – general Franco – and of the Vice President and later Government President, Admiral Luis Carrero. In addition to their presence in government and in diverse agencies of the State Administration, the duros created several associations. They took this step to better air their ideas and criticize some government decisions independently. These associations (not Political Parties, which were prohibited) were grouped according to two tendencies: neo-fascists1 and neo-Francoists. The neo-fascists vindicated the first period of Franco’s regime (1936–42), when the fascist party had an important representation in the coalition government, and in addition they were against the Law of Basic Principles of Movement, which in 1958 had finally replaced the fascist one-party by the ‘Movimiento’, representing the pro-Franco coalition.

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The neo-Francoists vindicated the first period and particularly the second period of Franco’s regime (1943–57), when the extreme-right coalition predominated in the government and the hegemony of national Catholicism was complete, without any opportunity for cultural changes. However, these tendencies were differentiated more by personal rather than by ideological questions and often collaborated closely. The neo-fascist tendency was represented by Círculos Doctrinales José Antonio (José Antonio Doctrinal Circles, named in honour of José Antonio Primo de Rivera, founder of the most important Spanish fascist party) and the Falange Española de las Juntas de Ofensiva Nacional Sindicalista (FE-JONS, the Spanish Phalanx of Units of the National Syndicalist Offensive, a recasting of the principal Spanish fascist party). The neo-Francoist tendency – more important both at the time and in the future – was represented by Fuerza Nueva (New Force, founded in 1967) and the National Confederation of Ex-combatants (1974). This latter organization was led by former Labour Minister José Antonio Girón, a Phalangist, and grouped together the associations of pro-Franco ex-combatants of the Civil War formed between the end of the 1950s and the beginnings of the 1960s. The first article of the by-laws of the Confederation established the following as its purposes: ‘to coordinate and reinforce the activities of the different Brotherhoods and Associations of Ex-Combatants in the common ideal of the survival and solidity of the Principles of 18 July’, and ‘to attempt to transmit these to the new generations as the most prized legacy’ (Rodríguez 1994; Casals 1998). The neo-Francoist organizations specialized in accusing not only the reformers, but also the government of being traitors. This was what happened when, after the assassination of the head of the government, Admiral Carrero, by the terrorist organization ETA in December 1973, Franco appointed Carlos Arias as the new government head. Arias, who was one of the regime’s hard-liners, initiated a tenuous opening up of the political system, and was then lambasted as a traitor, for supposedly allowing the regime to be infiltrated by its enemies.The extremist right-wing – defined by the reformers as the Francoist bunker2 – used this label for the reformists occupying positions in the State Administration and who worked in public companies. Its language hardened during the following months, as international events called its plans for the future into question: a left-leaning military coup in Portugal in April 1974 put an end to the government of Marcelo Caetano, the heir to Salazar’s ultra-conservative dictatorship. Two months later, a new military coup – this time in Athens – provoked the downfall of the dictatorship in Greece. During the following months, neo-Francoism managed to scuttle some of the government bills pending in the Cortes, the legislative assembly. In addition, with the support of the neo-fascists, it mobilized its partisans through a series of political assemblies held throughout the national territory, always for the purpose of exalting the figure of Franco and the spirit of the Crusade of 1936. In these activities, it had the support of sectors from the Army and the various secret services existing at the time, the Organización Sindical, the sole Francoist trade union, and a series of government-dependent political and social agencies, since neoFrancoism was then strong and influential.

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The neo-Francoist extreme right during the phases of democratic transition and consolidation (1976–82): from a position of power to opposition Electoral strategy Franco died on 20 November 1975, and two days afterwards, the man whom the dictator had designated to succeed him as Head of State, Juan Carlos de Borbón, was crowned King of Spain. Thus, the still-powerful Spanish extreme right, particularly the neo-Francoists, mobilized for a double purpose: to render homage to its caudillo and to try to prevent the change in the leadership of state from resulting in a change of regime. From then onwards, the changes occurred in rapid succession. The difficult situation of the country, bogged down in an economic and political crisis, gave rise to a pact between the reformist sector of the pro-Franco political class, headed by the King, and the anti-Franco opposition. In 1976, a process of democratization began and, in 1977, the first democratic elections since 1936 were held. During this process, the extreme right lost a significant part of its support and was progressively isolated. When Political Parties were legalized, a substantial part of its political cadres joined the conservative and centre-right parties. The sole significant remaining support for the extreme right was to be found in the Army. If the truth be told, the weakness of the extreme right was one of the surprises of the transition process to democracy. Its programme was of the neo-Francoist type, with some components proper to neo-fascism. This programme does not seem to have been adequate for these circumstances, since now the purpose was not to defend a regime, but to construct an alternative. In order to understand this situation, we have to bear in mind that in Spain the ideology and programme of the extreme right had not been revised since the end of the Civil War in 1939. Likewise, those in favour of revision were in a minority for several reasons: first, because of the four-decade participation of the extreme right in power-sharing, a factor that was not conducive to renovation; second, due to the very essence of its ideology, based as it was on Manichaean formulations and contrary to any sort of change; and third, the long duration of the dictatorship favoured the survival of national Catholicism and fascism as references for the new organizations that were created during the final stage of the regime, after the legalization of Political Parties in 1977. The extreme right failed the test of the 1977 elections. It must be borne in mind that these groups provoked a generalized rejection among voters, who identified them with the pro-Franco repression and the more reactionary ideas of the dictatorship. Likewise, the extreme right offered a stagnant programme – the rehabilitation of the Franco regime. Also, its forces were divided into three neo-fascist parties and the neo-Francoist party, Fuerza Nueva (New Force). In addition, the acceptance of political reform by a portion of pro-Franco politicians was damaging to the strategy of the extremists. The principal party acting as a federating force among

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the pro-Franco political cadres who were partisans of limited reform was the Alianza Popular (People’s Alliance). In that regard, the fact that this party accepted the project for democratic reform prepared by the new government backed by the King and headed by a man who had exercised various responsibilities in the previous regime – Adolfo Suárez – was to be a very significant factor in the consolidation of democracy (no such factor was present in the case of the Second Republic). It was also significant that it accepted the Constitution approved by the new Cortes in 1978 (although this threatened to produce an internal crisis), since the step taken by the People’s Alliance party implied that the greater part of the pro-Franco social bases placed confidence in the strategy marked out by politicians from the Francoist side and were accepting democracy as normal. Even the National Confederation of Ex-combatants recommended voting for People’s Alliance. For the elections held in June 1977, the parties New Force and Spanish Phalanx formed a coalition under the title Alianza Nacional 18 de Julio (National Alliance of 18 July, the date of the military uprising in 1936). This notwithstanding, agreement did not hold for all of their electoral factions and, moreover, other groups of neo-fascist ideology did not join this coalition. The votes obtained by the different organizations are reported in Table 7.1.3 With a combined total of less than 1 per cent of the votes, the extreme right was relegated outside the legislative assembly. In other words, the programme and slogans chorused in extreme-right political rallies, such as ¡Franco resucita, España te necesita! (‘Franco resuscitate, Spain needs you!’) and ¡Suárez dimisión, por perjuro y por masón! (‘Suárez resign, for perjury and freemasonry!’) found scant acceptance among the citizenry. In contrast, People’s Alliance, a party composed of members of the pro-Franco political class who had accepted political reform, although it did not satisfy them completely, obtained a million and a half votes (more than 8 per cent). To this must be added the fact that the governingt party, the Unión de Centro Democrático (Union of the Democratic Centre), composed of members of the pro-Franco political class who had backed political change, and members of the moderate anti-Franco opposition, had won the elections, accounting for more than six million votes (34.44 per cent). The second political force turned out to be the Socialist Party, and the third, the Communist Party. TABLE 7.1 1977 elections in Spain

1. Alianza Nacional 18 de Julio 2. Falange Española de las JONS Auténtica 3. Falange Española de las JONS 4. Asociación Círculos José Antonio 5. Asociación Política Fuerza Nueva 6. Falange Española Independiente

Number of votes received

Percentage of votes received

67,336 46,548 25,017 8,184 5,541 855

0.37 0.25 0.14 0.04 0.03 0.00

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The legislative elections of 1979, held after the approval of the 1978 Constitution, resulted in a similar situation. Nonetheless, the extreme right improved its election results. The ultra-right-wing coalition, named Unión Nacional (National Union), now grouped together the parties New Force, Spanish Phalanx (of Units of the National Syndicalist Offensive), José Antonio Doctrinal Circles, the National Confederation of Ex-combatants and the Agrupación de Juventudes Tradicionalistas (Union of Traditionalist Youth). The image of unity, greater economic resources, the support given by the newspapers El Alcázar – the voice of the Confederation of Ex-combatants – and, more importantly, of the recast El Imparcial, combined with a decrease in support for People’s Alliance, made it possible to obtain 378,964 votes, accounting for 2.11 per cent of the vote. The truth is the coalition expected more votes, owing to the crisis of People’s Alliance, but the 110,730 votes obtained in Madrid gave the coalition its only seat in the legislative assembly for New Force leader, Blas Piñar. He is the sole Member of Parliament ever to have been elected from the extreme right since the re-establishment of democracy. In proportional terms, the extreme right should have obtained a greater number of representatives, but Spanish electoral law is designed to give large groups the priority and to make access to Parliament difficult for small parties of a national scope. Four other neo-fascist organizations obtained derisory results.

The coup strategy: downfall The right-wing extremist leaders tried to justify the results by saying that voters had been deceived, or that they were anaesthetized by a plethora of organizations and communications media, behind which the hand of freemasonry lay concealed. Or – even worse – the hand of international Judaism, always very active, it was said, in multiple forms. However, deceived or not, what was clear was that voters did not place their confidence in anti-democrats. Thus, the extreme right understood that the sole possibility of seeing their aspirations fulfilled lay in a coup d’état. Evidently, the idea of liquidating democracy by means of a military coup had been in the heads of leaders like Girón, Piñar and journalists of El Alcázar, such as Antonio Izquierdo, for some time back. In laying their plans, they held some trump cards. Their main advantage was the fact that a significant number of key positions in the armed forces were still in the hands of officials who had been very loyal to Franco, and who were against the Constitution; their objections centred on the territorial organization of the state, chiefly in the granting of political autonomy to the regions. Besides they thought that the government was not deploying the means necessary to counter the terrorist organization ETA, which employed armed struggle in its attempts to achieve the independence of one of the regions, the Basque Country. For this reason, these military officials did not require a lot of encouraging to conspire against the democratic regime. This notwithstanding, the extreme-right press (El Alcázar, El Imparcial, Heraldo Español, Fuerza Nueva) undertook an important campaign against democracy. Its message was that the

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Franco regime was a time of peace, employment and economic progress, and that, in contrast, democracy was a disastrous system, responsible for the problems that Spain was experiencing: 14 per cent inflation, 16.5 per cent unemployment, the increase in ETA terrorist attacks, aimed largely against the military, and a crisis in the government party, the Union of the Democratic Centre. Moreover, they pointed out that Spain, because of decentralization and the granting of autonomy to the regions, was about to disappear. In a word, extreme-right politicians and journalists manipulated the information, used false data to provoke anti-democratic sentiments among right-wing voters, and presented existing problems as though they were phenomena exclusively found in democratic regimes. This relentless effort to make the public believe that there was widespread support for the re-establishment of an authoritarian regime was the main task performed by rightwing extremists. It was executed with a certain success, thanks to the seriousness of the problems affecting the country. At the beginning of 1981 there were two projects for a coup d’état under way. Politicians, military figures and journalists writing in the extremist right-wing organs of communication collaborated in preparations for the failed coup attempt of 23 February 1981, which signified the convergence of the two different coup projects, with the participation of military and civilian figures (Cernuda et al. 2001; Medina 2006). The failure of the coup d’état of 1981, and of a new coup attempt in 1982, indicated that the Army was divided. But the government gradually took control of the situation by replacing the commanding officers. In addition, the failure of the coup plotters and their arraignment in court inoculated the armed forces against this sort of malaise. What had happened also discredited the extreme right with respect to the voters of the conservative right. The greater part of the votes lost by People’s Alliance in 1979 to the advantage of the extreme right returned to the conservative fold in 1982. The Socialist Party won the elections with an absolute majority. It is of interest to observe the division of the extreme right into several parties, and even the emergence of new organizations, as shown in Table 7.2.4

TABLE 7.2 1982 elections in Spain

1. Asociación Política Fuerza Nueva 2. Solidaridad Española 3. Movimiento Falangista de España 4. Falange Española de las JONS 5. Falange Española Independiente 6. Movimiento Católico Español 7. Falange Asturiana

Number of votes received

Percentage of votes received

108,746 28,451 8,976 2,528 1,862 1,694 532

0.52 0.14 0.04 0.01 0.01 0.01 0.00

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The extreme right would never recover. The party Fuerza Nueva accepted defeat and announced its dissolution. Nonetheless, during the years to come, the extreme right would continue to be divided and would pursue the renovation of its programme to a very limited extent. If in France, the Front National gave impulse to a new extreme right, or at least adopted a more modern visage and less-overtly fascist strategy, in Spain the different parties continued to be bound to the model of the old extreme right.

Spanish neo-Nazis: a printing press for the denial of the Holocaust During the period between 1982 and 2008 the political relevance of extreme-right organizations was nil. Nonetheless, during the 1980s and 1990s there was a development that should be underscored in relation to political extremism. We are referring to the activities of a neo-Nazi organization, the Círculo Español de Amigos de Europa (CEDADE, the Spanish Circle of Friends of Europe), which was founded in 1965 and dissolved in 1994 (Casals 1998). There are two things that attract our interest about CEDADE: first, that it set up a wide network of international relations with associations, parties and even governments of non-democratic states; and second, that its members set up several publishing houses and bookshops that acted as centres of dissemination for neo-Nazi propaganda, above all pamphlets and books denying the Holocaust. The economic support provided by Nazi refugees in Spain, Arab governments and members of the organization was used to set up several publishing houses. A significant part of their production, drawn up in different languages, was exported to European and American countries, above all to those with laws prohibiting Nazi and fascist parties, Nazi propaganda and Holocaust denial. CEDADE offered neo-Nazi groups and individuals the possibility of publishing pamphlets, posters, brochures and books in Spain. For instance, two Austrians, Gert Honsik and Walter Ochsenberger, published the German-language magazines Halt (Stop) and Sieg (Victory) in Barcelona during the 1990s. When CEDADE was dissolved, its principal leader, Pedro Varela, founded the Librería Europa. Incidentally there is a neo-fascist bookshop in Rome called Libreria Europa. In 1995, the Penal Code was reformed. The new code considers the dissemination of ideas or doctrines aspiring to destroy an ethnic, racial or religious group, or pursuing the rehabilitation of regimes that support these forms of behaviour by any means, as a crime. In 1998, this was applied to Varela, accused of inciting racial hatred and defending the Jewish genocide. The material on sale at the Librería Europa was confiscated, the bookshop closed, and Varela sentenced to five years’ imprisonment for the defence of genocide. Nonetheless, Varela, who appealed the sentence, has continued to distribute neo-Nazi material from Distribuciones Europa, which operates from the same bookshop through a PO box in Barcelona. The shop reopened to sell books and host conferences given by personalities such as David Duke, former Ku Klux Klan leader, in November 2007 (suspended at the

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last minute), and David Irving, a Holocaust revisionist writer, in December 2007. It does not seem that Varela is going to have problems in continuing to disseminate racist propaganda, since at the beginning of 2008, the Constitutional Court issued a judgment establishing that the denial of Jewish genocide is not a crime. And following this, in March, the High Court of Barcelona reduced Varela’s sentence to seven months.

Bidding for the xenophobic vote (1995–2008) The making of a new extreme right? The Spanish right-wing extremists very belatedly began a process to revise their programme. As is already known, some extreme-right European parties substituted the explicit rejection of democracy with a formal acceptance of democracy and a xenophobic discourse centred on the rejection of immigrants, while at the same time upholding an ultra-nationalist line (Pérez Ledesma 1997; Antón 2002; Rodríguez 2004). This evolution, which would eventually give rise to the emergence of a new extreme right, is also perceptible in Spain and, since the mid-1990s, the various existing parties have been grouped into three tendencies: neo-Francoists, neo-fascists and national populists. However, there are three differences from other European countries. First, the neo-Francoist and neo-fascist parties are the dominant extreme-right tendencies in Spain today.These groups keep alive the historical memory of Spanish fascism, the Civil War and the Franco regime. This was perceptible in the names of several organizations, four of which continued to use the denomination of ‘phalanx’, like the fascist party founded in 1933. The same may be said with respect to organized political events.The most significant revolves around 20-N, 20 November of each year, when homage is paid to Francisco Franco and José Antonio Primo de Rivera, the founder of the Phalanx, both deceased on the same day, in 1975 and 1936, respectively. Every 19 November, the Phalangists organize a march from the Parque del Oeste in Madrid to the basilica in the Valle de los Caídos, located in the Guadarrama Mountains, 58 kilometres from the capital. They start out at night and arrive at daybreak. Afterwards, they hear a mass for Primo de Rivera. For its part, the National Confederation of Ex-combatants organizes a mass in the same basilica on that day for Franco and Primo de Rivera and, on 20 November, a rally at the Plaza de Oriente in Madrid. This rally is supported by the Francisco Franco National Foundation, Fuerza Nueva magazine, and the parties that succeeded the dissolved party of that name, such as the Movimiento Católico Español (Spanish Catholic Movement), the Frente Nacional (National Front, revamped Fuerza Nueva) and the Alternativa Española (Spanish Alternative), this latter founded in 2003. During the last few years, attendance at the 20 November events in Madrid has been very thin: between 1976 and 1981 there were always more than 200,000 people, but this later dwindled markedly to between 1,500 and 3,000 participants. These groups organize other events in different locations in Spain.

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The most important is that held on 12 October, a holiday in the Catholic religious calendar that coincides with the Hispanic Day, commemorating the discovery of America and the cultural ties uniting Spain to the countries of Central and South America. On that day, neo-Francoist groups pay homage to the Spanish flag in Sant Jordi square in Montjuic (Barcelona). Attendance does not usually exceed 200. Nowadays parties such as Nación Joven (Young Nation), Juntas Españolas (Spanish Assemblies) and Alianza por la Unidad Nacional (Alliance for the National Unity), founded in the 1980s and 1990s, have disappeared, but the neo-Francoist and neofascist tendencies are now represented by Alternativa Española and several parties named Falange. The second difference lies in the fact that in Europe several contemporary extreme-right xenophobic groups have experienced a marked growth, whereas in Spain they continue to obtain very bad electoral results.The outcomes of legislative elections have always been lower than those obtained in 1982. In 1986, 1989, 1993, 1996, 2000, 2004 and 2008, several extreme right-wing candidacies were presented, and the sum total obtained by the parties has never exceeded 0.3 per cent of the votes. Thus, the evolution of events is completely different from that of other European states, where the rise in immigration has given way to a growth in right-wing extremism. In Spain, immigration has greatly increased during the last decade, progressing from a million immigrants to more than four million on the census (4,169,086 official data in June 2008), or 10 per cent of the total population. The total figure is actually higher, since more than half a million illegal immigrants are not on the census. However, the extreme right have been unable to capitalize on either the increase in immigration or the modernization of their programmes. The third difference lies in the insufficient effort made by national populists to construct a new extreme right.The most evident case is that of the party Democracia Nacional (DN, National Democracy). It was founded in 1995 to give some unsuccessful experiments from previous years a new name. This was a party founded by middle-aged persons who had held positions of responsibility in CEDADE and some neo-fascist organizations. In spite of the past of its leaders, DN seeks to portray itself as a party of the ‘national right’, a moderate image, to attract the most conservative of right-wing voters, while still addressing social and economic problems which interest those sections of society who have been hardest hit by the recessions at the end of the 1990s and today. DN accepts the constitutional rules, while declaring its willingness fundamentally to reform the Constitution. However, its model of political organization refers to a system opposed to parliamentary democracy (‘the opening up of reforms of political participation close to citizen, and outside the structures of Political Parties’), with clear limits imposed on individual freedoms (‘recognizing responsibilities before rights’), beginning with restrictions on the freedom of the press, the total prohibition of abortion and the punishment of ‘immoral conduct’, to which must be added the traditional view of the role of women, that is, suggested measures to enable them to ‘choose, for their own personal development, to stay and look after the home and children’

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(Nuestra Propuesta (Our Proposal ), April 1995). In addition, this is the party which has most used immigration as a mobilizing theme. Its xenophobic content is consistently inspired by the work of the French Front National: The French first here becomes ‘Unemployment + immigration = Delinquency. Stop the Invasion. The Spanish first’. The programme also includes ultra-nationalist content exalting Spain and denying political autonomy to the regions. Likewise, there is rejection of globalization and supranational organizations such as the European Union and NATO, coupled with disdain for democracy, expressed through the condemnation of the entire political class and institutions. With a view to the legislative elections held in March 2000, DN formed the so-called Plataforma 2000 (Platform 2000), which enjoyed the support of Le Pen’s man in Spain, Alain Lavarde. During the following years, the party split into two groups: Democracia Nacional and España 2000 (Spain 2000). This latter is directed from the city of Valencia by two businessmen, former Phalangist José Luis Roberto and former member of New Force, Salvador Gamborino. Despite these changes, it is clear that the neo-Francoists and neo-fascists as well as the extreme right-wing parties that have most thoroughly revised their programmes have remained stagnant, as well as being divided. During the March 2008 elections, they (eight parties) achieved an abominable result, fewer than 0.05 per cent of the votes. Several possible reasons may be cited to explain this situation. Evidently, the association that the greater part of public opinion has established between extreme right-wing groups and political violence (Sánchez 1993) has something to do with it. This has been so since the years of transition to democracy, when extreme right-wing terrorist organizations carried out a series of attacks. Afterwards, during the 1990s, young right-wing extremists committed acts of aggression against the activists of leftist organizations, homosexuals and immigrants – mainly Africans – resulting in several deaths. Two types of issue are emerging in the first years of the new millennium. On one hand, the extreme-right parties stimulate violent attitudes in those places where there have been outbreaks of racism against immigrants. Occasionally, they have not only encouraged aggression, but scenarios have occurred where groups of citizens protested due to the rise of immigration or the competition for jobs. The calls were launched over the Internet. For example, during the xenophobic incidents of Terrassa (Barcelona) in July 1999, activists of the Catalonian neo-Nazi group European National State participated in them and distributed a leaflet justifying the ‘racism of the poor’, asking the inhabitants of one district of the town (Ca n’Anglada) to react against ‘people of the illegal Moorish collective’. The same thing occurred regarding several acts of racism in El Ejido (Almería), where, during the last few years, Moroccan immigrants working on farms have suffered beatings with iron bars at the hands of small organized groups. The party Platform 2000 has called its followers several times to this town with the intention of inciting altercations and aggression. The rally was convoked over the Internet under the title ‘Almería burns’, accompanied by the wish: ‘I hope that tonight Almería is reminiscent of Ulster’. Once again, in September 2005 there were demonstrations

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in Elche (Alicante), in which racist cries were heard at shoe shops and warehouses owned by Chinese. The shoemaking sector, which had always been significant in the area, now displays a high unemployment rate, and Spanish businessmen and workers complain that Chinese manufacturers ride roughshod over labour, tax and environmental laws to bring prices down while the administration fails to remedy the situation. Having said this, it must be pointed out that while extremist rightwing parties encourage racist acts, these almost always have the profile of spontaneous protests by low-income social groups. When the extreme right took the step of organizing demonstrations against immigration starting in 2007, it failed completely. One of the most recent examples was the rally called by National Democracy in Madrid in January 2008, under the motto ‘This is no way to live. Let us recover Madrid’. The number of participants was fewer than 180.5 On the other hand, it must be pointed out that xenophobia is increasingly taking the form of Islamophobia, due to the rise in the number of immigrants subscribing to the Muslim religion, which amount to over a million, and to the 11-M terrorist attack in Madrid perpetrated by a group of Islamic fundamentalists in March 2004. The outbreaks of Islamophobia have taken the form of graffiti, threats and damage wrought upon mosques, halal butcher shops and Islamic cultural centres, as has occurred in some cities: Soria, Madrid, Valencia, Ceuta and in several Catalonian towns. Mention must also be made of violent acts against persons, almost always immigrants with limited economic resources, and local indigents. The perpetrators are almost always sympathizers of the organizations cited (neo-Nazi skinheads frequent National Alliance and National Democracy sites) and activists of illegal white supremacy groups inciting racial hatred: Blood and Honour, which copies the name of a British neo-Nazi association; Volksfront (People’s Front), which in this case takes the name of a group that emerged in Oregon (USA) advocating white supremacy; and Hammerskin, the oldest group formed in Dallas (Texas) during the 1990s that has taken root in some European states through Hammerskin Nation sections. In sum, it is clear that the extreme right provokes rejection, because it is associated with violence, marred by internal divisions and bereft of an undisputed leader, endowed with the same chairsmatic personality as Jean Marie Le Pen.

The emergence of extreme right-wing formations at local level Another key element in its weakness is the fact that the greater part of the people sympathizing with its ideas vote for another party. First, they voted for People’s Alliance, and now the party that has emerged from its recasting, Partido Popular. They do so because they know that voting for the extreme right means weakening the only right-wing formation with any possibility of success.This situation has not changed. This was what happened when Partido Popular was in opposition at the beginning of the 1990s; also when the right was in power, between 1996 and 2004; and once again when it returned to opposition.

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This situation has given rise to two movements within the extreme right: the movement to specialize in anti-Islamic discourse, as has happened in other European states, and note must be made of a new electoral strategy. Since the parties of national scope have failed, some political cadres have undertaken to create parties at local level, centred once more on the exploitation of xenophobia. And this channel seems to present the possibility of a certain growth in some geographical areas, specifically Catalonia and the regions of Valencia, Andalusia and the Canary Islands. The most outstanding example of this is Plataforma per Catalunya (Platform for Catalonia), led by Joseph Anglada, a former activist of New Force, which managed to place councillors in several towns at the last municipal elections: El Vendrell, Cervera and Manlleu. The party Spain 2000 is taking the same route with less success in the region of Valencia, but the Grup d’Acció Valencianista (Valencian Action Group) has obtained several councillors. Last, we note a very significant recent development. At the end of 2005, Coalició Valenciana (Valencian Coalition), a party founded in May of that year under the leadership of lawyer Juan García Sentandreu (involved in the Spanish Phalanx and in Spain 2000), was reinforced when a regional assembly member from the Partido Popular, Francisco J. Tomás (the mayor of L’Ancora between 1993 and 2003), crossed over to join its ranks. From then on, the Mixed Group of the regional parliament has been open, giving this party a voice. As regards the composition of these parties, they are made up of middle-class university youths, and older people who occupy the posts of leadership and contribute the experience of several years of political activism and frustration, as well as contacts with other domestic and foreign organizations (Rodríguez 2004: 226–86; Gallego 2006). This includes the activism proper to the neo-Nazi groups, a mixture of young and very young manual workers, workingclass and lower middle-class people, and the unemployed.

Conclusion Spain forms part of the very short list of European nations where extremist rightwing parties enjoy very little institutional representation. The extreme right has still not recovered from its rout at the 1982 elections, a defeat capped by the break-up of New Force, the largest of the active extreme-right organizations over the last thirty years. Most of these groups, hostile to the entire system of standards and values enshrined in the political system, place themselves outside it, and continually criticize the existing order. Some of them have continued to feed on nostalgia for Francoism and fascism in Spanish history. The newer parties have tried to design a more contemporary programme, and nationalist discourse is based increasingly on xenophobia and opposition to the EU and NATO. However, the revisions to their programmes, for the time being, have yielded scarce results. Nonetheless, as in Britain, politicians who have their own ideas about the ultraconservative right wing are emerging in the ranks of the principal right-wing party. The extreme right was not able to make electoral capital out of antiCommunist demagoguery during the political transition to democracy, because the

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Communist Party played the card of moderation, and had a limited, and falling level of representation, while the Socialist Party, which took office in 1982, has not implemented a truly left-wing raft of policies. From another perspective, the duration of the socialist period in office until 1996 and the disintegration of the centrist parties, eventually resulted in the consolidation of People’s Alliance, then the Popular Party, in its role as the only possible alternative to the Socialist Party. Moreover, to expand its electoral base and not lose votes and seats on its right, the Popular Party admitted formulas straying from what is understood as the centre or centre-right. More recently, when surveys revealed a vertiginous increase in the predisposition to reject immigration, the Popular Party turned the immigration question into one of the principal items on its political agenda during the 2008 general elections. This makes the advance of the right-wing extremists harder, as also happens with respect to rejecting immigration. This notwithstanding, the growth of regionbased parties specializing in rejecting immigration is foreseeable, both in the sense of Spanish ultra-nationalism and those fighting for specific regional identity.

Notes 1 There is not enough agreement between specialists about the terminology (extreme right, extrème droîte and Rechtsextremismus, but also radical right, neo-fascism and populist right), about what the extreme right is, or about the classification of such parties and movements (Rydgren 2007; Betz 1999). In this chapter neo-fascism will be proposed as an extreme-right ideology, the most modern (up to the 1980s) and the most radical, and with a proposal for a New State, less dependent on religion than other Spanish extreme-right factions (always ultra-Catholic). 2 The expression Francoist bunker appears in the news media of the reformers, such as Cambio 16, in 1974–75, to refer to the neo-Francoist iron determination to keep the institutions under firm control and, by these means, to thwart any political change after Franco’s death. 3 Compiled by the author from the database of the Ministry of the Interior. 4 Compiled by the author from the database of the Ministry of the Interior. 5 El País, 21 January 2008, sets the figure at ‘less than 180’. El Mundo, 21 January 2008: ‘some 150 persons’.

Bibliography Antón, J. (ed.) 2002. Orden, jerarquía y comunidad. Fascismos, dictaduras y postfascismos en la Europa contemporánea. Madrid: Tecnos. Betz, H.G. 1999. ‘Contemporary Right-Wing Radicalism in Europe’, Contemporary European History, 8(2): 299–316. Casals, X. 1998. La tentación neofascista en España. Barcelona: Plaza y Janés. Caspistegui, F.J. 2006. ‘Los matices de la modernización bajo el franquismo’, in A. Mateos and A. Herrerín (eds), La España del presente: De la dictadura a la democracia. Madrid: Asociación de Historiadores del Presente, pp. 251–70. Cernuda, P., Jáuregui, F. and Menéndez, M.A. 2001. 23-F. La conjura de los necios. Madrid: Foca.

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Gallego, F. 2006. Una patria imaginaria. La extrema derecha española (1973–2005). Madrid: Síntesis. Maravall, J.M. and Santamaría, J. 1985. ‘Crisis del franquismo, transición política y consolidación de la democracia en España’, Sistema, 68–69 (November): 82–83. Medina, F. 2006. 23-F. La verdad. Barcelona: Plaza y Janés. O’Donnell, G., Schmitter, P. and Whitehead, L. (eds) 1989. Transiciones desde un gobierno autoritario 1. Europa meridional. Buenos Aires: Paidós. Pérez Ledesma, M. (ed.) 1997. Los riesgos para la democracia. Fascismo y neofascismo. Madrid: Pablo Iglesias. Rodríguez, J.L. 1994. Reaccionarios y golpistas. La extrema derecha en España: del tardofranquismo a la consolidación de la democracia (1967–1982). Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas. –––– 2000. Historia de Falange Española de las JONS. Madrid: Alianza Editorial. –––– 2004. La extrema derecha europea. Madrid: Alianza Editorial. Rydgren, J. 2007. ‘The Sociology of the Radical Right’, Annual Revue of Sociology, 33: 241–62. Sánchez, M. 1993. Los hijos del 20-N. Historia violenta del fascismo español. Madrid: Temas de Hoy. Thomàs, J.Ma. 1999. Lo que fue la Falange. Barcelona: Plaza y Janés.

8 LAOS AND THE GREEK EXTREME RIGHT SINCE 1974 Antonis A. Ellinas

Introduction The Greek extreme right has largely escaped the avalanche of academic interest on the European extreme right.Apart from a few articles (Dimitras 1992; Kapetanyannis 1995) and some brief references in the international literature (e.g. Ignazi 2003; Mudde 2007), little is known about the multiple extreme-right groupings that competed in Greek elections in the past three decades (but see Kolovos 2005). Given the voluminous literature on the extreme right, this scholarly indifference might be somewhat surprising, but a quick glance at the electoral record aptly explains it. For, apart from a brief electoral spurt in 1977, the extreme right has failed to make a mark on the Greek electoral landscape, receiving less than 2 per cent in all subsequent national legislative elections until 2004. Some of the most authoritative studies on the extreme right have attributed the marginality of the Greek extreme right to a developmental ‘lag’ of recent Mediterranean democracies (Kitschelt 1995) and to the bitter memories of authoritarianism (Ignazi 2003). Indeed, until recently these analyses went some way to accounting for the failure of the Greek extreme right. But the recent advances of the extreme-right Popular Orthodox Rally (LAOS) create the need to re-examine the conventional wisdom. Set up in 2000 by a maverick politician of the conservative New Democracy (ND), LAOS shocked the political establishment with its performance at the 2002 municipal elections, receiving 13.6 per cent in the most populous ‘super’ prefecture of Athens-Piraeus. The party got 2.2 per cent in the legislative elections in March 2004; 4.1 per cent in the European elections in June 2004; and 3.8 per cent in the legislative elections of September 2007 (see Table 8.1). Most observers consider the last result to be an important breakthrough for LAOS because it gave the party ten seats in the national legislature. Like previous political formations that sought to challenge the dominance of ND on the right, LAOS came into being after

21.5

1.1

54.4 13.6 9.4

16.7

6.8

41.8 25.3 9.4

1977

3.5

1.7

35.9 48 10.9

1981

3.7

0.6

40.8 45.8 9.1

1985

3.2

2.1

11

13.1

0.3

46.2 40.7

44.3 39.1

4.1

0.1

10.3

46.9 38.6

1989J2 1989N3 1990

Source: Greek Interior Ministry, Athens (Ελληνικó Υπoυργεío Εσωτερικών, Αθήνα). Notes: 1 1974: EDA, KKE, KKE Interior. 2 J = June. 3 N = November.

New Democracy PASOK Communist Party1 Coalition of the Left National Dem. Union National Camp Progressives’ Party Nat. Pol. Union (EPEN) National Party Party of Hellenism Front Line Hellenic Front Popular Orthodox Rally Others

1974

TABLE 8.1 Results in Greek parliamentary elections, 1974–2007 (per cent)

6.3

0.1

39.3 46.9 4.5 2.9

1993

9.3

0.2 0.2

38.1 41.5 5.6 5.1

1996

4.5

0.1 0.2

42.7 43.8 5.5 3.2

2000

0.1 2.2 2.6

45.4 40.5 5.9 3.3

2004

3.8 3.1

41.8 38.1 8.2 5

2007

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George Karatzaferis’s departure from the conservatives, with which he was voted MP in Athens in 1993, 1996 and 2000. But unlike previous ND challengers, LAOS is directly comparable with Western European extreme-right parties sharing their nationalist ideology and populist rhetoric as well as their anti-immigrant, xenophobic and anti-Semitic appeals. LAOS also has distinctive characteristics that reflect certain Greek particularities, like its emphasis on ‘national issues’ and, as its name suggests, its explicit religious appeal. The purpose of this chapter is to sketch the trajectory of the Greek extreme right since 1974. The first section traces the evolution of the various extreme-right parties that surfaced in the post-authoritarian period. These parties shared a notable attachment to the old regime and a strong antithesis to post-1974 policies towards the king, the communists and the junta. The second section uses primary party documents to show the gradual transformation of the extreme right in the 1990s through the adoption of an explicitly nationalist ideological platform. The transformation of the Greek extreme right prepared the ground for the appearance of LAOS in the 2000s. The third section uses evidence from party documents and from interviews with party officials to discuss the ideology of LAOS. It also uses election and survey data to analyse the party’s electoral base. The fourth section seeks to account for the rise of the party, examining both demand and supply factors. With regard to the demand factors, it points to the existence of favourable socio-cultural and socio-economic conditions for the rise of the extreme right. On the supply side, it notes that the difficulty New Democracy has in dealing with ‘national’ or national identity issues created opportunities for the rise of LAOS. It also highlights the communication resources made available to the party by the mainstream media. The chapter concludes with a discussion about the future of LAOS. It asks whether the party will follow the short-lived trajectory of previous ND challengers or whether LAOS will become a permanent force in Greek party politics.

The post-authoritarian extreme right As in post-war Europe, the transition of Greece to democracy in 1974 left behind a segment of the population that was still attached to the old regime and refused to accept the new political realities. This group, made up of ex-army officers, ex-officials of the Greek Colonels’ regime and die-hard anti-communists, became the core of the various extreme-right parties that appeared in the late 1970s and 1980s. They were largely led by older politicians who belonged to the pre-1967 political establishment. Rooted in the historical cleavages that shaped modern Greek party politics, the programmatic appeals of the post-authoritarian extreme right were largely a reaction to the policies set in place after 1974, especially those relating to the treatment of the Communist Party, the king and ex-junta officials. Unlike the contemporary Greek extreme right, which is more directly comparable with the European, the parties representing the post-authoritarian extreme right were not explicitly nationalist. Their programmes included implicit nationalist

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references, but more as a reaction to leftist internationalism than as a positive identification with the Greek nation. Their programmatic emphasis was on moral conservatism and, to a lesser extent, on economic liberalism. The first party that came to be associated with the post-authoritarian extreme right was the National Democratic Union (NDU). It was formed in 1974, immediately after the transition to democracy, in reaction to the way the prime minister, Constantine Karamanlis, handled the Turkish invasion of Cyprus, the communists and ex-junta officers. Unlike most contemporary European extreme-right parties, the party supported Greek membership in international organizations. It was critical of the decision to withdraw Greece from NATO and it supported Greece’s entry into the European Economic Community (EEC). Moreover, the NDU rebuffed the ‘indiscriminate persecution of large numbers of nationally-minded citizens as well as the ruthless staining of reputations and the humiliation of the armed and security forces’ (Dimitras 1992: 261). Like all extreme-right parties during this period, the NDU was also morally conservative, pledging to protect the Helleno-Christian tradition. Although the leader of the party, Petros Garoufalias, was quickly branded as extreme-rightist by his political opponents, he insisted that his party was against any form of dictatorship and stressed his democratic credentials.1 In the November 1974 elections, the party got only 1.1 per cent of the national vote, as the majority of the Greek populace rallied behind Karamanlis’s conservative New Democracy. It was only after 1974 that reactions against prime minister Karamanlis started to gain ground. Such reactions intensified after the Greek populace voted overwhelmingly against the monarchy in 1975, to the consternation of many conservative supporters. Along with Karamanlis’s legalization of the Communist Party and the handling of Greek foreign policy, dissatisfaction with government policies led to the creation of another extreme-right party, the National Camp.The party proved much more successful than the NDU, presenting a considerable challenge to the ND. Apart from its fervent anti-communism, the party pledged to free jailed junta leaders, to achieve Greek membership into the EEC and to rid the economy of state interventionism.2 The party benefited from extensive and favourable press coverage from the Greek dailies Estia (Εστία) and Eleftheros Kosmos (Ελεύθερος Κόσμος), which were critical of Karamanlis’s policies. Despite his efforts to brand the party as ‘neo-fascist’,3 the National Camp capitalized on popular dissatisfaction with the government and received 6.8 per cent of the 1977 vote. According to one study, the party was over-represented among younger males, manual workers and farmers in small- and medium-sized towns (Tsokou et al. 1986). By 1981, though, most of the National Camp’s members returned to the conservative ND. The remaining members took refuge in the Party of the Progressives, a conservative grouping that managed to get 1.7 per cent in the national elections and 2 per cent in the European elections, winning a seat in the European Parliament. Like its two predecessors, the party demanded the release of jailed junta leaders and emphasized the importance of classical and Christian education for the revival of the Great Idea, a reference to older irredentist claims.4 Moreover, the party rejected

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the government’s social and nationalization policies pledging, instead, to limit state intervention in the economy and to strengthen private initiative. The party was replaced by the National Political Union (NPU), a party nominally led by the imprisoned colonel and former dictator, George Papadopoulos. Fiercely anticommunist and socially conservative, the party centred its programmatic appeal on the release of its jailed leader.5 Unlike its predecessors, the NPU contested several elections, those of 1985 and June 1989, and it won a seat in the European Parliament in 1984. But its otherwise dismal results led to mass defections from the party and to the formation of a new one, the National Party (NP).

The transformation of the post-authoritarian extreme right The founding of the NP in 1989 by a thousand NPU members set the stage for the ideological shift of the Greek extreme right.6 The most distinctive characteristic of this shift was the emphasis on nationalism. Realizing the need to broaden its appeal beyond the backward-looking claims of its post-authoritarian predecessor, the new extreme right discarded its earlier programmatic fixation on the release of imprisoned junta leaders. Instead, it fully embraced nationalism as the supreme value and the essence of its ideology. One of the most fervent advocates of this change was the leader of NPU’s youth group (and since 2007, a LAOS MP), Makis Vorides, who considered nationalism to be the missing link between the party and society. As he recalls: Towards the late 1980s, I realised the need to change the demands of our movement [NPU]. We had demanded the release of the army officers who were involved in the junta, the return of the King, and the rehabilitation of the anti-communist struggle of 1945–49. All these smelled like mothballs to me! The King himself did not want to return! More importantly, our demands were historical, not social. I told NPU that we must move on. The legal discussion of whether General Papadopoulos should be in prison or not is interesting but it does not really concern the society in general. The demands about the past blocked our future.7 The ideological shift of the extreme right was evident in the programme of the NP, which called for the subordination of individual rights to the interest of the nation, from where they are supposedly derived. The party asserted the right for ‘selfdetermination’ for Greek populations abroad and advocated the secession of nonliberated Greek homelands. More importantly, the party paid close attention to developments in the rest of Europe, where extreme rightists started making significant electoral advances by capitalizing on anti-foreigner sentiment. Following the example of the French National Front – with the leaders of which NPU had a long-standing relation – Greek extreme rightists gradually extended their nationalist appeals to immigration.8 The NP introduced anti-immigrant statements into its 1990 programme, calling for the repatriation of foreign workers. Moreover, blending

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the moral traditionalism of its predecessors with anti-Semitism, the party blamed ‘world Zionism’ for corrupting ‘Helleno-Christian traditions’.9 For nearly a decade, the transformation of the ideological profile of the Greek extreme right did not alleviate its electoral misfortunes. The NP failed miserably in the 1990 election, receiving 0.1 per cent of the vote. In the early 1990s, when the Macedonia issue broke out, nationalists had new opportunities to revive their waning political fortunes. Amid the nationalist fervour that swept Greece over the Macedonia issue, Political Spring, an ND-splinter party that adopted a maximalist position on the matter, staged a significant breakthrough in the 1993 elections. Avoiding the traditional emphasis of the Greek extreme right on ‘Helleno-Christian’ values, the party built its credibility by insisting that the name ‘Macedonia’ is exclusively Greek. But besides this issue, Political Spring failed to establish a distinctive ideological profile and by the mid-1990s, when the salience of the issue started to wane, the party collapsed. Its early success had revitalized extreme-rightist efforts to gain electoral prominence. In 1994, Vorides and former members of earlier extreme-right groupings formed the Hellenic Front, identifying themselves as Greek nationalists and seeking to fight ‘national decadence’ and illegal immigration.10 Initially the party was inactive and it was only in 2000 that it started participating in national elections. Along with Front Line, a party headed by the unrepentant Holocaust-denier Kostas Plevris, the Hellenic Front received 0.2 per cent of the vote. The two parties faced competition from Sotiris Sofianopoulos, a former host of a local TV programme in Argolida and a fervent nationalist. Initially founded in 1981, his Party of Hellenism called for a return to ‘Hellenic roots’ and presented ‘Hellenism’ as a substitute of capitalism, socialism and communism. Sofianopoulos revived the dormant party in 1996 and ran in the national legislative elections, receiving 0.2 per cent of the vote. In 2004, the Party of Hellenism and the Front Line joined LAOS, lured by the access Karatzaferis could grant them to his marginal TV station, Teleasty, and to his weekly newspaper, Alpha 1. In 2005, the Hellenic Front also joined LAOS.

LAOS The transformation of the post-authoritarian extreme right in the 1990s laid the foundations for the emergence of LAOS in the 2000s. Founded in September 2000 in the midst of a political row over identity cards (explained below), the party shares many of the basic attributes of the Western European extreme right. But it also has a number of distinct characteristics that reflect Greek particularities. Like most extreme-right parties in Europe (see e.g. Mudde 2007), LAOS is explicitly nationalist, seeking to protect ‘the Nation, the Genus, the Faith, the History and the cultural identity’ of the Greeks.11 In its most recent programme, LAOS emphasizes the ‘Helleno-centric’ and ‘patriotic’ nature of the party. It states that its policies are inspired by ‘the Hellenic spirit, the Hellenic values and the Hellenic culture’.12 This ethnocentric worldview is the basis for the party’s anti-immigrant, antiAmerican and anti-Semitic appeal. According to LAOS, illegal immigration is the

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biggest ‘wound’ in Greek society, undermining national security, increasing unemployment and causing crime.13 Angrily replying to questioning about her views on immigration, a candidate of the party for the 2004 national legislative elections put this quite succinctly: ‘I do not want an Albanian neighbour, but a Greek one. I prefer neighbours who will enter my house through the door at 6pm, not those who break into my house through the windows at 3am. If this makes me a extremerightist, then I am!’14 In his rhetorical outbursts, Karatzaferis reinforces such xenophobic claims by asking: ‘Compare and choose: a Greece of Greek Christians?15 Or, a Greece of Albanian illegal immigrants?’16 The anti-immigrant profile of the party has been bolstered by the absorption of the Hellenic Front in 2005, which was the most vocal opponent of immigration before it merged with LAOS. Nevertheless, recent years have witnessed increased moderation from the party on the issue, in part because immigration has stayed on the sidelines of the mainstream debate. In its 2007 programme, the party rejects ‘the solution of the multi-cultural society’ and the welfare policies that ‘benefit Muslims and Gypsies by allowing them to live without the need to work’. LAOS argues that Greece should use its cultural heritage and Greek education to make immigrant children ‘become Greeks in soul and in spirit’.17 The party is not only against immigration but it is also suspicious of foreign powers, especially the United States. Its first programme maintains that the ‘party was founded because foreign powers want to impose a new situation on our people, foreign and extraneous to the traditions of our race’. Seeking to tap into widespread anti-American sentiments among the Greek populace, Karatzaferis accuses the two main parties of ‘slave-like’ behaviour towards the US, which is leading the country ‘into a situation that is going to be worse than Nazism’. Not surprisingly, the party is sympathetic to those who stand against the US. Karatzaferis boasts of having a picture of Fidel Castro in his office and to being an admirer of Hugo Chavez. He is also sympathetic to China, ‘the only power that can pose a credible bulwark against American hegemony’.18 As he reassures his followers, ‘I have not suddenly become a Communist but Fidel is the symbol of resistance against the Americans, and the Americans are those plotting everything against Greece.’19 The party’s suspicion of Western powers is connected with its fervent antiSemitism. Its proclamation asks the party’s supporters to say ‘no’ to ‘the puppets of foreign and domestic Zionism’. Such views are consistent with those of its leader, who in 1996, as an ND MP, tabled a formal question in the Greek parliament about the Jewish descent of the deputy foreign minister, Christos Rozakis. In May 2000, he claimed on his TV show: ‘We live in a country run by Jews. The prime minister is of Jewish descent. His grandfather was Aaron Avouris. George Papandreou has his grandmother, Mineiko, who was a Polish Jew. The entire government is run by Jews.’20 In private discussions, members of the party go even further than their leader: ‘Six million deaths. This is overblown! Hitler, a Jew, surely persecuted the Jews. But such numbers are exaggerated.’21 While the primacy of nationalism in the party’s programme makes it comparable with the Western European extreme right, LAOS has a number of characteristics

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that reflect Greek particularities and distinguish it from most of its Western European counterparts. The first distinction relates to its explicit religious appeal. Given the historical association between the Greek nation and Greek religion, ‘faith in Orthodoxy’ constitutes one of the ‘founding stones’ of the party’s ideology. In his televised speeches and public appearances, Karatzaferis makes frequent reference to Orthodoxy and to the Greek Church, which he considers the ‘mother of the modern Greek state’.22 He is known to have had a close relationship with the late Greek Archbishop Christodoulos, with whom he agreed on issues like the name of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) and the revision of history books. Due to the status and role of the Church in Greek politics, Karatzaferis often uses this relationship as a source of legitimacy for his ideas. While setting LAOS apart from other Western European extreme-right parties, the religious appeal brings LAOS closer to the post-authoritarian extreme right’s preoccupation with Helleno-Christian values. The second distinction relates to the emphasis LAOS places on foreign policy, especially on relations with Turkey, Albania and FYROM. Tension with each of these countries has been a source of nationalist mobilization in the 1970s and 1980s (with Turkey over Cyprus and the Aegean) and in the 1990s and 2000s (with Albania over the rights of the Greek minority and with FYROM over its name). The party seeks to capitalize on the high public resonance of these issues by holding hard-line positions on foreign policy, especially over Cyprus and Macedonia. In recent years, these ‘national’ issues have become the signature issues of LAOS, putting a lot of pressure on the conservative ND to take them into consideration. Like most of its European counterparts, LAOS combines its nationalist ideology with strong populist and anti-systemic appeals. The party rejects the term extreme right, insisting that the placement of parties on a left–right scale is outdated. When asked, Karatzaferis rarely misses an opportunity to stress that ‘the party is on the Right on national issues and on the Left on social issues’.23 LAOS makes a significant effort to appeal to leftist voters, especially low-earning workers, through fierce populist attacks on globalization, foreign chains and commercial banks. The emphasis the party places on social issues is sometimes reminiscent of left-wing or anti-plutocratic populism. In his first appearance in the Greek parliament in September 2007, the leader of LAOS asked the government to combat banks, which record the ‘biggest profits’ in Europe. ‘This is not the product of labour but the product of theft. Bankers are thieves, Mr Prime Minister, and you must send the attorney in to check on them,’ he said.24 Like many European extreme-right parties, the party supplements these populist outbursts with strong anti-systemic rhetoric. The party’s 2007 programme begins with a call for the ‘overthrow of the rotten establishment that oppresses our country, leading it to gradual de-Hellenization and enslavement’.25 Moreover, the party programme refers to the form of Greek government as ‘prime-ministerial dictatorship’ and calls for various forms of direct democracy.26 The 2007 programme also proposes setting up an institutional mechanism for determining ‘political fraud’. Through this mechanism the party wants to ensure that party politicians meet

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their electoral promises and intends to penalize them with the retraction of their parliamentary status if they do not.

Electorate As is the case with many of the smaller Western European extreme-right parties, the limited size of LAOS’s electorate makes it difficult to analyse its social base. Some evidence about the composition of LAOS’s electorate comes from the geographical distribution of its votes in the 2007 legislative elections. The party managed to increase its share of the vote in all prefectures, an indication of its stable growth across the entire country. LAOS exceeded its national average of 3.8 per cent in twelve out of the fifty-six prefectures, receiving more than 5 per cent in the first and second prefectures of Salonica, Piraeus and Athens, as well as in Greater Attica. In these seven urban prefectures the party won eight of its ten seats, and more than half of its 271,763 votes. The party underperformed in Crete and in parts of Western Greece. The overproportionate support for LAOS in urban prefectures is comparable with that for Western European extreme-right parties but contrasts with the 1977 results of the National Camp, which had received less than its national average in all seven prefectures. An exit poll of 7,498 voters at the September 2007 elections provides further analytical insights into LAOS’s voter profile (see Table 8.2). According to the poll, the electorate of LAOS bears significant similarities with the general profile of extreme-right voters in Western Europe (Betz 1994; Betz and Immerfall 1998; Kitschelt 1995; Norris 2005). LAOS’s voters are predominantly young males, albeit more educated than their Western European counterparts. In terms of their occupational profile, there is an over-representation in LAOS’s constituents among small-business owners, entrepreneurs, the self-employed and private sector employees and an under-representation among farmers, the first-time unemployed and retirees. Moreover, LAOS supporters are over-represented among late-deciders and among those placing themselves on the right of the left–right spectrum or dismissing left–right categories as meaningless. Like the other two small parliamentary parties, the Greek Communist Party (KKE) and the Coalition of the Radical Left (SYRIZA), LAOS is grossly over-represented among protest voters. Like most extreme-right parties at a comparable stage of development, the advent of LAOS in the 2007 elections harmed the moderate right more than any other political party. According to this exit poll, nearly 40 per cent of those who voted for the party in the 2007 elections had voted for the conservative New Democracy in the previous legislative elections, held in March 2004. Another 11 per cent had voted for the socialist PASOK and 17 per cent had not voted or had voted for the rest of the parties. Interestingly, nearly a third of LAOS’s voters in the 2007 elections had also voted for the party in the 2004 elections. Indeed, additional data show that the party kept 74 per cent of its 2004 voters, losing most of the rest to New Democracy. While this figure suggests that the party might be

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TABLE 8.2 Social profile of LAOS voters (N = 273)

Sex

%

Male Female

5 3

Age group 18–24 25–34 35–44 45–54 55–64 Over 65

3 6 5 4 2 2

Occupation Employers/Entrepreneurs Farming Self-employed Small-business owners Public sector employees Private sector employees First-time unemployed Unemployed (worked before) Housewives Public sector retirees Private sector retirees College students

5 2 5 9 4 5 2 4 3 3 2 3

Actual result

3.8

Notes: Margin of error was 1.1%. Total sample: 7,498 voters. Source: Public Issue/VPRC, exit poll, 16.09.07.

gaining a stable electorate, the percentage of loyal voters is lower than that of the three biggest parties.

The rise of LAOS: possible explanations In line with the now voluminous literature on this topic, an attempt to understand this phenomenon needs to begin with a consideration of demand factors (e.g. Kitschelt 1995; Mudde 2007; Norris 2005). This necessitates an examination of the basic socio-cultural and socio-economic conditions that are often thought to affect electoral behaviour and voter support for the extreme right. In the case of Greece, there are a number of such conditions. In repeated polls, for example, Greece scores the highest in aggregate measures of xenophobia in Western Europe. According to Eurobarometer, almost seven out of ten Greeks think that immigrants are a threat to their way of life, by far the biggest percentage among the fifteen older member states of the European Union.27 Moreover, 11.7 per cent of

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Greeks think that a dictatorship could be preferable to a democracy while another 7.7 per cent think that it does not matter whether there is a democracy or a dictatorship (Vernardakis 2000: 317). In combination with one of the worst corruption records in Europe, this mix of xenophobic, nationalist and authoritarian attitudes among the populace would seem to feed extreme-right support. Socio-cultural attitudes aside, Greece has also had socio-economic conditions that are thought to favour the rise of such parties. Until recent years, Greece had stagnant growth, high inflation and one of the highest unemployment levels in Europe. Since the late 1980s, the country has also witnessed a sudden inflow of immigrants that now make up more than 8 per cent of the population.28 For those viewing voting behaviour as a function of economic interests, the combination of high unemployment and high immigration would seem to make Greece an ideal candidate for extreme-right advances. Socio-cultural attitudes and economic conditions provide the structural setting for the recent advances of the extreme right, but the electoral spurt of LAOS cannot be fully understood without a consideration of the broader political environment within which the party operates. Much of the work on the extreme right considers the availability of opportunities in this environment to be an important determinant of extreme-right performance (e.g. Kitschelt 1995). In Greece, the availability of such opportunities relates to the difficulty of the conservative party in effectively addressing the signature issues of the extreme right. Since the early 2000s, there have been a number of such issues. One of the most notable ones was the political row in 2000 over the removal of references to religious affiliation from national identity cards. Although the conservatives initially supported Church mobilizations against this, by the 2002 local elections, LAOS managed to present itself as the most fervent defender of the Church’s position (Ellinas 2007).The party was rewarded with 13.6 per cent of the vote in the closely watched election of the Athens-Piraeus super-prefecture. The return of ND to government in 2004 after eleven years in opposition provided further opportunities for the electoral growth of the extreme right. While in opposition, the conservatives had more flexibility to manoeuvre on the issues that feed extreme-right support. But once in government, they became compelled to balance their electoral motivations with their governmental responsibilities. The tension between the two became obvious only weeks after the new government took office, in April 2004, over a UN plan for the reunification of Cyprus. Whereas the socialist PASOK was unambiguously supportive of the plan, ND avoided taking a clear stance on the issue, leaving LAOS as the most vocal defender of a ‘patriotic’ no to the UN proposal, only a few weeks before the European elections.29 Another issue was the resurfacing of a dispute with the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) in 2007 over its claim to what the Greeks consider to be an integral aspect of their national identity, the name ‘Macedonia’. In fear of international isolation, the conservative government sought to avoid a hard-line stance against its northern neighbour, stressing the need for a ‘realistic’ solution to the problem and preparing the ground for political compromise. This left LAOS

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defending a maximalist position with a relatively high public resonance, especially in northern Greece. The party’s 2007 programme insisted that the new name should not include the word ‘Macedonia’ at all and that Greece should veto FYROM’s EU accession if this condition is not met.30 The most important opportunity for the party was probably the political controversy that broke out in 2007 about a new history textbook for twelve-year-olds. Introduced in September 2006, the new textbook sought to eliminate the nationalist overtones of the previous textbook, especially in its references to Turkey. But the textbook soon came under fierce attack by the Church and by some conservatives for minimizing the suffering incurred by the Greeks under the Ottomans and during the flight of the Greeks from Smyrna (modern-day Izmir, in Turkey) in 1922. The critics considered the revisionist views presented in the textbook to be unpatriotic and pointed to historical inaccuracies, questioning the credentials of its authors. The issue divided the conservative camp between those who demanded the immediate withdrawal of the book and those who rejected this on institutional grounds. Among the former were prominent members of New Democracy, like the Salonica prefect, Panayiotis Psomiades and the ND MP, Yiannis Ioannides. Responding to this criticism, the conservative government asked various academic bodies to send comments to the drafters of the textbook to be taken into consideration for future revisions. But the ND education minister, Marieta Yiannakou, refused to give in to pressures for the withdrawal of the book. Her insistence gained Yiannakou sympathy among the left but aggravated certain members of her party, who felt that the government was supportive of an unpatriotic view of history. The ambivalence of the conservative government over the textbook issue allowed LAOS to emerge as the sole defender of an unequivocal demand to withdraw the book. The difficulty ND had in dealing with these issues presented opportunities for the rise of LAOS, but the party might not have been able to capitalize on these opportunities and enter the political system had it not enjoyed excessive media exposure. As mentioned before, LAOS has had a significant advantage compared to previous extreme-right groupings in Greece, because its leader owns a national, albeit minor, TV channel that he uses to give the party wider visibility than its finances could otherwise afford or its thin organization would otherwise allow. More importantly, though, the party received considerable exposure from the mainstream media, especially during 2007, when the textbook and Macedonia issues became salient. So much was the publicity granted to LAOS, that it raised suspicion among political commentators that the party was patronized by socialistcontrolled media. This suspicion was later vocalized and reinforced by the Greek Communists who accused the Socialists of ‘directing’ certain media to give LAOS over-proportionate exposure.31 While the Communists did not present any evidence to substantiate these claims at the time, subsequent data show that the national media gave much more attention to LAOS than its electoral standing would have justified. In the last month of the 2007 legislative elections, Karatzaferis received 9 per cent of all TV and radio references to political leaders; in the last week,

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Karatzaferis got 11 per cent of all references, more than the leaders of SYRIZA and KKE (Media Metrix 2007).

The future of the Greek extreme right The electoral breakthrough of LAOS in 2007 can potentially transform the Greek political landscape. In the past few decades, parties like LAOS have consolidated their presence across a number of European countries, changing the basic contours of the political discourse and, in some cases, bringing about important policy changes. Will the extreme right become a permanent and sizeable force in Greek party politics like the Austrian FPÖ, the Flemish Vlaams Belang and the French Front National? Or will its recent breakthrough prove as short-lived as that of the German Republikaner, the Dutch Pim Fortuyn List and the Swedish New Democracy? There are a number of factors suggesting that LAOS might prove to be a transient phenomenon, and disappear from the electoral map as quickly as it appeared. A number of other factors, though, suggest the exact opposite: that LAOS will consolidate its presence in Greek politics and become a credible contender for the conservative vote. It is worth considering both sets of factors. Greek electoral history may be instructive for the future trajectory of the Greek extreme right. The two major formations that came to challenge the dominance of ND on the right – the National Camp in 1977 and the Political Spring in 1993 – failed to sustain their initial bases of support and quickly collapsed. After its notable 1977 breakthrough, the leadership of the National Camp was quickly co-opted by the conservatives and joined the ND ticket for the 1981 elections (Kapetanyannis 1995: 136). Similarly, the advances of Political Spring in the 1993 legislative elections and in the 1994 European elections proved to be ephemeral. By the 1996 legislative elections, party support collapsed sharply along with the salience of the single issue that brought the Political Spring to existence – the Macedonia issue. On both occasions, ND was able to recapture the political space and win back most of the constituencies lost to the two splinter parties. In line with this previous experience, it is tempting to view LAOS as a temporary party that is likely to be absorbed by ND in the coming years, just as the National Camp and the Political Spring were. Like these parties, LAOS still lacks a solid organizational structure that would help it sustain and extend its initial electoral gains, and it continues to rely on the persona and the communication resources of its leader. So far, the party has relied largely on the media to communicate with voters, setting aside the important task of organizational growth. Seven years after its foundation the party still lacks the necessary structures to mobilize voters and to disseminate its newly gained resources. It also lacks the mechanisms to resolve intra-party conflicts. Unless the party builds its organizational capacity it will become vulnerable to conservative co-optation strategies and fall victim to infighting between its radical and more moderate members. Without solid organizational roots LAOS might simply replicate the short trajectory of other ND challengers.

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While recent history points to the ephemeral nature of efforts to challenge ND’s dominance of the right, a number of reasons suggest that LAOS might prove to be more enduring than its predecessors. The first is ideological. Unlike previous ND challengers, LAOS has a comprehensive nationalist worldview through which it filters its programmatic positions on both foreign policy and domestic issues. This has helped the party establish credibility on ‘national’ and ‘national identity’ issues that would make it hard for ND to trespass onto its programmatic territory. Nationalism is also the unifying theme that currently connects its somewhat heterogeneous parliamentary group. The second factor relates to the favourable opportunity structure LAOS confronts. The re-election of New Democracy in government with a very thin majority seriously hampers its capacity to manoeuvre in the competitive space and to recapture the electorate lost to LAOS in the 2007 elections. As long as ND stays in government, it will find it difficult to effectively address the signature issues of LAOS, without alienating its more moderate constituencies or, in the case of Macedonia, its international allies. Unlike ND, LAOS can move freely in the competitive space and take tougher programmatic stances than the government on ‘national’ and ‘national identity’ issues. Moreover, the party has the potential to become a net beneficiary from the popular dissatisfaction with the government and from the disarray of socialist opposition. A third factor relates to its growing visibility in the mainstream media. This visibility might become a serious threat for the mainstream parties should LAOS choose to put immigration on the political agenda. Due to the high public resonance of the issue and widespread Greek xenophobia, this issue can provide the basis for the party’s future support.

Notes 1 Εθνική Δημοκρατική Ένωση, ‘Εργασία – Εθνική ισχύς – ευημερία οι πρωταρχικοί στόχοι της Ε.Δ.Ε.’, Ελεύθερος Κόσμος, 23 Οκτωβρίου 1974, σελ. 3, 7. [National Democratic Union, ‘Employment – National power – Prosperity, the primary aims of NDU’, Eleftheros Kosmos, 23 October 1974, pp. 3, 7.] I am thankful to Yiannis Kolovos for making available various documents of some extreme-right parties of the postauthoritarian period. 2 Εθνική Παράταξη, ‘Διακήρυξις της Εθνικής Παρατάξεως προς τον Ελληνικόν Λαόν’, Ελεύθερος Κόσμος, 9 Οκτωβρίου 1977, σελ. 3. [National Camp, ‘Proclamation of the National Camp to the Greek People’, Eleftheros Kosmos, 9 October 1977, p. 3.] 3 ‘Καραμανλής: ΝεοφασιστικόΚόμμαη ‘ΕθνικήΠαράταξη’, Ελευθεροτυπία, 22 Οκτωβρίου 1977. [‘Karamanlis: The National Camp is a Neo-Fascist Party’, Eleftherotypia, 22 October 1977.] 4 Κόμμα Προοδευτικών, ‘Αι Θέσεις της Πολιτικής του κ. Σπύρου Μαρκεζίνη και η Ανασύστασις του Κόμματος των Προοδευτικών’, Εστία, 5 Νοεμβρίου 1979, σελ. 6. [Estia, Party of the Progressives, ‘The political positions of Mr Spyros Markezines and the reconstitution of the Party of the Progressives’, Estia, 5 November 1979, p. 6.] 5 ΕΠΕΝ,‘ΗΠολιτικήμαςΠρόταση: ΕΠΕΝ, ΈφτασεηΏρα!’, 1989. [(Party programme) EPEN, ‘Our political programme: EPEN, The time has arrived!’ 1989.] 6 Even before the appearance of the National Party, the United Nationalist Movement attempted to make nationalism the most distinctive characteristic of the Greek extreme right. The party clearly identifies itself as nationalist and seeks to turn

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7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29

30 31

Antonis A. Ellinas

Greece into a nationalist state through revolutionary action. ΕνιαίοΕθνικιστικόΚίνημα, ‘ΕΝΕΚ: 15 ΙδεολογικέςΑρχές’, άγνωστηημερομηνία. [(Party programme) ENEK: 15 ‘Ideological Principles’, n.d.] Interview with author, Athens, February 2004. Several interviews with leaders of the National Party’s successor party, the Hellenic Front, Athens, February–March 2004. Εθνικό Κόμμα, ‘Εθνικό Κόμμα: Πολιτικές Αρχές’. [(Party programme) National Party, ‘National Party: Political Principles’, n.d., p. 2.] Ελληνικό Μέτωπο, ‘Πολιτικό Πρόγραμμα: Αποφάσεις Ιδρυτικού Συνεδρίου’, Αθήνα, 9–10 Απριλίου 1994. (Party programme.) The party was initially dormant but began functioning in 1997. Programme of the Popular Orthodox Party (2001) LAOS, ‘For a Greece that belongs to the Greeks’, Athens: LAOS (in Greek). LAOS, ‘Framework of Positions’, August 2007, Athens, pp. 3, 7 (in Greek). Ibid. Interview #5, Athens, February 2004. This was one of the slogans of the Greek junta (Ελλάς Ελλήνων Χριστιανών). http://www.iospress.gr/ios2002/ios20021020a.htm (accessed 28 September 2007). Ios is a group of investigative journalists who have written extensively on the extreme right and who have been interviewed by the author. LAOS, ‘Framework of Positions’, August 2007, Athens (in Greek). Discussion with the author, Limassol, Cyprus, July 2006. Λ. Σταυρόπουλος, ‘Ο ‘κόκκινος’ κ. Καρατζαφέρης’, Το Βήµα, 4 Νοεμβρίου 2007, σελ. Α22. [L. Stravropoulos, ‘The “red” Mr Karatzaferis’, To Vima, 4 November 2007, p. A22.] Ιός, ‘Ο Αγών του’, Ελευθεροτυπία, 20 Οκτωβρίου 2002, Ios, ‘His struggles,’ Eleftherotypia; 20 October 2002. Interviews in the party’s office with a high-ranking party official and a self-identified historian, Athens, February 2004. Programme of LAOS, 2001. Meeting with the author, February 2004, Athens. Official Parliamentary Minutes, ‘Continuation of the discussion on the Programmatic Statements of the Government’, 29 September 2007, p. 195 (in Greek). LAOS, ‘Framework of Positions’, August 2007, Athens, p. 2 (in Greek). Ibid., p. 13. For example, Eurobarometer 199, Autumn 2003, p. 28. Eurostat, http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/pls/portal/docs/PAGE/PGP_PRD_CAT_ PREREL/PGE_CAT_PREREL_YEAR_2006/PGE_CAT_PREREL_YEAR_2006_ MONTH_05/3-19052006-EN-AP.PDF (accessed 5 March 2008). The Greek communists also rejected the UN proposal, albeit for different – antiAmerican, anti-imperial – reasons. On the day of the referenda in Cyprus over the UN plan, the official newspaper of LAOS, Alpha 1, proclaimed that the (Greek) Cypriots ‘stamp with their NO the refusal of Hellenism to unconditionally surrender to the plans and the demands of Americano-Zionists’. See ‘Greeks are still in existence’, Alpha 1, p. 1 (‘Υπάρχουν ακόμα Έλληνες’, Άλφα 1, σελ. 1). LAOS, ‘Framework of Positions’, August 2007, Athens, pp. 21–22 (in Greek). For example, ‘Ενίσχυση ΛΑΟΣ από ΠΑΣΟΚ καταγγέλλει η κ. Παπαρήγα’, Καθημερινή, 6 Ιουνίου 2007. [‘Papariga accuses PASOK of Reinforcing LAOS’.]

Bibliography Betz, H.-G. 1994. Radical Right-Wing Populism in Western Europe. New York: St. Martin’s Press. Betz, H.-G. and Immerfall, S. (eds). 1998. The New Politics of the Right: Neo-Populist Parties and Movements in Established Democracies. London: Macmillan.

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Carter, E. 2005. The Extreme Right in Western Europe. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Dimitras, P. 1992. ‘Greece: The Virtual Absence of an Extreme Right’, in P. Hainsworth (ed.), The Extreme Right in Europe and the USA. London: Pinter, pp. 146–68. Ellinas, A. 2007. ‘Playing the Nationalist Card: Mainstream Parties, Mass Media and Extreme Right Breakthroughs in Western Europe’, PhD dissertation. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University. Ignazi, P. 2003. Extreme Right Parties in Western Europe. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Kapetanyannis, V. 1995. ‘Neo-fascism in Modern Greece’, in L. Cheles, R. Ferguson and M. Vaughan (eds), The Extreme Right in Western and Eastern Europe. London: Longman, pp. 129–44. Kitschelt, H. 1995. The Radical Right in Western Europe: A Comparative Analysis. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Kolovos, Y. 2005. Extreme Right and Radical Right in Greece and in Western Europe, 1974–2004. Athens: Pelasgos.[Κολοβός Γ. 2005. Άκρα Δεξιά και Ριζοσπαστική Δεξιά στην Ελλάδα και στην Δυτική Ευρώπη, 1974–2004. Αθήνα: Εκδόσεις Πελασγός.] Media Metrix 2007. ‘Political Thermometer’, 25 September (in Greek). Mudde, C. 2007. The Populist Radical Right in Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Norris, P. 2005. Radical Right:Voters and Parties in the Electoral Market. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Tsokou, S., Shelley, M. and Dobratz, B. 1986. ‘Some Correlates of Partisan Preference in Greece, 1980: A Discriminant Analysis’, European Journal of Political Research, 14(4): 441–63. Vernardakis, C. 2000.Greek Public Opinion 1999–2000: Research and Opinion Polls. Athens: Livanis. [Βερναρδάκης, X. 2000. Η Κοινή Γνώμη στην Ελλάδα 1999–2000: Έρευνες και Δημοσκοπήσεις. Αθήνα: Εκδόσεις Λιβανή.] Von Beyme, Κ. 1988. ‘Right-wing Extremism in Post-War Europe’, West European Politics, 11(2): 1–18.

PART III

The Extreme Right in a Post-Communism Context

9 THE EXTREME RIGHT IN CROATIA, BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA AND SERBIA1 Veˇra Stojarová

Introduction With the rise of extreme-right parties in Western Europe and the lifting of the Iron Curtain, researchers turned their focus to the countries in the former Eastern bloc. In so doing, a major question arose: is the extreme-right family in Eastern Europe comparable to that in Western Europe, and in particular, does it have similar ideologies? This chapter is an introduction for research into extreme-right parties in the Balkans and seeks to chart the core issues and problems surrounding research into the extreme-right party family in Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Serbia.2 Debates about the nature of extreme-right parties and controversies about what exactly constitutes their core ideological features have been examined time and time again (Betz 1994; Ignazi 1995, 2003; Merkl and Weinberg 1997; Ramet 1999). In order to ascertain to what extent parties on the right of the right in the selected Western Balkan party systems since 2001 can be defined as extremeright parties, this chapter will use the minimalist framework defined by Mudde (2000b: 179). In this framework, the ideological core of the extreme right rests on a combination of strong state, welfare chauvinism, xenophobia and nationalism. This latter feature is particularly problematic within the Balkans, as the delineation between nationalism and ethno-regionalism is difficult to ascertain. Mudde claims that ‘regionalism is best limited to groups that call for more autonomy of a region within a larger state structure’ while interpreting ‘nationalism in a holistic way including both civic and ethnic elements’ (Mudde 2007: 29, 17). For the purposes of this study, we understand nationalism in terms of internal homogenization (by assimilation, genocide, expulsion, separatism) as well as external exclusivity (bringing all members of the nation within the territory of the state by means of territorial expansion or, e.g., population transfer).

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One of the major issues when assessing the nature of parties in the Balkans is the fact that the party system is not yet consolidated: parties frequently emerge and disappear. Further, the nation-building process is not yet complete in this region. It is equally difficult to associate nationalism exclusively to the right of the right. In Serbia, for instance, the war against NATO means that nationalism, understood as staunch opposition to Euro-Atlantist integration, permeates the entire political spectrum. Finally, the wars in Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Kosovo have had an adverse impact on economic stability and living standards, and socio-economic arguments developed by mainstream parties are not clearly different from those found on both extremes of the political spectrum. As such, it is also difficult to distinguish clearly between parties of the left and the right.

The extreme right in Croatia Even though more than a decade has passed since the end of the war in Croatia, the post-war setting and inter-ethnic relations are far from being ‘normalized’. A more or less stable two-party system has emerged, structured around the polar opposition between the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ, Hrvatska Demokratska Zajednica) and the Social Democratic Party (SDP, Socijaldemokratska Partija Hrvatske) and their respective minor allies. There seems to be a consensus about the future orientation of Croatia with the relevant parties supporting rapid integration into the EU. The leading post-war party, HDZ,3 has transformed itself, striving to become a standard centre-right conservative party. Even though HDZ wishes to appear as pro-European and pro-democratic, it retains some relics of its nationalist past.4 Further to the right, the Croatian extreme right is clearly fragmented, between the Croatian Party of the Right (HSP), the Croatian Bloc (HB) and many other extreme-right parties which remain without political representation in parliament. Some core themes cut across the Croatian right from the HDZ to the most extreme parties, with varying degrees of salience: the desire to build a Greater Croatia, Tuđmanism, the dignity of the patriotic war, a negative stance towards the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), antiSerbianism, a negative stance towards the EU and NATO, a positive stance towards the Independent Croatian State (NDH, Nezavisna Država Hrvatska). Most parties also promote compulsory military service (see Table 9.1). Some issues recur on a regular basis in Croatian extreme-right discourse, in particular the importance attached to a Croatian ethnic space and the protection of Croats abroad. The most extreme parties5 would like to see the unification of Croatian ethnic space and creation of a Greater Croatia, while other parties seek to promote equality of rights in Bosnia-Herzegovina between Croats, Serbs and Bosniaks, that is, their right to form their own political entity – a Croatian republic in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Of course, most parties demonstrate strong anti-Serbian feelings. Another controversial issue on the Croatian political scene is attitudes towards the first president of independent Croatia – Franjo Tuđman. The parties of the right admire him, since he succeeded in gaining independence for Croatia and

+ + + + +

− − − − +

Anti-Serbianism Negative towards EU Negative towards NATO Positive towards NDH Compulsory military service

+ Referendum Referendum − −

Croats in BiH as equal entity anti + +

HIP

Protection of Croats in BH + + + + Prosecution + + vs.Tribunal + N Referendum − Referendum − + NK + NK +

HČSP

+ − + NK NK

+ + Depolitisation

+

HB

+ + + NK −

+ + +

+

HP-HPP

N + + − −

Protection of Croats in BiH + + +

HPB

Abbreviations: HDZ, Croatian Democratic Union; HSP, Croatian Party of Right; HSP-1861, Croatian Party of Right 1861; HČSP, the Croatian Pure Party of Right; HIP, Croatian True Revival; HB, Croatian Bloc; HP-HPP, Croatian Rightists – Croatian Rightist Movement; HPB, Croatian Rightist Brotherhood. Notes: + party demonstrates the feature. – party does not demonstrate the feature. N not an issue for the party. NK not known. ∗ The HSP used to be more radical. Currently it is moving more to the centre, abandoning the NDH, Ustasha ideology and other ultra-nationalistic features. Some statements give clear signals the party is reconsidering its position towards integration with the EU.

+ + +

+ + −

Tuđmanism Dignity of Patriotic War Negative towards ICTY

+

−

HSP∗ HSP-1861

Greater Croatia

HDZ

TABLE 9.1 The Croatian extreme right – specific features

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won the patriotic war; on the left, he is sometimes denounced as authoritarian and lacking in respect for the Serbian minority.The only party on the right which stands in opposition to Tuđmanism is HSP-1861. Whereas the so-called Patriotic War has become a controversial issue for society at large, for the extreme-right parties their stance is clear: one must protect the dignity of the war and stand against the ICTY, a political institution. The stance of the parties towards the EU is becoming less negative, since such parties tend to promote EU membership, subject to approval in a referendum, recognition of the right to withdraw, and a guarantee that Croatian national values will be protected.The position of the parties towards NATO is more negative, either demanding a referendum on NATO membership or demanding military neutrality for the country. Among all existing extreme-right parties, the case of the Croatian Party of the Right (HSP) is interesting in many respects. It is the only extreme party which regularly has representation in the Croatian Assembly. In the early 1990s, it belonged to the extreme end of the extreme right, but it has recently attempted to modernize its image. Its former vice chairman and current leader, Anto Đapić, was one of those who organized the Croatian Defence Forces (HOS, Hrvatske Obrambene Snage), one of the first militia formed at the onset of the Croatian war, later absorbed into the Croatian army. The party has around 15,000 members (Buljan and Duka 2003: 52) and traditionally its electoral base has consisted of voters from areas impacted by the war, along with neo-Nazis. Party members used to present themselves with black shirts, openly wearing Ustash symbols and commemorating the Ustashi leader, Ante Pavelić, once leader of NDH, the puppet state set up by Hitler and Mussolini in 1941 after the Kingdom of Yugoslavia was attacked by the Axis forces. Typically infused with nostalgia for a fascist past, the party has nevertheless attempted to change its image and reframe its discourse in a way which would indicate a desire to appear as a modern conservative party, including, sporadically, pro-European stances. After approximately 2000, the party started to reform and presented itself as a modern (sometimes even pro-European) conservative right-wing party similar to the CSU in Germany. In place of controversial issues like the ICTY and the patriotic war, the party began to deal with legal issues of state, protection of the environment, pollution of the Adriatic and the use of genetically modified food (Pleše 2003). Ecological topics were the domain of party vice-chairman Tonči Tadić, a nuclear physicist who had studied in Japan and was considered to be the chief specialist in these areas. However, Tonči Tadić left the party and with the election of a new chairman in 2009, the party reverted to a focus on issues to do with nationalism – for example, the Vukovar declaration (on the role of Serbs in Croatia) or the Open Letter to the Prime Minister (on the role of Serbia in the international community) (HSP 2010a; HSP 2010b). The modernization process is, of course, ambiguous and is a source of intraparty tensions. Some party representatives may present themselves as pro-European, but the programme still contains anti-European components,6 and there is certainly no support for European supranationalism. If the party has abandoned its revisionist

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stance on the Ustash past, the HSP still presents itself as an ethno-nationalist party, even if its earlier external exclusive nationalism – seeking the inclusion of all members of the Croatian ethnic community within a single Croatian State Party – is not as central as in the past. Xenophobia, mainly directed against the Serbs, remains a core feature of the party. The HSP leadership may today be interested in promoting a more moderate image: having won eight seats in the 2003 parliamentary elections, the HSP parliamentary representation was reduced to one seat in 2007.There would be a strategic advantage in presenting a more moderate image and promoting a series of populist policies with a wider electoral appeal. As such, slogans and policies aimed at the creation of a Greater Croatia and the expulsion or assimilation of the ethnic Serbs have been toned down, but the HSP’s right-wing credentials are maintained through its support for welfare-chauvinist policies, tough law and order policies, and recurrent outbursts of nationalism against organizations such as the EU or NATO, which are perceived to undermine Croatian national interests. Most of the features used by Mudde to define an extreme-right party are to be found within the HSP, with a varying degree of intensity. Yet, not only are these features changing but they are also often contradictory: it would be hard to find a perfect ideological coherence in the HSP programme, whose contradictions reflect internal divisions. It is unclear which tendency within the party will win: the leadership is now distancing itself from nationalism and xenophobia and is looking for different issues, such as ecology. As such, the HSP reflects tensions, in terms of both ideology and electoral strategy, common to most extreme-right parties, in Croatia and beyond. What is clear it that today the Croatian extreme right remains electorally marginal with only one party (HSP) represented in parliament.

The extreme right in Bosnia-Herzegovina It is fairly difficult to assess the situation in Bosnia-Herzegovina (BH) since the main parties which were present at the outbreak of war are still in power and they are still based on ethnic and national cleavages. The political system is very complicated and elections take place almost every year. The Party of Democratic Action (SDA, Stranka Demokratske Akcije) is a Bosniak party which has been striving for a single, united BH. Even though the party claims to be open to other nationalities (e.g. the electoral slogan ‘we are the party for beer drinkers too’), its electoral base is made up mainly of Bosniaks. The party defines itself as a party of the centre, aiming to create a national identity which would be at a higher level than, but complementary to, the Serbian, Croatian and Bosniak identities (SDA 2005). The Croatian Democratic Movement BiH (HDZ BiH, Hrvatska Demokratska Zajednica BiH) seeks to revise the Dayton Peace Agreement and to establish a new constitution for BH, since HDZ BiH disagrees with its present federal arrangements which, in its view, tend to marginalize Croatians to the advantage of Serbs and Bosniaks.7 The party seeks integration into the EU and NATO; it further

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wishes to have special relations with Croatia and would like to see dual citizenship for inhabitants of these two countries. The party declares that it is open to anyone regardless of ethnicity (HDZ BiH 2007). Finally, the Serbian Democratic Party (SDS BiH, Srpska Demokratska Stranka BiH) defines itself as a Serbian national party. Due to its staunch nationalism, the party has obstructed the peace process in Bosnia-Herzegovina and has continually dreamt of integrating Republika Srpska (RS) with Serbia. Its recent programme underlines the special relationship between Republika Srpska and Serbia, as well as the right of RS to self-determination, once the Dayton Peace Agreement reaches its term (SDS 2007). As the state-building process in Bosnia-Herzegovina is not yet finished, most of these Political Parties include strong nationalist features, and seem to be at odds with the mainstream parties,8 which are seeking to establish a multi-ethnic Bosnia and do not promote either internal homogenization or external exclusivity. Within the Bosniak context, the HDZ BiH is the main representative of the Croatian ethnic but is surrounded by a series of small parties, often born out of earlier ideological and strategic splits.9 If the vast majority of them display nationalist and xenophobic features, nearly all of the ethnic Croatian Political Parties seek to revise the constitution, redrawing the institutional organization of BosniaHerzegovina. All agree that the Dayton Peace Agreement must be nullified, as it does not provide Croats with a territorial entity with its own legal, executive and judicial powers, as granted to Serbs (Republika Srpska) and Bosniaks (Federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina). BH’s multi-ethnic configuration does not allow the development of an extreme-right rhetoric based on the exaltation of a strong state; on the contrary, Croatian parties in BH can only advocate a stronger regionalization of the state, without necessarily agreeing on what such regionalization entails. For instance, the Croatian National Community (HNZ, Hrvatska Narodna Zajednica) strives for a sovereign, independent, united and decentralized BH, where the Croats would enjoy a degree of regional autonomy similar to Bosniaks and Serbs, so as to avoid their marginalization within the state (HNŽ 2005). On the other hand, the New Croatian Initiative (NHI, Nova Hrvatska Inicijativa) promotes regionalization of BH as a prelude to further collaboration, if not integration, with Croatia (Bilic 1998). As for the Croatian Party of Rights in Bosnia-Herzegovina (HSP BiH, Hrvatska Stranka Prava), both regionalization and support for EU – and even NATO – integration, would serve vital Croat interests: indeed, integration into the EU is also seen as the re-integration of all Croats into one supranational state. In the particular case of the Croatian extreme right in BH, the notion of Croatian nationalism, indubitably at the heart of such parties, functions nonetheless in an unusual fashion and its varied nuances must be charted in more detail. Almost all ethnic Serbian political parties in BH display a high level of nationalism, xenophobia, and clear support for a strong state and welfare chauvinist policies.10 The Serbian Democratic Party, mentioned above, together with what is currently the largest player in Serbian politics in BH – the Party of Independent Social Democrats (SNSD, Stranka Nezavisnih Socijaldemokrata), led by the former

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prime minister of Republika Srpska, Milorad Dodik, are the key players. The SDNS programme points to the artificiality of BH as a state, essentially understood as the outcome of a series of international agreements. Recently, its leader has repeatedly supported the organization of a referendum on the independence of Republika Srpska (SNSD n.d.). Using a variety of arguments, these two parties, as much as the plethora of smaller extreme-right parties,11 display clear nationalist and xenophobic features (SNS RS 1997). In 2006, three parties organized a delegation to the Russian Duma,12 seeking support for the Serbian people, declaring that ‘the Serbian nation in BH has the right to decide via referendum with whom it would like to live in one state, and so to fulfil its national interests without harming the national interests of others’ (RS RS, SS RS, SNS RS 2006). As already noted, in the Balkans the study of extreme-right parties tends to confirm and at the same time nuance our understanding of the various ways in which the extreme right articulates nationalist ideas, as much as its ambiguous support for the development of a strong state. As the state-building process is not yet complete in Bosnia-Herzegovina, the situation is quite difficult to assess.The political scene continues to be divided along ethnic lines, with most parties lobbying for their own ethnicity, while the core subject of controversy is the Dayton Peace Agreement and the continued involvement of the international community in Bosnian state affairs. Most of the parties wish to rewrite the agreement which ended the Bosnian war. But each ethnicity has a different vision. The Bosniak parties wish to abolish the entities and create a centralized BH. The Croats wish to create a third entity within BH and thereby have one federal state composed of three republics. The Serbs wish to have stronger centralization at the entity level and the right to leave the federation. The Serbian political parties seem to be most nationalistic, with some of them talking openly about an independent Republika Srpska tied to Serbia, while the Croatian political parties seek only the creation of their own entity within BH, a Croatian Republic of BH, with links to Croatia.

The extreme right in Serbia The extreme right in Serbia is represented by three parties – the Serbian Radical Party (SRS, Srpska Radikalna Stranka), the Party of Serbian Unity (SSJ, Stranka Srpskog Jedinstva)13 and the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS, Srpska Napredna Stranka).14 Even if many parties demanded the unification of Serbian territories at the beginning of the 1990s, and thus demonstrated strong nationalistic features, such as for instance, the Democratic Party of Serbia (DSS, Demokratska Stranka Srbije), they cannot easily be defined as extreme-right parties: this sort of nationalist claim was shared throughout the Serbian party system and has not been the sole preserve of the Serbian extreme right. Quite interestingly, the SRS is usually lumped together with the Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS), created in 1990 by Slobodan Milošević (Goati 2001: 179; Stojiljković 2006: 193). They share similar views on a variety of subjects, such as

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‘criminal usurpation of the country’, ‘the spread of anarchy’, the desire to see a return of ‘national-patriotic politics’ based on a ‘system of law, work and responsibility’ (Komšić 2006: 175).Voters of this red-black pole, in contrast with DS voters, identify themselves much more with the nation, do not like Americans, tend towards authoritarianism, are traditional, patriarchal, passive, anti-Western, against privatization, against giving rights to minorities, and against the membership of Serbia in the EU (Mihailović in Lutovac 2006: 158). During the regime of Milošević, the Serbian Radical Party was partially in opposition and partially backing the regime in formal coalitions with SPS. Since 2000, the party has been very successful in attracting voters, and in both elections (2003, 2007) it gained more than 27 per cent of votes. The Serbian Radical Party seeks the unification of all Serbian territories and protection of all Serbs; this therefore entails the unification of Serbia, Republika Srpska, Republika Srpska Krajina,15 Montenegro (SRS does not talk about the Montenegrin nation), Kosovo of course and, if possible, Macedonia as well. The programme of the Serbian Radical Party is negative from the outset, when it states that the Serbian nation is divided between three states thanks to Serbia’s traditional enemies – Croats and Muslims; it demands the return of refugees and unification of the Serbian territories (SRS. n.d. Program Srpske radikalne stranke: article 7). The high turnout for SRS in the elections shows the high frustration of Serbs, who for almost twenty years have lived in isolation and economic crisis due to their previous leadership. Even the bloc of democratic parties has not been able to get Serbia out of isolation or, better put, out of the vicious circle of Kosovo. The never-ending story of Kosovo is far more comprehensible to the average voter than is privatization, inflation, the indebtedness of the country and so on: the simplistic slogans of the radicals (e.g. ‘Serbia is like a Nokia, it is getting smaller and smaller’) work very well. It is highly possible that the radicals could gain the majority of votes in a future election and (if pressure from the international community is not strong enough), they would form a coalition government with the nationalist Democratic Party of Serbia. However, whether this nationalist government could last more than a single term is an open question. There are still open sores in Serbia which (together with strong populist leadership) could attract nationalistic voters, and these relate above all to the issue of cooperation with the ICTY: in the words of the radicals, ‘the chief culprit for the dreary political and economic situation of the country [is] the West’. SRS demonstrates all features – nationalism (Greater Serbia), xenophobia (against almost anyone non-Serbian), law and order (strong state providing security to its citizens) as well as welfare chauvinism (selling of Serbian lands and properties). In 2008, a new player made its presence felt in Serbian politics, the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS, Srpska Napredna Stranka), created by former SRS Deputy President Tomislav Nikolić and his supporters, because of internal disagreements over party direction with the party’s leader, Vojislav Šešelj. Probably the chief difference is that the party promotes the accession of Serbia to the EU and its nationalism has been softened. The party says it does not wish to create a Greater Serbia, nor does it wish for any region to be annexed. Its only claim is to Kosovo,

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which it sees as an integral part of the Republic of Serbia. The relationship with Serbs in Croatia and BiH is to be defined by economic unity with Republika Srpska. The party’s programme also calls for ethnic and religious tolerance, military neutrality on the part of Serbia and a fight against crime and corruption. Its economic policy leans left on issues to do with social justice and the welfare state. The SNS is becoming very popular with the Serbian public and it has begun to call for early elections. Opinion polls in February 2011 showed that 34.4 per cent of voters would vote for SNS and its allies,16 29.1 per cent would vote for DS, 7.1 per cent for the SPS, 6.1 per cent for LDP, 5.7 per cent for DSS, and SRS would struggle to get past the 5 per cent threshold (Trećina Gradjana za Prevremene Izbore 2011). If voters in the upcoming elections behave as the opinion polls suggest, there would be a complete shake-up of the currently stable political party system and new configurations would emerge. SNS is also very unpredictable as a new political player, something which might lead to lack of commonality with the EU during the accession process.

Conclusion The primary aim of this chapter has been to present those parties which are supposedly on the extreme right of the political spectrum. The criteria put forward by Mudde prove to be a useful tool, a good starting point to discuss, rather than define, the nature of the extreme-right family in the Western Balkans. Immigration is still not an issue in the region and racism, stricto sensu, is not very common. Instead of that, we may observe strong nationalism accompanied with xenophobia, often in the guise of hostility to the West and welfare chauvinism (tied to EU accession and sale of properties to foreign firms). Anti-Semitism is pervasive, and historical revisionism is to be found in Croatia, where nationalism has been strongly tinted by its historic association with the Nazi regime. Across the board, nationalism is a core feature: the extreme right in the Western Balkans strives for the creation of monoethnic states, requiring support for expanding borders as well as xenophobia towards local ethnics. However, the Balkans also form a specific context which makes it more difficult than elsewhere to decipher and define what makes such and such a party an extremeright party. First, conservative and traditional values remain strong across the entire political spectrum: subjects such as same-sex marriages, euthanasia and abortion, as much as discourses about the protection of traditional values, are part of the programme of most Political Parties (Milardović et al. 2007: 43–61). Likewise, conspiracy theories, anti-globalism and populist anti-party sentiments are themes used by a wide variety of parties: in no way can they be solely identified as specific features of the extreme right in the Western Balkans. Similarly, enthusiastic support for charismatic leadership goes well beyond the boundaries of the extreme right. Second, the party systems are still very much in flux. There is now a degree of consolidation in Croatia and Serbia, but this is not the case in Bosnia-Herzegovina and as such, research is far more difficult. Third, the Western Balkans do not form a

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homogeneous entity: strong national traditions mean that extreme-right parties in this region are also characterized by their differences. For instance, as a rule, the position of such parties towards the West and globalization differs – if the West has sided with their nation, then the nationalist formations tend to support integration into Euro-Atlantic structures, whereas if the West has stood against their nation, the formations are often against the EU, NATO and ICTY. Of course, the reality is even more complex. The Croatian Political Parties remain divided in their relation towards the Euro-Atlantic integration of Croatia. HSP, HP-HPP and HPB clearly oppose the integration of Croatia into the EU as well as NATO while HSP-1861 and HČSP condition membership to approval through referendum. If HB is negative towards NATO, it does not demonstrate a negative stance towards the EU and HIP does not seem to be negative towards either of those supranational organizations. But all these parties have a rather negative stance towards ICTY, with a softer approach adopted by HIP which supports prosecution, though through domestic courts, while HB promotes depoliticization of ICTY. Conversely, all Political Parties in BH support the integration of the country into the EU and NATO while most of the ethnic Croatian and ethnic Serbian parties are against the ICTY as they see it as a politicized institution lacking the sense of justice. Here, the Euro-Atlantic rhetoric is not yet on the agenda (most important is the new constitution for BH). In Serbia, the Serbian Radical Party under Vojislav Šešelj was clearly against the accession of Serbia into NATO and the EU. The new leader Tomislav Nikolić, representing the party while Šešelj has been in The Hague, did support accession to the EU but was forced to resign. The SRS clearly stands against any cooperation (collaboration) of the Serbian state with the ICTY, a politicized institution. As we have seen, most of the parties manifested strong nationalism during the 1990s in terms of internal homogenization as well as external exclusivity. At present, the parties tend to be more realistic, though dreaming about uniting their nation under EU auspices. The hardest stance is clearly presented by the Serbian parties which have not abandoned the idea of a Greater Serbia. Given the strong presence of the SRS in the Serbian parliament, this position remains at the core of the Serbian agenda. Conversely, the idea of a Greater Croatia has been progressively marginalized within the Croatian polity, given the weaker electoral success of parties with such an agenda in Croatia. Further, some extreme-right parties in Croatia, such as the Croatian Party of the Right, are now moving away from policies which support nationalist hatred. In Bosnia, nationalism is still very high on the agenda. Croats would like to see a different configuration of BH and strive for their own entity within the state, which would have the right to be more closely attached to Croatia. Serbs seek more powers to be devolved to their community and the right to be closely associated to Serbia; some parties champion referenda concerning the incorporation of RS into Serbia (see Table 9.2). Eatwell claims that when right and left occupy the centre there is space for formations to emerge at the extreme of the political spectrum (Eatwell 2003). The case of the Balkans shows it works only in some places and within certain limits. In Croatia, there is a consensus about integration into the EU; the two largest

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TABLE 9.2 Western Balkan political scene – extreme right features

HSP1 HB HDZ BiH HSP BiH Ðapić-dr. Jurišić HB BiH NHI HNZ SDS BiH SNSD SRS RS RS RS SNS RS SNS (U) SNP SRS SNS2

Nationalism Xenophobia

Strong state, law and order

Welfare chauvinism

+ + + + + + − + + + + + + + + +

+ + NK + NK NK NK NK + + + + + + + +

+ + NK NK NK NK NK NK − + + + + + + NK

+ + + – + + − + + + + + + + + −

Abbreviations: HSP, Croatian Party of the Right; HB, Croatian Bloc; HDZ BiH, Croatian Democratic Community of BiH; HSP BiH Ðapić-dr. Jurišić, Croatian Party of the Right in BiH; HB BiH, Croatian Bloc in BiH; NHI, New Croatian Initiative; HNZ, Croatian National Community; SDS BiH, Serbian Democratic Party; SNSD, Party of Independent Social Democrats; SRS RS, Serbian Radical Party of RS; RS RS, Radical Party of RS; SNS RS, Serbian Progressive Party of RS; SNS(U), Serbian National Union; SNP, League of People’s Rebirth; SRS, Serbian Radical Party. Notes: + party demonstrates the feature. − party does not demonstrate the feature. N not an issue for the party. NK not known. 1 HSP has dichotomous and diverse opinions but is slowly moving from the extreme right to the centre. 2 The position of the SNS (Serbian Progressive Party) is also unclear. It was provisionally assigned to the extreme right because of its links with the SRS, but this could change over time, particularly if the party succeeds in future elections and ends up playing an important role in setting up the government. In addition, the party profiles itself more on social populism than on national issues. Further developments regarding EU accession will also have great impact on the further position of the party within the party system.

parties both have very much the same programme. There is consensus in society about the direction of the country as well, and the extreme right remains marginal. The extreme right currently seems so factionalized that unification of the extreme right family in Croatia cannot be expected and its electoral future is very much in doubt. In Bosnia-Herzegovina, the main parties are nationalistic and therefore there is not enough space for a clear extreme right to emerge on the fringe of the political system. In Serbia, there is great polarization concerning the country’s direction: the extreme right and the extreme left share many common traits, such as ultranationalism, xenophobia and traditionalism, and are willing to cooperate. In a way labels such as left and right are rather difficult in the Serbian case. The political scene, as well as society, is polarized (modern pro-Western vs. traditional nationalist):

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the level of consensus about core issues is weak, but extreme-right parties are remarkably strong. As we have seen, research in the area of the Western Balkans is complicated due to the incomplete process of state- and nation-building, and an unconsolidated political (party) system. Most of the parties analysed here have an ideological core made up of nationalism, xenophobia, law and order as well as welfare chauvinism.

Notes 1 This chapter has been undertaken as part of the Research Project ‘Conceptualization of security and the application on the Western Balkan region’ (GAČR 407/08/P268). 2 The text focuses on the Serbian party system but excludes both the Vojvodinian and Kosovar party systems. 3 The Croatian Democratic Union was set up in 1989 in Zagreb and became the major party in Croatia during the 1990s – it ruled from 1990 to 2000 and has been in power again since 2003. In the 1990s, party – that is to say government – policies were heavily influenced by the war in Croatia and in Bosnia-Herzegovina and therefore heightened nationalism was the dominant philosophy. 4 To cite an example taken from the HDZ programme: ‘HDZ was an endeavour of the Croatian national and democratic movement in the last decade of the last century, led by the salvation idea of reconciliation of the Croatian national entity, established and then divided during the political and military storms of the 20th Century, the idea of the unity of inland and extraterrestrial Croats, that Croatians in Bosnia-Herzegovina are an indivisible part of the united Croatian national entity’.

5 6 7 8

9

10

11

Nevetheless, the current standpoint of the party is protection of the Croatian minority in Bosnia-Herzegovina and promotion of their rights to become a third entity; the party promotes the right for active as well as passive voting for the Croats living abroad (HDZ 2002). For example, the Croatian Party of Rights, Croatian Pure Party of Rights, Croatian Bloc and Croatian Rightists – Croatian Right Movement. The main issue is now the unresolved question of the Slovenian–Croatian border and the EU member Slovenia is seen as an obstruction affecting Croatian membership; HSP sees EU membership as involving the sacrifice of Croatian national interests. Bosnia-Herzegovina is a federal state made up of two entities: Republika Srpska (not to be confused with the neighbouring Serbia) and the Federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina (not to be confused with Bosnia-Herzegovina). SDA (nine mandates out of 42 in the House of Representatives at the federal level and 28 out of 98 at the FBiH level in 2006), SBiH (eight mandates out of 42 in the House of Representatives at the federal level and 24 out of 98 at the FBiH level in 2006) and BPS (one mandate out of 42 in the House of Representatives at the federal level and 4 out of 98 at the FBiH level in the 2006 elections). Electoral coalition HDZ-HNZ (three mandates out of 42 in the House of Representatives at the federal level and eight out of 98 at the FBiH level in 2006); HDZ 1990 and its allies (two mandates out of 42 in the House of Representatives at the federal level and seven out of 98 at the FBiH level in 2006). SDS HDZ-HNZ (three mandates out of 42 in the House of Representatives at the federal level and eight out of 83 at the RS level in 2006); SSND (seven mandates out of 42 in the House of Representatives at the federal level and 41 out of 83 at the RS level in 2006); RS (two mandates out of 83 at the RS level in 2006). Serbian Radical party of RS (SRS RS, Srpska Radikalna Stranka Republike Srpske), Radical Party of RS (RS RS, Radikalna Stranka Republike Srpske), Serbian National

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12 13

14

15 16

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Union (SNS, Srpski Narodni Savez), League of People’s Rebirth (SNP, Savez Narodnog preporoda), Serbian Progressive Party of RS (SNS RS, Srpska Napredna Stranka Republike Srpske). The SNS formed an electoral coalition with Radical Party of RS and the Serbian Party of RS (SS RS, Srpska Stranka Republike Srpske). SSJ was led (until his assassination) by Željko Ražnatović Arkan and later on by Borislav Pelević; its aim was the unity of the Serbian nation (Komšić 2006: 172–74). The SSJ merged in 2007 into the Serbian Radical Party. (For further details, see e.g. Komšić 2006: 171–75.) In 2008, SRS split due to internal disagreements concerning Serbian accession to the EU and the acting party leader formed a new party with other MPs – the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS, Srpska Napredna Stranka). Although the party never ran an election campaign, it is represented in parliament; the SNS focuses on social populism and is currently one of the most popular political parties in Serbia. Republika Srpska Krajina (RSK) was a self-declared and unrecognized republic in the territory of Croatia during the war at the beginning of the 1990s. The self-declared government in exile of RSK still resides in Belgrade. The Strength of Serbia Movement (PSS, Pokret Snaga Srbije), New Serbia (NS, Nova Srbija), Socialist Movement (PS, Pokret Socijalista). The only parliamentary party is the monarchist NS, while PS emerged only in 2008 and PSS a year later. A possible coalition partner in terms of ideology might be DSS.

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HDZ BiH 2007. Program Hrvatske demokratske zajednice Bosne i Hercegovine. Mostar, available at: http://www.hdzbih.org/download/xx_program.pdf . HDZ-1990 2006. HDZ 1990 – Programska Deklaracija. Mostar, available at: http://www. hdz1990.org/dokumenti/Programskapercent20deklaracijapercent20HDZpercent20 1990.doc. Herceg, N. and Tomić, Z. 1999. Izbori u Bosni i Hercegovini (Drugo dopunjeno izdanje). Mostar: Sveučilište u Mostaru, Centar za studije novinarstva. HIP 2001a. Politički profil. Zagreb, available at: http://hidra.srce.hr/arhiva/392/5980/www. hipnet.hr/kategorije.phppercent3fKATEGORIJA_IDpercent3d33.html. HIP 2001b. Program stranke. Zagreb, available at: http://hidra.srce.hr/arhiva/392/5980/ www.hipnet.hr/kategorije.phppercent3fKATEGORIJA_IDpercent3d19.html. HNZ 2005. HNZ: BiH treba biti decentralizirana država Hrvata, Bošnjaka, Srba i svih njezinih građana. Mostar, 13 December, available at: http://www.hnzbih.org/news.htm. HP-HPP (n.d.) Temeljna načela, available at: http://www.hrvatskipravasi.hr/index.php?id= m&lnk=2. HPB 2004. Programska deklaracija političke stranke Hrvatsko pravaško bratrstvo. Arbanija 2004, available at: http://www.hpb-makarska.com/content/view/6/11/. Hrvatska stranka prava BiH Đapić -dr. Jurišić 2005. Programska načela. Mostar, available at: http://www.hsp-bih.ba/prog.htm. Hrvatski blok-pokret za modernu Hrvatsku 2003. 100 Pitanja i odgovora. Zagreb, available at: http://www.hrvatski-blok.hr/doc1/100pitanja.pdf . Hrvatski blok u BiH 2005. Politička sudbina Hrvata u BiH. Mostar, available at: http://www. hrvatski-blok.hr/doc1/PolitickaSudbina-kb.pdf. Hrvatski blok 2006. Program Hrvatskog bloka. Zagreb, available at: http://hrvatski-blok.hr/ doc1/program.pdf . HSP 2010a. Vukovarska Deklaracija. 18 September, available at: http://hsp.hr/content/ view/997/138/. HSP 2010b. Otvoreno pismo. 2 September, available at: http://hsp.hr/images/stories/ otvorenopismo.pdf . HSP-1861 (n.d.) Vijesti iz medija, available at: http://www.hsp1861.hr/Ostalo.html. HSP-1861 (n.d.) Temeljna načela Hrvatske stranke prava-1861, available at: http://www. hsp1861.hr/1temeljna.htm. HSP 2007. Govor predsjednika Hrvatske stranke prava na konvenciji 16.IX.2007, available at: http://www.hsp.hr/content/view/90/137/lang,hr/. HSS 2007. Pogled u budučnost. Sažetak izbornog programa. Zagreb, available at: http://www.hss. hr/onama_prog.php?id=1. IDS 2007. Programska deklaracija IDS (2007) Istarski demokratski sabor, available at: http:// www.ids-ddi.com/ids-ddi/dokumenti/programska-deklaracija/. Ignazi, P. 1995. The Re-emergence of the Extreme Right in Europe. Reihe Politikwissenschaft, no. 21. Wien: Institut für Höhere Studien, available at: http://www.ihs.ac.at/publications/pol/pw_21.pdf . —— 1996. New Challenges: Post-Materialism and the Extreme Right. Estudios No. 91. Madrid: Instituto Juan March de Estudios e Investigaciones. —— 2003. Extreme Right Parties in Western Europe. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Komšić, J. 2006. Dileme demokratske nacije i autonomije. Ogledi u političkoj tranziciji u Srbiji. Beograd: Službeni glasnik. Lutovac, Z. (ed.). 2006. Demokratija u političkim strankama Srbije. Beograd: Institut drušstvenih nauka. Merkl, P.H. and Weinberg, L. 1997. The Revival of Right-Wing Extremism in the Nineties. London: Frank Cass.

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10 EXTREME-RIGHT PARAMILITARY UNITS IN EASTERN EUROPE1 Miroslav Mareš and Richard Stojar

Introduction The development of the extreme right in post-communist Europe has been accompanied by the existence of non-state paramilitary subjects. In contemporary Eastern Europe, in comparison with Western Europe, the activities of paramilitary units are a much more important part of extreme-right politics. Despite the growing Europeanization of the political spectrum in some post-communist European countries, the presence of paramilitary tendencies is still a characteristic feature of the extreme right, including the new EU member countries. Research into the phenomenon of paramilitary units calls for a multidisciplinary approach (including security studies). In this chapter we will first define paramilitarism for the purposes of research into right-wing extremism, before briefly describing the traditions of extremeright paramilitary units in East Central Europe, and then analysing the role of extreme-right units in armed conflicts in the post-communist era and contemporary paramilitary units oriented towards vigilantism. In conclusion, we will evaluate the general potential of extreme-right military units in Eastern Europe, and explain the importance of paramilitarism for constructing extreme-right identity in Eastern Europe in the context of the political culture in this area.

Definition of paramilitarism ‘Paramilitarism’ is a frequently used term. In the most general sense ‘paramilitary’ means ‘organized like an army (and possibly armed)’ (Bowyer 2004: 174). However, such a vague definition means it can be used to label very different activities (Dasgupta 2004). For the purpose of research into right-wing extremism in Eastern Europe only some of these are important.

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This chapter is aimed mainly at two types of paramilitary organization: combatant paramilitaries in armed post-communist conflicts, and the vigilante paramilitary formations (mostly with racist orientation) of Political Parties and movements. There has been much activity on the part of young extreme-right activists (mostly members of the skinhead sub-culture). These can be characterized more as children playing soldiers than real paramilitaries. The public visual presentation of some paramilitary units sometimes has only a propaganda effect. On the other hand, paramilitary units have a real capability of influencing the political situation or political culture in some countries or regions, and paramilitary activities are currently, as they will be in the future, a threat to public order and inter-ethnic relations in East European countries.

The tradition of extreme-right paramilitaries in Eastern Europe to 1989 Central and Eastern Europe The extreme-right paramilitary units in Eastern Europe were inspired by a combination of many factors. Determinant factors for their genesis were national tradition, state support or state suppression. The roots of the units in Eastern Europe can be found in the nationalist movements of the second half of the nineteenth century, which are regarded by present groups as their predecessors in defending national interests. A prominent role in this respect was played by national groups founded on an ethnic basis, and standing in opposition to state institutions and to other ethnic groups – for example, in Eastern Europe the Czech organization Sokol (Falcon) had an impact on the emergence of similar movements in the AustroHungarian empire and in the Slavic states outside of the monarchy. Sokol was founded in 1862. Unlike other existing sports groups having an elite character, Sokol was nationally all-inclusive, and for this reason not politically defined; the main idea was Czech nationalism and pan-Slavism. Sokol was inspired by two external actors – the volunteer groups from the Risorgimento era Camicie Rosse (Redshirts) of Garibaldi, and the German national gymnastics group Turnverein (Gymnastic Union). Sokol accented (in accord with the romanticism of the period) the ideals of classical Greece, including physical prowess and battle readiness, and the ideal of a classical Greek education (Waldauf 2007: 7). During the building of Czechoslovakia, Sokol provided voluntary military groups, which were actively engaged in combat against the Hungarian Bolsheviks in Slovakia. These traditions were part of the programme of Czech fascist organizations in the period between the two wars, and their legacy is claimed by the contemporary extreme right as it fulfils its: ideological criteria as well as the combat tradition. A couple of other groups that could meet the criteria for extreme-right paramilitary units emerged in interwar Czechoslovakia. The creation of the Czechoslovakian state was carried out by the national ambitions of Czech society, thus minimizing the potential for local nationalism. Sokol declined somewhat,

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with the existence of national armed forces eliminating its raison d’être as a parallel national army; thus it fully transformed itself into a social, cultural and sports organization identifying with the democratic ideals of the new state.The failure of Czech fascists to infiltrate Sokol led them to form their own paramilitary units such as Fašistická Omladina (Fascist Youth) and Junák (Hero) (Pasák 1999: 118). In Slovakia in the 1920s, Rodobrana (National Defence), a paramilitary organization of clerical and autonomist tendencies, became very influential. After five years this group was officially dissolved, and its successor was Hlinkova Garda (Hlinka Guard), which in 1938–45 came to be a military branch of the Slovenská Ľudová Strana (Slovak People’s Party), which backed the fascist regime during the Second World War. Its functions were laid down in a series of government decrees: it was supposed to be a paramilitary wing of the party, fostering love of country, providing paramilitary training, safeguarding internal security, counterbalancing the Slovak army, and last but not least fighting against the anti-fascist guerrilla movement. Even though Sokol influenced other Slavic nations in the framework of the Habsburg monarchy, these were not as successful as their Czech counterpart. In Poland it was the national movement Strzelec (Rifleman) that provided real military training for the planned conflict with Russian units in Russian Poland. As in the case of the Czech Sokol, its members formed the nucleus of the Polish Legion that took part in the Second World War. The organizations from the pre-First World War era could be taken as examples for the extreme right because of their nationalistic character and their real military significance. The ideological purpose of extreme-right paramilitary units could be seen in the interwar era, when nationalistic and fascist organizations in Eastern Europe were striving to form their own units. A great inspiration for them was the successful model of Benito Mussolini’s squadristi (i.e. the fascist squads and the blackshirts), but they also drew on local traditions and specific national contexts. In Hungary the first paramilitary unit with fascist ideology was formed as early as 1919. An extreme group of Hungarian radicals within the nationalist army formed Szeged which became known as Szeged Fascists, and later developed into the Magyar Országos Véderő Egylet (Hungarian National Defence Association). This group was from the beginning sharply politically profiled against the leftist Marxist groups. Its primary idea was revision of the Trianon peace treaty, and the restoration of a Greater Hungary. Later on another group emerged in Hungary called Nyilaskeresztes Párt – Hungarista Mozgalom (the Arrow Cross Party), which was completely under the influence of Nazism. It opposed Marxism as well as the nationalist conservative groups which were dominant during the post-war era in Hungary. The ideology of the movement was based on extreme nationalism, extreme Catholicism, anti-capitalism, anti-communism and militant anti-Semitism. This party formed paramilitary units, training of which was supervised by party sympathizers from the army as well as the police. During the 1938 Czech–German conflict, the paramilitary unit carried out a couple of relatively large armed attacks against Czechoslovak forces on the Slovak–Hungarian frontier.

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Paramilitary formations were also created in the Baltic States, during the period when these nation-states were being founded and did not have any regular units. For example, the nationalist Lietuvos Šaulių Są junga (Union of Lithuanian Riflemen) was supported and directed by the state. Later Soviet dominance of Eastern Europe and the dominance of communist ideology resulted in the suppression of all forms of political resistance and divergence. The extreme-right organizations in exile were therefore the only groups sustaining nationalist ideals. The decline of the Eastern bloc brought revival, and the return of some of them, sometimes in a different shape and form.

South Eastern Europe While the Versailles system fulfilled many of the regional nationalistic ambitions left over from the nineteenth century, it created many new sources of conflict. The formation of paramilitary organizations was often secretly supported by the countries that were defeated in the First World War, because the strict demilitarization incorporated in the peace treaties limited the ability to maintain state military forces. These paramilitary units were without exception strongly nationalistic with fascist elements (nationalism, strong state, cults of unity and purity, militarism), aimed at revision of the post-war settlement in Europe. In Bulgaria, the former guerrilla formation Vnatrešna Makedonska Revolucionerna Organizacija (Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization) took part in the liquidation of leftoriented governing bodies in the 1920s. Later it succeeded in forming a parallel state with its own military units in the so-called Pirin region of Macedonia. Its units were eliminated by the Bulgarian government in the 1930s. A paramilitary fascistic organization linked to national mythology and religious mysticism was created in Romania in 1927. Initially it was called Legiunea Arhanghelul Mihail (Legion of the Archangel Michael); in 1930 the name was changed to Garda de Fier (Iron Guard), also known as the Mişcarea Legionară (Legionary Movement). Its activists carried out several high-level political assassinations in the interwar period. After 1935 it operated as a political party as well, and in 1940–41 it took part in the government. Due to its links with Nazi Germany and its aggressiveness, it was a source of intrastate disruption for the Romanian government; its influence was eliminated by repressive action. The group also had a strong impact on the mythology of neo-fascists in Western Europe. The traditions of extreme-right paramilitary units in Serbia are mostly based on formations called četnici (Chetniks) with origins in the wars of the twentieth century. Many paramilitary units pertained to distinct ethnicities, and their Political Parties and ideological currents were active in the interwar period in the Yugoslavian kingdom. In the 1920s in Croatia it was the Hrvatska Nacionalna Omladina (Croatian National Youth); its counterpart in Serbia was Srpska Nacionalna Omladina (Serbian National Youth). A special case was the Organizacija Jugoslavenskih Nacionalista (Organization of Yugoslav Nationalists), whose main goal was maintaining a strong unitary Yugoslav state and fighting

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against any form of domestic ethnic separatism, communism and Italian fascism. From the mid-1930s, the main Croatian political force, the Hrvatska Seljačka Stranka (Croatian Peasant Party), formed two paramilitary units: one in the countryside and one in the cities. Their aim was similar to the previously mentioned Czech organization Sokol: to form a parallel and independent national force in a multinational state dominated by other ethnic groups, and in this case also to compete with the illegal, armed, fascistic Ustaša (Insurgent, Ustasha) movement.

Extreme right paramilitaries in post-communist armed conflicts Extreme-right paramilitary units played an important role in the post-Cold War era in some of the ethnic and ideological conflicts in Eastern Europe. They were heavily engaged in the conflicts following the disintegration of Yugoslavia. This was due to many factors: the extreme right was founded on the traditions of the local movements during the Second World War, and was therefore not perceived by society in negative terms. In some cases these local movements compromised themselves by collaboration with the occupation regime and fascist ideology. In the post-war era they were part of the authoritarian ideology of the Yugoslav Communist Party, and were perceived as the bearers of national identity striving for the realization of legitimate national interests. The continuity provided by a strong exile community that provided extensive propaganda on their behalf was another factor in maintaining the importance of these groups. Then there was the potential for conflict and future military confrontation in the ethnically mixed territories.The limited military potential of the newly formed successor states led to the formation of paramilitary units on a larger scale; for the new states the participation of these units in the conflict was a temporary necessity. In 1991 the Yugoslav federal army disintegrated; its main remnant withdrew to Serbia and the territories controlled by the Serbs. Though they were engaged on the Serbian side, the army was distrusted by Serbian moderate nationalists for its ideological indoctrination with communist ideology, and blamed for its inability to protect Serbian national interests ( Jovanović 1994: 141). Generally, paramilitary units in Yugoslav conflicts acted in symbiosis with the official armed forces of the different entities, but were largely infiltrated by criminal elements (Stojarová 2007: 85) (see Serbian organizations below). The Hrvatske Obrambene Snage (HOS, Croatian Defence Forces) was the Croatian counterpart of the Serbian paramilitary units. The HOS was formed by the Croatian Party of Rights, and was based on the traditions of the fascist Ustaša movement. Its political affiliation, and the fact that it was not under the full control of the Croatian governing bodies, was the reason for its gradual liquidation (Jerman 2001: 262). Many Western European extreme-right volunteers, mainly from Germany, fought in the ranks of the HOS. The radical Serbian nationalists refused to serve in the federal army, and entered the voluntary paramilitary units. The Srpska Garda (SG, Serbian Guard), the armed

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wing of the opposition nationalist party Srpski Pokret Obnove (SPO, Serbian Renewal Movement), played a significant role at the beginning of the SerboCroatian conflict. It was the first Serbian armed paramilitary formation to become a mobilizing factor in Serbian society, and it had ambitions to become the basis for a national Serbian army which would replace the federal army under socialist control (Mičković and Višnjić 1992: 78). The regime of Slobodan Milošević was intimidated by its initial popularity, and so it started to support other paramilitary units in order to minimize the potential power of anti-communist Serbian nationalism. After the initial euphoria SG lost its strong position and perished. Another significant Serbian nationalist paramilitary unit was the Beli Orlovi (White Eagles), formed in 1991–92 during the initial phases of conflict in Croatia and Bosnia. The name White Eagles refers to an anti-communist, pro-fascist paramilitary unit that was formed during the Second World War, also known as the Srpski Dobrovoljački Korpus (Serbian Volunteer Corps). Soon it became totally autonomous, and severed connections with the opposition parties it had cooperated with before. Many other small paramilitary units which were completely independent from the original structures or organizations were conducted under the name of SG or White Eagles during the war, or made use of their symbols (Valeckij 2006: 33, 47). The Serbian unit that became best known was the Srpska Dobrovoljačka Garda (SDG, Serb Volunteer Guard), formed by Željko Ražnatović Arkan in 1990. The nucleus was initially made up of radical soccer hooligans from Belgrade, and it claimed over 10,000 fighters, though this number is probably overstated. Known as the Arkan Tigers, it was initially tied to the Serbian secret service.There was speculation about the extent of its contacts with the Milošević regime. Some authors even concluded that the SDG was the military wing of the Party of the Yugoslavian Left of Milošević’s wife Mirjana Marković (Thomas and Mikulan 2006). The SDG cooperated with the Serbian regular military forces operating in the territory of Croatia and Bosnia that were populated predominantly by Serbs during the first half of the 1990s. It also cooperated with the Russian extreme-right party of Vladimir Žirinovskij with whom it shared a never-implemented plan of engaging his party’s paramilitary unit in the Bosnian conflict. Though the unit was never present in the Kosovo conflict, news of its engagement there was very often presented to the public (Lopušina 2002: 123). Regarding the Kosovo question, a new extreme-right paramilitary unit emerged in Serbia called the Garda Svetog Cara Lazara (Saint Tsar Lazar Guard), founded by the nationalistic political party Movement of Veterans of Serbia, uniting former Serbian veterans from the Yugoslavia wars. The aim was to convert it into a Christian militia in Kosovo in the event of any military conflict with Kosovo’s Albanian community. The United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) banned the activities of the Guard in Kosovo, and the illegal guerrilla organization Armata Kombëtare Shqiptare (Albanian National Army) declared its readiness to prevent any penetration of the Guard into Kosovo territory. One spokesman for the Guard rejected the interpretation of the group as an armed paramilitary unit, presenting it instead as an organization that could assume

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the character of police, army or gendarmerie. The number of its members probably ranges from several dozen to a maximum of a hundred people, although its leadership speaks of more than 5,000 activists; its ranks include Kosovan as well as Macedonian Serbs. Its relationship with the Serbian authorities is negative, as it accuses the Serbian state of ‘insufficiently protecting the territorial integrity of the nation’ and using repressive methods against its members. The leader of the Guard, Milić, said in this regard that state repression cannot restrain its activity, and regardless of the position of the state authorities, the paramilitary unit would fight for the liberation of Kosovo from Albanian separatists and terrorists. Serbian security expert Dragišić questioned the Guard’s ability to bring the Kosovo conflict to the boil (Dragišić 2007), and events confirmed his opinion as to the Guard’s declared potential. In June 2007 the Guard wanted to infiltrate Kosovo and demonstrate its power on the Kosovo battlefield, but was prevented from doing so by UNMIK. It called upon the Serbian parliament to intervene militarily in Kosovo, and planned a couple of large demonstrations on the Kosovo–Serbian border. However, these demonstrations did not attract the desired level of support. After the declaration of an independent Kosovo in February 2008, the Guard instigated unrest on the administrative border, and its activists even attacked some buildings on the border and vehicles of the UN mission. Finally, as in the former Yugoslavia, many nationalist paramilitary units emerged out of the conflicts following the disintegration of the Soviet Union. The revival of latent nationalist tensions opened up space for the activation of such units, though to a lesser extent than in Yugoslavia. Because of the 70-year-long communist domination, the extreme right had no tradition, and the newly emerging organizations proclaimed the traditions of the older pre-revolutionary nationalistic and xenophobic movements, into which they imported elements taken from Western European right-wing extremism. Paramilitary units of this type included the formations of volunteers and Cossacks who were actively engaged in the conflicts in Abkhazia and Transdniestria. The ultimate representative of the Russian extreme right is Russkoye Natsionalnoye Edinstvo (RNE, Russian National Unity), founded in 1990. This group was based in Russia, but also operated in former Soviet republics with large Russian-speaking populations − the Baltic countries, Belarus and Ukraine. During 1991–93 the RNE developed a wide network of regional organizations, which practised military drills, martial arts and tactical training. During the constitutional crisis in autumn 1993, RNE supported the Russian parliament against then-president Yeltsin, and its units took part in defending the Russian parliament against Yeltsin’s troops, and probably in the raid on the Ostankino TV transmitter (Lichačev and Pribylovskij 2005: 187). For this reason, RNE had to work illegally for several months after Yeltsin’s victory, and its leaders were arrested. But state repression meant only a temporary weakening; in subsequent years membership grew enormously, and the movement reached its high tide at the end of the 1990s. By autumn 1999 local police forces were asking the local RNE for help during the Russian anti-terrorist operation Storm targeted at Caucasus immigrants (Lichačev and Pribylovskij 2005: 188).

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The actual contribution of the paramilitary units in these conflicts is a very contentious issue. In the initial phases of the conflict, their actions were quite significant; however, after the formation of the national forces they became more of a burden, and came under criticism. When paramilitaries presented a potential threat to the governing elites, they came under attack and were liquidated by the state apparatus. In conclusion, it is also worth mentioning the Ukrainska Natsionalna Asamblea – Ukrainska Natsionalna Samooborona (UNA-UNSO, the Ukrainian National Assembly – Ukrainian National Self Defence) which played a similar role to the Russian RN, but on the Ukrainian side and against Russia. Indeed, its radical Russophobe activists initiated many clashes with the Russian minority in Kiev and Crimea, and after the disintegration of the USSR its activists fought in the various conflicts of the post-Soviet region.

Recruitment and organization of volunteer units for foreign conflicts: some brief reflections Individuals from UNA-UNSO actively took part in the conflicts in former Yugoslavia, fighting on the Serbian side as well as the Croatian side (Valeckij 2006: 29). Many Western European extreme-right volunteers, mainly from Germany, fought in HOS ranks. Some neo-Nazis from post-communist countries in the first half of the 1990s were probably members of the 1. Gardijska Brigada ‘Baron Trenck’ (1. Guard Brigade ‘Baron Trenck’). This was a unit of extremists from German-speaking countries that fought in Bosnia and Herzegovina (Landesamt für Verfassungschutz Hamburg 2001: 108–9). Of the Russian volunteers, most of these fought on the Serbian side in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Nevertheless, the small neo-Nazi unit Werewolf from Moscow was engaged in the mid-1990s on the Croatian side (Laqueur 1997: 292). Anti-Russian attitudes in Ukraine led to the recruitment of volunteers in conflicts which took place in Chechnya and Abkhazia. UNA-UNSO units operated mostly during the first Chechen war and in the second half of the 1990s. In the new century they have expressed propaganda support for the Chechen struggle; however, not for acts of terrorism (McGregor 2006). It is interesting that this organization uses Islamophobic motives in its propaganda, but anti-Russian feeling was in this case probably stronger (Laryš 2008: 16–17). In the second half of the 1990s some Polish nationalist volunteers also declared their intention of fighting in Chechnya against the Russian army, but there is no relevant information on their actual participation. A specific activity in relation to Eastern European extreme-right paramilitarism is the recruitment and organization of volunteer units in Middle Eastern armed conflicts. In this respect, both anti-Americanism and anti-Semitism (sometimes masked as anti-Zionism) have become the ideological basis for the engagement of extreme right-wing activists in the Middle East. In 1993 the leader of the extremist Liberalno-Demokratisheckaya Partija Rossii (LDPR, Liberal Democratic Party

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of Russia) Vladimir Žirinovskij created a small diversionary unit to help the Saddam Hussein regime in the fight against the Americans, in view of the declared friendship between the LDPR and the Iraqi state-party Baath. However, this unit probably only flew for a short visit to Jordan, and never actually fought for the Iraqi regime (Frank 1993). Similarly in 2003, a limited number of members of the Natsional Bolshevistkaya Partia (National Bolshevik Party) from Russia declared their willingness to fight for the Saddam Hussein regime, and later some of them visited Iraq for propaganda reasons; however, they were probably not involved in military actions (Mesopotamskij 2003). Finally, in 2006, 41 activists of the Czech neo-Nazi organization Národní Odpor (NO, National Resistance) sent a letter to the Czech president with a request for permission to serve in the Iranian army (Bezpečnostní informační služba 2007). This was a reaction to the Hizballah–Israel conflict and the threat by the United States against Iran because of its nuclear programme. However, no real action followed. Inside the NO this action led to disputes, as some of the activists rejected the idea of supporting Islamism, and wanted to use Islamophobic motives in their propaganda. However, Iranian president Ahmadinejad managed to maintain considerable popularity among some rightist militants because of his denial of the Holocaust and his anti-Americanism (Mareš 2008: 4).

Vigilante activities by extreme-right paramilitarists in Eastern Europe Paramilitary units in Eastern Europe in the post-communist era are also linked to vigilante activities.Vigilantism is, at least in theory, a traditional feature of extremeright thinking. The typical ‘law and order’ demands are often connected with the idea of self-preservation. The recent case of – now institutionalized – ‘ronde’ in Italy is, in this sense, quite symptomatic of this approach. Further, vigilantism is usually closely linked to intolerant nationalism and racism, as other ethnic or religious groups are usually regarded only as ‘potential criminals’. In Eastern Europe such extremist racist propaganda is aimed mostly against the Roma and immigrants from third world countries. In Russia propaganda is applied against people from Caucasus – while in the Balkans and the Central European countries it is aimed mainly against the Albanians. Recently, Islamophobia is also on the rise in this area, because the Muslims are presented in extremist materials as terrorists and criminals. Vigilantism also targets people from the same ethnic group and nation as the perpetrators, mainly leftist activists, alternative youth, drug users, criminals, homeless people and homosexuals. These all stand condemned as asocial or decadent. People from the above-mentioned groups are often attacked by individuals or small non-organized rightist groups. It is important to mention that only some of this extreme vigilante activity is carried out by paramilitary units. In some parts of post-communist Europe, paramilitary vigilantism was initially associated with elements from a racist skinhead

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sub-culture. This sub-culture came from the West to some regions of Eastern Europe, first to countries strongly influenced by Western culture (East Central Europe) at the end of the 1980s, and later in the 1990s to various other parts of Eastern Europe. At that time skinheads were generally racially oriented. Later, non-racist groups of skinheads also appeared. Some skinheads tried to establish the whole skinhead sub-culture as a paramilitary structure (as part of an imaginary ‘European Skinhead Army’). However, such plans were unrealistic because this sub-culture attracted many primitive and undisciplined people. The more consistent skinhead elite organizations were likewise unable to conduct effective paramilitary vigilante activity; thus ad hoc hate crimes in the street were more typical. This applies to the East European organizations of the Hammerskins Nation or Blood and Honour/Combat 18. Vigilante tendencies are also typical of contemporary modern neo-Nazism in Eastern Europe in connection with ‘warriors and weapons fetishism’. In some regions of East and Central Europe (mostly in the Czech Republic and Slovakia) the concept of ‘free nationalism’ (the decentralized cell-structure of the neo-Nazi scene) created by the German model has become popular. In this concept an important role is played by ‘free liberated national zones’. It means that in parts of towns, villages or certain places, these national-socialist activists in fact exercise power, and are able to conduct community policing. Among the groups involved in this free nationalism are the National Resistance, Free Nationalists and Autonomous Nationalists. They sometimes organize paramilitary training; some small groups specialize in these activities. However, so far such tendencies (in the sense of quasi-military training, paintball and airsoft games, survival, etc.) have not led to real consistent action against the political enemies of the national-socialists in a paramilitary form. Some short-term projects have appeared; for example, the antiRoma home guard organized by the National Resistance of Silesia, but this was active only for a few days in 2005. On the other hand, national-socialist paramilitarism with vigilante and sometimes terrorist tendencies (aimed mostly against people from Caucasus and Central Asia) is on the rise in Russia. In the 1990s the RNE (see above) was very active. In contemporary Russia, organizations like Russkaya Natsionalnaya Sotsialistisheckay Partia (RNSP, Russian National Socialist Party) tend towards paramilitarism. Vigilante activity without declared racist prejudice has also been connected with some traditional nationalist organizations in the Baltic States, for example Jaunoji Liuetva (Young Lithuanians). In May 2001 the uniformed militia of this group was registered with the city of Kaunas, with the goal of helping law enforcement in the fight against drug dealers and hooligans. Paradoxically enough, the risk here is that ‘these musclemen in uniform might be used for purposes related to politics’ (Kiaulakis 2005: 136). Paramilitary groups were also active in Slovenia (Peace Institute and Trplan 2005). Relatively consistent paramilitary training is typical of neo-fascist or nationalist organizations from East-Central Europe. In the second half of the 1990s the most active in this sense were organizations connected with the International Third

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Position (ITP), mostly the Romanian Noua Dreapta (ND, New Right), the National Narodowe Odrodzenie Polski (NOP, Rebirth of Poland), Slovenská Pospolitost’ (SP, Slovak Community) or Hnutí národního sjednocení (HNS, Movement for National Unification) from the Czech Republic. The declared goal of their paramilitary training is to counter crime, mostly crime by immigrants or ethnics (Roma). However, real participation by these groups in vigilantism is very limited. A dangerous escalation of inter-ethnic tensions threatened Slovakia in 2004. In February 2004 a sizeable portion of the Roma population in Eastern Slovakia was involved in social riots (particularly the ransacking of supermarkets) because of new restrictive social measures by the Slovak government. In reaction, the leader of the right-wing extremist Slovak Community Marian Kotleba declared that ‘Slovaks have the right to use the gun for the protection of their lives and property’ (Kotleba 2004). Some racist skinheads in Slovakia were prepared to attack the Roma rioters. However, due to quick action by Slovak security forces, vigilante activities by the SP or other rightist groups were forestalled. An organized anti-Roma attack was carried out by racist skinheads in Bulgaria in the summer of 2007 during riots by the Roma in Sofia.The small ultranationalist Bulgarski Natsionalen Soyuz (BNS, Bulgarian National Union) declared in August 2007 that in response to these riots it would create the vigilante Bulgarska natsionalna gvardya (BNG, Bulgarian National Guard) (Bulgarski Nacionalen Sojuz 2007). This situation, like that in Slovakia three years before, was calmed after several days of escalation. The founding of the BNG is part of a new trend of paramilitary activities in East-Central Europe, which since 2007 has focused primarily on acquiring media attention, and the adoption of the tactic by the new rising extra-parliamentary right-wing extremist parties of seeking to blend into society. Some of these units are also engaged in current border disputes. The most important representative of this trend is the Magyar Garda (HG, Hungarian Guard). This is a relatively new organization founded by the extremeright party Jobbik Magyarországért Mozgalom (Movement for a Better Hungary) in 2007 for the purposes of ‘physical, mental and spiritual self-defence’. According to its leader HG is ready to defend the Hungarian nation in time of war. The reference to the Hungarian nation implies the Hungarian minorities in Slovakia, Romania, Ukraine and in Serbian Vojvodina as well. This paramilitary unit could become engaged in possible national conflicts beyond Hungarian borders. Local chapters of the HG were also formed in Hungary. In 2008 HG planned to initiate a new campaign against the 1920 Treaty of Trianon, including the revival of the Justice for Hungary campaign from the interwar period that aimed for cultural and territorial autonomy for Hungarian minorities living abroad. Currently the HG tries to make headway in domestic politics by blaming the governing socialists for sympathizing with communism, globalization, and trying to ‘whitewash’ the problem of crime by the Roma community, which makes up 10 per cent of the Hungarian population. The Hungarian Guard, though unarmed, has clear paramilitary features: a hierarchical structure, and members wearing uniforms and organizing exhibitions

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and training. Unlike other European extreme-right organizations, the HG encompasses a wider demographic structure, from young skinheads to right-wing radicals, to representatives of the older generation. In terms of military potential, the HG probably presents no serious risk, as it is an unarmed formation. Its symbols are taken from the Arrow Cross Party, and its name and officially declared tradition recalls more the revolutionary Hungarian Territorial Army from 1848–49 and the Hungarian insurgents of 1956 (Magyar Gárda 2007).The Magyar Gárda was banned in 2009 in Hungary, though several successor and splinter groups have since been established (Bélaiová 2011). The Národní Garda (NG, National Guard), which was closely linked to the Národní Strana (NS, National Party), was founded in the Czech Republic in 2007. Its members say they want to help people in regions with high crime rates (usually with a high concentration of Roma population), and come to the aid of citizens after disasters (this is a propaganda issue connected with restrictions on official army participation in civil defence). The NG also wants to bring in members of the police and the army. However, following the decline of the National Party in 2010 the NG is no longer active (Smolík 2011). In 2008 the small Dělnická Strana (Workers Party) founded its own paramilitary protection corps, the Ochranné Sbory Dělnické Strany (Protection Corps of the Workers Party). The party has been closely connected with the structures of neo-Nazism in the Czech Republic. The protection corps was involved with anti-Roma riots in Northern Bohemia in autumn 2008, and with monitoring crime in some localities with strong Roma population in 2008–9. The party was banned in 2010, and the existence of the Protection corps was one of the most important reasons for the ban (Mareš 2010). In several cases, extreme-right vigilante activities aimed against the Roma or other minorities prompted the targeted groups to organize their own vigilante selfdefence against racial attacks. Such attempts were limited to a short period (usually a few days). The same is true of the home guards of the ‘new minorities’ in the East European area, for example Vietnamese anti-skinhead home guards in the Czech Republic in the 1990s (Mareš 2005: 236–37). Despite the short period of existence of these minorities’ home guards, street wars between extreme-right and minority paramilitaries are not out of the question in the future in some regions of Eastern Europe.

Conclusion Contemporary paramilitary activities in Eastern Europe are the result of specific historical traditions of the extreme right from the first half of the twentieth century. Ethnic conflicts after the fall of communism led to the rebirth of traditional paramilitarism. Strong militarism was typical of the extreme right, and had deep historical roots. Current extremist right-wing paramilitary units in several countries are used in party propaganda. Parties like Jobbik or the Workers Party use a quasi-archaic model of paramilitarism combined with xenophobic prejudices (mostly against

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Roma and immigrants) and vigilantism to win media attention and build a stable base of supporters. The image of the Eastern European extreme right at the beginning of the twenty-first century is also closely linked to the paramilitary groups.

Note 1

This paper has been written as part of the Research Plan ‘Political Parties and Representation of Interests in Contemporary European Democracies’ (code MSM0021622407).

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–––– 2008. Nové vývojové trendy v pravicovém extremismu ve střední Evropě: Bratislava: Friedrich Ebert Stiftung Bratislava, available at: http://www.fes.sk/fi les/Mareš-Senec08-FESfi nal. doc (accessed 23 May 2008). —— 2010. ‘Gewalt und Ideologie. Rechtsextremismus in Tschechien’ [Violence and Ideology. Right-Wing Extremism in Czechlands], Osteuropa, 60(10): 33–50. McGregor, A. 2006. ‘Radical Ukrainian Nationalism and the War in Chechnya’, Chechnya Weekly, 7(13), available at: http://www.jamestown.org/chechnya_weekly/ article.php?articleid=2372436 (accessed 9 March 2008). Mesopotamskij, L. 2003. Kak pojechat v Irak na dzichad? Available at: http://nbp-info.com/ new/photo/irak/djihad.html (accessed 9 March 2008). Mičković, R. and Višnjić, A. 1992. Komandant Srpske garde Giška. Belgrade: Književna zajednica Herceg Novi. Pasák, T. 1999. Český fašismus 1922–1945 a kolaborace 1939–1945. Prague: Práh. Peace Institute and Trplan, T. 2005. ‘Slovenia’, in C. Mudde (ed.), Racist Extremism in Central and Eastern Europe. London: Routledge, pp. 243–66. Smolík, J. 2011. ‘Národní garda. Krátký příběh’, Rexter 8(1): 16–35, available at: http://www. rexter.cz/wp-content/uploads/rexter-2.pdf (accessed 18 August 2011). Stojarová,V. 2007. Současné bezpečnostní hrozby západního Balkánu. Brno: CDK. Thomas, N. and Mikulan, K. 2006. The Yugoslav Wars, 2 vols, vol. 1. Leeds: Osprey. Valeckij, O. 2006. Volki belye. Serbskij dnevnik russkogo dobrovolca 1993–1999. Moscow: Grifon. Waldauf , J. 2007. Sokol – malé dějiny velké myšlenky. Luhačovice: Ateliér IM.

11 EXTREME-RIGHT PARTIES IN ROMANIA AFTER 1990 Incumbency, organization and success Gabriela Borz

Introduction The evolution of the extreme right in post-communist Romania bears some resemblance to its Western counterpart in terms of success after 2000, but also some differences concerning its appearance, discourse and explanations for its popularity. While the success of the extreme right in Western Europe is attributed to the protest vote, due to a reshaping of the party competition space after post-industrialism and the growth of the welfare state (Kitschelt 1995; Veugelers and Magnan 2005), to psychological factors like alienation from politics (Ignazi 1996), or to structural conditions like the high costs of modernization and the lack of rewards for unskilled workers (Betz 1994), in Eastern Europe, the counterparts of modernization losers (Minkenberg 2000) could be called the losers of the transition, and ethnic problems and nationalism are identified as the driving forces for high electoral results for the extreme right (Mudde 2005). The Romanian context after 1990 offered an interesting evolution of the two extreme-right parties: Partidul România Mare (PRM, Greater Romania Party) and Partidul Unităţii Naţionale Române (PUNR, Romanian National Unity Party). While their message and the type of followers almost coincided, one extreme-right party proved to be more successful than the other in terms of persistence and electoral fortunes, even though the one that failed was part of the governing coalition. The two parties operated in the same institutional environment and used to compete for the same kind of voters. In this case, one may ask what other variables, besides the structural, economic or institutional ones, matter for the success of an extreme-right party and what makes one extreme-right party more successful than another? There are a few cases across Europe where extreme-right parties have entered government, like the List Pim Fortuyn (LPF) in 2002 in the Netherlands, the

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Freedom Party (FPŐ) in 2001 in Austria, and the PUNR in 1994 in Romania. The coalition governments did not last long and the aftermath for the extreme-right parties was an electoral collapse or party splits, as exemplified in the Romanian, Austrian and Dutch cases.This questions the suitability for government of extremeright parties, and suggests that electoral collapse after the incumbency period is a typical consequence. Scholars of Political Parties stipulate that incumbency is expected to have a beneficial effect, contributing to party stabilization (Harmel and Svåsand 1993; Mackie and Rose 1988), provided that participation in government does not occur too early in the phases of party development. While not specifying extreme-right parties, van Biezen (2003) argues that, in new democracies with weak party loyalties, entering the government in early phases may have a destabilizing effect for parties.Therefore building organizational mechanisms which help maintain party unity appears necessary for these parties, especially if they become incumbent or have government aspirations. The literature lacks a theoretical account of the extreme right in government and its consequences, and moreover, what constitutes an ‘early’ phase of party development may differ from case to case, thus making it very hard to establish a clear cut-off point for every phase. Given the gap in the literature on Political Parties on the success of the extreme right in Eastern Europe, and its participation in government, the aim of this chapter is to explore the link between party success, incumbency and party organization for the extreme right, looking at the evolution of the two extreme-right parties in Romania after 1990. Following Mudde (2000) and Meijerink et al. (1998: 165), I consider as belonging to the category of extreme right those parties whose ideology exhibits at least one feature from each of the following dimensions: ‘in-group– out-group’ (nationalism, ethnocentrism, racism, xenophobia) and ‘hierarchical’ dimension (authoritarianism, anti-democracy). This chapter provides first a short theoretical framework under which the analysis operates, justifies the classification as extreme-right parties, then compares the evolution of the two cases, in terms of party organization and incumbency (for PUNR). The first goal is to identify what the organizational mechanisms are that helped the two extreme-right parties to succeed or fail. The second goal is to see if the incumbency period has had a negative effect on the extreme-right party, contributing to its failure. The main argument is that a strong charismatic leader combined with strong centralization of decision-making and dominance/overlap of the party executive over the party in public office contribute to party success for the Romanian extreme right, while a soft charismatic leader, weak party centralization and a separation between the party executive and the party in public office combined with incumbency lead to disaster.

The link between party success, incumbency and party organization for extreme-right parties This section briefly discusses and links the literature on party success, incumbency and party organization in relation to extreme-right parties. The concepts of party

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failure and party success can be regarded as ambiguous, and different meanings can be attributed to both. One understanding of party failure can be that its organization has ceased to exist (Mackie and Rose 1988: 533), therefore ‘failure to survive as measured by organisational death’ (Harmel 2003: 9). In contrast to this, party success can be perceived as organizational persistence and continuity in competing in national elections and sending representatives to parliament, as a minimal criterion. For extreme-right parties, which are usually marginalized and have to fight against a ‘cordon sanitaire’ (Van der Brug and van Spanje 2004), getting into the government coalition can also be regarded as a ‘victory’ if this was the party’s goal. But as the Eastern European experience shows, some extreme-right parties may enter the government at a stage when they are not prepared and this accomplishment may not always turn out to be successful for the party in the long run. Apart from incumbency, the parties may choose the strategy of deliberately staying in opposition or only supporting the government party in the legislature. In time, these strategies may prove to be electorally more attractive than the alternative of incumbency (Rose and Mackie 1983). Therefore, for the purpose of this chapter, success and failure are defined using two criteria: sequential electoral performance, which allows the party to gain seats in parliament, and party organizational persistence. In this analysis I consider a party as incumbent when it is a part of the government, and as a consequence is expected to influence public policy. Most of the party elite are therefore incorporated in the state structures. The literature on Political Parties states that participation in government is supposed to have a positive effect on a party’s career. Whether associated with party development or party institutionalization, most of the time incumbency is regarded as a beneficial factor in these processes (Randall and Svåsand 2002) as parties attain more routine in terms of procedures, distribution of power and resources (Harmel 2003: 14). Mackie and Rose (1988: 555) also find that parties which are often in government are less likely to fail. At the same time, ‘parties in government do not maintain sufficient agreement on the rewards of office to remain completely intact’ and as their results show, out of 195 parties from nineteen Western European nations, 55 per cent maintained their organization intact, and only 23 per cent disappeared. What needs to be mentioned is that the research was conducted only for Western Europe, with relatively stable parties which have already participated in at least three elections. For that reason, this chapter seeks to check if indeed incumbency has a positive or negative effect on one of the Romanian extremeright parties. Moving on to the organization of the new extreme-right populist parties, the common stipulated characteristics are charismatic leadership, and a small and selective centralized organizational pattern (Kitschelt 1995; Taggart 1995). Other party scholars (Betz 1998; Panebianco 1988; Pedahzur and Brichta 2002) also state that, in order to be successful, an extreme-right party needs a strong charismatic leader, a leader capable of setting the direction that the party will follow, a leader that can

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control the party and its members. While charisma can benefit parties right across the political spectrum, extreme-right parties ‘need’ it more because the xenophobic and nationalistic message of the party requires a leader of this type, who can appeal more to people’s emotions rather than trying to attract their support for the party’s economic and social ‘policies’. Because of the absence of clear policy proposals, charismatic leaders capture the consent of party members and the masses merely on the basis of their unique personal qualities. At the same time, if charisma were to characterize the leaders of all parties, this would reduce the explanatory power of charismatic leaders for the success of the extreme right. While there is agreement among scholars on the importance of charisma, there is also agreement on the difficulty of defining and measuring it. Eatwell (2006: 271) uses a discourse-based approach and sees a charismatic personality in terms of three traits: missionaries with a vision, working in symbiotic hierarchy (above and of the people) and demonizing their enemies. Similarly, based on the leaders’ characteristics, Pedahzur and Brichta (2002: 40) differentiate between soft and hard charismatic parties, emphasizing that the hard charismatic parties have a preacher and a rigid organizer with charismatic authority who can eliminate tendencies to factionalism, which implies that in contrast soft charismatic parties are more prone to splits. This chapter investigates the degree of charisma exercised by the two extreme-right party leaders by gathering evidence from their party leadership styles and from their comparative popularity as party leaders. Concerning the bureaucratic chain within the party organization, the literature points in different directions. Kitschelt (1995: 32) argues that, because of the lack of a clear bureaucratic chain inside the party, the danger of factional battles will be inevitable. The other argument, posed by Betz (1998: 9) is that, precisely because of the lack of bureaucratic structure and the presence of a strong discipline within the party, factions will be avoided and the party can easily change its issue position if this is perceived to benefit the number of votes received or chances of office. On a similar line to Kitschelt, Eatwell (2006: 267) highlights the importance of considering leadership in relation to the organization, as the key activists in the country can serve to limit party splits. Carter’s findings for Western Europe (2005: 99) were that ‘well-organized and well-led right-wing extremist parties have tended to record electoral scores that are significantly higher than those of their badly organized and badly led counterparts’. It is still a question of if and how the factions will be avoided, and one solution could be a balance of power tilted more towards the extra-parliamentary executive, precisely because parties in Eastern Europe want to increase cohesion and eliminate possible internal conflicts (van Biezen 2003: 218–19; 2005). While the previous literature has neglected the organization of extreme-right parties in Eastern Europe, in this chapter I address the issue of organization for the two cases in terms of degree of organization (structural articulation, intensiveness and extensiveness) membership size (pervasiveness of organization), leadership skills and balance of power (centralization). In a similar vein to Janda (1980: 98), I use structural articulation in the sense of a well-defined set of party organs with definite

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terms of operation and selection procedures, while intensiveness and extensiveness of organization refer to the importance and size of the basic local unit and its spread throughout the country.

The extreme right in Romania Scholarly works on the Romanian extreme right (Gallagher 2005; Mungiu-Pippidi 2001; Voicu 2000) have so far offered descriptive accounts of its evolution on the Romanian political landscape with emphasis on the communist heritage and its peculiarities. While the institutional setting is kept constant by this analysis (communist past, institutional context, party voters, party ideology), one can ask why one extreme-right party was more successful than the other by looking at the evolution of party organization, at the party leadership, at the incumbency period and trying to find the factor or combination of factors responsible for the different outcomes. The comparison of the two parties is a good strategy since they differ on the dependent variable (success) while they are similar on most potential independent variables, and consequently it is easier to identify the actual reasons for their different outcomes. As Mudde (2000) and Meijerink et al. (1998) state, the condition for classifying parties as extreme right is that the party ideology must exhibit at least one feature from each of the following dimensions: ‘in-group–out-group’ (nationalism, ethnocentrism, racism, xenophobia) and ‘hierarchical’ dimension (authoritarianism, antidemocracy). The two Romanian parties employ at least one of these features if one looks at the party manifestos from 1997 and 2001, and at the party discourse (Greater Romania Party 1997, 2001; Romanian National Unity Party 1997). Both parties manifest high levels of nationalism, if nationalism is understood as the political doctrine asserting the congruence of the state and the nation, and also nationalism in the sense of a major loyalty of the individual to the state. The PRM’s statute from 2001 stresses the importance of ‘the achievement of national interests … completion of national unity, territorial integrity, sovereignty and independence ideals’, while nation and country are very important words, written with capital letters in both the party statute and party programme. The Romanian nation is the surrounding space for individuals’ everyday life. PUNR’s programme expresses support for the existence of nation-states, especially the Romanian one, the nationstate being the proper environment for individual development. National unity is the main idea in the party doctrine and the historical unification from 1918 represents the corollary of Romanian statehood. As far as ethnocentrism is concerned, a discrimination against the out-group in favour of the in-group is expressed by both parties, if one looks at the party discourse, which is completely different in this aspect from the parties’ programmes. The number of out-groups is larger for the Greater Romania Party (Roma, Jews, Hungarians, and sometimes Chinese and Arabs), while PUNR had Hungarians as its main target. The in-group is, of course, the Romanian nation and its values, which has always ‘belonged’ to Europe. Xenophobia, manifested as the fear of aliens, was present in both party discourses.

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As mentioned, the targets of the two parties were clearly defined, but the Greater Romania Party has a wider range of unacceptable ‘aliens’. Both party programmes exhibit authoritarian features, like emphasis on discipline and authority, with a particular emphasis on the idea of ‘law and order’. Before the 1996 elections,Vadim Tudor, PRM’s leader, promised two years of authoritarian rule in Romania, if his party won the elections. Moreover, both parties, although not in a pronounced manner, looked at the communist past with admiration, and both party leaders were also partisans of Marshal Antonescu’s rehabilitation and the erection of statues portraying him. Considering the above-mentioned criteria, both parties can be considered as extreme right, though the PRM has been more successful than the PUNR, which, although part of the government for a while, has failed to keep its voters and organization. In 1998 the PUNR experienced a split, with party leader Gheorghe Funar and his followers joining PRM and the remaining faction forming a new party (National Alliance), which in 2000 did not manage to enter parliament and ended its activity in 2002.

The evolution of the two parties The puzzle is why PRM gradually became very successful, while PUNR, after two years of incumbency as a coalition partner, experienced a split and disappeared almost completely from the political arena. Its remaining faction formed another party, which after the 2000 elections became insignificant. Is incumbency a deadly experience for an extreme-right party, contributing to its disappearance? Although the two cases studied here cannot offer a final answer to this question, their comparison indicates possible causes for their different outcomes in terms of success, and constitutes a step towards an empirical theory of the incumbency effect on extreme-right parties.

Party organization: origin and development The PUNR began its legal existence in March 1990, in Braşov, one of the Transylvanian cities, and was the political expression of Cultural Union – Vatra Românească (Stoica 2000: 76). The union, formed at the beginning of 1990, was a reaction to the appearance of the Democratic Alliance of Hungarians from Romania (UDMR). The party’s initial name had the location specified ‘from Transylvania’ but after two months this was dropped in favour of just PUNR – the Romanian National Unity Party – in order to avoid giving the party a regional character. The party did not have a charismatic leader at the beginning of its activity in 1990, but its message was quite clear and succeeded in attracting attention. Gheorghe Funar rapidly became an important party figure and already by 1992, without holding the party chair, was a candidate for presidency in the national elections and finished third with 10.8 per cent of the votes. Gheorghe Funar was the charismatic

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leader that the party needed and at the same time had been the mayor of ClujNapoca, one of the biggest Transylvanian cities, since 1992. The message promoted by the party was clearly nationalistic – the party’s main target was to preserve national integrity, and to add to the present Romanian state the old provinces that are no longer part of it (e.g. Moldova). Gheorghe Funar knew how to attract attention to himself and the party and used the Hungarian population as his main target. Being the mayor of a city with a substantial Hungarian population (20 per cent) and the party leader from 1992, Funar used many strategies to impose the ‘traditional values’ of the Romanian nation. Until 2005, some distinctive features of the city were the benches and rubbish bins painted in the colours of the national flag, or placards in the city centre displaying sections from the Romanian constitution (e.g. ‘the official national language is the Romanian language’), all these targeting the Hungarian minority. The PRM started its activity one year later than PUNR, in 1991, and from the beginning it had a charismatic leader (Corneliu Vadim Tudor), who was able to attract electoral support and promote the party message. The party advocates ultranationalistic principles and anti-Hungarian sentiments as well as combining fascist and communist elements. Its orientation towards (re)unification with Moldova is one of PRM’s main electoral selling points. Like the PUNR, the PRM programme states that the Romanian nation is one of the most ancient civilizations in Europe and that Romanians distinguish themselves by their talents and qualities. The party programme was called ‘National Doctrine as a Synthetic Expression of a Multimillenary Existence of Romanians’. Following the same nationalistic ideas and similarly emphasizing the danger represented by UDMR, but with a much more radical position than PUNR, PRM was created by the editors of Greater Romania Magazine (Stoica 2000: 66). The magazine had a wide coverage and Corneliu Vadim Tudor, the leader, participated in all the populist events in Transylvania.

Party leadership Gheorghe Funar, the PUNR’s charismatic leader, managed to win three consecutive mandates for the city hall in Cluj-Napoca. But since most of his activities were based in Transylvania, the party did not manage to extend its organizational reach throughout the country and one indicator of this is the electoral results in the other regions. In contrast, Corneliu Vadim Tudor, the PRM’s charismatic leader, was able to impose consensus among the members and to contribute to the party’s growth over the years. He proved to be an authoritarian leader and his strategies involved the elimination of party dissent, the promotion of a personality cult like that experienced during the communist period, and a continuous propaganda campaign directed against conventional politicians, ethnic minorities, liberalism and international capitalism, in order to attract alienated voters. Compared to other parties across the Romanian political spectrum, charisma applies more to the leaders of the two extreme-right parties and emerges as an

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explanatory variable for their success/failure given the lack of a clear policy programme offered by the parties and the low political knowledge of the voters in the early 1990s. If we think in terms of ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ charisma applied to leaders, Vadim Tudor is clearly a hard charismatic leader – the creator, preacher and rigid organizer of his party – while Funar is a soft charismatic leader, lacking in strategic or consensus-building skills. He tried to delegate, to coordinate and maintain consensus among the competing views, while Vadim insisted on loyalty to the leader and eliminated any signs of factionalism. Clear evidence of Vadim’s hard charisma are the high level of party centralization in terms of decision-making, allocation of resources and candidate selection, as will be shown in the following section. Also, party defections in the face of clear discipline show that no party member could continue his/her career in the party if s/he did not accept the leadership line. Since 1992, around nine MPs have left the party. In 2001, two MPs from PRM resigned as a result of the party’s move to the extreme right of the political spectrum. They refused to follow the political views imposed by their leader and complained that Vadim made statements without consulting members. The PRM was more the creation of its leader, who knew how to control the party from the outset, while the PUNR was the political expression of a cultural union in Transylvania, and had from the beginning an organizational structure that could not easily be disciplined. Gheorghe Funar has not excluded any member from the party and indeed does not have the right to do so according to party statutes. Moreover, he could not impose his views and future strategies on the rest of the party members, as clearly demonstrated at the 1997 Party Congress when he was defeated in the race for the party leadership. Table 11.1 records that voter trust (by party) in political leaders is high only in the case of former Romanian president (1996–2000) Emil Constantinescu with his party, and in the case of Vadim with the Greater Romania Party. The personality of the leader impacts the same way as the party itself on the voters. The trust score for PUNR and its leader Funar is not that high and is indeed split between Funar and his eventual successor as party leader,Valeriu Tabără. Furthermore, PUNR sympathizers show a relatively similar degree of trust in Vadim, unexpected for the leader of a rival party around 1995. Though charisma is very difficult to measure and quantify, the figures in Table 11.1 can still give an approximation of the leaders’ popularity vis-à-vis their party and vis-à-vis their electoral success, indicators at which Vadim scores higher than Funar. Both politicians show charisma by their oratorial qualities, but then charisma gets differentiated into hard and soft by their different abilities as party leaders. While PRM is a case of a strongly led and well-organized extreme-right party, PUNR falls into the opposite category of a poorly led and weakly organized party.

Degree of organization and centralization of power The PUNR organization, as stated in the 1990 party statute, article 24, had branches at county level and in the capital city, as well as sub-units in each town and

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TABLE 11.1 Voters’ trust in parties and party leaders in Romania

Mean trust∗ Party and party leaders 1995–97

Ion Iliescu

Gheorghe Funar

Vadim Tudor

Marko Bella

Valeriu Tabara

Emil Constantinescu

Petre Roman

PDRS

2.92 1.04 1.64 0.97 1.95 0.98 2.20 1.07 2.13 0.93 1.30 1.04

1.74 1.22 1.52 1.09 1.80 1.07 2.06 1.16 2.61 1.12 1.18 1.12

1.96 1.36 1.57 1.17 1.83 1.13 3.13 1.13 2.28 1.16 0.96 1.07

0.84 1.10 1.08 1.16 1.50 1.30 1.05 1.10 1.29 1.21 2.45 1.29

1.26 1.32 1.16 1.16 1.46 1.16 1.51 1.23 1.86 1.42 0.45 0.73

1.97 1.02 3.12 0.86 2.52 0.99 2.03 1.00 2.20 1.03 2.57 1.17

2.08 1.03 2.36 1.03 2.49 1.10 2.02 1.04 2.21 1.02 1.79 1.15

SD CDR SD PD SD PRM SD PUNR SD UDMR SD

∗ Mean trust values range from 1 – very low to 4 – very high. Source: 1995–97 Open Society Romanian opinion barometers, N = 1,495.

rural area. The internal organs responsible for the party organization at the central level were the National Convention, National Council, Permanent Bureau and the National Commission of Censors. The most powerful body was the National Convention, composed of local delegates, senators and deputies, which used to hold sessions every two years. As compared with the PRM, PUNR’s organization was looser in terms of structural articulation since the lines of authority among organs were blurred or contradictory. Even if in the party statutes or the initial website, party extensiveness was emphasized, the party did not manage to have local units throughout the country. The centralization of power was quite low; not even the party statutes put much emphasis on the party leader and his attributes. In contrast, the PRM started from the beginning with a centralized organization as evidenced by the 1997 and 2001 party statutes. The party structure was complex (at least on paper) from the start, with the party Congress as the major party structure, which ran sessions every four years. The Congress still adopts the party statutes, party programme and party strategy, and elects the party leader and other party organs (National Council, Central Commission for Coordination and Central Commission for financial control). Between Congresses, the party activity is controlled by the National Council, which elects the Executive Committee. It is the National Council that establishes the party strategy and approves the annual budget. The Executive Committee is the executive organ of the National Council, which coordinates the activity of the local units, elaborates norms and instructions, negotiates political alliances and mergers with other parties and validates the lists of party candidates for the parliament. In addition to these structures, there is also a Permanent Bureau, which holds weekly sessions.

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Distinct features of the PRM’s party statute are the strong leader attributes. Considering the decision-making system, experts classified the PRM as the most centralized party on the Romanian political landscape (Grecu et al. 2003). Having a complex and well-specified structure from the beginning and keeping all the decisions centralized, Vadim Tudor was able to keep the party united. As an MP since 1992, Vadim was involved with the party in public office as well as being the party executive. The PRM had the organizational pattern whereby the party executive dominates the party in public office and this organizational aspect can be regarded as a disciplinary measure employed by the party. It allowed the party’s central leadership to control the party’s MPs and to keep the party united. The case was not the same for the PUNR’s organization. The party chair was in Transylvania most of the time running the city hall in Cluj-Napoca and this weakened his control over the ministers and the party’s MPs, since from the beginning the party statute did not have strong powers attributed to the party leader. In addition to this, the party executive was not completely involved with the party in public office and it could not act as a disciplinary force inside the party. The situation was the reverse for the PRM, whose leader was an MP throughout and was thus able to control the party’s MPs. Another aspect of major importance for the success of extreme-right parties in government, besides the partial overlap or dominance of the party executive over the party in public office, is the actual involvement of the party leader in the everyday political game, since the regional location or change of leader can only work to their detriment, as other examples show.The situation of PUNR was similar to that of FPŐ in Austria after Jőrg Heider retained only the governorship of Carinthia and controlled the party from behind the scenes (Kitschelt 2005; Luther 2003). The incumbency generated factionalism, and the party lost popularity in regional elections except Carinthia and suffered a split in 2005. Similarly, two years after being in government and following the death of its leader, the LPF in the Netherlands also experienced a split when most of its MPs left and formed their own group. As Table 11.2 illustrates, the evolution of party membership shows no major differences between the parties until 1996. PUNR started with more members in the early 1990s, but PRM grew much more after 1998. After Funar’s PUNR faction merged with PRM in 1998, Funar became the General Secretary of PRM. The merger is a sign that Corneliu Vadim Tudor knew how to strengthen the position of his party and his organizational and strategic skills were used to good advantage.

TABLE 11.2 Evolution of party membership in Romania

PUNR PRM

1990

1992

1996

2000

2004

2007

21,176 –

49,000 25,000

40,000 32,000

55,000–100,000

150,000

103,000

Sources: Party declarations; Lewis (2000: 102–3); Ivanici (1993: 118); Pepine (1994: 5–6).

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If previously they had been rivals competing for the same voters, in 1998 Funar became Vadim’s ‘right hand’.

The incumbency period During the incumbency period (1994–96), PUNR had four ministerial positions in the cabinet in areas where reforms were required. Considering the party size in parliament (44 MPs), the two-year incumbency period, and the number of leaders, one would have expected PUNR to stabilize as a party and to increase its electoral success. The problem, however, was not only the weak organization of the party across the regions but also the emergence of factionalism. Funar was not able to keep the party ministers disciplined and he was not strong enough to impose his point of view within the party any more. The regional location of the party leader worked to his detriment because the party ministers were in Bucharest actually taking part in the governing process. In July 1996 during the National Council meetings, Funar proposed carrying on the alliance with the Social Democracy Party (PDSR), while the party’s minister,Valeriu Tabără, favoured a strategic alliance with the Romanian Social Democratic Party (PSRD) and the Romanian Ecologist Movement, both in opposition at the time. Funar’s proposal was rejected, and in September 1996, two months before the legislative elections, the party withdrew from the government protesting against the Romanian–Hungarian treaty signed during that period. What happened after that was a sharp electoral decline in the national elections of November 1996, when the percentage of votes fell to 4.33 per cent for the Chamber of Deputies and the number of the party’s MPs was reduced from 44 to 25. Dissent inside the party materialized with the election of Valeriu Tabără as the new party leader in March 1997 but he was not a charismatic leader comparable to Funar. What followed was factional infighting over leadership and strategy, resulting in a split one year after the incumbency period. Gheorghe Funar left the party in November 1997 and his faction joined the PRM one year after the split. If the incumbency period occurs at an early stage of party organization, and if factionalism is not controlled by strong party discipline, the result can be disastrous for the party, and PUNR is a good example. When a party enters government, the relationship between the party’s different ‘faces’ becomes more complex, because the ‘party in public office’ is now divided between the ‘party in government’ and ‘the party in parliament’. Incumbency at an early stage of party development proved to be destabilizing for PUNR.The party was not prepared and had not built mechanisms that could maintain party unity. ‘The party in government’ became influential and started to challenge the extra-parliamentary party. The PUNR is an example that runs counter to what van Biezen (2003) illustrated as being a possible pattern of party organization in Eastern Europe, with the domination of extraparliamentary executive over the parliamentary party and a partial overlap among the two. For PUNR the party executive was not part of the parliamentary party

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(as in the case of PRM) and, as the events show, it is not the extra-parliamentary party that was more powerful, but the party in government.

Party success and party failure The merger between PRM and the Funar faction of PUNR seemed to have had electoral benefits, because at the 2000 elections the PRM became the second largest party in parliament after the Social Democrat Party. Besides vote pooling, the merger facilitated resource mobilization and, moreover, it pooled legislative votes, improving PRM’s access to committee positions and staffing resources. The Greater Romania Party became more stable after the 1996 elections and its leader publicly declared that the party was ready to be part of the government, but none of the mainstream parties were disposed to enter into a coalition with an extremeright party. Given the international political pressure, the option of an extremist party in the Romanian government was excluded if Romania wanted to join the Euro-Atlantic structures. In contrast to the PRM’s development, the PUNR was rather less successful (Figures 11.1 and 11.2). The party entered the coalition government in 1994 at a stage when more organization was required given the increased parliamentary size of the party by 1992. Its electoral fortunes dropped in 1996 and internal dissent started to intensify.The disruption was manifested by the party split in 1998 and the poor electoral results in 2000 of the newly formed National Alliance (a merger of the remaining PUNR with the National Romanian Party). The regional distribution of electoral success and consequently of electoral mandates between the two parties differs considerably, as shown by Figures 11.1 and 11.2.

Number of mandates

35 30 25 20 15 10 5 0 1990

1992

1996

2000

2004

Election year

FIGURE 11.1

Transylvania

Muntenia and Oltenia

Banat

Moldova

Dobrogea

Bucharest

PRM electoral mandates by region, 1990–2004

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40

Number of mandates

35 30 25 20 15 10 5 0 1990

1992

1996

2000

2004

Election year

FIGURE 11.2

Transylvania

Muntenia and Oltenia

Banat

Moldova

Dobrogea

Bucharest

PUNR electoral mandates by region, 1990–2004

The PRM had a homogeneous distribution of mandates throughout the regions while the PUNR had most of its MPs from Transylvania. Even if local branches were established in every region, the leader’s activity was mainly in Transylvania as a city mayor and he was the charismatic figure who attracted most of the votes.The difference between the two parties in constructing local organizations and attracting votes is quite obvious. Even with a lower number of MPs, by 1996 the PRM succeeded in having a relatively uniform distribution of mandates all over the country. The PUNR, however, had its main supporters in Transylvania during all three elections in 1990, 1992 and 1996. Gheorghe Funar, the party leader until 1997, conducted his activity most of the time in Cluj-Napoca, even though the headquarters of the party were moved to Bucharest in 1992. PUNR restarted its activity in 2002 under a slightly changed name, performed badly in the 2004 elections and merged into the Conservative Party at the beginning of 2006. Despite its highest electoral scores in 2000, after the 2008 elections the PRM gained only 3.2 per cent of the votes and failed to enter parliament again.

Conclusion This analysis shows that for an extreme-right party to succeed in a newly established democracy, a strong charismatic leader is needed, in addition to strong party discipline and party centralization, especially if the party is to enter government. With a strong leader, an extreme-right party can postpone its entry into government until the party is sufficiently developed and the rewards of the incumbency can be greater. A strong charismatic leader can decide about the organization of the party, increase centralization and change strategy without too much internal debate.

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There were differences between the two party leaders in their ability to see, predict, understand and act in accordance with the demands and opportunities posed to the parties by their environment. This proves that the success of the extreme right depends not on the existence of charisma per se, but also on its extent and the way it is deployed. Strong authoritarian attitudes inside the party and a strong authoritarian leader seem to be a combination that leads to success. But the combination of strong authoritarian attitudes inside the party, a soft charismatic leader and incumbency seems to generate failure if the party is not able to change and adapt in time. As illustrated, combined with the lack of a strong leader and strong disciplinary rules, the incumbency period led to factionalism over leadership and strategy, factors that contributed to the party’s collapse. The PRM case verifies Kitschelt’s predictions about a successful extremeright party with a strong leader and a centralized organization, and also Carter’s hypothesis about a well-organized and well-led extreme-right party. As Kitschelt stipulated, the lack of a clear bureaucratic chain inside the party will make the danger of factional battles inevitable and the PUNR clearly shows this. The Romanian cases point to the fact that if the extreme-right party is to enter government, the need for structural articulation comes first. What can be added to Kitschelt’s model is the requirement for charismatic leadership participation in public office at the national and not at the regional level, which can facilitate an overlap between the party executive and the party in government and prevent faction formation and party splits. Therefore this chapter sets a question mark for the ability of an extreme-right party to participate in government without undergoing major organizational changes.

Bibliography Betz, H.-G. 1994. Radical Right Wing Populism in Western Europe. London: Macmillan. –––– 1998. ‘Introduction’, In H.G. Betz and S. Immerfall (eds), The New Politics of the Right. Basingstoke: Macmillan, pp. 1–10. Carter, E. 2005. The Extreme Right in Western Europe. Success or Failure? Manchester: Manchester University Press. Eatwell, R. 2006. ‘Explaining Fascism and Ethnic Cleansing: The Three Dimensions of Charisma and the Four Dark Sides of Nationalism’, Political Studies Review, 4(3): 263–78. Gallagher, T. 2005. Theft of a Nation. Romania since Communism. London: Hurst & Co. Greater Romania Party Statute and Party Programme. 1997 and 2001. Service public fédéral de l’intérieur. Grecu, R., Răduca, A., Năstase, R. and Todor, A. 2003. ‘Mapping Policy Preferences of Romanian Political Parties’. Paper presented at the 4th Annual Conference of Romanian Society of Political Science, 25–28 September. Harmel, R. 2003. ‘Party Change: So What? Toward a Research Agenda on Consequences of Party Change’. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, 27–31 August, Washington, D.C. Harmel, R. and Svåsand, L. 1993. ‘Institutionalization:Three Phases of Development’, Western European Politics, 16(1): 67–88.

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Ignazi, P. 1996. ‘The Crisis of Parties and the Rise of New Political Parties’, Party Politics, 2(4): 549–66. Ivanici, I. (ed.) 1993. Partide Politice [Political Parties]. Bucharest: Agenţia Natională de Presă Rompress. Janda, K. 1980. Political Parties: A Cross-National Survey. New York: Free Press. Kitschelt, H. 1995. ‘The Contemporary Radical Right: An Interpretative and Explanatory Framework’, in H. Kitschelt (ed.), The Radical Right in Western Europe: A Comparative Analysis. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, pp. 1–47. –––– 2005. ‘The Radical Right in the Alps. Evolution of Support for the Swiss SVP and Austrian FPŐ’, Party Politics, 11(2): 147–71. Lewis, G.P. 2000. Political Parties in Post-Communist Eastern Europe. London: Routledge. Luther, K.R. 2003. ‘From Populism Protest to Incumbency: The Strategic Challenges facing Jőrg Haider’s Freedom Party of Austria’.Working paper, Keele European Parties Research Unit. Mackie, T. and Rose, R. 1988. ‘Do Parties Persist or Fail? The Big Trade-Off Facing Organizations’, in K. Lawson and P. Merkl (eds), When Parties Fail. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, pp. 533–58. Meijerink, F., Mudde, C. and van Holsteyn, J. 1998. ‘Right-Wing Extremism’, Acta Politica, 22(2): 165–78. Minkenberg, M. 2000. ‘The Renewal of the Radical Right: Between Modernity and Anti-modernity’, Government and Opposition, 35(2): 170–88. Mudde, C. 2000. The Ideology of the Extreme Right. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Mudde, C. (ed.) 2005. Racist Extremism in Central and Eastern Europe. New York: Routledge. Mungiu-Pippidi, A. 2001. ‘The Return of Populism – the 2000 Romanian Elections’, Government and Opposition, 36(2): 230–52. Panebianco, A. 1988. Political Parties: Organisation and Power. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Pedahzur, A. and Brichta, A. 2002. ‘The Institutionalization of Extreme Right Wing Parties: a Paradox?’, Party Politics, 8: 31–49. Pepine, H. 1994. ‘PUNR’, Sfera Politicii [Political Sphere], 6: 5–6. Randall, V. and Svåsand, L. 2002. ‘Party Institutionalization in New Democracies’, Party Politics, 8(1): 5–29. Romanian National Unity Party Statute and Party Programme 1997. Rose, R. and Mackie, T. 1983. ‘Incumbency in Government: Asset or Liability?’, in H. Daalder and P. Mair (eds), Western European Party Systems: Continuity and Change. London: Sage, pp. 115–37. Stoica, S. 2000. Mic Dicţionar al partidelor politice din România (1989–2000). [Brief Dictionary of Romanian Political Parties: 1989–2000]. Bucharest: Editura Meronia. –––– 2001. Dicţionar al partidelor politice din România (1989–2001). [Brief Dictionary of Romanian Political Parties: 1989–2001]. Bucharest: Editura Meronia. Taggart, P. 1995. ‘New Populist Parties in Western Europe’, Western European Politics, 16(1): 41–55. van Biezen, I. 2003. Political Parties in New Democracies. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. –––– 2005. ‘On the Theory and Practice of Party Formation and Adaptation in New Democracies’, European Journal of Political Research, 44(1): 147–74. Van der Brug, W. and van Spanje, J. 2004. ‘Consequences of the Strategy of a “Cordon Sanitaire” against Immigrant Parties’. Paper presented at the ECPR Joint Sessions, Uppsala, Sweden.

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Veugelers, J. and Magnan, A. 2005. ‘Conditions of Far-Right Strength in Contemporary Western Europe: An Application of Kitschelt’s Theory’, European Journal of Political Research, 44(6): 837–60. Voicu, G. 2000. Zeii cei Răi: Cultura conspiraţiei în România postcomunistă. [The Bad Gods: The Culture of Conspiracy in Post-Communist Romania]. Bucharest: Polirom.

12 ANTI-SEMITISM AND THE EXTREME RIGHT IN CONTEMPORARY UKRAINE Per Anders Rudling

Introduction A young state, Ukraine became independent when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. As the old order crumbled, new national heroes replaced the old, after a difficult process of soul-searching. A country divided by culture, language and religion now faced the difficult task of consolidating the republic as a nation-state. Establishing a common pantheon of national heroes for this divided country has proven difficult. While nationalism is strong in the western part of the country, Soviet historiography still lingers in the heavily Russified east and south. In Western Ukraine, this process of revising Ukrainian history has often involved turning the villains of Soviet historiography into the heroes of today. This trend is particularly strong in Galicia, which had not been under Moscow’s control before 1939, and has a separate political history and traditions, its own pantheon of heroes. Unlike the Ukrainians in the Russian empire, who had a certain openness to the Russian language and culture, the Galicians developed an exclusivist either/or identity, clearly delineated from Polish and Russian identities (Himka 2006: 18). The historical experiences of Western Ukraine between 1920 and 1939 were very different from those of Soviet Ukraine, which was deeply transformed by Stalin’s terror in the 1930s. A considerable portion of its intellectual, political and cultural leaders were murdered. The brave wartime attempts of Ukrainian nationalists to spread their nationalist ideology into Soviet Ukraine had limited success (Matla 1952: 17; Weiner 2001: 250). Facing increasingly harsh national oppression from the Polish authorities in the 1920s and 1930s, and inspired by the rise of fascism, Ukrainian nationalism was radicalized. Western Ukraine generally regarded the arrival of the Soviets in 1939 as an occupation, Eastern and Central Ukraine often identified with the Soviet or larger Eastern Slavic community. The heterogeneous political and cultural landscape in Ukraine has produced a complex

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situation for the extreme right.This chapter aims to introduce the intellectual background and the history of the Ukrainian extreme right, focusing, in particular, on the role of anti-Semitism as a link to extremists in Russia, the Middle East and the Western world.

Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN), fascism and anti-Semitism Ukrainian nationalism in Galicia had already developed a highly racialized narrative by the late nineteenth century, complete with an elaborate anti-Jewish discourse (Himka 2005: 16–17). The predominant Ukrainian fascist movement, the Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) was established in 1929. Drawing heavily upon Italian fascism, its main ideologue Dmytro Dontsov, a former Marxist, was inspired by Nietzsche and German National Socialism, combining extreme nationalism with terrorism, corporatism and the Führerprinzip (Armstrong 1968: 402). The Ukrainian nationalist press of the 1930s published anti-Semitic articles on a regular basis (Mytsiuk 1933a, 1933b; Wysocki 2003: 201). Dontsov himself, who has been described as ‘an organic anti-Semite’, translated anti-Semitic articles by Hitler, Goebbels, Rosenberg and Mussolini for the OUN press (Kuzio 1992: 34; Kurylo 2007: 10, 14–20). Volodymyr Martynets’, the editor of the OUN’s most important ideological journal, Rozbudova Natsiї, described the Jews as a ‘parasitical’, ‘morally damaging’, ‘corrupting’ and ‘hostile element’, ‘racially unsuited for miscegenation and assimilation’. Rather than violent pogroms and mass murder, Martynets’ argued that ‘a total and absolute isolation of the Jews from the Ukrainian people’ would be a more effective solution to the ‘Jewish problem’. It is easier to liquidate 44,000 Jews using these methods, than to liquidate 3¼ million with more radical methods … All of the possibilities, especially if combined, will decrease the current strength of Jewry and will not only bring an end to their expansion in our country, but assure a continuous decline in the number of Jews, not only through emigration, but also through the decline of their natural growth rate. As the Jews will not be able to make a living, the Jews will take care of this themselves. (Martynets’ 1938: 10, 14–15, 22) In 1940, the OUN split into two factions. The anti-Semitism of the Bandera wing of the OUN – the OUN(b) – was programmatic and pogrommatic (Carynnyk 2005: 14–17). Referring to itself as a ‘natural ally’ of Nazi Germany, the OUN(b) declared its readiness to go to war against the USSR (Kul’chyts’kyi et al. 2006: 12, 61). In April 1941 it declared that it ‘combat[s] Jews as supporters of the Muscovite-Bolshevik regime’ (Kul’chyts’kyi et al. 2006: 43). Its propaganda directives of May 1941 demanded the destruction of the Jews: ‘Ukraine for the Ukrainians! … Death to the Moscovite-Jewish commune! Beat the commune,

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save Ukraine!’ (Kul’chyts’kyi et al. 2006: 159, 165). The goal of both wings of the movement was the establishment of a Ukrainian state. In April 1941, Andriy Mel’nyk, the leader of the OUN(m), a more conservative wing of the movement, proposed to Hitler the creation of a Greater Ukraine, stretching from the Danube to the Caspian Sea (Kul’chyts’kyi et al. 2006: 10). Encouraged by the German support for fascist states in Slovakia and Croatia, on 30 June 1941 the OUN(b) proclaimed a Ukrainian state which would ‘cooperate closely with National Socialist Greater Germany … under the Führer Adolf Hitler’ (Kul’chyts’kyi et al. 2006: 11; Himka 2006: 19; Serhiichuk 1996: 239). The main propagandist of the OUN(b)dominated ‘government’, Stepan Lenkavs’kyi, advocated the physical destruction of Ukrainian Jewry while ‘Prime Minister’ Iaroslav Stets’ko expressed his support for ‘the destruction of the Jews and the expedience of bringing German methods of exterminating Jewry to Ukraine, barring their assimilation and the like’ (Finder and Prusin 2004: 102; Berkhoff and Carynnyk 1999: 171). Whereas individual members of the Nazi leadership, such as Ostminister Alfred Rosenberg and circles within the Abwehr, the military intelligence, were more favourably disposed towards the Ukrainians, Hitler rejected both the nationalists’ declaration of independence and their offer of partnership. From the autumn of 1941, the OUN–Nazi relationship began to deteriorate. While some leading Ukrainian nationalists, such as Iaroslav Stets’ko and Stepan Bandera, were imprisoned by the Germans, others, among them Roman Shukhevych, the head of the OUN(b) between 1943 and 1945 and from 1943 to 1950 the commander of its armed wing, the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (the UPA), served in German uniform until 1943. As the Red Army approached, the UPA began to cooperate with the Germans, as their interests on the ‘Jewish question’ overlapped (Golczewski 2008: 143; Ainsztein 1974: 253–54, 363, 373). After the war, the émigré OUN went through a number of sectarian splits. Bandera and his circle retained their anti-democratic orientation (Rudling 2006a: 174). After 1991, the OUN(b), under the leadership of Iaroslava Stets’ko (1920– 2003), Iaroslav Stets’ko’s widow, was re-established in Ukraine. The Bandera wing of the OUN formed the so-called Congress of Ukrainian Nationalists (KUN), which came to have a considerable influence in Galicia in the early 1990s (Wilson 1997: 79).

The Soviet anti-Zionist tradition While formally banned in the Soviet Union, latent anti-Semitic attitudes were deeply rooted and seldom confronted. In the wake of the Holocaust, there were pogroms in Dnipropetrovs’k in the summer of 1944, and in Kyiv in September 1945, targeting Jewish survivors who returned to their former homes (Weiner 2001: 169; 2003: 192). Some of the post-war show trials in Eastern and Central Europe during the late Stalin era, notably the Slánský trial and the purging of Romanian foreign minister Ana Pauker, had strong anti-Semitic undertones (Wasserstein 1997: 51–57).

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Stalinism, with its concept of socialism in one country, glorification of the army and the ‘patriotic war’ and its ‘anti-Zionist’ rhetoric defies our traditional left–right political scale (Dahl 2006: 212). While the war between Nazi Germany and the USSR and the latter’s subsequent victory over fascism in 1945 has created the popular perception of Stalinism and fascism as political antipodes, on a number of occasions in history these two ‘ends’ of the political spectrum have met (Gross 2006: 224). Commenting on Communist Poland, Michael Steinlauf refers to the phenomenon of combining key concepts of the interwar national democrats, the Endecja, with ‘proletarian rhetoric’ as ‘Endo-Communism’, a ‘peculiar marriage of authoritarian Communism with chauvinist nationalist tendencies’, in which anti-Semitism plays a central role (Steinlauf 1996: 115). Soviet anti-Semitism was occasionally overt. The book Judaism without Embellishments, published by the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences in 1963, linked Israeli ‘racism’ and ‘militarism’ to the Talmud, presenting Jews as Nazi collaborators (Kichko 1963: 160–66). In July 1967, the Soviet authorities launched a propaganda campaign against ‘cosmopolitanism’ and ‘Talmudism’, presenting Zionism as a ‘world threat’ comparable to Nazism (Wasserstein 1997: 211–16; Sachar 2005: 722; Umland 1999). The extreme right in Eastern and Southern Ukraine shows many similarities with its Russian counterpart, its rhetoric saturated with Soviet and Stalinist references. During Gorbachev’s perestroika, Soviet nostalgists, anti-modernists and militarists united in opposition to the political changes they felt threatened the Soviet homeland. Their interpretation of the world varied, but these ‘conservative’ forces found common ground in their opposition to liberalism, the Western world and modernity, often mixed with anti-Semitic components (Andreyeva 1993: 70, 88, 98, 126). While they were not always favourably disposed to Marxism and Communism, they respected Soviet institutions as incarnations of the united and indivisible Russia. The military, the state, the party and the personality of Stalin represented a tradition of Soviet/Russian glory with which these people identified. Labels such as conservatives, fascists or fundamentalists are inadequate to describe this diverse group, which belongs on both extremes of the political spectrum at the same time (Ljunggren 1992: 16).

The national Bolshevik tradition The amalgamation of Stalinist authoritarianism and nationalist extremism has crystallized into an illiberal political movement known as National Bolshevism, or Eurasianism. This movement is indebted to a tradition which includes thinkers such as Alain de Benoist, the Strasser and Jünger brothers, Ernst Niekisch and Moammar al-Gaddafi (Dahl 2001: 142–45; Staud 2006: 83). A diverse movement, National Bolsheviks share the rejection of Western individualism and liberalism, finding inspiration in the collectivist organization of societies east of the Elbe. Ernst Jünger’s embracing of the ‘ideas of 1914’, and his promotion of the therapeutic and cleansing qualities of war are promoted as an alternative to the ‘ideas of 1789’

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(Neaman 1999: 32). Ernst Niekisch (1889–1967), a pioneer of National Bolshevism, rejected National Socialism for its alleged Jewish origins, and found instead inspiration in Russia, identifying the Bolsheviks as the guardians of the Prussian collectivist tradition. In an untranslatable phrase, Niekisch asserted that ‘Russland überfremdete sich preussisch … [w]e have become more French than France itself; Russia has become more Prussian than we ourselves have remained.’ Germany, Niekisch thought, ‘can find the road to Potsdam, back to itself, only through Moscow’ (Heidegren 1997: 55–56). Niekisch’s Manichean Weltanschauung juxtaposes the positive values of Protestantism, Prussia and Bolshevik Russia against the negative values, represented by liberalism, capitalism, Rome and the Western world. In the GDR, Niekisch’s critique of National Socialism was interpreted as anti-fascism, and he landed a professorship in ‘Imperialism Studies’ at the Humboldt University in East Berlin after the war (Staud 2006: 94). A slightly modified version of this dichotomy can be found in the rhetoric from the Russian and Ukrainian ‘New Right’, which articulates an opposition to what it calls ‘American-Jewish globalism (Mondialism)’ and ‘Atlanticism’ and the supposed ‘Semitic-liberal values’ it represents. Two major and rival concepts of nationhood are discernible in the National Bolshevik movement: on the one hand, there are the neo-imperialist Eurasianists, on the other the neo-Slavophiles and isolationists (Dymerskaya-Tsigelman and Finberg 1999: 9–10; Laqueur 1993: 138–42).

UNA-UNSO The UNA-UNSO, the leading Ukrainian extreme right organization, traditionally based in Western Ukraine, has been characterized as an influential fringe movement. While its membership is small, around 8,000, this organization’s spectacular activities are highly visible (McGregor 2006).While some leading members of the UNAUNSO partly acknowledge the National Bolshevik New Right as a source of inspiration, Andrii Shkil, leader of the strong UNA branch in L’viv, has emphasized other sources: Dmytro Dontsov, Arthur de Gobineau and Walter Darré. UNAUNSO is oriented towards Germany and has modelled itself on the German NDP, Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands, emulating its neo-Nazi style street violence against foreigners and its veneration of the Nazi past. Its ideology resembles Le Pen’s Front National, with strong influences from the ideas of the German ‘conservative revolutionaries’ of the Weimar era. Aleksandr Kovalenko, a leading figure in the movement, also recognizes the inspiration from Russian National Bolshevik Aleksandr Dugin. Kovalenko denounces the values of the Kravchuk and Kuchma regimes, which he identifies as ‘Protestantism, political liberalism, and scientific positivism’ – and contrasts them with the ‘Eurasian’ values of UNA-UNSO – ‘Eastern Orthodoxy, Catholicism, and Islam’. Kovalenko interprets these as a counter-force to capitalism, emphasizing that all these traditions ‘consider usury and banking manipulations to be sins’ (Dymerskaya-Tsigelman and Finberg 1999: 13–14). Despite its uneasy relation to Russia, the key thoughts of the Ukrainian extreme right resemble those of Russian Eurasianists. Vladimir Zhirinovskii calls for a

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Russian-led Eurasian empire, stretching ‘from the English Channel to Vladivostok’ and the Indian Ocean; Dugin proposes a Eurasian empire from Vladivostok to Dublin. For their part, Kovalenko and the UNA do not want ‘some provincial, pocket-sized Ukraine, an object of mockery, but a Ukraine for which our ancestors fought, a Ukraine that will rule the world, … [a] Ukrainian superpower with borders from the Adriatic to the Pacific’ (Zhirinovskii 1994: 40, 48, 66; DymerskayaTsigelman and Finberg 1999: 14, 19, 22). The Ukrainian Eurasianists have occasionally been open to the idea of assimilating other Slavs. ‘Ukrainian panSlavism aspires to a confederation that might not only include Slavic states,’ UNA chairman Oleh Vitovich asserted. ‘The only salvation for Ukraine is the establishment of a new super-ethnos … with a continent of its own, a culture of its own. It is even possible that there will be a new civilisation.’ The UNA denies the Russian claims of being descendents of the Aryans, maintaining that Russia should be regarded as Northeast Ukraine. While the UNA has not toned down its anti-Russian rhetoric, leading representatives have often asserted that Ukraine and Russia have common interests (Dymerskaya-Tsigelman and Finberg 1999: 17, 22, 23). From 1991 to 1994 and again from October 2005, UNA has been led by Iurii Shukhevych, who is also the main commander (holovnyi komandyr) of its paramilitary wing, the UNSO (Solchanyk 1999: 290, 293). A former dissident and longtime political prisoner, Iurii Shukhevych is the son of UPA and OUN(b) leader Roman Shukhevych. In the early 1990s, Iurii Shukhevych led the extreme-right Ukrainian Inter-party Assembly (UIA), a movement based upon Dontsov’s philosophy (Wilson 1997: 73). While the UNA-UNSO denies that it is fascist and anti-Semitic, the rhetoric of its leaders contains elements of both (Solchanyk 1999: 293). In the 1990s, its election posters carried the slogan ‘Vote for us and you will never have to vote again.’ In a 2007 interview Shukhevych alleged that ‘the ghetto was invented not by Hitler, but by the Jews themselves’, and repeated the Soviet ‘anti-Zionist’ allegation that Simon Wiesenthal ‘was a Gestapo agent’ (Denysenko 2007). The more committed Eurasianists, led by former UNA-UNSO leader Dmytro Korchyns’kyi and his National Bolshevik organization Bratstvo, find some common ground with the pro-Soviet left. In 2004, they entered an alliance with Natalya Vitrenko’s Progressive Socialist Party of Ukraine, one of the most successful antiWestern and Eurasian groups in Ukraine. In the 2006 election, her party received 2.93 per cent of the votes, just below the 3 per cent needed to enter the Rada. Her strongest support base is in Russophone Southern and Eastern Ukraine (Umland 2006).

Anti-Semitism The Second World War permanently transformed the ethnographic landscape of Ukraine. The Holocaust, Stalinist terror and several waves of ethnic cleansing removed most of its large pre-war Jewish, Polish, German and Tatar populations

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(Snyder 2003: 203–13). Whereas they constituted the majority population in many Western Ukrainian cities prior to the war, few Jews remain today. The Ukrainian census of 2001 listed only 103,000 Jews in Ukraine, or 0.2 per cent of the total population. This exodus has continued – between 14,000 and 21,000 Jews leave Ukraine every year (Rudling 2006b: 83). Jewish émigrés cite a number of reasons, including economic hardship and anti-Semitic violence (Burds 2008: 712–13). The phenomenon of anti-Semitism without Jews is one of the more curious aspects of the Ukrainian extreme right. Anatolii Shcherbatiuk, an editor of Naskorena natsiia, describes Russians and Jews as ‘enemies of Ukraine’ which should be purged. He describes them in biological terms – Russians as parasites and alcoholics, genetically predisposed towards theft, vandalism and aggression, unable to appreciate, let alone create, culture. Jews, on the other hand, are described as cautious and suspicious, taking advantage of the weakness of Ukraine and living off the misfortunes of the ‘host peoples’. Since both thrive and multiply within the weakened Ukrainian national organism, Shcherbatiuk demands their immediate and ruthless destruction, their conversion into ‘biomass’, explicitly calling for the establishment of ‘cleansing units’, modelled on the Einsatzgruppen, to annihilate these peoples in Ukraine and all the territories to which his Ukraine lays claim. The next millennium will be marked by an aggravation of the struggle between two opposing worlds – the Aryan one and the Semitic one, between the forces of Good and those of Evil. Ukraine, headed by UNA-UNSO should be the vanguard of Aryan civilization. That the kikes are the servants of the Devil is obvious from the Bible, the Talmud, the Torah, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and from the whole history of the kike people. Who created the satanic teaching of Communism? Who built the Evil Empire of the USSR? Who were the members of the CheKa? Who destroyed the churches, organized the mass starvation and the destruction of the elite of the Ukraine? (Dymerskaya-Tsigelman and Finberg 1999: 20–21) Shcherbatiuk has worked at the paper Personal Plius, a paper published by the largest anti-Semitic organization in Ukraine, a private educational institution called MAUP, Mizhrehional’na Akademiia Upravlinnia Personalom, or the Inter-Regional Academy of Personnel Management.1 With 65,000 students on seven regional campuses and over 55 affiliates, in 2006, MAUP was the largest private university in Ukraine.Virtually every issue of Personal Plius, to which its students are required to subscribe, contains, crude anti-Semitic propaganda, such as alarming reports of Jewish ritual murders (see, for instance, Personal Plius 2006c, 2006d). The leading publisher of hate literature in Ukraine, MAUP produces up to 85 per cent of all the country’s anti-Semitic material (Rudling 2006b: 81). As an accredited institution whose diplomas are recognized by UNESCO, its links to a political party, let alone a fascist one, are unusual. MAUP is headed by Heorhii Shchokin, a co-founder of the Ukrainian Conservative Party. Shchokin maintains that Osama Bin Laden is

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really a Jew by the name of Benya Landau, and that Bolshevism and capitalism are the tools of a Jewish Zionist world conspiracy, under which the Ukrainians suffered more than other people, particularly under the ‘Zionist’-organized famine of 1932–33 (Rudling 2006b: 88–89). Several leading Ukrainian politicians, not all of them associated with the extreme right, have served on MAUP’s board of directors, possibly attracted by its deep pockets. Among them were two Ukrainian presidents, Leonid Kravchuk and Viktor Yushchenko, Ukrainian foreign minister Boris Tarasiuk and several other top politicians (Varfolomeyev 2008). MAUP’s conferences bring together leading antiSemites, such as the first Ukrainian ambassador to Canada, Levko Luk’’ianenko. An important figure in Yulia Tymoshenko’s bloc, Luk’’ianenko is also the chairman of the Association of Holodomor Researchers in Ukraine (Dietsch 2006: 208–9). Luk’’ianenko holds Jews collectively responsible for Stalin’s terror, and claims that ‘Jewish puppet masters control mass media, using their blood money … to cultivate the animal instincts of our young’ (Luk’’ianenko 2004: 4–5). Luk’’iankenko, a prominent Soviet dissident, has been advocating a second Nuremberg process that would put on trial the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Luk’’ianenko 2000). At an ‘academic’ conference, organized by MAUP in 2002, in the presence of former president Leonid Kravchuk, Ambassador Luk’’ianenko asserted that Jews, among whom he included Lenin and Stalin (whose real names, he asserted, were Blank and David Koba, respectively) along with 83 per cent of the members of the top echelons of the USSR, totally controlled the USSR (Luk’’ianenko 2003: 12–13). Other presenters went even further, citing The Protocols of the Elders of Zion (Khyzhniak 2002: 62). A key figure in Shchokin’s circle is MAUP Professor Vasyl’ Iaremenko. Iaremenko holds ‘Zionists’ responsible not only for the famine, but also the Holocaust. Not only did Zionists finance the Nazis, Iaremenko claims, he also describes the SS as a ‘horde of 400,000 Jewish men’ (Iaremenko 2003: 111). The allegations of Nazi–Zionist collaboration have Soviet and Stalinist roots. Much like in Russia, the political agendas of the Stalinist and the extreme right sometimes coincide. The conspiratorial outlook, the illiberal, anti-Semitic and Eurasian orientation applies to the ‘new’ Eurasian right as well as to Stalinism. While MAUP reveres the UPA and OUN, its leaders often use a political language reminiscent of the Stalinist rhetoric of the Great Patriotic War. Statements from the MAUP/ UCP often end with slogans such as ‘No to Jewish fascism!’, ‘Judeo-Nazism will not succeed!’ and ‘Reject the evil activities of organised Jewry!’ (Senchenko et al. 2006). MAUP has maintained periodical contact with the leader of the OUN(m), Mykola Pavliuk (Panchenko 2006: 6–7). Prior to the 2006 elections to the Rada, an alliance between UCP and the UNA-UNSO, called The National Liberation Bloc of Shukhevych and Shchokin, ‘God and Ukraine Above All!’, was announced (Kipiani 2005; Personal Plius 2005b). However, fears that such a bloc would be declared unconstitutional and banned from participation in the elections averted the formation of a formal bloc only two days prior to its founding congress (ZIK 2005). The UCP and the UNA-UNSO both performed dismally in the polls.2

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International contacts An effective anti-Semitic propaganda centre, MAUP became a meeting ground for right-wing extremists and anti-Semites across Europe, the Middle East and North America. The Islamic world exercises considerable attraction on the Ukrainian extreme right. Shcherbatiuk believes the remedy to the degeneration of the world, corrupted by Jewish influences, can be found in the Middle East. He advocates a political model that merges religion and politics. He found inspiration in the Iranian revolution and Saddam Hussein’s Iraq – countries he viewed as promising allies of Ukraine (Dymerskaya-Tsigelman and Finberg 1999: 21). MAUP has conducted research seminars on Gaddafi’s Green Book; its press has praised Hezbollah which it has compared to the OUN and UPA (MAUP 2005; Personal Plius 2006b). The European extreme right has a long tradition of orienting itself towards the Middle East.3 Today, the links to the Middle East translate into monetary and political support for the extreme anti-Semitic right in Ukraine. MAUP has received substantial financial support from Libya, Iran and Saudi Arabia (U.S. Department of State 2005). In December 2006, Shchokin travelled to Damascus on the invitation of the Syrian foreign minister, establishing a formal cooperation between the UCP and the Baath Party. The Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad received an honorary doctorate from MAUP, Shchokin a gold medal from the Baath Party. ‘The collaboration between the true Ukrainian intellectual elite and those Arab political regimes, which can be characterized as conservative revolutionaries, are necessary, not only for economic reasons, but also due to national security’, Personal Plius wrote, adding that ‘a great power, Ukraine cannot avoid practising a healthy expansionist policy, even if the Ukrainian expansion will only have a peaceful and humanitarian character.’ MAUP is working to establish a branch in Damascus and a campus in the Palestinian autonomy. A reciprocal arrangement has been made with Damascus State University (Huk 2006; MAUP 2007c). Another MAUP associate is Ahmadinejad’s Iran. The Iranian president has kept a high anti-Semitic profile, repeatedly questioning the Holocaust, demanding Israel’s eradication from the map, and organizing conferences on Holocaust denial. Personal Plius hails Ahmadinejad as a ‘politician of a new type’ and the Iranian ambassador is a frequent guest at MAUP conferences (Irzhavyi 2006; MAUP 2007d). Iran has taken an increasingly active interest in the activities of the European extreme right. Not only the UNA-UNSO, but also the NPD, its sister organization in Germany, regard Ahmadinejad’s Iran as an ally.4 Mirroring the Iranian and Syrian regimes’ use of history, MAUP uses Holocaust denial as a tool to express its hostility to the Western world and liberal democratic values (Trafford 2001). MAUP operated a bookstore of anti-Semitic literature at Babyn Yar, selling works in which Jews are presented as the true perpetrators of the Holocaust, until it was closed by the authorities in May 2007 (MAUP 2007b). MAUP has actively cultivated links with European political figures sympathetic to their worldview. In April 2006, then– Polish Deputy Prime Minister Andrzej Lepper of the Kaczyński government received an honorary doctorate and in January 2007 became an honorary professor

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at MAUP (Personal Plius 2006a; MAUP 2007a). Intellectually kindred to MAUP, Lepper lists Joseph Goebbels and Jean-Marie Le Pen as sources of inspiration (Pankowski and Kornak 2005: 160). His party, the Samoobrona (Self-defence), initiated a close cooperation with the UCP. The former Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, David Duke, defended his PhD in history in September 2005, on a dissertation titled ‘Zionism as a Form of Ethnic Supremacism’, and has since worked as an adjunct professor at MAUP. At a 2005 MAUP conference, attended by David Duke and the ambassadors of Iran, Syria and Palestine, several delegates called for the deportation of Jews from Ukraine (Rudling 2006b: 92–93).

Conclusion Organized anti-Semitism in Ukraine is influenced by two political traditions. The OUN’s legacy of anti-Russian, anti-Semitic and anti-Polish sentiments has its strongest support in Western Ukraine. It is intimately linked to the defence of the Ukrainian language and culture. It is closely linked to the Galician historical experiences, and its appeal outside Western Ukraine has been limited. On the other hand, there is the xenophobic Eurasian nationalism, steeped in the Soviet ‘antiZionist’ tradition and stronger in the southern and eastern parts of the country. It has merged aspects of integral nationalism with Stalinism into a new amalgamation, with many similarities with the Russian ‘New Right’ (Wilson 1997: 197–98). If successors of the OUN, such as KUN, represent the former, MAUP/UCP and the UNA-UNSO represent the latter. The UCP has an ambiguous relation to the Soviet past. On the one hand, it strongly condemns Soviet Communism, which it sees as a tool for Jewish domination and responsible for all disasters that befell Ukraine in the twentieth century. On the other hand, MAUP laments the collapse of the USSR, which it perceives as a result of a Zionist conspiracy (Rudling 2006b: 106–9). At the same time, the UNA-UNSO and MAUP share many of the anti-democratic and anti-Semitic attributes of the Russian extreme right: anti-Semitism, militarism, illiberalism and Eurasianism. Whereas they generally articulate themselves in Ukrainian, their attitude to the Russian language is not uniformly negative. Several Russian names are found among its leadership, and their propaganda is disseminated in both languages. This ambiguity is reflected in the organization’s controversial political actions.The UNSO has sent paramilitary forces to fight on the same side as Russian extremist militants in Transdnistria, while fighting Russian interests in Chechnya and Abkhazia (McGregor 2006). Moderate Ukrainian nationalists often claim that anti-Semitism is a ‘foreign’ import, lacking roots in the Ukrainian humanistic culture, but brought to society by Russian imperialism (Myrs’kyi and Naiman 2000: 73). In September 2005, President Yushchenko declared that ‘there is no such problem as anti-Semitism or other manifestations of xenophobia in Ukraine’ (Rudling 2006b: 82). Yet, antiSemitic attitudes have increased significantly between 1994 and 2006. In 1994

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38 per cent of Ukrainians were ready to accept Jews in their closest circle – as family members and friends – but this number had fallen to 21 per cent in 2006, while the percentage of the population that would not tolerate Jews as inhabitants of Ukraine increased from 26 to 36 per cent during the same period. Particularly noteworthy is that the highest levels of anti-Semitism are found among those under the age of 20 and over the age of 70. In 2006, 45.5 and 42.3 per cent of the people in these age groups, respectively, did not want to accept Jews as inhabitants of Ukraine, a sharp increase over the previous decade (Paniotto 2007: 19–20). Recent studies among Ukrainian high school and college students similarly show that while explicit anti-Semitic views are held by a minority, there is also a tolerance of or indifference to it. The Holocaust is seen as something distant and remote and not part of Ukrainian history (Ivanova 2005: 418). German historian Wilfried Jilge links this to the government-sponsored cult of the OUN(b) and UPA. The absence of the Holocaust from the Ukrainian culture of memory is directly connected to the closeness of the OUN to National Socialism, particularly in its relation to anti-Bolshevism and anti-Semitism … Nationalist intellectuals can legitimise the heroic role of the OUN and UPA only by ignoring the Jewish Holocaust and its connection to Ukrainian national history. ( Jilge 2006: 14–17) While post-Soviet Ukraine has been open to discuss crimes committed by the Soviet regime against Ukrainians, there has been less openness to come to terms with war crimes committed by nationalist extremists (Łada 2005; Marples 2007: 298–301; Dietsch 2006: 147–76). Old stereotypes have been modified and recycled. The OUN position that Jews were the agents of Bolshevism has transformed into the idea of Bolsheviks as the agents of the Jews in the narratives disseminated by the MAUP publishing house. Since independence, political life in Ukraine has been dominated by centrist, rather than extremist ideologies on the left and right (Wilson 1997: 194–204; Dymerskaya-Tsigelman and Finberg 1999: 24). Yet, while the extreme right constitutes a divided minority, it is not isolated. Their ideas feed the nationaldemocratic, liberal and ecologist right (Chauvier 2007). As a part of Yushchenko’s bloc Nasha Ukraїna, KUN has had some influence over Ukrainian politics, particularly over the manufacturing of heroic myths of the past.While the UCP and UNAUNSO have remained extra-parliamentarian organizations, the extremists have maintained cordial relations with the forces of the ‘Orange’ Revolution. Levko Luk’’ianenko was, until his retirement in 2007, a deputy of the Verkhovna Rada, and a high-ranking member of Yulia Tymoshenko’s bloc. Andryi Shkil remains one of Tymoshenko’s deputies (Chauvier 2007; Rudling 2006b: 116–18). In 2005 and again in 2007, Yushchenko decorated Luk’’ianenko with the highest award of the republic in recognition of his dedication ‘to the ideals of freedom and democracy’ (Den’ 2005). UNA-UNSO leader Yuriy Shukhevych was made a Hero of Ukraine

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in August 2006, something that prompted the Wiesenthal Center in Europe to protest to the Council of Europe about Yushchenko honouring a ‘right-wing extremist’. The master narrative of victimization that prevails in Ukrainian nationalist discourse provides a fertile ground for extremist interpretations. Nationalist politicians and opinion makers regularly portray the 1932–33 famine as an act of genocide against ethnic Ukrainians and do not hestiate to inflate the number of victims for political purposes (Himka 2008). The culprits of the evils that befell the Ukrainians in the twentieth century are often portrayed as easily definable ethnic ‘others’. For instance, in July 2008 the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), to which president Yushchenko has assigned the task of producing a comfortable and edifying national past, published a list of 19 perpetrators of the ‘famine-genocide’. Eight of the listed perpetrators were of Jewish nationality (SBU 2008). This action by the SBU was part of a larger campaign to mitigate the role of Western Ukrainian nationalists in the Holocaust (Kurylo and Himka 2008). Not only is it impossible to establish the ethnic origin of the people responsible for the famine, this sort of narrative also helps legitimize the extreme right’s conspiratorial interpretations of the famine as a Jewish and Russian genocide against the Ukrainian people, reinforcing anti-Semitic prejudice. While the extreme right’s direct influence over Ukrainian politics remains limited, there has been a certain acceptance of nationalist extremism within Yushchenko’s circle. The fascist leaders of the OUN(b) are venerated as national heroes, and the extreme right retains a certain respectability within the corridors of power. It is not known what sort of money Kravchuk, Yushchenko and Tarasiuk received for their associations with Shchokin’s network, but it took considerable international attention to make Yushchenko and Tarasiuk distance themselves from MAUP. The continued growth of the Ukrainian economy may be the most effective remedy against political extremism. On the other hand, the levels of acceptance of anti-Semitic attitudes mean that a considerable part of the Ukrainian population may be open to the message of the extremists, which have not yet exhausted their growth potential.

Postscript, August 2011 Since this chapter was written there have been a number of changes in Ukrainian politics. Under Yushchenko’s successor, Viktor Yanukovych, the state-promoted cult of the OUN has come to an end. Yushchenko’s Nasha Ukraïna has been marginalized politically, and the worship of the OUN taken over by the allUkrainian Union Svoboda, or the Freedom Party.This marks a change in Ukrainian politics as, for the first time, an extreme-right political party has real power in Ukrainian politics. Svoboda has its roots in the Social Nationalist Party of Ukraine, which used an SS symbol as its party emblem and, like the OUN, promoted a ‘community of blood and spirit’. Svoboda leader Tiahnybok has employed openly anti-Semitic rhetoric, referring to Muscovites (moskali) and Jews (zhydy) as scum,

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and the Ukrainian leadership as a moskal’sko-zhydivs’ka mafia. In the local elections in 2009 and 2010 Svoboda had a breakthrough. With around 30 per cent of the popular vote, the largest political party in several Western Ukrainian city assemblies, there is, in the words of political scientist Anton Shekhovtsov, a strong and disturbing possibility that the Freedom Party will set up the first overtly ultranationalist parliamentary group in the Verkhovna Rada, thus constituting a new landmark of the resurgence of the radical right in Ukraine (Shekhovtsov 2011: 213, 216, 225; Umland and Shekhovtsov 2010: 2).

Notes 1 Shcherbatiuk had a fallout with MAUP in February 2006 after which he accused MAUP of ‘working for Arab and Russian money to discredit the domestic politics of Ukraine in the eyes of the world – as xenophobic and chauvinist’ (Shcherbatiuk 2006). 2 In the 2006 election, the UCP received 0.09 per cent and UNA 0.06 per cent of the votes cast. Two other far-right parties, Svoboda and Kostenko-Plyush Ukrainian People’s Party, received 0.4 and 1.9 per cent respectively (Ukrainian Central Election Committee n.d.; Matveyev 2007). 3 Nazi Germany cultivated close relations with the Middle East. Egypt and Syria were, along with South America, prime destinations for fugitive Nazis after the war (Dahl 2006: 151–52). Alois Brunner, Eichmann’s right-hand man, and Franz Stangl, the commandant of Sobibor and Treblinka, found refuge in Syria (Knopp 2004: 326, 354–57; Sereny 2000: 371–74). Hundreds of Germans and Austrians assisted in the build-up of Egyptian military aviation and missile development. Old Nazis produced anti-Semitic propaganda for the Nasser regime (Goodrick-Clarke 1998: 176; Trafford 2001). 4 ‘Iran is our ally, particularly now, [and] opposed to the Zionists and their fellow travelers. We have tomorrow’s great power behind us.’ Klaus Menzel, member of the Bundesparlament of Saxony for the NPD, sees no problem accepting money from Iran. ‘No. Absolutely not. We accept the money from our friends. Our allies’, July, 2006 interview with Klaus Menzel, NPD member of the Saxony Landestag (Andersson 2008).

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Myrs’kyi, R. and Naiman, O. 2000. Iudofobiia proty Ukraїny: stari zabobony i moderny vyhadky. Vydannia druhe, Kyiv: Akademiia istoriia ta kul’tury evreiv Ukraїny im. Sh. Dubnova. Mytsiuk, O. 1933a. ‘Pozaahrarna diial’nist’ zhydiv po svitovii viini’, Rozbudova Natsiї, (11–12): 277–87. –––– 1933b. ‘Ahraryzatsiia zhydivstva za doby bol’shevyzmu’, Rozbudova Natsiї, (7–8): 180–90; (9–10): 226–35. Neaman, E. 1999. A Dubious Past; Ernst Jünger and the Politics of Literature after Nazism. Berkeley: University of California Press. Panchenko, O. 2006. Ukraїntsi i ievreї: Zbrinyk stat’ei, dokumentiv ta eseїv. Hadiach, Ukraine: Vydevnytsvo ‘Hadach’. Paniotto, V. 2007. ‘Dynamics of Anti-Semitism in Ukraine (1994–2006)’. Paper presented at the ASN 12th Annual World Convention, 12–14 April, New York: Columbia University, pp. 19–20. Pankowski, R. and Kornak, M. 2005. ‘Poland’, in C. Mudde (ed.), Racist Extremism in Central and Eastern Europe. London: Routledge, pp. 156–83. Personal Plius 2005a. ‘Sionizm – Zahroza Svitovii tsivilizatsii: U MAUP vidbulasia IV Vsesvitna naukova konferentsiia “Dialoh tsivilizatsii”’, Personal Plius, 23(122): 8–14 June. –––– 2005b.‘Boh i Ukraїna – Ponad use!’, Personal Plius, 50(149), 14–20 December. Retrieved 1 March 2008 from http://www.personal-plus.net/149/237.html. –––– 2006a. ‘Pochesnyi doktor MKA – vitse-prem’ier Pol’shchi’, Personal Plius, 19(170), 10–16 May. Retrieved 2 March 2008 from http://www.personal-plus.net/article. php?ida=669. –––– 2006b. ‘Heopolitychnyi slovnyk: partiia Boha – Khezbolla’, Personal Plius, 30(181), 27 July–2 August. Retrieved 3 March 2008 from http://www.personal-plus.net/181/ 979.html. –––– 2006c. ‘Prykhovannyi kul’t’, Personal Plius, 32(183), 10–16 August. Retrieved 2 March 2008 from http://www.personal-plus.net/183/1042.html. –––– 2006d. ‘Ritual’ne vbyvstvo na zamovlennia ditei sionu’, Personal Plius, 39(190), 29 September–5 October. Retrieved 2 March 2008 from http://www.personal-plus. net/190/1210.html. Rudling, P.A. 2006a. ‘Theory and Practice: Historical Representation of the Wartime Activities of the OUN-UPA (Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists-Ukrainian Insurgent Army)’, East European Jewish Affairs, 36(2): 163–91. –––– 2006b. ‘Organized Anti-Semitism in Contemporary Ukraine: Structure, Influence and Ideology’, Canadian Slavonic Papers/Revue canadienne des slavistes, 48(1–2): 81–118. Sachar, H. 2005. A History of the Jews in the Modern World. New York: Knopf. SBU 2008. ‘Sluzhba bezpeki Ukraїny vidkryvae dlia shyrokoho zahalu arkhivni materialy shchodo osib, prychetnykh do orhanizatsiї ta zdiisnennia politiki Holodomoru-Henotsydu represii’. SBU website, 23 July. Retrieved 26 October 2008 from http://www.sbu.gov. ua/sbu/control/uk/publish/article?art_id=80420&cat_id=395. Senchenko, M.I. et al. 2006. ‘Ni evreis’komu fashyzmu! Iudo-natsyzm v Ukraїni ne proide!’, ‘Prypynity evreis’ki pogromy v Kyevi!’ Retrieved 1 March 2008 from http://www. maup.com.ua/news/news.php?idn=607. Sereny, G. 2000. Vid avgrunden: Från barmhärtighetsmord till folkförintelse, trans. N. Lindgren. Stockholm: Ordfront. Serhiichuk, V. 1996. OUN-UPA v roky viyny: Novi dokumenty i materialy. Kyïv: Vydavnytsvo khudozhn´oï literatury ‘Dnipro’. Shcherbatiuk, A. 2006. ‘FSB okopalas’ v MAUP: Informatsiia do rozdumiv’, ORD, 27 March.

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Shekhovtsov, A. 2011. ‘The Creeping Resurgence of the Ukrainian Radical Right? The Case of the Freedom Party’, Europe-Asia Studies, 63(2): 203–28. Snyder, T. 2003. The Reconstruction of Nations: Poland, Ukraine, Lithuania, Belarus, 1569–1999. New Haven, CT:Yale University Press. Solchanyk, R. 1999. ‘The Radical Right in Ukraine’, in S. Ramet (ed.), The Radical Right in Central and Eastern Europe since 1989. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press. Staud, T. 2006. Moderne Nazis: Die neuen Rechten und der Aufstieg der NPD. Cologne: Kiepenheuer & Witsch. Steinlauf , M. 1996. ‘Poland’, in D.S. Wyman (ed.), The World Reacts to the Holocaust. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, pp. 81–155. Trafford, D. 2001. ‘Beyond the Pale: Nazism, Holocaust Denial and the Arab World’, Searchlight, June. Ukrainian Central Election Committee (n.d.) Tsentral’na vyborcha komisiia Ukraïny. Retrieves 14 March 2008 from http://www.cvk.gov.ua/pls/vnd2006/W6P001. Umland, A. 1999. ‘Soviet Antisemitism after Stalin’, East European Jewish Affairs, 29(1–2): 159–68. –––– 2006. ‘Vitrenko’s Fascist Friend’, Unian.net, 14 April. Retrieved 3 May 2006 from http://www.Unian.net/news/print.php?id=152563. Umland, A. and Shekhovtsov, A. 2010. ‘Pravoradikal’naia partiinaia politika v postsovetskoi Ukraine i zagadka elektoral’noi marginal’nosti Ukrains’kikh nationalistov v 1994–2009 gg’, Ab Imperio, (2): 2. UNHCR 2004. ‘U.S. Department of State Annual Report on International Religious Freedom for 2004 Ukraine – September 2004. Released by the U.S. Department of State Bureau for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor on September 15, 2004, covering the period from July 1, 2003 to June 30, 2004’. Retrieved 16 May 2006 from http://www. unhcr.ch/cgi-bin/texis/vtx/rsd/print.html?CATEGORY=RSDCOI&id=416ce9df7. U.S. Department of State 2005. ‘Ukraine: International Religious Freedom Report, 2005, The U.S. Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor.’ Released 8 November 2005. Retrieved 1 March 2008 from http://www.state.Kyiv/g/drl/rls/irf/2005/51588. htm. Varfolomeyev, O. 2008. ‘Xenophobes to Contest Seats in Ukrainian Parliament’, Eurasia Daily Monitor, The Jamestown Foundation, 9 January. Retrieved 19 February 2008 from http://jamestown.org/edm/article.php?article_id=2370640. Wasserstein, B. 1997. Vanishing Diaspora: The Jews in Europe Since 1945. New York: Penguin Books. Weiner, A. 2001. Making Sense of War: The Second World War and the Fate of the Bolshevik Revolution. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. –––– 2003. ‘When Memory Counts: War, Genocide, and Postwar Soviet Jewry’, in A. Weiner (ed.), Landscaping the Human Garden: Twentieth-Century Population Management in a Comparative Framework. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, pp. 191–216. Wilson, A. 1997. Ukrainian Nationalism in the 1990s: A Minority Faith. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Wysocki, R. 2003. Organizacja Ukraińskich Nacjonalistów w Polsce w latach 1929–1939: geneza, struktura, program, ideologia. Lublin: Wydawn. Uniwersytetu Marii Curie-Sklodowskiej. Zhirinovskii, V. 1994. Poslednii brosok na iug. Moscow: Izdatel’sko-informatsionnoe agenstvo “RAIT”. ZIK 2005. ‘UNA ne blokuvatymet’sia z UKP cherez antysemits’ki zaiaby ukraїns’kykh konservatoriv’, ZIK: syla informatsiї, 20 December. Retrieved 1 March 2008 from http:// zik.com.ua/ua/news/2005/12/20/27823.

PART IV

National and Comparative Perspectives: A Challenge to ‘Exceptionalism’?

13 CHALLENGING THE EXCEPTIONALIST VIEW Favourable conditions for radical right-wing populism in Switzerland Damir Skenderovic

Introduction International academic research on the extreme right has until very recently shown little interest in the Swiss case and few ‘comparative’ books and articles have taken Swiss examples into consideration. The main reason for this oversight is that most of the literature mischaracterizes the Swiss case and claims that Switzerland represents a case of failure for radical right-wing populism. The literature has thus far failed to take account of the existence of key causal factors in Switzerland that have favoured the emergence and continuity of such parties. As a consequence, many scholars embrace the notion of ‘Swiss exceptionalism’. Yet, as this contribution argues, Switzerland represents a case of ‘success’ and there is little justification for maintaining the notion of ‘exceptionalism’. The country has had electorally and discursively important radical right-wing populist parties since the 1960s. In truth, Switzerland has been a forerunner of radical right-wing populist parties in Western Europe, since it was one of the first countries to produce a new type of Political Party which conspicuously avoided drawing on a fascist legacy. It is important to note, furthermore, that the party system saw the rise of seven different radical right-wing populist parties between the 1960s and 2000s, which were all at some point represented in the national parliament. Thus, among Western European democracies, Switzerland has recorded the largest number of such parties to have had national MPs elected. The main goal of this chapter is to challenge the notion of ‘Swiss exceptionalism’ by testing a number of variables that are commonly used in the literature to explain the success or failure of radical right-wing populist parties. Moreover, while the dramatic electoral successes of the Swiss People’s Party (SVP, Schweizerische Volkspartei) have in recent years attracted the attention of scholars of radical rightwing populist parties, there are very few accounts that take a historical perspective

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and reflect this success story as being both a rise and a continuation of local radicalism. Therefore, I present an explanation that takes into account certain aspects of what Cas Mudde (2007) has called the external supply-side. These are contextual factors that refer to specific settings of Swiss politics and society, including the institutional (direct democracy, consociationalism, federalism), the cultural (nationhood, citizenship, multiculturalism) and the historical (interwar history). However, I also keep in mind that internal factors including ideology, organization, campaigning and leadership are essential for understanding the success of these parties and show how this party-centric approach helps to explain the unprecedented electoral growth of the SVP during the course of the last twenty years.

Long-term traditions since the 1960s In Switzerland, the history of radical-right parties is characterized by a remarkable continuity from the 1960s onwards (Skenderovic 2009a). Less than twenty years after the end of the Second World War, the parties of what is known to the Swiss public as the Movement against Overforeignization (Anti-Überfremdungsbewegung) made their appearance on the political stage and, at the time, their anti-immigration and populist agenda was unique in Europe. During the 1960s and 1970s, the movement was comprised of four small parties, including National Action (Nationale Aktion, founded in 1961),Vigilance (1964), the Swiss Republican Movement (Schweizerische Republikanische Bewegung, 1971) and the Swiss Democratic Union (EidgenössischDemokratische Union, 1975). In terms of the support they received in parliamentary elections, they were fringe parties. Combined, they never received more than 8 per cent of the vote in elections to the National Council (see Table 13.1), the 200-strong lower house of parliament, and hence never had more than eleven national MPs. As a result of continuous dissension and conflicts between and within the different parties, the movement was characterized by a high degree of factionalism, and thus its development is described as the ‘history of a divided family’ (Gentile and Kriesi 1998). Nevertheless, since the parties made extensive use of the instruments of direct democracy, they achieved a degree of continuity in mobilization and campaigning, and regularly exerted strong pressure on the government and polity, in particular in the area of migration policy (Skenderovic and D’Amato 2008). In the 1980s and early 1990s, the founding of the Automobile Party of Switzerland (Auto-Partei Schweiz, 1985) and the League of Ticino (Lega dei Ticinesi, 1991) saw the arrival of two new parties which also contributed to the further diversification of the radical right-wing party camp. The Automobile Party, which was renamed the Freedom Party of Switzerland (Freiheits-Partei der Schweiz) in 1994, represented a new type of radical movement for Switzerland, since it propagated both neo-liberal principles and a fierce anti-asylum agenda. The League of Ticino, based in the eponymous Italian-speaking canton, also exerted a strong anti-establishment appeal and ‘saw itself as a representative of the interests of the common people against environmentalists, the state, and the political establishment’ (Betz 1994: 22). The Swiss Democratic Union, founded as a breakaway from the Movement against

0.6 – – – – 11.0

NA/SD SRB1 EDU APS/FPS Lega BGB/SVP2

1 – – – – 21

3.2 4 4.4 7 – – – – – – 11.0 23

1971 2.5 3.0 0.3 – – 9.9

1975

1983

1987

1991

1995

1999

2003

2007

2 1.3 2 3.4 4 3.0 3 3.4 5 3.1 3 1.8 1 0.9 1 0.5 – 43 0.6 14 0.5 14 0.3 – – – – – – – – – – – – 0.3 – 0.4 – 0.9 – 1.0 1 1.3 1 1.2 1 1.3 2 1.3 1 – – – – 2.6 2 5.1 8 4.0 7 0.9 – 0.2 – 0.1 – – – – – – – 1.4 2 0.9 1 0.9 2 0.3 1 0.6 1 21 11.6 23 11.1 23 11.0 25 11.9 25 14.9 29 22.5 44 26.7 55 28.9 62

1979

Notes: First column: share of the vote; second column: number of MPs (total 200). 1 Includes Vigilance’s share of the vote in the canton of Geneva. 2 Until the National Council elections of 1995, the BGB/SVP did not belong to the camp of radical right-wing populist parties. 3 Includes the MP of Vigilance. 4 MP of Vigilance. Party abbreviations: NA/SD: National Action/Swiss Democrats; SRB: Swiss Republican Movement; EDU: Federal Democratic Union; APS/FPS: Automobile Party of Switzerland/Freedom Party of Switzerland; BGB: Farmers, Artisans and Citizens Party; SVP: Swiss People’s Party. Sources: Die Bundesversammlung – Das Schweizer Parlament, http://www.parlament.ch/SiteCollectionDocuments/wa-nr-nationalratswahlenwaehlerstimmen-1919.xls (accessed 15 January 2009); Federal Statistical Office, http://www.bfs.admin.ch/bfs/portal/de/index/themen/17/02/blank/key/ national_rat/mandatsverteilung.html (accessed 15 January 2009).

1967

Parties

TABLE 13.1 Results of radical right-wing populist parties in national council elections, 1967–2007 in Switzerland

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Overforeignization, developed into a religious fundamentalist party of Protestant orientation. In the 1990s, the party was a fierce opponent of Muslim immigration and displayed pronounced anti-Islamic views. In the 1990s, there were further major changes. Most significantly, the SVP was transformed from a conservative into a radical right-wing populist party and it became a forceful competitor to the fringe parties on the right-wing margin. After a period of more than sixty years of electoral stagnation, the SVP dramatically increased its share of the vote in National Council elections from 11.9 per cent in 1991 to 28.9 per cent in 2007 (see Table 13.1). The progress of the SVP came at the expense of mainstream centre-right parties as well as fringe radical-rightist parties. Following its extraordinary electoral successes, the SVP succeeded in gaining a second seat in the federal government. In December 2003, the party leader, Christoph Blocher, was elected to the seven-headed Federal Council. This marked a historic moment in the Swiss political system, bringing an end to the so-called ‘magic formula’, an informal rule of governance that had remained unchanged for close to half a century, resulting in a government that was, for a long period of time, perhaps the most stable in the world. In December 2007, however, Blocher was voted out of government and replaced by Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf, a representative from the electorally weak moderate faction of the SVP. In the summer of 2008, the conflict over the election of Widmer-Schlumpf resulted in the foundation of a breakaway party named the Bourgeois Democratic Party (Bürgerlich-Demokratische Partei), which has since founded sections in a total of fifteen cantons and was joined by Federal Councillors Widmer-Schlumpf and Samuel Schmid, who had both deserted from the SVP. Then again, when Schmid stepped down as Federal Councillor in December 2008, the national parliament elected Ueli Maurer, a close ally of Blocher, as his successor, thereby conceding to the SVP its representation in the federal government. The development undergone by the national SVP since the early 1990s typifies the transformation of an established conservative party into a radical right-wing populist party, similar to the transformation of the Austrian Freedom Party under the leadership of Jörg Haider. The origins of the SVP go back to the late 1910s, when a number of farmers’ parties were created in agrarian cantons of Protestant German-speaking Switzerland. Throughout the post-war era, the Farmers, Artisans and Citizens Party (Bauern-, Gewerbe- und Bürgerpartei), as it was called at the time, acted as a close partner of the right-wing mainstream Political Parties and, as a member of the government coalition, was tightly integrated into the Swiss consociational system. It stood for markedly conservative viewpoints on issues of domestic policy and represented the electorate of farmers and small business people ( Jost 2007).When in 1971 the party merged with the two Democratic Parties from the cantons of Glarus and Graubünden and changed its name to the Swiss People’s Party, this resulted in a shift towards the centre. From this point on, debates emerged over the SVP’s programmatic course which revealed early signs of disagreement between the cantonal parties of Bern and Zurich, the two most powerful sections within the SVP. Under the leadership of Blocher, cantonal party president since

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1977, the Zurich party began to embrace an exclusionist agenda and to adopt a contentious campaigning style (Hartmann and Horvath 1995). In the early 1990s, the Zurich cantonal party started successfully to pursue a campaign to gain control of the national party organization and to take the helm in debates on key policy areas, such as migration, European integration and public policy, and to set the political agenda of the national SVP. The process of political and ideological radicalization resulted in the adoption of a programme and rhetoric similar to that of other radical-right parties in Western Europe. While the agenda of the SVP became overtly marked by exclusionist beliefs, most of its policy proposals were related to all-encompassing identity politics combined with a populist appeal. Accordingly, some authors speak of the emergence of a ‘new’ SVP in the 1990s (Mazzoleni 2008). As the development of Swiss parties since the 1960s demonstrates, it is essential that ‘the party itself should be included as a major factor in explaining its electoral success and failure’ (Mudde 2007: 256). This approach echoes the criticism in recent literature on radical right-wing populism which argues that research has been heavily dominated by demand-side oriented explanations and therefore suffers from an ‘externalist bias’ (Goodwin 2006; see also Art 2011). In the case of the SVP, there are several internal reasons why the party was much more successful in the 1990s and 2000s than the fringe parties of the previous three decades. In contrast to these parties, the SVP was not a new movement and did not have to go through the initial process of party formation. Organizationally, it expanded enormously, almost doubling the number of cantonal parties and eventually contesting elections in all cantons. The party was also able to rely on large financial resources, including the contributions from Blocher who, as one of Switzerland’s wealthiest people, has repeatedly financed the party’s public campaigns. This made it possible for the SVP to invest heavily in advertising campaigns in the printed press and to address a nationwide public. With the growing mediatization of Swiss politics in the 1990s, personalization and sensationalism became more common in the media coverage of politics, even though it still remained at a relatively low level when compared with most Western democracies (Donges 2005; Skenderovic 2009b). This redounded to the SVP’s advantage, since Blocher was seen by his followers as a leadership figure with charismatic popular appeal. It is important to acknowledge, however, that with its style and techniques of campaigning, the SVP has also been a driving force in this process of mediatization. The SVP has built up an efficient election and propaganda apparatus, and by means of professional marketing and a controversial campaigning style, it has considerably shaped the way in which politics is discussed in Switzerland. Finally, the SVP went through a process of ‘nationalization’ which resulted in organizational centralization and ideological cohesion, as well as in the increased homogenization of the election and voting campaigns. Here again, Blocher – with his authoritarian leadership and dominant position, and a circle of devoted senior party officials – played an important role. Thus, the SVP gained advantage

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over other traditionally ‘low-profile’ parties, that tended to be characterized by factionalism, loose organizational structures and a weak central power base. The party’s unity was also reflected in the growing homogeneity of the SVP constituency across different cantons (Kriesi et al. 2005). Even though the exit of some leading members in 2008 and the revived criticism of the intransigent style of the Zurich-led faction inside the SVP have somewhat weakened the national party’s cohesion, there is little sign of a palace revolution, given that those factions supporting the turn towards radical-right politics had produced an excellent electoral record.

The notion of ‘Swiss exceptionalism’ Despite the continuity of radical right-wing populist parties throughout the postwar era and the boost they have experienced since the early 1990s, the idea persists that Switzerland differs from other Western democracies where such parties have achieved notable electoral success. As suggested, this is based on a notion of ‘Swiss exceptionalism’, implying that the Swiss case features particular historical aspects, or aspects of the political system and culture, which are seen as creating contextual conditions that are disadvantageous for the strength of radical-right politics. I argue instead that there is strong evidence that conditions and factors exist in Switzerland which support, rather than impede, the emergence as well as the persistence of radical right-wing populist parties. But let us first start with an argument that tries to explain why Swiss radical right-wing populist parties spent so long a period of time receiving relatively little support. Referring to the notion of direct democracy as an institutionalized ‘safety valve’, it is argued that these parties do not have to direct the bulk of their efforts to election and parliamentary work, but can ensure their political survival by focusing on direct democratic opportunities (Armingeon 1995: 55ff.; Helms 1997: 47).1 This avenue for exerting political pressure allows small parties and voters to express their oppositional stance to policies embraced by the government or the established parties without requiring a strong parliamentary position. In sum, the argument highlights the significance of direct democracy as a particular method of political decision-making which makes it possible to keep challenger parties out of the parliamentary arena, even though they may receive considerable support in referenda from time to time. The second argument points to the highly unifying effect of ‘consociational democracy’ (Lijphart 1984) and the strong integrative capacity of the Swiss party system. According to this viewpoint, the Swiss political system does not accommodate radical parties unless they follow an opposition policy that is loyal to the system (Helms 1997: 43f.). One pillar of political stability is the governmental coalition, which is composed of members from the major parties. In this view, the large degree of electoral support for the four parties forming the government coalition suggests that there are strong political alignments to the established parties, and that the consociational system has strong support among voters.

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The third argument points to the specific conception of Swiss national identity. Switzerland is traditionally described as the prototype of a state-nation (Staatsnation) strongly reliant on political will (Kohn 1956). In reference to Jürgen Habermas (1996), the claim may be made for the existence of a strong ‘constitutional patriotism’ in Switzerland. The Swiss federal state unites four ethno-culturally distinct regions, each with its own language and culture. This, together with the institutional mixture represented by the three elements of direct democracy, federalism and neutrality, is used as one of the key references in the construction of Swiss national identity. It could be argued, therefore, that the exploitation of Swiss civic nationalism is difficult for the radical right-wing populist parties, whose ultranationalist discourse depends upon the concept of a homogeneous ethnic and cultural nation. The fourth argument takes a historical perspective and stresses the fact that Switzerland has no experience of fascism or National Socialism (Helms 1997: 44). Drawing on what Roger Eatwell (2003: 62f.) has called the ‘national traditions thesis’, it is assumed that there is a very low acceptance in Swiss political culture for an anti-democratic right-wing stance or a demagogic revitalization of radical ideologies. While Switzerland witnessed the emergence of radical right-wing groups in the 1930s, in comparison to other countries these groups did not succeed in developing into a mass movement and their political impact was rather ephemeral. The fifth argument takes the view that a pronounced notion of respect and tolerance toward minorities and other cultures exists among large segments of the Swiss population. These values purportedly contrast with radical right-wing actors, whose ideology generally draws on resentment and intolerance toward minorities (Armingeon 1995: 55). This view is supported with surveys indicating that fundamental rights, such as freedom of conscience and the right to one’s own language and culture, are highly respected among the Swiss population (Armingeon 1998: 90; Melich 1991: 12). Further support for the tolerance argument is provided by claims concerning the favourable institutional framework for native minorities that has been created by Swiss federalism and the elaborate protection that is provided for minority rights (Linder 2010).

Direct democracy, federalism and consociationalism In order to challenge this view of Switzerland as an exceptional case, it is first necessary to examine variables identified by the comparative literature which focuses on the parties’ institutional environment. It is argued that the degree of ‘openness’ of the political system provides conditions which foster or impede the radical rightwing populist parties from evolving into a serious political competitor (Eatwell 2003: 58ff.; Rydgren 2007: 254–58). The first question that arises is which institutional channels are available through which radical rightist parties can articulate political claims and intervene in policy-making processes. In Switzerland, direct democracy represents a key element of the country’s political system. Since the 1960s, Swiss radical right-wing populist parties have

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extensively used direct democracy to mobilize constituencies and influence the formation of public policy.2 Direct democracy has allowed the fringe parties as well as the SVP to lead large campaigns to promote their policies, with the result that far-reaching sections of the voting public became familiar with radical-right goals (Skenderovic 2007). This view on the effects of direct democracy undermines the above-mentioned safety-valve argument, which ignores the impact of the campaigning and public pressure that is generated through direct democratic activities. Moreover, these parties are keen to present popular referenda as important channels for expressing disapproval with consensual agreements and ‘for venting voter dissatisfaction with the state and with the behavior of political leaders’ (Kobach 1997: 207). Thus, the Swiss system of direct democracy vividly demonstrates that ‘[p]opulist movements and discourse are accentuated rather than reduced by the existence of opportunity structures favouring forms of popular expression’ (Mény and Surel 2002: 15). In other words, the existing set of direct democratic institutions represents a meaningful political arena, where these parties emphasize the role of ‘the people’ in their populist rhetoric (Canovan 1999).3 Focusing on political institutions, a proportional electoral system can certainly encourage the electoral rise of radical right-wing parties (Norris 2005: 114–18). Another common assumption holds that a federalist political system can favour the emergence of fringe radical right-wing populist parties, since it typically leads to a multiparty structure. In Switzerland, both proportional representation and federalism are central to the party system, and led to its so-called horizontal fragmentation (Ladner 2001: 124f.). In 2007, for example, twelve parties were represented in the National Council. Twenty-six electoral districts correspond to twenty-six cantons of highly different population size, and the electoral threshold in cantons with a large population is much lower than in small cantons. As a consequence, the small radical right-wing parties could take advantage of the relatively low threshold in cantons with a large population, such as Zurich, Bern and Geneva. Federalism has also resulted in so-called vertical segmentation, giving great importance to the sub-national level in terms of party-building and party autonomy (Ladner 2004: 201). While weakening national parties, federalism has the effect of strengthening cantonal parties. Since the fringe radical parties had limited resources, they succeeded in consolidating their party organization by investing the bulk of their party work at the regional or local level. Federalism also makes it possible for a cantonal party which comes from a large canton to rely on important resources and become a key player in national politics. As already mentioned, the relative autonomy of cantonal parties was an essential prerequisite in order for the Zurich SVP party to build up a powerful party apparatus and lead the transformation process of the national SVP. Consociational democracy is another key feature of the Swiss political system and has a major integrating effect on party politics in Switzerland. This results in a convergence of mainstream parties and, in contrast with the exceptionalist view, should not be regarded as a hindrance, but rather as a favourable factor for the

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success of radical right-wing populist parties. Indeed, the political space opens up to radical right-wing populist parties when major left-wing and right-wing parties cluster around the centre (Kitschelt 1995; Carter 2005: 102–45). Public mistrust towards the Political Parties in power and attitudes of disillusionment with politics are one of the consequences of this consensual system of negotiation and the lack of real opposition forces. These developments give populist parties the opportunity both to apply a strategy of de-legitimization regarding the political establishment, and to claim that the established parties fail to take care of issues salient to the voters (Karapin 1998: 227f.). In the case of Switzerland, the fact that the major parties of the moderate right and left moved closer together and have come to share power has provided convenient conditions for radical right-wing populist parties in various ways. First, these parties commonly used the strategy of inciting popular resentment against the political elite and the government, and then presented themselves as the defenders of those alienated from these negotiational arrangements. As the SVP shows, this strategy was rather successful, since the party succeeded in attracting a large number of volatile and newly mobilized voters in the 1999 national elections, when the party reached a historical high for the first time (Lutz 2003: 76ff.). These types of parties could also take advantage of the general trend of growing public mistrust towards political institutions. As surveys show, the proportion of people who approved of how the Swiss government was doing its job decreased from 70 per cent in the mid-1970s to 40 per cent in the mid-1990s (Suter 2000: 191). Second, the tradition of the consociational system (the ‘magic formula’) has had a major effect on how mainstream parties deal with the SVP and how the SVP has been able to build up its image as a ‘legitimate’ actor in Swiss politics. As the literature emphasizes, the question of whether mainstream parties adopt a position of demarcation or inclusion is essential to an understanding of the success of radical right-wing populist parties (Bale 2003). Indeed, the Swiss mainstream parties basically applied a strategy of integration towards the SVP, despite its radicalization, in the 1990s. The ‘historical capital’ of the SVP and its long-time integration in the consociational system made it possible for the party to appear like a more acceptable force. They continued to think about the SVP in terms of a traditional government party, whose status as such obliged the party to act responsibly at the executive level (Mazzoleni and Skenderovic 2007). Also, the voting out of Blocher from the government was not a shift towards a strategy of demarcation, but rather a statement against his confrontational style and his incorporative attitude in the government body. This was confirmed by the support that a large majority of the two centre-right parties, the Liberal Democratic Party (Freisinnig-Demokratische Partei) and the Christian Democratic Party (Christlichdemokratische Volkspartei), gave to Ueli Maurer when he was elected into the government in December 2008. As SVP party president from 1996 to 2008, Maurer had been a driving force behind the process of transformation that had turned the SVP into a radical right-wing populist party.

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Traditions of exclusionist discourse and policies Some of the literature has critically acknowledged that the institution-centred political opportunity approach fails to take into account the broader cultural and discursive determinants and dynamics of the political mobilization of radical rightwing populist parties. Conversely, they propose the concept of discursive or cultural opportunity structures to capture how radical right-wing populist parties mobilize symbolic and cultural resources in order to set forth their proposals (Koopmans and Statham 1999). A commonly held assumption, also expressed by the exceptionalist position, considers Switzerland as a ‘voluntary nation’ whose civic nationalism is seemingly difficult to exploit for these parties. In the voluntarist conception of Swiss nationhood, however, political institutions can assume an exalted, almost naturalized significance when they are conceived of in terms of a constant cornerstone of the country’s ‘civic exceptionalism’, whose origins go a long way back in history (Marchal 2007). Following this view, in their nationalist rhetoric the radical rightwing populist parties present the country’s institutional settings as distinctive and unique features of Switzerland’s authenticity that must be preserved in times of change, come what may. In addition, there are convincing arguments which hold that Swiss nationhood is built not only on the conception of the state-nation based on political will and civic rights, but on cultural and ethnic categories as well. As a matter of fact, Switzerland’s self-perception as a national community is shaped by a long-term process of inventing national traditions that emphasize the Swiss people’s common mentality, as well as shared historical and geographic experiences, which have collectively generated some kind of organically grown national culture (Zimmer 2003). The continuous invention of national myths contributed to ‘an ethnic construction relying on a perception of Switzerland as an exceptional or insular case’ (Froidevaux 1997: 58). This point of view is supported by studies on Swiss citizenship, which point to the highly exclusionist basis of the country’s nationhood and emphasize that Swiss citizenship policy comes close to an ethnic-assimilationist model (Koopmans et al. 2005). Embracing this notion of Swiss nationhood, radical right-wing populist parties correspond to the model of ‘a social movement that mobilises an ethnic-cultural framing of national identity against the idea of the nation as a political or civic community’ (Koopmans and Statham 1999: 229). As a result, there is a seemingly paradoxical situation in Switzerland, in which the idea of the voluntary nation represents a discursive opportunity structure for Swiss radical right-wing populist parties, alongside ethnic nationalism which refutes the idea of civic nationalism, but does not interfere with the radical right making use of it. Another important discursive and symbolic frame in Switzerland is represented by the so-called Discourse of Overforeignization. Unique in Europe for its persistence throughout the twentieth century, this long-held and widely accepted discourse has consistently been utilized by radical right-wing populist parties to construct and

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to politicize the boundary between ‘us’ and the ‘other’. Initially developed by Swiss intellectuals in the early twentieth century, the term ‘Overforeignization’ (Überfremdung) implies the notion that a dangerous threat is posed by those who are of foreign origin and culture and that one’s own identity and group is also threatened (Kury 2003). In the 1960s, the fear of ‘Overforeignization’ was revived by large parts of the polity, including state authorities, social democrats and trade unions. While the emerging radical right-wing populist parties were able to benefit from this widely touted discourse of exclusion, they also radicalized it with their demands for restriction on immigration and channelled it into political action in the 1960s and 1970s (Skenderovic 2003). Still in the 1990s and 2000s, ‘Overforeignization’ was a buzzword used by these parties in campaigns directed against EU membership and the government’s migration policy (Skenderovic and D’Amato 2008). It is also worth noting that for many Swiss, the notion of multicultural society and tolerance towards the ‘other’ refers primarily to ‘native’ minorities and ‘indigenous multiculturalism’. The country’s history is a success story for the integrative force of multiculturalism that binds together the different regions of the country where German, French, Italian and Rhaeto-Romance is respectively spoken. However, multicultural coexistence, reinforced by institutional agreements and political will in favour of minority policy, has largely failed to develop open attitudes towards the new minorities of immigrants (Linder 2010). While the immigrants that came from southern Europe in the 1960s and 1970s were received with much scepticism by large sections of the Swiss population, their counterparts in the 1980s and 1990s, refugees and immigrants from Indochina, Turkey and the former Yugoslavia, were confronted by considerable mistrust. Thus, in contrast to the above-mentioned tolerance argument, opinion polls have consistently provided strong evidence to suggest that the attitudes of exclusion and intolerance towards immigrants that are found among the Swiss population are similar to those found in other Western societies (Armingeon 2000; Cattacin et al. 2006). As the literature argues, the existence of successful radical right-wing movements in the past can be another factor that helps to explain the success or failure of contemporary radical right-wing populist parties (Art 2006). Thus, it was long argued that because Switzerland had not experienced fascism to the degree that most other European countries had, there was a very low level of acceptance within the Swiss political culture for anti-democratic rightist forces. This exceptionalist view, however, has increasingly been challenged by historical research which insists that the Switzerland of the 1930s and 1940s must be seen in the wider European context. Recent studies have convincingly demonstrated that ideologies of discrimination such as anti-Semitism and culture-based racism did emerge and were often more widespread than many had long been made to believe (Altermatt 1999). At the same time, a number of intellectuals represented the Swiss version of the German Conservative Revolution and, with an attitude of cultural despair and fierce anti-modernism, formulated a sharp criticism of liberal and pluralistic society

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as well as parliamentary democracy (Mattioli 1995). Although there is little research on the ways in which the political work of these intellectual and political actors continued during the post-war period, one can certainly say that Switzerland’s political culture has also had long and firmly held traditions of authoritarian, antipluralistic and discriminatory ideas.

Conclusion This chapter has shown that Switzerland can hardly be viewed as an exceptional case among Western democracies when it comes to accounting for parties that have a radical right-wing populist profile. There is a significant history of parties of this type within Switzerland and a number of contextual factors exist that are rather favourable for the emergence of such parties. For a long time, this has been ignored by most specialists in Swiss politics and history, including many domestic scholars who have preferred to adopt an exceptionalist view and have labelled these parties in different ways (e.g. ‘national-conservatives’ when referring to the SVP). Thus, there has so far been little effort to test the Swiss case against the explanatory theories that have been used in cross-national research in order to understand the emergence and consolidation of these parties (for a recent exception, see Art 2011). As suggested, several external factors account for the persistence of radical rightwing populist parties in Switzerland and these help to capture the reasons for their remarkable organizational and electoral continuity since the 1960s. Institutional and political conditions such as direct democracy, federalism, the proportional voting system and consociationalism are important opportunity structures which, contrary to the conventional view, actually helped these parties to mobilize support. They have also been able to benefit from discursive opportunities and symbolic resources drawing on the widely accepted notion of Switzerland as a special case and the ethnic-assimilationist nature of Swiss nationhood. Moreover, the so-called ‘Discourse of Overforeignization’, which turned into an exclusionary tool in relation to the ‘other’, served as an influential reference point for post-war radical right-wing parties. While for a long period of time these Swiss parties experienced only limited success in parliamentary elections, the Swiss People’s Party enjoyed increasing electoral support throughout the 1990s and 2000s at municipal, cantonal and national level. This raises the question of assessing what factors account for this success, and which aspects need to be considered in addition to the enduring institutional and discursive opportunity structures. Certainly, as some have claimed, changing socio-economic conditions and the growing salience of the asylum theme, as well as new policy issues such as Switzerland’s international integration and the re-examination of the country’s role in the Second World War have all provided a new fertile environment. It is equally important, however, to take into account that radical right-wing populist parties are in many ways both the designers and

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the builders of their own success. Thus, after accepting that by all means favourable conditions exist in Switzerland for radical politics, the focus of further research should be centred on the SVP as a political actor and on the way in which the party reinforces cleavages in Swiss society that are linked to various aspects of identity politics (Skenderovic 2009a); for example, by examining the role the SVP plays in the political construction of issues such as migration, asylum seekers and international integration, by presenting them as a threat to national identity. This party-centric approach would also make it possible to catch up with new trends emerging in comparative research on right-wing populist parties, which pays growing attention to the impact that these parties have on public discourses and policies.

Notes 1 The Swiss political system has three institutions of direct democracy at the national level. First, there is the popular initiative, which calls for a partial revision of the constitution and must be signed by 100,000 eligible voters. Second, international treaties and many legislative acts are subject to an optional referendum, meaning that they must be submitted to a vote if so requested by 50,000 eligible voters. Third, revisions of the constitution and membership in organizations for collective security or supranational communities are subject to a mandatory referendum. 2 In fact, of the 113 federal initiatives that were put to the ballot between 1970 and 2010, 18 were submitted by parties and groups associated with the Swiss radical right. Although the voters approved just three of these initiatives, this was above average, since a total of only nine federal initiatives were accepted during the whole of this period. From the 95 optional referenda that were held between 1970 and 2010, 18 were introduced by radical right-wing populist parties and groups. In four cases the voters followed the radical right’s rejection of policy change. This was less than the overall approval rate in optional referenda, which was around one-third. 3 In the 1990s, the SVP consistently tried to stir up resentment against what they called the ‘political class’ by leading controversial referendum campaigns opposing governmental proposals. As a consequence, the referenda dealing with international integration issues were important votes against the government. For example, 73 per cent of those who voted in 1992 against Switzerland’s membership in the European Economic Area (EEA), a treaty vigorously combated by the SVP, were also expressing their mistrust towards the government (Longchamp 1993: 43).

Bibliography Altermatt, U. 1999. Katholizismus und Antisemitismus. Mentalitäten, Kontinuitäten, Ambivalenzen. Zur Kulturgeschichte der Schweiz 1918–1945. Frauenfeld:Verlag Huber. Armingeon, K. 1995. ‘Der Schweizer Rechtsextremismus im internationalen Vergleich’, Swiss Political Science Review, 1(4): 41–64. –––– 1998. ‘Rechtsextremismus: Die Schweiz im internationalen Vergleich’, in H.-R. Wicker (ed.), Nationalismus, Multikulturalismus und Ethnizität. Bern: Haupt, pp. 79–99. –––– 2000. ‘Fremdenfeindlichkeit in der Schweiz in international vergleichender Perspektive’, in R. Moser (ed.), Die Bedeutung des Ethnischen im Zeitalter der Globalisierung. Bern: Haupt, pp. 219–37.

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Art, D. 2006. The Politics of the Nazi Past in Germany and Austria. New York: Cambridge University Press. –––– 2011. Inside the Radical Right. The Development of Anti-Immigrant Parties in Western Europe. New York: Cambridge University Press. Bale, T. 2003. ‘Cinderella and Her Ugly Sisters: The Mainstream and Extreme Right in Europe’s Bipolarising Party Systems’, West European Politics, 26(3): 67–90. Betz, H.-G. 1994. Radical Right-Wing Populism in Western Europe. New York: St. Martin’s Press. Canovan, M. 1999. ‘Trust the People! Populism and the Two Faces of Democracy’, Political Studies, 47(1): 2–16. Carter, E. 2005. The Extreme Right in Western Europe: Success or Failure? Manchester: Manchester University Press. Cattacin, S., Gerber, B., Sardi, M. and Wegener, R. 2006. Monitoring Misanthropy and Rightwing Extremist Attitudes in Switzerland. An explorative study. Geneva: University of Geneva. Donges, P. (ed.) 2005. Politische Kommunikation in der Schweiz. Bern: Haupt. Eatwell, R. 2003. ‘Ten Theories of the Extreme Right’, in P.H. Merkl and L. Weinberg (eds), Right-Wing Extremism in the Twenty-First Century, 2nd edn. London: Frank Cass, pp. 47–73. Froidevaux, D. 1997. ‘Construction de la nation et pluralisme suisses: idéologie et pratiques’, Swiss Political Science Review, 3(4): 29–58. Gentile, P. and Kriesi, H. 1998. ‘Contemporary Radical-Right Parties in Switzerland: History of a Divided Family’, in H.-G. Betz and S. Immerfall (eds), The New Politics of the Right: Neo-Populist Parties and Movements in Established Democracies. New York: Macmillan, pp. 125–41. Goodwin, M.J. 2006. ‘The Rise and Faults of the Internalist Perspective in Extreme Right Studies’, Representation, 42(4): 347–64. Habermas, J. 1996. Between Facts and Norms: Contributions to a Discourse Theory of Law and Democracy. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Hartmann, H. and Horvath, F. 1995. Zivilgesellschaft von Rechts. Die Erfolgsstory der Zürcher SVP. Zurich: Realotopia. Helms, L. 1997. ‘Right-Wing Populist Parties in Austria and Switzerland: A Comparative Analysis of Electoral Support and Conditions of Success’, West European Politics, 20(2): 37–52. Jost, H.U. 2007. ‘Tradition und Modernität in der SVP’, traverse. Zeitschrift für Geschichte, 14(1): 25–44. Karapin, R. 1998. ‘Radical-Right and Neo-Fascist Political Parties in Western Europe’, Comparative Politics, 30(2): 213–34. Kitschelt, H. (in collaboration with A.J. McGann) 1995. The Radical Right in Western Europe: A Comparative Analysis. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Kobach, K.W. 1997. ‘Spurn Thy Neighbour: Direct Democracy and Swiss Isolationism’, West European Politics, 20(3): 185–211. Kohn, H. 1956. Nationalism and Liberty: The Swiss Example. London: George Allen and Unwin. Koopmans, R. and Statham, P. 1999. ‘Ethnic and Civic Conceptions of Nationhood and the Differential Success of the Extreme Right in Germany and Italy’, in M. Giugni, D. McAdam and C. Tilly (eds), How Social Movements Matter. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, pp. 225–51. Koopmans, R., Statham, P., Giugni, M. and Passy, F. 2005. Contested Citizenship: Immigration and Cultural Diversity in Europe. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

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Kriesi, H., Lachat, R., Selb, P., Bornschier, S. and Helbling, M. (eds) 2005. Der Aufstieg der SVP. Acht Kantone im Vergleich. Zurich:Verlag Neue Zürcher Zeitung. Kury, P. 2003. Über Fremde reden. Überfremdungsdiskurs und Ausgrenzung in der Schweiz 1900–1945. Zurich: Chronos Verlag. Ladner, A. 2001. ‘Swiss Political Parties: Between Persistence and Change’, West European Politics, 24(2): 123–44. –––– 2004. ‘The Political Parties and the Party System’, in U. Klöti, P. Knoepfel, H. Kriesi, W. Linder and Y. Papadopoulos (eds), Handbook of Swiss Politics. Zurich: Verlag Neue Züricher Zeitung, pp. 197–242. Lijphart, A. 1984. Democracies: Patterns of Majoritarian and Consensual Government in TwentyOne Countries. New Haven, CT:Yale University Press. Linder, W. 2010. Swiss Democracy: Possible Solutions to Conflict in Multicultural Societies, 3rd edn. London: Macmillan. Longchamp, C. 1993. ‘Den Pelz waschen, ohne ihn nass zu machen. Eine sozialwissenschaftliche Analyse der Entscheidung der Schweiz über den Beitritt zum Europäischen Wirtschaftsraum vom 6. Dezember 1992’, in H. Rust (ed.), Europa-Kampagnen. Vienna: Schriftenreihe des Zentrums für angewandte Politikforschung, pp. 9–57. Lutz, G. 2003. ‘Mobilisierung als Schlüsselfaktor für den Wahlerfolg?’ in P. Sciarini, S. Hardmeier and A. Vatter (eds), Schweizer Wahlen 1999. Elections fédérales 1999. Bern: Haupt, pp. 59–84. Marchal, G.P. 2007. Schweizer Gebrauchsgeschichte. Geschichtsbilder, Mythenbildung und nationale Identität, 2nd edn. Basel: Schwabe. Mattioli, A. (ed.) 1995. Intellektuelle von rechts. Ideologie und Politik in der Schweiz 1918–1939. Zurich: Orell Füssli. Mazzoleni, O. 2008. Nationalisme et populisme en Suisse. La radicalisation de la ‘nouvelle’ UDC, 2nd edn. Lausanne: Presses Polytechniques et Universitaires Romandes. Mazzoleni, O. and Skenderovic, D. 2007. ‘The Rise and Impact of the Swiss People’s Party: Challenging the Rules of Governance in Switzerland’, in P. Delwit and P. Poirier (eds), Extrême droite et pouvoir en Europe – The extreme right parties and power in Europe. Brussels: Editions de l’Université de Bruxelles, pp. 85–116. Melich, A. (ed.) 1991. Die Werte der Schweizer. Bern: Peter Lang. Mény, Y. and Surel, Y. 2002. ‘The Constitutive Ambiguity of Populism’, in Y. Mény and Y. Surel (eds), Democracies and the Populist Challenge. New York: Palgrave, pp. 1–21. Mudde, C. 2007. Populist Radical Right Parties in Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Norris, P. 2005. Radical Right:Voters and Parties in the Electoral Market. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Rydgren, J. 2007. ‘The Sociology of the Radical Right’, Annual Review of Sociology, 33: 241–62. Skenderovic, D. 2003. ‘Constructing Boundaries in a Multicultural Nation: The Discourse of “Overforeignization” in Switzerland’, in R. Ohliger, K. Schönwälder and T. Triadafilopoulos (eds), European Encounters: Migrants, Migration and European Societies since 1945. Aldershot: Ashgate, pp. 186–209. –––– 2007. ‘Immigration and the Radical Right in Switzerland: Ideology, Discourse and Opportunities’, Patterns of Prejudice, 41(2): 155–76. –––– 2009a. The Radical Right in Switzerland: Continuity and Change, 1945–2000. Oxford: Berghahn Books. –––– 2009b. ‘Campagnes et agenda politiques. La transformation de l’Union démocratique du centre’, in O. Mazzoleni and H. Rayner (eds), Les partis politiques suisses: traditions et renouvellement. Paris: Michel Houdiard, pp. 378–409.

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Skenderovic, D. and D’Amato, G. 2008. Mit dem Fremden politisieren. Rechtspopulismus und Migrationspolitik in der Schweiz seit den 1960er Jahren. Zurich: Chronos. Suter, C. (ed.) 2000. Sozialbericht 2000. Zurich: Seismo. Zimmer, O. 2003. A Contested Nation: History, Memory and Nationalism in Switzerland, 1761–1891. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

14 TURKISH EXTREME RIGHT IN OFFICE Whither democracy and democratization? Ekin Burak Arıkan

Introduction The 1990s gave witness to an upsurge of extreme right-wing parties throughout Western Europe. In a few cases these parties even became partners in coalition governments and thus had far-reaching influence in their respective countries. This remarkable development raised concerns about the functioning of democracy in Western Europe and, as a result of this, studies on extreme right-wing parties intensified and a heated debate on both defining the phenomenon and locating these movements on the political spectrum emerged. Akin to its European counterparts, the Turkish extreme right, represented by the Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi (MHP, Nationalist Action Party), steadily increased its electoral support and, for the first time since the 1980 military intervention, surpassed the national threshold, won representation in the Türkiye Büyük Millet Meclisi (TBMM, Turkish Grand National Assembly) and became a coalition partner in the 57th government of Turkey. Because of its non-democratic and violent past, this development raised serious concerns among many about the functioning, and further enhancement, of democracy in Turkey. The MHP, as I have analysed extensively in another study, is remarkably similar to many Western European extreme right-wing parties (Arıkan 2002b). The application of Cas Mudde’s (1995) ‘five common features’ analysis to the party, which is also affirmed by Hainsworth (2000), clearly displays that the MHP is nationalist, racist, xenophobic, anti-democratic and has desires for a strong state, thus situating it within the European extreme right-wing family. Despite this, the MHP also has several clear dissimilarities to its European counterparts. References to the Central Asian roots of the Turks and the party’s emphasis on Islam are the most discernible of these differences. Still, Turkey’s geographical proximity to Europe, her close socio-cultural, socio-political and economic relations with European nations,

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the sizeable number of Turks living in several European countries and her candidature to the European Union have driven MHP closer to the European realm. Thus, studying the party, especially from the perspective of its relations to Turkish democracy and democratization, seems to be both interesting and worthwhile. The primary aim of this chapter is to clarify whether the MHP is an antidemocratic force and a threat to Turkish democratization. The main hypothesis of this study is that the MHP is a political force that opposes the establishment and consolidation of participatory democracy in Turkey. Further, it is a party that systematically challenges the ongoing democratization process in the country. Thus, the party opposes both the vertical and the horizontal dimensions of liberal democracy. Verifying this hypothesis, however, is not easy. The party, like several Western European extreme right-wing parties, appears, at least on the public level, to be supportive of democracy and its rules and regulations. Neither printed party materials, including the party programme, books and brochures prepared by the party school, nor election leaflets openly support an anti-democratic position. However, an in-depth analysis of the party, its ideology, the way it functions internally, and the party MPs and leader’s actions both in the parliament and in the government (1999–2002) gives significant clues about its anti-democratic stance and how it can threaten the democratization process in Turkey. The first section of this chapter is devoted to a brief analysis of the Turkish political structure. The following section familiarizes the reader with the historical development of the MHP. The third section is devoted to an analysis of the MHP ideology and its relation to democracy. This analysis clearly shows the anti-democratic roots of the party. The fourth section looks into the current political programme of the party and how it views and relates to democracy. At first sight, the party demonstrates a belief in liberal democracy. A closer analysis, however, shows that the MHP’s version of democracy is one that is contrary to the basic principles of a participatory democracy. The final section is dedicated to the analysis of the antidemocratic position and actions of the party in government. All reform packages brought before parliament with the aim of democratizing Turkish democracy were relentlessly criticized and opposed by the MHP. The MHP, thus, is a significant political force that aims to establish a limited democratic order in Turkey.

Turkish state, politics and democracy Since Ottoman times, the Turkish state was always deemed a sacred entity, both by the elites and the masses, and thus has always been beyond question. The attempts at modernizing the declining Ottoman Empire, which intensified after the Tanzimat period, did not change the sacred status of the state in Turkish politics. The modernization process was initiated and administered, first by the Ottoman and later by the republican elite. It was a modernization ‘from above’. For the republican elite the periphery constituted the greatest danger to the political unity of the republic. The Said rebellion in Southeast Anatolia and the Menemen incident were both interpreted as proofs of this danger.1 According to Mardin (1977), ruling the

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periphery through top-down law-making simply duplicated the Ottoman social administration mechanism. The chessboard-like structure of Anatolia was refused altogether by the official doctrine of the republic. The new generations educated with this doctrine viewed all ethnic, local and religious groups of Anatolia as unessential remnants of the dark ages of the Ottoman Empire. The failure of the republican elite’s grand structural changes and mass mobilizing measures put enormous pressure on the official ideology. This was more than any ideology could sustain. This ideology, one that glorified the sacredness and the unity of the Turkish state, continued to dominate Turkish politics in the following decades. Once the Demokrat Parti (DP, Democrat Party) government became the centre of attraction for the long-forgotten peripheral (mostly reactionary) forces, it was ended by the 1960 military intervention. Mardin (1977) argues that this intervention signified the deep divide between the periphery and the centre, which was strongly associated with the dogmatic structure of the regime. The 1971 and the 1980 interventions were both carried out in order to reassert the raison d’être of this republican dogma. When the forces of the periphery came into conflict with the centre, the dogmatic defensive reflex always came from the military and suppressed these peripheral forces. The 1980 military intervention played a unique role in republican political history. The intervention put an end to the long-lasting coherence of the Turkish military and civilian bureaucracy with the intelligentsia. Unlike the situation during and after the 1960 military intervention, in this instance the Turkish intelligentsia was among those who were severely punished by the military. As a result, they were excluded from the post-military political design processes. The 1982 constitution, as Metin Heper (1988), a prominent student of Turkish politics, pointed out, was a ‘mixed’ constitution that wished to ‘regulate’ democracy in Turkey. Accordingly, against any future drift of the political regime towards extreme instrumentalization (or peripheralization) the ultimate guardian of the state was the military, not the civil bureaucratic elite or any other institution. This carved an arena for the state against ‘politics’ (Heper 1988). As a result a participatory democracy did not flourish in Turkey and the political structure which grew out of this can better be termed an authoritarian state with a democratic outlook. Naturally, Turkish democracy has taken significant strides since Heper’s findings. Primarily due to the Turkish candidature to the European Union, both vertical and horizontal dimensions of democracy have become centres of political debate in Turkey. The MHP has been actively participating in this debate on the side of the anti-democratic forces. It is therefore important to elucidate the anti-democratic roots and traditions of the party, which are covered in the following section.

History of the Turkish extreme right The first extreme right-wing party of Turkey, Cumhuriyetçi Köylü Millet Partisi (CKMP, Republican Peasant Farmers’ Nation Party) was founded in 1948 by

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General Fevzi Çakmak. In 1965 Alparslan Türkeş and his friends were elected to the party leadership and, consequently, Turkist and virulent anti-communist features started to acquire importance in party rhetoric. In the party Congress of 1967 a new programme that was based on ‘communitarian nationalism’ and Dokuz Işık Doktirini (Nine Lights Doctrine) were accepted. Türkeş was declared Başbuğ (the ‘great leader’), and he made his well-known statement, ‘whoever joins the cause and then becomes a traitor, kill him’. It was not only nationalist ideologies that were turned into a violent political tool in the hands of the MHP, but Islam was also being politicized as a force that could be manipulated against rising Marxist currents. With the advance of the 1970s, Türkeş and his aides began referring to Islam as an indispensable part of Turkish culture. This new combination was called the Turkish-Islamic synthesis. Türkeş articulated this synthesis in the following words: ‘We are as Turk as the Tengri mountain [the MHP maintains that the Turks’ ancestors emigrated from Central Asia], and as Muslim as the Hira Mountain [which is located in the Muslim holy lands in Saudi Arabia]. Both philosophies are our principles’ (Bora and Can 1988: 54). It was the 1969 Adana Congress that marked the end of an era for the Turkish nationalists. The name of the party was changed from CKMP to MHP; the rank and file Turkists who opposed the Turkish-Islamic synthesis were expelled and a hierarchical structure, which primarily augmented Türkeş’s powers, was institutionalized. The anti-capitalist and anti-Masonic rhetoric of the party was also set aside, a tribute to the workings of the forces of the establishment, which increasingly considered the MHP as a legitimate force because of its stringent anticommunism (Bora and Can 1988: 46). In the years 1969–74 the party remained a marginal force in Turkish politics, receiving around 3 per cent electoral support. The party’s fortunes turned in 1975 when they were invited to join the Milli Cephe (National Front) government alongside the right-wing Adalet Partisi (AP, Justice Party) and the Islamist Milli Selamet Partisi (MSP, National Salvation Party). Although in the 1977 elections the MHP almost doubled its vote share, the party leadership was not satisfied. It was hoped that the coalition experience would integrate the party into the system as a legitimate actor and widen its base of support. Even though the party succeeded in attracting an increasing number of marginalized members of the middle class who faced difficulties in adapting to the rise of entrepreneurial capitalism, economic hardship and inflation, the party’s inflexible and rigid attitude towards change constrained its electoral prospects. Rather than adopting a new strategy and programme that would tackle the problems of the Turkish society, it remained a single-issue party whose only concern was an anti-communist stance. Before the party could find time to reflect on its minimal electoral accomplishment, the curtain fell on the MHP in 1980 as the military intervened and suspended all political activity. Although the 1980 military coup primarily smashed the left into pieces, the MHP was also hit hard by the harsh measures of the intervention. Many MHP supporters and members were given various prison sentences.

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This constituted a period during which the Ülkücüler (nationalists) found themselves, for the first time in their history, having to question their unconditional support of the Turkish state. A book written by Alparslan Türkeş (1995) at the time, entitled Basılan Kervanımız (Our Suppressed Journey) expressed this sense of betrayal by the state. It is also at this time that one of the prominent leaders of the party, Agah Oktay Güner, said, ‘We are in prison, yet our ideology is in government’; this became a popular slogan in Ülkücü circles, reflecting their disillusionment and sense of betrayal by the Turkish state. In the 1987 general and 1991 local elections, the party showed no particular gain at the polls and its performance was almost identical to the pre-1980 period. In 1991 the MHP entered the elections in a coalition pact with the Islamist Refah Partisi (RP, Welfare Party) in order to circumvent the 10 per cent threshold restriction, which it could not achieve on its own, and as a result won 19 seats in the parliament. Parliamentary representation seemed to have been beneficial for the party. In the 1994 local elections its vote share rose to 8 per cent, while it further increased 0.6 per cent in the following parliamentary elections in 1995. This time, however, the MHP could not enter the parliament due to the election barrier. In 1997,Türkeş died at the age of 80.The death of Türkeş was a new and difficult challenge for the party that now found itself facing an uncertain future. In November 1997 the party congress elected Devlet Bahçeli as party chair and thus opened a new era in MHP’s history. Bahçeli was seen as a figure who could reunite the party around its founding principles. Aware of this potential, Bahçeli and his aides quickly set to restructure the party’s policies and strategies, in order to appeal to the expectations of MHP’s electorate in the countryside, along with to its urban supporters. The party core rapidly concentrated its energy on the re-establishment of links with the conservative electorate in central Anatolia. Since it served a dual purpose, this policy turned out to be very successful. While support for the party in the countryside started to increase steadily, the new policy helped Bahçeli to further consolidate his power within the party structure. The branches that refused to accept the directives issued by the party core were immediately dissolved. The foundation of a party school and the establishment of a Research and Development (R&D) department were all organized to restore the party core’s domination over the parts and to indoctrinate the members in line with the ideals of the party administration. As a result, the autocracy of Bahçeli was established, ideological standards were re-enforced and links with the rural electorate were strengthened. As the results of the 1999 general elections revealed, this policy was very successful. The MHP crossed the electoral threshold by a large margin and emerged as the second largest group in the parliament.

The MHP ideology: any trace of democracy? Parties and party ideologies are not immune to change. They adapt themselves to changing political conditions. Since its foundation in the late 1940s, the MHP has

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undergone several transformations. With the changing conditions in Turkish politics, the party ideology has been altered, renovated and revised several times in the past. In line with this process, numerous party programmes have been written. Although almost all versions of the party programme made references to democracy (as the most virtuous regime in the world), democracy and democratization did not occupy a central position in any of these programmes. The ideological core of the party, Turkish nationalism, always weighed heavier than any other feature of the programme. The first party programme, valid until the 1960s, contained a corporatist, developmental-modernist ideology primarily underlined by a Kemalist restoration agenda. During the 1950s, under the leadership of Osman Bölükbaşı, the party ideology was shaped by a populist, conservative and nationalist stance, which was primarily supported by peasants and by the middle classes. Between 1965 and 1969, Turkist and virulent anti-communist features started to acquire importance in party ideology and rhetoric. This was primarily a response to the rise of Marxist revolutionary groups and factions in Turkish politics. Since the 1967 Congress, the centrepiece of the party programme has been based on the Dokuz Işık Doktrini (DID), ‘the path of development and glorification’ written by Alparslan Türkeş. In the 1993 party programme, the DID was introduced to the reader as a doctrine that eliminated all liberal-capitalism, communism, Westernism and imitationism as systems that are contrary to the history and traditions of the Turks. The DID’s nine principles are: nationalism, idealism, moralism, communitarianism, positivism, ruralism, libertarianism and character-building, modernization, and populism and industrialism (Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi Programı 1993). Interestingly enough there is no reference to democracy among the nine DID principles. Against possible criticisms that would label the DID fascist, Türkeş on several occasions urged the party to differentiate their ideology from national-socialism: ‘National-socialism is based on capitalism, (anthropological) racism that is created in laboratories, and anti-democratic ideas. However, the followers of the DID believe in Turkish communitarianism, a social-psychologically defined (moral) respect for ancestral traditions (lineageism), and a true democratic system’ (Türkeş 1996: 19). The characteristics of ‘a true democratic system’ as mentioned by Türkeş, however, were never made clear. People very well knew that the MHP was nationalist and ‘in the service of the Turkish nation’, but no one knew how the party viewed democracy. The first four principles of the DID (nationalism, idealism, moralism, communitarianism), clearly display that, once it acquires power, the MHP favours establishing a fascist-like corporatist state, rather than a ‘liberal’ democracy. It is clearly stated that the MHP movement is a reaction against individualism, competition, and a society based on political and economic struggles between the classes. Turkish society is viewed as an organic whole and the programme aims to abolish class conflict and to create a harmonious society. As with corporatism, Turkish society is seen as a body and the individuals as the cells composing it. The criticisms of both egalitarianism and capitalist economic ideas, and the extreme glorification

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of a paternalist state idea, strengthen the corporatist character of the MHP programme. What is strange about the MHP is that these ideas were still supported by the party in the mid-1990s. By that same time, almost all Western European extremeright movements had adopted a more democratic position and rhetoric (at least at a cosmetic level) and had eliminated nearly all fascist(ic) arguments from their vocabulary. Like Turkey itself, the MHP was late to adapt itself to changing world politics. Although the MHP, like the Front National (FN, National Front) of France, had the chance to benefit considerably from the ideology of a right-wing think-tank, the Aydınlar Ocağı (AO, Hearth of Intellectuals), which during the late 1970s and early 1980s had served almost all of the Turkish right, this group failed to adopt a more democratic and economically liberal stance. The collapse of the communist bloc was welcomed by the party administration and supporters: were they not the ones who relentlessly fought against communism? Hence, the victory was theirs. The truth, however, was different. The victory was not theirs; it was, instead, a victory for capitalist liberal democracy. For a long time, the MHP had not only been criticizing communism (a class-based ideology) but it had also been severely condemning capitalism (an individualistic ideology) (Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi Programı 1993). The organic society that it has traditionally idealized was very much in contradiction to the plural socio-political structures of Western democracies. While the European extreme right was going through a substantial transformation, the MHP was standing still. Even though the party was static towards change, some party members were aware of the changing dynamics of world politics. Devlet Bahçeli (the current leader of the party) was among those who demanded change. During his party secretariat, he and Ali Güngör started a reform movement that aimed to transform the MHP into a modern mass Political Party. The team efforts of Bahçeli-Güngör first became visible in the 1988 programme of the party. It was only with this programme that democracy started to acquire some significance and attention in the party ideology and rhetoric. When compared to previous MHP programmes, the classical fascist(ic) rhetoric of the party was softened. The changes were not radical, however, and their primary aim was to uplift the public image of the party (Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi Programı 1988). The rigid statements of the past were removed from the new programme. Although the core of the programme was preserved, it was now far more modestly emphasized (Bora and Can 1988). The arguments on a possible ‘organic’ Turkish nation were moderated and more emphasis was given to the historical/cultural roots of the Turks. The new programme was based on four primary concepts: legitimacy, respect for human character and rights, the rule of law and devotion (Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi Programı 1988). The emphasis on democracy, however, was singled out to be the most significant change in the new programme. The old ‘national democracy’ concept was replaced by ‘national, democratic, rule of law state’. The programme repudiated all interventions to the functioning of democracy. This was linked to the concept of legitimate government. Above all, the emphasis on human rights

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and rule of law meant that the 1988 programme was radically different from its predecessors. Despite this, as the subsequent programme (1993) shows, the party continued to emphasize corporatist fascistic elements in their party programmes. The final party programme, which is explored at length in the next section, further eliminated fascist(ic) statements and stressed the party’s commitment to democracy. These changes did not, however, all reflect the ideas and actions of the MHP supporters and the party members. As elaborated in depth in the next section, in fact, once the party was in power, the make-up melted away and the MHP was once again seen with its bona fide anti-democratic face.

MHP and democracy: the new party programme According to the 2003 party programme, the first and most important value for the MHP is nationalism. Turkish nation and nationalism are perceived to be the safeguards of the independence and strength of the Turkish republic. They also claim to be the guardians of democracy in Turkey (Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi Programı 2003). Democracy is singled out to be the second significant principle of the party. With this programme, the MHP accepted a modern definition of democracy. Accordingly, concepts such as rule of law, respect for human rights and individual liberties are incorporated. Democracy is considered to be the best political system in the world and one that would create national unity, societal peace and a peaceful order in Turkey. Obviously, a properly functioning democratic order confirms national unity and creates a peaceful order. But in order to achieve this, democracy must be seen as an end in itself. Traditionally, the MHP has always concentrated its efforts on fighting against any force that it has believed would weaken the national unity of the country. Accordingly, the party constantly interpreted democracy as a means to achieve its self-defined comprehension of Turkish national unity. Democracy as an end does not mean much to MHP. As the party programme clearly shows, the primary aim of the party is not to establish a well-functioning democracy in Turkey, but to use it as a means to achieve its narrowly defined national unity and peaceful order (Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi Programı 2003). A robust national unity and a peaceful order, however, can only materialize within a democratic regime that creates a suitable atmosphere in which the citizens can openly debate and criticize the character of the regime in which they live. Obviously, such a regime is not the MHP’s preference. The third paragraph of the democracy section is devoted to a critique of the Turkish elite. It is argued that in order to institute a working democracy in Turkey, the Turkish elite must first themselves internalize democracy, should not overlook their fellow citizens, and must hold with the national and moral values of the society. To a certain extent, the criticism is well founded. Political actors in Turkey have traditionally been highly elitist. In a globalizing world, however, expecting the Turkish elite to act within the limits of national/local moral values carries the risk of jeopardizing democratization in Turkey. The MHP views democracy and a productive civil society from a strictly defined nation-state perspective. As the

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subsequent sections show, the party relentlessly criticizes almost any idea that is supported by the actors of the civil society on the grounds that it does not accord with the norms and values of the people. The party and its supporters from time to time even go as far as accusing the pioneers of these ideas of high treason (Nihat 2001). Finally, the MHP believes that it is their duty to put a stop to any provocative and violent action, though ‘within the limits of rule of law’. When defining democracy, reference for provocative and violent actions and how to tackle them is nothing but absurd. This on its own shows the MHP’s securityoriented mentality and how it tries to legitimize it by using concepts like rule of law and democracy. The next section of the programme is dedicated to human rights and liberties. The first two paragraphs of the section underline the significance of human rights and liberties as indispensable components of democracy and how they must be protected. Soon, however, one realizes that these are nothing but cliché repetitions of internationally accepted norms and values. The real intentions of the party come to light with the third paragraph. For the party, the acknowledgement and protection of human rights and liberties are not taken for granted. They are conditional. They will only be respected as long as the behaviour and/or action of the individual complies with the indivisible unity of the country, state and the nation. Once again the emphasis is on national unity. Human rights and liberties, as the word ‘human’ indicates, are related to the rights and liberties of human beings and evidently not related to any sort of ‘unity’. What is more, ‘the indivisible unity of the country, state and the nation’ is such vague terminology that anyone can interpret it in a different way. Such a condition surely nullifies MHP’s sincerity as regards respecting and providing the basic rights of Turkish citizens. Accordingly, a Turkish citizen’s basic human rights can be violated if that individual acts against ‘the indivisible unity of the country, state and the nation’. The fifth section of the MHP programme is devoted to democratization and rights and liberties (Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi Programı 2003). There are eight subheadings under this section: democratization, the protection of human rights and liberties, torture, a social contract-like constitution, freedom of thought, equality before law, the right to organize and demonstrate, rights for women and children. Only a sentence or two explains each subheading and these are all cliché statements which in reality do not mean much at all. The most significant subheading, which once again displays the anti-democratic understanding of the party, is ‘freedom of thought’. For the party, Turkish citizens are free to think whatever they like, as long as these thoughts do not contradict national unity, the public good and the accepted moral values of the population. This clearly contradicts the definition of freedom of thought. The research conducted and books printed by the Party School (PS) and the Research and Development (R&D) branch of the party are other indicators of the MHP’s level of interest in democracy and democratization. Neither the R&D branch nor the PS has published any book on democracy and democratization in Turkey. With the Turkish candidature to the European Union, the transition of

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both state and society towards democracy has received significant attention (Heper 1988). The neglect of these debates by the R&D branch and the PS of the party, both of which are composed of academics, can be considered as a clear indicator of the level of interest given to democracy by the party. The analysis of the MHP’s recent party programme clearly demonstrates that the MHP is not sincerely devoted to the establishment of a contemporary democracy in Turkey. Rather it aims to preserve the narrowly defined semi-democratic nationstate in the country. The party distorts such concepts as democracy, human rights and freedom of thought in order to achieve its ultimate goal of creating a homogeneous organic society. It is obvious that the party during the 1990s has only instituted a public relations exercise rather than transforming itself into a democratic political force.

Democratization, Copenhagen Criteria and the MHP As mentioned earlier, the 1982 constitution was a product of the military junta. Shaped and sealed by the generals, the new constitution did not allow the establishment of a properly functioning participatory democracy in Turkey. Often, the state security forces violated human and minority rights and ‘the rule of law’, as the indispensable values of a modern democratic state were pushed aside. With the Turkish candidature to the EU, the constitutional shortcomings began to be more openly expressed by the Turkish intelligentsia. The ‘EU process’ has had major positive effects on the forces of democracy in Turkey. Concepts like democratization, human rights, rule of law and minority rights were all incorporated into the daily vocabulary of Turkish citizens. Political Parties have had to clarify their positions vis-à-vis Turkish candidature to the EU. Turkish society, though unhurriedly, was going through the kind of extensive transformation process that can only be equated to the early days of the republic. The transformation process speeded up in the late 1990s. Reforms towards satisfying the requirements of the Copenhagen Criteria also gave rise to various societal tensions. The reflections of these were also seen in Turkish politics. While some political actors supported the ever intensifying reform process, others were sceptical about the EU process. Interestingly, none of these actors (including the political Islamists) totally refused Turkish membership to the EU. The MHP belonged to the sceptical group. They supported Turkish candidature to the EU since it was now ‘state policy’. Yet, at every occasion they fought against any democratization attempt that aimed to meet the Copenhagen Criteria. Democratization attempts intensified during the period when the MHP was in power (1999–2002). Reform packages brought before the parliament were both severely criticized and outrightly refused by the party. Three constitutional amendment proposals (abolition of capital punishment, rights of minority foundations and broadcasting in native languages) aimed at meeting the Copenhagen Criteria, or in other words further democratizing Turkey, are chosen as examples of MHP’s strict opposition to democratization. Democracy for the party, as explained above,

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is nothing more than an instrument to actualize its perception of national unity. This perception leaves no space for either human or minority rights. During its election campaign leading up to the 1999 parliamentary elections, the MHP promised that it would immediately execute Abdullah Öcalan, the leader of the PKK, once it came to power. Eventually, the MHP came second in the elections and joined the coalition government of Bülent Ecevit. Soon, with increasing pressure from the EU, the government decided to abolish capital punishment. The MHP was stuck between standing behind its promise of executing Öcalan or continuing to benefit from the gains of political office. For the party, the midand/or long-term benefits of democratization did not mean much at all. As a party that approaches political democracy from a short-term and pragmatic perspective, it decided to oppose the proposal and not to resign from the government. Again, for pragmatic reasons, this was also accepted by the coalition partners of the MHP. During the discussions in the parliament, the MHP speakers linked the proposal to the execution of Abdullah Öcalan. The party members maintained that the real aim of the proposal was simply to save Öcalan from execution. They viewed the proposal as an exclusive amnesty for the leader of the PKK. Thus, in MHP Erzurum MP İsmail Köse’s words, the MHP refused to participate in this evil action (TBMM 2002a). Despite MHP’s opposition, the proposal was accepted thanks to the support of the opposition parties. The elimination of capital punishment was only a start. The proposition that would allow minority foundations to hold property and to exercise authority over it was also refused by the MHP. According to the articles of the Treaty of Lausanne, the property rights of Turkish citizens of Jewish, Armenian and Greek origin were guaranteed. Yet, minority foundations had been deprived of this right. Thus, their existence was left to the mercy of the Turkish state. The aim of the proposed constitutional amendment was to correct this anti-egalitarian treatment of the minority foundations. The Treaty of Lausanne defined Turkish minorities in reference to religion and, hence, Turkish Christians (Greeks and Armenians) and Jews were considered as minorities and were given particular rights. The MHP officially accepted the outcomes of the treaty (TBMM 2002b) and, thus, in principle it acknowledged its acceptance of the legal status of the Turkish minorities. But that was as far as its acceptance went. The MHP was ready to display its genuine hatred towards minorities. Its criticisms were underlined by a revolting racist rhetoric. During the hearings, the speaker for the party group was İrfan Keleş. Keleş’s openly racist speech was frequently interrupted by the cheers and applause of the MHP MPs. In his speech, he argued that, with the proposed amendment, the land of the nation was being sold to Armenians, Greeks and Jews (TBMM 2002c). It was here that the applause from the MHP members reached a crescendo. Keleş, however, definitely missed a few important points. First of all, the land was not to be sold to minorities (they already had the right to own property), but to minority foundations. Even if this was the case, the land of Turkish citizens was again being sold to other

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Turkish citizens, not to Armenians, Greeks or Jews as he narrowly defined them. The land would be sold to Turkish citizens originating from different ethnic and religious backgrounds. Obviously, Keleş was trying to provoke hatred among the citizens of the Turkish republic. Above all, his speech and the supportive cheers of the MHP MPs clearly demonstrated how the MHP viewed its fellow citizens of different ethnic and religious backgrounds. It was obvious that the MHP did not consider minorities as Turkish citizens. For Keleş, the proposal also contained several risks. What if, for instance, an Armenian foundation decided to own property in Diyarbakır,Van, Ağrı and Kars?2 What if the same foundation declared that it would help Armenia since it had lots of money? (TBMM 2002c). In a way he was stating that the minority foundations were a threat to Turkish territorial integrity. Thus, extending their rights was considered to be a vital danger to the very existence of the Turkish republic. Within the traditionally defined national unity of the MHP, the minorities did not hold any place at all. Despite the MHP opposition, this proposal was also accepted with the support of the opposition parties. The tension once again rose when a proposal to lift the ban on broadcasting in native languages was brought before the Turkish parliament. The MHP opposed the proposal from a strictly defined, nation-state perspective. First of all, there was no minority in Turkey other than that specified by the Treaty of Lausanne. In his speech delivered to the parliament, a leading MHP MP, Koray Aydın, pointed out that there was no Muslim minority in Turkey (TBMM 2002b). With ‘Muslim minorities’ he was in fact referring to Kurds. In his opinion, through the EU process the West was seeking to pursue its traditional policy of dividing Turkey geographically. For Aydın, it was the same hostile mentality that had once tried to achieve this evil objective through the implementation of the Treaty of Sèvres. The only difference was that this time they were not using military but political and economic tactics (Copenhagen Criteria). The MHP interpreted the right to broadcast and to be educated in native languages as the first step in this separationist project. According to Aydın, the second step would be the establishment of a federal structure in Turkey. Furthermore, the proposal, in his opinion, was contrary to Article 42 of the constitution; thus the sponsors of the proposal were also committing a constitutional offence.3 Eventually, the proposal was firmly rejected by the MHP MPs on the basis that it carried a potential to endanger the very existence and integrity of the Turkish nation. Once again the amendment was passed thanks to the support of the opposition parties. The first clause of the Copenhagen Criteria is, in fact, a brief definition of a modern democratic state. It asks that candidate countries stabilize their political institutions so as to guarantee democracy, the rule of law, human rights and respect for and protection of minorities. The three constitutional amendment proposals clearly aimed to meet the first clause of the Copenhagen Criteria. Above all, they endeavoured to establish a modern democratic state in Turkey. The MHP, although claiming to support both Turkish candidature to the EU and a viable democracy in Turkey, is actually against any sort of democratization attempt.

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Conclusion As the most prominent extreme right-wing party in Turkey, the MHP has always been one of the most significant anti-democratic forces in the country. Ideologically speaking, since the foundation of the party, all MHP programmes have had authoritarian and/or fascistic outlooks. Democracy and democratization never acquired any significance within the party ideology and programme. The changes that were employed towards adopting a more democratic rhetoric by the 1990s were only a cosmetic that melted away once the party achieved political power. The MHP’s version of a modern liberal democracy can be better termed a ‘conditional democracy’. Almost all the features of a modern democracy are pushed aside in favour of the better interests of the state. Thus, the MHP does not support human rights and liberties, the rule of law and minority rights. If liberal democracy is equality through liberty, the MHP believes in neither equality nor liberty. As such, the MHP is a political force that is a threat to both the functioning of democracy and democratization in Turkey. The MHP, with reference to Heper’s terminology, is one of the best examples of ‘absence of learning’ of Political Parties in Turkey with reference to democracy (Heper 1991b).

Notes 1 The Said rebellion was a Kurdish uprising with strong Islamic undertones, while the Menemen incident was purely an Islamist uprising against secularization attempts. 2 Most of the cities named by Keleş had been densely populated by Armenians in the past. 3 Article 42 of the constitution states that, ‘No language other than Turkish can be taught as a native language in Turkish education institutions’.

Bibliography Arıkan, E.B. 1998. ‘The Programme of the Nationalist Action Party of Turkey: An Iron Hand in a Velvet Glove?’, Middle Eastern Studies, 34(4): 120–34. –––– 2002a. ‘Türkeş’ten Bahçeliye Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi: Değişim Nereye Kadar?’ in S. Öngider (ed.), Milliyetçilik, Faşizm ve MHP. İstanbul: Aykırı Yayıncılık, pp. 49–79. –––– 2002b. ‘Turkish Ultra-Nationalists under Review: A Study of the Nationalist Action Party’, Nations and Nationalism, 8(3): 357–76. Bora,T. and Can, K. 1988. Devlet Ocak Dergah: 12 Eylül’den 1990lar’a Ülkücü Hareket. İstanbul: İletişim Yayınları. Dahl, R.A. 1982. Dilemmas of Pluralist Democracy: Autonomy vs. Control. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Hainsworth, P. (ed.) 2000. The Politics of the Extreme Right: From the Margins to the Mainstream. London: Pinter Publishers. Heper, M. 1985. The State Tradition in Turkey. North Humberside: The Eothen Press. –––– 1988. ‘State and Society in Turkish Political Experience’, in H. Metin and A. Evin (eds), State, Democracy and the Military: Turkey in the 1980s. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. –––– 1991a. ‘Introduction’, in M. Heper and J.M. Landau (eds), Political Parties and Democracy in Turkey. London: I.B. Tauris, pp. 1–10.

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–––– 1991b. ‘Transitions to Democracy Reconsidered: A Historical Perspective’, in D.A. Rustow and K.P. Erickson (eds), Comparative Political Dynamics. Research Perspectives at the Turn of the Century. New York: The Johns Hopkins Press, pp. 192–211. –––– 1999. ‘Başkalaşmadan Değişen Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi’, Türkiye Günlügü, 55: 12–22. Landau, J.M. 1991. ‘Conclusion’, in M. Heper and J.M. Landau (eds), Political Parties and Democracy in Turkey. London: I.B. Tauris, pp. 202–7. Linz, J.J. 1980. ‘Political Space and Fascism as a Late-Comer’, in S. Larsen et al. (eds), Who Were the Fascists? Social Roots of European Fascism. Bergen: Universitetsforlage. Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi Programı. 1988. Milliyetci Hareket Partisi Programı. Ankara: MHP Party Press. –––– 1993. Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi Programı. Ankara: MHP Party Press. –––– 2003. Available at: http://www.mhp.org.tr/Tanitim/Prg&Tzk/Program.htm#_Toc 511564223. Mardin, Ş. 1977. ‘Center-Periphery Relations: A Key to Turkish Politics?’, Daedalus, Winter. Mudde, C. 1995. ‘What, Who, Why? The Defining of the Extreme Right Family’, ECPR Joint Sessions Proceedings, Bordeaux: 8. Nihat, M. 2001. ‘Tetikçiler Çırılçıplak’, Daily Ortadoğu, 12 December. Sartori, G. 1987. The Theory of Democracy Revisited. Part 2: The Classical Issues. Chatham, NJ: Chatham House. TBMM 2002a. General Assembly Minutes, 21(124): 9. –––– 2002b. General Assembly Minutes, 21(125): 120. –––– 2002c. General Assembly Minutes, 21(125): 57. Türkeş, A. 1995. Basılan Kervanımız. [Our Suppressed Journey]. Istanbul: Hamle. –––– 1996. Milliyetçilik. İstanbul: Hamle. Wolfreys, J. 1993. ‘The Programme of the National Front: An Iron Hand in a Velvet Glove’, Parliamentary Affairs, 46(3): 420.

15 SCANDINAVIAN RIGHT-WING PARTIES Diversity more than convergence? Marie Demker

Right-wing parties and the political opportunity structure In countries such as Belgium, France, Austria, Italy, Denmark and the Netherlands extreme-right parties have thrived on xenophobia.These parties usually express a defensive attitude towards rapid cultural changes in their own national states. Some of these parties have been successful in gaining support, some also in enjoying policy influence, but many of them are characterized by sudden but short-lived success.1 A puzzling question is why extreme-right parties have not developed in the same way in the three Scandinavian countries – Denmark, Norway and Sweden. These Scandinavian countries are often studied together because it is generally admitted that they share a common political culture, characterized by proportional representation, stable parliamentary democracy and a social democratic welfare state. Yet, whereas in Sweden the extreme right has enjoyed only brief and recent electoral success at national level, in Denmark the Dansk Folkeparti (Danish People’s Party) has become a parliamentary force, supporting the government since 2001,while in Norway the Fremskrittspartiet (Progress Party) with 38 seats has been the second largest party in parliament since 2005 but excluded from influence. This chapter discusses these differences among the Scandinavian countries and explores the reasons why Sweden seems to be different from its Scandinavian neighbours. Empirically, there is no evidence to support a direct correlation between the level of immigration in a given country and strong electoral support for an extreme-right party.2 Other reasons may equally explain the electoral strength of such parties, notably domestic variations in the political opportunity structure (Tarrow 1994; Kitschelt 1995; Koopmans and Statham 2000; Meyer and Minkoff 2004; Kestilä and Söderlund 2007). Tarrow argues that the concept of ‘political opportunity structure’ is crucial to understanding the formation and development of social movements and social protest. The starting point of this approach is that external

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factors enhance or inhibit prospects for mobilization and that these factors could explain why certain claims and strategies affect political institutions and others do not. This approach has nevertheless been criticized for being both too narrow and too broad, for being vague and for neglecting phenomena like ideologies and identities (Benford 1995; Koopmans 1999). Ruud Koopmans (1999: 100) points out that the political opportunity structure approach is more powerful in explaining cross-national variations than in longitudinal single-case studies. Therefore, in this chapter I will analyse differences between Scandinavian xenophobic extreme-right parties, with a clear focus on Sweden as a deviant case (Downs 2001; Bleich 2002; Ivarsflaten 2005; Frölund Thomsen 2006). I will use a modified model of political opportunity structure by arguing that (a) the immigration issue must be put on the political agenda by legitimate societal actors, (b) the immigration issue must be perceived as an ideological issue where a usually well-mobilized anti-immigration lobby seems to oppose a non-mobilized pro-immigration one, and (c) existing political cleavages provide a grid through which immigration policy can be understood. It is important to stress that Scandinavian countries are not politically as similar as many outsiders tend to believe (Rokkan 1987; Björgo 1997; Demker 2006b). Since the 1950s the party systems in both Norway and Sweden have developed in different ways with polarization in Norway and an overcrowded middle-ground in Sweden (Demker and Svåsand 2005). Sweden on one hand and Norway and Denmark on the other differ in political cleavages. The Swedish party system has for a long time been characterized by the left–right cleavage, but in Denmark and Norway it is structured around several regional, urban/rural and religious cleavages. The more pluralized political landscape in Denmark and Norway tends to give room for xenophobia as a political issue, while in Sweden this issue must be subordinated to the left–right cleavage. I argue that the most plausible explanation of the divergence in voter success between the right-wing parties in Scandinavia is that the political opportunity structure in Sweden for parties on the right of the right has been unfavourable, while in Denmark and Norway this is not the case.3 As an additional explanation I will argue that the newest right-extremist party in Sweden – Sverigedemokraterna (Sweden Democrats) – has a history of racism and linkage with Nazism that sets its origins apart from the more opportunistic right-extremist parties in Denmark and Norway (cf. Rydgren and Widfeldt 2004; Ivarsflaten 2006).

Party strategy of right-extremist parties in Scandinavian agenda-setting Political scientist Anders Widfeldt has described Danish and Norwegian rightextremist parties as a product of the second wave of European extreme-right politics since the end of the Second World War (Rydgren and Widfeldt 2004: 12–17), a wave which followed a first attempt made by Nazi and fascist parties to reorganize in the aftermath of the war (cf. Engene 2005). From 1955 until 1980, this second

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wave was characterized by populist protest movements with mostly tax protests and anti-modernism on the agenda. Mogens Glistrup’s Fremskridtspartiet in Denmark and Anders Lange’s Parti in Norway were two such 1970s parties, whose rhetoric echoed to an extent the French Poujadists of the 1950s.Yet, these Danish and Norwegian parties were not xenophobic from the start: they were essentially a neo-liberal answer to an escalating social-democratic welfare state with progressive taxation responding to citizen demand for better education, health and social services. In Sweden, by contrast, no similar party emerged: instead the conservatives themselves endorsed a more neo-liberal agenda in the 1970s and 1980s. In Denmark, Mogens Glistrup founded his neo-liberal tax-abolition party in 1972. Its initial success slowly crumbled until Pia Kjaersgaard replaced Glistrup in parliament when he went to jail in 1984, sentenced to three years for tax fraud. Glistrup was an odd and provocative politician. He came up with proposals like selling Greenland to the highest bidder or replacing the Danish army with a telephone answering machine.While the number of asylum seekers increased in all the Nordic countries during the 1980s, Glistrup chose the elections of 1987 and 1988 to leave behind the old anti-tax rhetoric and make immigration the most important issue. He attacked immigrants, specifically Muslims (or ‘muhammendaner’ in his words), accused of aiming to take over the country. The party enjoyed an electoral revival, but its social base changed: after 1987–88 its electorate became more working class with lower levels of education (Skidmore-Hess 2003). Following intense personal conflict, the party expelled its former leader Mogens Glistrup in 1991. Pia Kjaersgaard was officially appointed leader of the party with the double objective to make the party more respectable, more mainstream and to make immigration its top priority. Under her leadership the party, renamed Dansk Folkeparti (DPP, Danish People’s Party) in 1995, has distanced itself from Glistrup and his supporters, whose overtly racist rhetoric, notably after the terror attacks on 11 September 2001, led to their marginalization and moral discredit. Kjaersgaard, on the other hand, has become a successful leader. In the 2007 general elections, the DPP won 14 per cent of the vote and gained 25 seats out of 179 and is now a key member of the Danish parliamentary majority In Norway, Fremskrittspartiet (PP, the Progress Party) was founded by Anders Lange in 1973 as an anti-tax party, a neo-liberal protest organization, just like the Danish Fremskridtspartiet. When Lange died in 1974, the new leader Carl Hagen reorganized the party. Under his leadership, xenophobia did not rise to the top of the party’s agenda, even if the party expressed some concerns about rising antagonism between immigrants and Norwegians due to a lack of jobs in the national labour market (cf. Hagelund 2004). In Norway, as in Denmark, immigration or immigrants were never a big issue until the 1980s.The two countries had a small number of foreigners coming into the labour market, mainly other north Europeans but also some migrants from southern Europe. In the 1990s, the flow of refugees increased throughout Scandinavia and their integration became a controversial issue, particularly in Norway. Here asylum seekers increased from two or three hundred to tens of thousands in a few

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years and a discussion about what to do was initiated. For the PP, welfare benefits distributed to immigrants became the major issue, as it argued that refugees drawing generous benefits from the Norwegian welfare system put a strain on its resources at the expense of the native population. The PP’s manifesto did not make immigration its central issue until around the turn of the millennium and focused on this subject with an intensity not reflected in any other party (Svåsand and Wörlund 2005; cf. Harmel and Svåsand 1997). During the 1990s the voter profile changed from a party for younger people to one that mainly attracted older voters. Hitherto, if the PP had occasionally supported centre-right governments on specific issues, it never gained enough support to exercise any governmental responsibility. Despite gathering 15 per cent of the vote in the 2001 general election, 41 per cent of Norwegians were opposed to its participation in government, as public opinion perceived the party to be too right-wing (Svåsand and Wörlund 2005: 263–77).With the current left-wing government, elected in 2007, there is no scope for the PP to cooperate with government and thus no ground to acquire the status of a legitimate partner. After the terrorist acts of 22 July 2011, when Anders Behring Breivik murdered 77 people (eight in Oslo and 69 at a social democratic summer camp) there was a backlash against the Progress Party in the opinion polls. Breivik justified his actions in terms of a necessary war against multiculturalism and threats to Western values. In the aftermath it was revealed that Breivik was a member of the Progress Party until just recently. In Sweden,the party NyDemokrati (ND, New Democracy) was founded in 1991 in the rural town of Skara. Like its Scandinavian sister parties, ND was a tax-reduction party, but unlike them it also had an anti-immigration agenda from the outset. ND was a classic anti-establishment party with two odd leadership figures, popularly represented as ‘the count and the servant’: Count Ian Wachtmeister, ND’s eccentric initiator, known for his practical jokes and highly provocative statements, and Bert Karlsson, an entrepreneur, owner of a gramophone company and now in the business of selling mass-produced Swedish pop music. Both firmly believed that the country could be run like a business, using corporate solutions to manage the country as a whole. ND was a typical example of a so-called flash party organization (Taggart and Widfeldt 1993). At first, it was fairly successful, and in the 1991 general elections, with 6.7 per cent of the vote, ND seized 25 parliamentary seats (out of 349). However, internal divisions and poor political acumen led the party to collapse. By the 1994 elections, both voters and leaders had left the party and it only survives at the margins of the political spectrum, occasionally winning a few scattered seats in local elections. However, in the 2010 general elections, an unambiguously xenophobic, nationalist and populist party had a breakthrough in the national elections. The party Sverigedemokraterna (SD, Sweden Democrats) won 5.7 per cent of the votes, enough to gain parliamentary representation. Nevertheless, SD already had, since 2006, elected representatives in nearly half of Sweden’s municipalities (144 out of 291). The roots of this party are not to be found in a neo-liberal anti-establishment agenda, but in right-wing extremist ideology. SD was founded in 1988–89, merging into a single party a number of racist, Nazi and nationalist groups. The party is now

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trying to distance itself from this racist past. Its new leader, media-savvy Jimmy Åkesson, has given SD a new image and built up an organization from local to national, developing a nationalist-conservative agenda but with the immigration issue as top priority. In Sweden, immigration is traditionally not high on the Political Party agenda. Likewise, immigration is not the top issue of concern for Swedish public opinion. A desire to see the implementation of tougher policies towards immigrants does not necessarily lead voters to cast their vote in favour of a xenophobic party: immigration is not seen to be as important as other issues such as welfare, health and education (Holmberg and Oscarsson 2004: 123). None of the established parties in Sweden have discussed the possibility of closing borders or initiating immigrant expulsions. Generally, immigration as an issue has not been put on the agenda by legitimate societal/political actors. Instead most political actors have discussed immigration as something genuinely constructive for Swedish society. This is different from Denmark, where most parties perceive immigration to be a problem (Green-Pedersen and Odmalm 2008) and from Norway, where the PP, thanks to its strong parliamentary representation, has successfully reshaped the political agenda to make immigration a national priority.

Opportunity structure in Scandinavian opinion – Sweden as a deviant case A review of Swedish opinion on immigration Since 1986 the SOM-institute, at the University of Gothenburg has investigated attitudes towards immigration and refugees in Sweden.4 We know very little about opinion patterns before 1986, but there are indications of discrimination towards almost all immigrant groups and minorities already in the 1960s (Swedner 1966). For all we know, xenophobic attitudes were both more widespread and more accepted in the 1960s than now. From the end of the Second World War, Sweden has been a country of immigration (Demker and Malmström 1999), but from the 1990s, the increase in immigrant population has been particularly sharp: in relation to its overall population, Sweden has received one of the highest levels of refugees and immigrants. Yet, the evolution of public opinion towards immigration since 1986 seems to have changed slowly from an antagonistic to a more tolerant attitude (see Figure 15.1). Swedish opinion has grown more tolerant since 1992, but still nearly half the population approves of the suggestion that Sweden should receive fewer refugees (Demker 2006a). This can be nuanced if we consider more specific responses towards the cultural background of immigrants. In four selected years I have investigated xenophobia in terms of distance, aversions and the respondents’ own feelings towards foreigners. In these figures there is a clear pattern of increasing tolerance towards all immigrants/foreigners, with one noticeable exception: freedom of religion. Other investigations and research indicate that reservations about religious freedom should be interpreted as a sceptical

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80 61 60

65 56

59 56 56

54 54

50

46 43 44

50 50 52 48 46 49

40 22 20

20 21 20 16 19

28 26 26 28 29 25 24 24 24 21 24

46

45

42 30 26

28

Fewer refugees

2010

2009

2008

2007

2006

2005

2004

2003

2002

2001

2000

1999

1998

1997

1996

1995

1994

1993

1992

1991

1990

1989

1988

1987

0

More refugees

Swedish attitudes to receiving more/fewer refugees to Sweden, 1987–2007 (percentage thinking more/fewer is a good suggestion)

FIGURE 15.1

Note: The SOM-survey is an annual postal survey, the external loss is about 30 per cent and the N is usually between 1,670 and 3,700. Percentage is calculated on full answers; only respondents that have chosen one alternative are included in the percentage base. The suggestions were: ‘Receiving more refugees’ and ‘Receiving fewer refugees’ and the five alternatives were: ‘very good suggestion’, ‘good suggestion’, ‘neither good nor bad’, ‘bad suggestion’, and ‘very bad suggestion’. Here only the respondents who answered ‘very good’ or ‘good suggestion’ are accounted for.

attitude towards Islam, which is the most well-known immigrant religion in Sweden (Hvitfeldt 1991). As we can see in Table 15.1, antagonism towards foreigners and immigrants has decreased during the years 1993–2009 (Demker 2005, 2008, 2010). But only a minority of the Swedish population is willing to allow foreign cults without restrictions. Previously immigrants were mainly Lutheran, Orthodox or Catholic Christians, but since the late 1980s many Muslims have come to Sweden. As many TABLE 15.1 Swedish attitude towards immigrants, 1993–2009 (per cent)

Agree completely or mainly with the statement:

1993 1997 1999 2004 2007 2009

‘There are too many foreigners in Sweden’ ‘Immigrants in Sweden should be free to exercise their religion’ ‘I could think of joining an organization against racism and xenophobia’ ‘I would not like having an immigrant from another part of the world married into my family’

52 41

48 39

40 41

42 40

39 37

36 38

40

44

49

47

39

41

25

18

17

15

14

12

Note: See Figure 15.1. The alternatives were ‘agree completely’, ‘mainly’, ‘partly’, ‘not at all’ and ‘do not know’. The alternative ‘do not know’ is not accounted for in these figures.

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of them have fled from religious oppression in their home countries, they have little interest in emphasizing religion (refugees from Iran, for example) in Sweden. In later years, though, more refugees have escaped from secular oppression and hope to have the opportunity to enjoy religious freedom again (refugees from Kosovo, for example). In Sweden conflicts between religious conceptions and political norms have mainly been discussed as issues of gender equality, religious education and freedom of speech. It means that arguments for and against religious clothing, liberal policy on sexuality, food restrictions and the existence of religious holidays have become central issues in the political debate. Since the 1980s, Swedish women have voted more leftist than men. Women, on the other hand, have been a bit more sceptical towards religious freedom and preserving national culture (Demker 2005). Generally speaking, younger women are more tolerant of refugees while younger men and men beyond their 70s are most restrictive.5 Teenage boys were in 1999 very much more negative than the population in general and teenage girls much more positive. Among Swedish women the attitude towards immigration has for a long time been more supportive than among men (Demker 2000). Education – in terms of both the level and the nature of educational qualifications – is a prominent factor explaining attitudes towards refugees. Among respondents with a university degree, 33 per cent had a restrictive attitude to receiving refugees, compared to 55 per cent among respondents with lower attainment (two-year postobligatory education) (Demker 2003). Already in the early 1990s the anti-immigrant profile was tightly connected to males and low education. The most generous profile was consequently found among highly educated women (Bennulf and Demker 1992). The most critical attitude to refugees is found in working-class households, and the most generous attitude is found in white-collar and academic households (Demker 2005, cf. O’Rourke and Sinnott 2006).6 Interestingly enough, not only the length of education decides attitudes, but also the type of education. Respondents with a qualification in art and literature (humanities) or in pedagogy are more positive about receiving refugees. Respondents with an education in hotel, restaurants and services or economy/business are the most negative. Among women, respondents with a qualification in natural sciences, pedagogy, humanities, aesthetics, social sciences and engineering are the most generous. Among men, the most generous are respondents with a qualification in humanities, social sciences, natural sciences and economy/business (Demker 2003). Turning to how the immigration issue is interpreted in Sweden we observe that among citizens who identify themselves as leftists only a minority wants restrictions on receiving refugees while citizens who identify themselves with the right are more supportive of restrictions (Demker 2006a). But there is also a left–right division among party sympathizers within each party. Sympathizers who perceive themselves as on the left of their own party are more tolerant towards refugees than those who perceive themselves as on the right of the same party (Demker and Gilljam 1994).

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There is also evidence that leftist ideology is more important when explaining attitudes towards receiving refugees than sex and age (Demker 2000, 2004). Among women that identified themselves as ‘clearly to the left’, only 24 per cent wanted to reduce the number of refugees coming to Sweden, while among women identifying themselves as ‘clearly to the right’ that proportion was 58 per cent. The same pattern appeared across most of the age groups. Only in the group between 60 and 75 years old was the ideological identification not decisive for attitudes towards receiving refugees to Sweden (Demker 2000). Among teenagers this pattern is very clear, where young boys and young girls are on totally opposite sides of the fence: young boys mostly to the right with a very restrictive attitude, and young girls mostly to the left with a very generous attitude. As is shown in Table 15.2 the ideological effect is stronger than effect by sex. It is also clear that among the younger generation there is a considerable divergence of positions on immigration. In 2006, 37 per cent of teenage girls had a restrictive view on refugee immigration, contrasting with 51 per cent of the teenage boys.7 People under 30 years are also the group most interested in refugee policy (Demker 2007). If the parties to the right took up the immigration issue and mobilized voters against immigration, or at least argued for rigorous restrictions, it would be possible to put restrictions on immigration on the political agenda in Sweden. But, as I made clear earlier, none of the Swedish parliamentary parties have up until now made a serious attempt to make immigration restrictions or a tough refugee policy an important issue in election campaigns (Dahlström and Esaiasson 2011). However, given that the immigration issue in Sweden is partly interpreted in left–right terms, and that the most right-wing voters are the most restrictive, it will be the parties of TABLE 15.2 Attitudes towards refugees among boys

and girls (15–19 years old) regarding ideological attitude in 1999 in Sweden (per cent) Statement: Receive fewer refugees in Sweden Left Boys Girls Effect:

Right

Effect

44 24

75 56

+31 +32

+20

+19

Note: See note to Figure 15.1. Percentage is calculated on full answers; only respondents who have given one alternative are included in the percentage base. The suggestions were: ‘receive fewer refugees’ and ‘accept fewer refugees’ and the five alternatives were: ‘very good suggestion’, ‘good suggestion’, ‘neither good nor bad’, ‘bad suggestion’, and ‘very bad suggestion’. The ideological alternatives were ‘clearly to the left/right’ and ‘somewhat to the left/right’ which have been fused into ‘left’ and ‘right’. The alternative ‘neither left nor right’ has been taken out of the analysis.

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the right that hold the key on this political issue. But, if they decided to play that card, they would meet resistance from leftist and green political groups, which strongly support a generous influx from outside Sweden. And given the divisions in public opinion, and the higher level of generosity compared to Denmark and Norway, the outcome of that drama is not predetermined.

Swedish opinion in a Scandinavian perspective Immigration issues have been handled differently in the Scandinavian countries. Denmark and Norway did not take on any immigration flows until the 1980s while Sweden has been an immigration country since the 1950s. Immigration policies and the way public opinion reacts and supports such policies greatly diverge among the Scandinavian countries. It is remarkable that Swedish public opinion does not perceive immigration as a threat in the same way and in the same proportion as in Norway and Denmark. For instance, left-wing voters differ substantially in the way they support or oppose immigration. Only 22 per cent of Norwegian and 24 per cent of Danish left-wing voters support an immigration policy that would not restrict immigrants’ entry into their respective countries, a position which appears rather lukewarm when compared with the 41 per cent reached in Sweden. However, 11 per cent of Norwegian and Danish left-wing voters think that immigration is undermining their country’s cultural life, an opinion shared by only 6 per cent of Swedish left-wing voters. The right is also more resolute in its opposition to immigration in Norway and Denmark, since 19 per cent of Norwegian and 17 per cent of Danish right-wing voters perceive immigration as a threat to their national culture, as opposed to 7 per cent in Sweden. And if 31 per cent of Swedish right-wing voters believe that immigrants should be allowed to enter and settle in the country, that support is reduced to 17 per cent and 19 per cent respectively among Danish and Norwegian right-wing voters. Not only does resisting immigration have a stronger correlation to left–right attitudes in Denmark and Norway than in Sweden, but the left in Norway and Denmark is also less supportive of immigration. Further, beyond political cleavages, Swedish public opinion displays less restrictive tendencies towards immigration than its neighbours. Some 33 per cent of the population thinks that it is a good idea to allow many immigrants of a different race/ethnic group to come and live in Sweden, compared with 14 per cent in Norway and 12 per cent in Denmark.8 Studies of xenophobia in Denmark show an overwhelming trend of restrictive attitudes explained mostly by a cultural antipathy against foreign traditions and values. About 40 per cent of the Danish population perceives immigration as a threat to Danish society. That feeling has also increased during the last twenty years (Frölund Thomsen 2006: 226–27; Gaasholt and Togeby 1995: 98). Likewise, comparative studies show that Norwegians stand out as more xenophobic than Swedes, and this result is linked to the traditionally strong nationalistic feeling in Norway (Knudsen 1997; cf. Hjerm 2000). Immigration as a threat is thus much more salient, as an attitude, in Norway and Denmark.

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Comparing the Scandinavian countries, it is worth reflecting that during the 1990s in Sweden immigration was not an issue monopolized by a particular section of the political spectrum.9 And none of the parliamentary parties have hitherto used immigration as a full-fledged part of an electoral, vote-maximizing strategy. Finally, Swedish voters in general do not find immigration an important political issue. The exception is the voters for Sweden Democrats, almost all of whom find immigration a very important issue (Demker 2011). Conversely, if immigration has been an important issue for the Danish People’s Party right from the start, today the vast majority of Danish parties acknowledge that immigration is the major political issue (Green-Pedersen and Krogstrup 2008). Most Danish parties now agree that restrictive policies are necessary, if not desirable, and this constitutes a marked contrast with Sweden where more liberal, generous solutions towards immigration are still very much in evidence (Green-Pedersen and Odmalm 2008). In Norway, immigration does not yet have the same salience as in Denmark. At first, it was not central to the Norwegian populist party Fremskrittspartiet, but it has steadily become part of its policies in later years (Svåsand and Wörlund 2005: 267). The PP is now the only party which has tried to make immigration a core subject on the political agenda, arguing since the 1993 general elections for a restrictive approach. None of the other parties have made immigration – in one way or another – prominent in their party strategy (Svåsand and Wörlund 2005).

Tentative conclusions and discussion The aim of this chapter is to discuss and explore differences in the parliamentary achievements of right-wing parties among the Scandinavian countries. I argue that the Swedish opportunity structure for extreme-right parties is unfavourable.10 I argue that a profitable opportunity structure is at hand if (a) the immigration issue is put on the political agenda by legitimate societal actors, (b) the immigration issue divides a mobilized position of anti-immigration and a non-mobilized position of uninterested voters, and (c) immigration could be interpreted and perceived as an extension of existing political cleavages in the system. First, my results indicate that xenophobia in Sweden is not commonly expressed by legitimate societal actors but restricted to specific sections of Swedish society, mainly low-educated, politically uninterested, young and middle-aged provincial men. In Norway, and to a lesser extent in Denmark, xenophobic support enjoys a much wider social base (see also Maddes et al. 2000). In Denmark other parliamentary parties, besides the Danish People’s Party, have engaged in electoral debates over immigration as a problem. This has not been the case in Sweden (cf. Goul Andersen 2004; Dahlström 2007). Thus, in Sweden, as opposed to Denmark and to a lesser extent to Norway, a restrictive view of immigration has not been put on the agenda by legitimate societal actors. Second, the way immigration issues are mediated in public debate is also important. In Sweden, since ND entered parliament in 1991, immigration and integration policy has been politicized at both ends of the political spectrum.The issue has

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not been monopolized by the right of the right, but left-wing parties as much as a series of civil society associations have been able to defend vigorously a more generous approach to immigration, offering a plausible alternative to the more restrictive solutions usually found on the right of the political spectrum.The debate is thus polarized and structured around clearly differentiated scenarios. Thus, in Sweden, as opposed to Denmark and Norway, immigration has not become an issue monopolized by those who wish to support a restrictive approach to immigration, but is also politicized by those who demand a more generous approach to immigration issues. Finally, the nature of the cleavage structure differs between the three countries selected for this study. Whereas the Swedish party system is structured around a single dominant political cleavage – left and right – the Norwegian and Danish party systems are far more complex and combine different cleavages, such as the rural–urban and centre–periphery dimensions (Rokkan 1987: 239ff.; Oscarsson 1998; Demker and Svåsand 2005). New parties can thus prosper outside the strict left and right cleavage and draw support from a variety of interests (Demker and Svåsand 2005). In Norway and Denmark, voters do not identify themselves as clearly with the left–right cleavage as is the case in Sweden. In Sweden, the Sweden Democrats party has voters who define themselves as being from the centre to the right on a left–right axis (Holmberg 2007). Because the left–right axis in Sweden is the dominant political cleavage, the SD is clearly identified with the right and indeed, its voters do define themselves as right-wing voters. For instance, SD voters tend to be hostile to globalization, equality between men and women, membership in the European Union and protecting the environment (Oscarsson and Holmberg 2008). The only potential overlap between SD and left-wing voters is on a form of opposition to the European Union. But on most other issues, SD voters are on the right of the Swedish left–right axis. The situation is far more complex in Norway and Denmark where the Norwegian Progress Party and Danish People’s Party do not have to align themselves with the right: rather, they can form a new pole within the party system which potentially crystallizes the opposition to all other parties, from left to right, but also attracts voters from different political traditions (Björklund and Goul Andersen 1999). In Sweden, as opposed to Denmark and Norway, resistance to immigration has been considered to be located further to the right of the political spectrum, and as such, does not permeate the constituent elements of the Swedish political cleavage system. Sweden has recently witnessed the arrival of a populist/nationalist party in parliament. As in the Danish case, the cultural issue seems to be the most vulnerable point for a populist/nationalist party to enjoy relative national success in Sweden. The Sweden Democrats try to focus on this point and have put effort into building a solid party organization (cf. Goodwin 2006). However, this party has its roots in an extremist, nationalistic and racist organization and its transformation into a mainstream democratic, populist party is difficult. The party identity as such is very rigid and could not be changed easily (Demker 1997). However, they have managed to mobilize the relatively limited group of voters that both support a

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restrictive immigration policy and find immigration politics the most important political issue on the agenda. Sweden Democrats has made the most of its abilities as a party. It was easier to gain support in Denmark and Norway where the Progress Party and the Danish People’s Party were both derived from previous neo-liberal populist parties which did not have any racist connections. In Sweden the way opportunity structures may change will depend primarily on how other parties respond to the challenge that the Sweden Democrats represent.

Notes 1 For a discussion, see Van der Brug and Fennema (2003); Art (2006); Frölund Thomsen (2006). See also Abedi (2004). I will use the term ‘right-wing party’ which includes both populist and more extreme far-right parties. This terminology is used to illuminate that the Scandinavian parties do not have similar roots among the bloc of far-right party organizations. 2 Among the ten industrialized European countries that have had the highest average of asylum seekers between 1992 and 2001 there are xenophobic parties in six. Among the ten industrialized European countries with the lowest average of asylum seekers between 1992 and 2001 there are xenophobic parties in five. Source: UNHCR 2003 and parliamentary Internet sites. 3 For the contradictory standpoint about Sweden, see Rydgren (2002). 4 Managed by Professor Henrik Ekengren Oscarsson since 2010. 5 SOM (Samhälle, Opinion, Medier 2006). Calculated by the author. 6 This fact has often been explained by fears of labour-market competition. However, a study of European attitudes has shown that there is no connection between this fear and immigration attitudes (Hainmueller and Hiscox 2007; cf. O’Rourke and Sinnott 2006). 7 SOM (Samhälle, Opinion, Medier 2006). Calculated by the author. 8 ESS (European Social Survey 2006). 9 Among respondents with the most restrictive attitude, 60 per cent found the immigration issue very important, and among the most generous respondents 50 per cent thought about the same (Demker 2001). 10 See Koopmans and Statham (2000) for a discussion of an opportunity structural approach in this research area.

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Björklund, T. and Goul Andersen, J. 1999. ‘Anti-Immigration Parties in Denmark and Norway: The Progess Parties and the Danish People’s Party’,Working Paper 1999:4, Institute for Economy, Politics and Administration, Aalborg University. Bleich, E. 2002. ‘Integrating Ideas into Policy-Making Analysis. Frames and Race Policies in Britain and France’, Comparative Political Studies, 35(9): 1054–76. Dahlström, C. 2007. ‘Rhetorical Objectives and Program Efficiency in Swedish Policy about Immigrants’, Journal of Public Policy, 27(3): 319–40. Dahlström, C. and Esaiasson, P. 2011. ‘The Immigrant Issue and Anti-Immigrant Party Success in Sweden 1970-2006. A Deviant Case Analysis’, Party Politics. Prepublished June, 10 2011, doi: 10.1177/1354068811407600. Demker, M. 1997. ‘Changing Party Ideology. Gaullist Parties Faces Voters, Organization and Competitors’, Party Politics, 3(3): 407–26. –––– 2000. ‘Attityder till flyktingar: unga flickor och unga pojkar på var sin sida’, in S. Holmberg and L.Weibull (eds), Det nya samhället, SOM-rapport 24. Göteborg: SOM-institute, Göteborg University, pp. 59–68. –––– 2001. ‘Minskat flyktingmotstånd: Svår marknad för främlingsfientliga partier’, in S. Holmberg and L. Weibull (eds), Land du välsignade? SOM-rapport 26. Göteborg: SOM-institute, Göteborg University, pp. 85–90. –––– 2003. ‘Trendbrott i flyktingfrågan – och polariseringen har ökat’, in S. Holmberg and L. Weibull (eds), Fåfängans marknad, SOM-rapport 33. Göteborg: SOM-institute, Göteborg University. –––– 2004. ‘Vänster och höger i flyktingpolitiken’, in S. Holmberg and L. Weibull (eds), Ju mer vi är tillsammans, SOM-report 33. Göteborg: SOM-institute, Göteborg University, pp. 33–40. –––– 2005. ‘Både tolerans och kritik i attityderna till invandrare i Sverige’, in S. Holmberg and L. Weibull (eds), Lyckan kommer, lyckan går, SOM-rapport 36. Göteborg: SOMinstitute, Göteborg University. –––– 2006a. ‘Stora regionala skillnader i attityden till flyktingar’, in S. Holmberg and L. Weibull (eds), Du stora, nya värld, SOM-rapport 39. Göteborg: SOM-institute, Göteborg University, pp. 205–9. –––– 2006b. ‘Essor et déclin du modèle nordique à cinq partis’, Revue Internationale de Politique Comparée, 13(3): 469–82. –––– 2007. ‘Flyktingpolitik – viktigt för vem?’, in S. Holmberg and L. Weibull (eds), Det nya Sverige, SOM-rapport 41. Göteborg: SOM-institute, Göteborg University, pp. 449–56 –––– 2008. ‘Långsamma förskjutningar inom stabila ramar’, in S. Holmberg and L. Weibull (eds) Skilda världar, SOM-rapport 44. Göteborg: SOM-institute, Göteborg University, pp. 151–60. –––– 2010. ‘Svenskarna långsiktigt alltmer positiva till invandrare’, in S. Holmberg and L. Weibull (eds), Nordiskt Ljus, SOM-rapport 50. Göteborg: SOM-institute, Göteborg University, pp. 107–14. –––– 2011. ‘Framgång för Sverigedemokraterna trots en allt mer flyktinggenerös opinion’, in S. Holmberg, L. Weibull and H. Oscarsson (eds), Lycksalighetens ö, SOM-rapport 52. Göteborg: SOM-institute, Göteborg University, pp. 135–44. Demker, M. and Gilljam, M. 1994. ‘Om rädslan för det främmande’, in S. Holmberg and L. Weibull (eds), Vägval, SOM-rapport 10. Göteborg: SOM-institute, Göteborg University. Demker, M. and Malmström, C. 1999. Ingenmansland? Svensk immigrationspolitik i utrikespolitisk belysning. Lund: Studentlitteratur.

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Demker, M. and Svåsand, L. 2005. Partiernas århundrade. Fempartimodellens uppgång och fall i Norge och Sverige. Stockholm: Santérus förlag. Downs, W. 2001. ‘Pariahs in their Midst: Belgian and Norwegian Parties react to Extremist Threats’, West European Politics, 24(3): 23–42. Engene, O. 2005. ‘Ytre Höyre: Valgtaperne’, in Demker, M. and Svåsand L. (eds), Partiernas århundrande. Fempartimodellens uppgång och fall i Norge och Sverige. Stockholm: Santérus Förlag, pp. 219–40. ESS, European Social Survey, Round 3, 2006/7. Dataset through web. Frölund Thomsen, J.P. 2006. Konflikten om de nye danskere. Om danskernes holdninger til etniske minoriteters kultur og rettigheder. Köpenhamn: Akademisk Forlag. Gaasholt, Ö. and Togeby, L. 1995. I syv sind. Danskernes holdninger til flygtninge og indvandrere. Århus: Politica. Goodwin, M.J. 2006. ‘The Rise and Faults of the Internalist Perspective in Extreme Right Studies’, Representation, 42(4): 347–64. Goul Andersen, J. 2004. ‘Danmark: Fremskridtspartiet och Dansk Folkeparti’, in J. Rydgren and A. Widfeldt (eds), Från Le Pen till Pim Fortuyn. Populism och parlamentarisk högerextremisk i dagens Europa. Malmö: Liber, pp. 147–70. Green-Pedersen, C. and Krogstrup, J. 2008. ‘Immigration as a Political Issue in Denmark and Sweden’, European Journal of Political Research, 47: 610–34. Green-Pedersen, C. and Odmalm, P. 2008. ‘Going Different Ways? Right-Wing Parties and the Immigrant Issue in Denmark and Sweden’, Journal of European Public Policy, 15(3): 367–81. Hagelund, A. 2004. ‘En fråga om anständighet? Fremskrittspartiet och den norska invandringspolitiken’, in J. Rydgren and A. Widfeldt (eds), Från Le Pen till Pim Fortuyn. Populism och parlamentarisk högerextremisk i dagens Europa. Malmö: Liber, pp. 171–96. Hainmueller, J. and Hiscox, M.J. 2007. ‘Educated Preferences: Explaining Attitudes toward Immigration in Europe’, International Organization, 61: 399–442. Harmel, R. and Svåsand, L. 1997. ‘The Influence of New Parties on “Old Parties” Platform: The Cases of the Progress Parties and Conservative Parties of Denmark and Norway’, Party Politics, 3(3): 315–40. Hjerm, M. 2000. ‘My People Right or Wrong? A Comparative Analysis of National Sentiments and their Meaning’. Dissertation, Umeå University, Umeå. Holmberg, S. 2007. ‘Sverigedemokrater – vilka är dom och vad vill dom?’ in S. Holmberg and L. Weibull (eds), Det nya Sverige, SOM-rapport 41. Göteborg: SOM-institute, Göteborg University, pp. 159–68. Holmberg, S. and Oscarsson, H. 2004. Väljare. Svenskt väljarbeteende under 50 år. Stockholm: Norstedts Juridik. Hvitfeldt, H. 1991. ‘Svenska attityder till Islam’, in S. Holmberg and L. Weibull (eds) Politiska opinioner. Göteborg: SOM-institute, Göteborg University, pp. 99–114. Ivarsflaten, E. 2005. ‘Threatened by Diversity: Why Restrictive Asylum and Immigration Policies Appeal to Western Europeans’, Journal of Elections, Public Opinions and Parties, 15(1): 21–45. –––– 2006. ‘Reputational Shields: Why Most Anti-Immigrant Parties Failed in Western Europe, 1980–2005’, American Political Science Association’s Annual Meeting 2006. Kestilä, E. and Söderlund, P. 2007. ‘Subnational Political Opportunity Structures and the Success of Radical Right: Evidence from the March 2004 Regional Elections in France’, European Journal of Political Research, 46(6): 773–96. Kitschelt, H. (with McGann, A.J.) 1995. The Radical Right in Western Europe. A Comparative Analysis. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.

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16 DOWNSIDE AFTER THE SUMMIT Factors in extreme-right party decline in France and Austria Michelle Hale Williams

Introduction Extreme right-wing parties across Western Europe experienced a well-documented surge in support at the end of the twentieth century. Throughout the 1990s, they made electoral gains and seemed to be on an upward trajectory of electoral success. Many of them portrayed themselves as populists calling for change and a return to nationalism and core cultural values at a time when economic challenges, immigration waves and other social problems worried national populations. In France beginning with a breakthrough election in Dreux in 1983, the National Front won local elected offices and gained seats for the first time in the national parliament in 1986. They also amassed a stable and growing percentage of the popular vote in national elections typically ranging from 10 to 15 per cent through 2002. In Austria, the Freedom Party went a step further entering the governing coalition following parliamentary elections in 1999 and staying there until 2006. However, in both cases the extreme right later experienced a measure of twentyfirst-century electoral decline. Although in both cases the parties have since rebounded, focus on their periods of decline promises illumination of key factors shaping their electoral fortunes.

The logic of extreme-right party decline This chapter examines the pattern of extreme right-wing party rise and decline in two cases. Several propositions provide a basis for expecting that extreme-right parties may experience a decline after their zenith. First and foremost, populism as a strategy seems short-lived. The fact that many of these parties have positioned themselves as anti-establishment or anti-government protest parties means that once they begin to assume seats in government, and especially as they begin to join

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coalition governments, they may need to rethink their mobilization strategy. Once they become part of the establishment, it becomes increasingly difficult for them to oppose it. Additionally, to the extent that extreme right-wing parties have made gains by paying attention to demand factors such as public attitudes (see discussions in Eatwell 2003; Rydgren 2003, 2007; Norris 2005), they become vulnerable when other parties also pay closer attention to these cues. Extreme-right parties can easily be out-competed by mainstream parties that similarly respond and give voice to popular concerns.

Extreme-right decline in Austria following the 1999 electoral victory The Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ, Freiheitliche Partei Österreichs) has proven itself as one of the most successful extreme-right parties in Western Europe. The FPÖ entered the governing coalition in 1999 not as a junior partner but as the party that had topped the Austrian People’s Party (ÖVP, Österreichische Volkspartei) by a narrow margin of approximately 400 votes. This election moved the FPÖ into a new status position. No longer was it an anti-establishment fringe party occupying third place and perpetual opposition status. It had attained a new level of achievement, and worldwide reaction resulted following elections in a country that generally goes unwatched in such political contests. The attainment in 1999 would not have been possible without Jörg Haider. Haider proved to be one of the most highly visible and charismatic leaders of any extreme-right party. The physical appearance and public image that he worked diligently to cultivate formed the basis of his charisma (Eatwell 2005: 108). Extremeright parties outside Austria often used his photo on their campaign materials. Inside Austria, billboards, flyers and posters blazed his image ubiquitously. In a marketing sense, Haider was a brand. On this collateral, he travelled the world as a diplomat talking with controversial leaders in other countries, including Saddam Hussein (Heinisch 2003: 111).

The rise of the FPÖ The FPÖ began its ascendancy in earnest in 1986 when Jörg Haider took leadership from Norbert Steger. As party support waned in the mid-1980s, Haider proposed taking the party in a completely different direction. At the 1986 party convention in Innsbruck, Haider was selected as party leader with the backing of the German nationalist faction within the party. One of the exogenous elements beyond party strategy and the ascension of Haider as party leader fuelling popular support for the FPÖ was the Waldheim Affair of 1986. As Kurt Waldheim became president of Austria in 1986, his past affiliation with Nazism came to light and sparked much controversy and reconsideration of the Austrian role in the Second World War (Bassett 1990). Waldheim first denied the allegations but later claimed he had provided nothing but dutiful service

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to his country (Wodak and Pelinka 2002: xii). Waldheim’s diplomatic credibility faltered. Domestically the Waldheim Affair elicited repressed memories for many Austrians. Some Austrians rallied to defend Waldheim while others questioned their cultural identity. Overall, the situation produced a victimization complex whereby many Austrians collectively felt that they too had been victims of the Third Reich and they asserted pride in their country and heritage (Art 2006: 102). This directly fed the nationalist appeal of the redirected FPÖ platform under Haider’s leadership. Austria in 1986 proved ripe for fomenting cultural identity issues and Haider took advantage of this circumstance to build a base of support. The FPÖ continued to gain ground electorally through the 1990s. By 1993, many from the more liberal faction within the party broke away to form Austria’s liberal democratic party, Liberal Forum. This left behind a party base that tended to be more right-wing conservative. This is not to say that there were not liberals remaining, as an economic liberal faction would re-emerge in the early twenty-first century, but a larger base now came from the nationalist wing. This becomes evident when looking at the electoral trend. Rather than losing ground electorally after the split in 1993, the party increased its vote share from 16.6 per cent in 1990 to 22.5 per cent in 1994. It hovered at 22 per cent in 1995 and then soared to its all-time high return of 26.9 per cent in the 1999 elections. A significant strategic shift that seemingly accounts for this trend came with a reorientation of the party around the immigration issue. Specifically, in the early 1990s FPÖ politicians began strategically emphasizing a hard anti-immigrant message through their public rhetoric (Müller 2002: 165–66; Art 2006: 183–84). Some supporters left the party during this period, but new ones joined in droves. While the nationalist and anti-immigrant position may have accounted only partially for this trend in the 1990s, a populist and anti-establishment message accounted for much of the rest (Müller 2000: 198). The FPÖ claimed rhetorically that the people of Austria should be more directly involved in the political decisions of the country (Müller 2002: 171). They challenged the traditional post-war pillarization of Austrian politics and the power-sharing of various grand coalition governments, the Proporz system of proportional allocation of civil service jobs, and the division into three Lager or political camps made up of socialists, Catholic conservatives and nationalists (Bunzl 2002: 64; Kitschelt 1995: 200). In sum, in addition to playing upon a cultural identity crisis at the right time with calls for the reinvigoration of national culture, they found the time ripe to launch a vehement, populist critique of government and the political establishment. The fourth session of the European Parliament (EP) from 1994 to 1999 was the first session in which the FPÖ held seats. Holding representative office outside Austria represented an important shift for the FPÖ. Reasons to seek office at the EP level include gaining influence and recognition outside Austria and connecting or networking with other extreme-right parties. Another reason suggested by an FPÖ

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member who held an EP seat in both the fourth and fifth sessions is that the FPÖ perceived the EP as an important policy-maker and therefore a place where it would want to have a voice in policy decisions. I think the average politician and also the people in the country underestimate how much membership in the European Union influences more and more of our daily life and also our political life. I think that more than fifty per cent of all decisions that concern our life in one of the member countries are already decided in the European Union. (Sichrovsky 2001) Moreover the EP gave the FPÖ an opportunity for image-building and visibility outside Austria. As the same member of the EP explained, the FPÖ has always battled with its negative image outside Austria, and the EP provided another platform where members could present themselves interacting and working with members from other European countries. First of all, the Freedom Party always concentrated on Austria. We never cared what was printed [in the media] outside. … Because they [FPÖ elites] said, ‘Ok that’s what’s written in the US’. Now that they’re [FPÖ elites] in government they realize that was a big mistake. Because now all that people know outside of Austria about the Freedom Party is from what they’ve read in the last 10–15 years. And what they [the media] write wasn’t very positive. And we have a tremendous PR and image problem outside of Austria. (Sichrovsky 2001) However, the party had to be careful not to associate formally with extremists in the EP in order to build a stronger rather than a weaker image outside Austria. In terms of other parties or leaders that might be seen as extremist, the delegate mentioned the National Front leader in France, Jean-Marie Le Pen: Or look at Le Pen in France. I think the difference compared to the Freedom Party is that we did not position ourselves in such an extreme and definite way … We are not like Le Pen in the extreme right. (Sichrovsky 2001) The FPÖ held three seats in the fifth session of the EP from 1999 to 2004, one seat in the sixth session from 2004 to 2009, and currently has two representatives in the seventh session serving until 2014. By the elections of 1999, the FPÖ reaped unprecedented rewards for its strategic efforts to capture popular support. By a slim margin it became the second most popular party in Austria, yet the triumph seems even more fragile considering that one-fifth of all voters made their decision on how to vote within the final weeks

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and days before the election (Müller 2000: 197). Still, after fierce negotiations between the three largest parties, the FPÖ entered a coalition government, with the mainstream conservative ÖVP, early in 2000.

The fall of the Freedom Party In many ways the FPÖ changed the moment it took government office. Coalition negotiations were hard fought and took months before the ÖVP–FPÖ coalition agreement was announced on 1 February 2000.Worldwide reaction resulted. Leaders of the other then fourteen European Union (EU) member states sanctioned Austria and withdrew all but technical bilateral relations, claiming that the FPÖ exhibited extremist party characteristics (Müller 2000: 156). Sanctions were lifted later in the year following an EU report commissioned by the president of the European Court of Human Rights that alleviated concerns to some extent. However, the tarnish on the legitimacy of the FPÖ remained. From scholarly literature to popular media, investigations of the ‘threat to democracy’ posed by the FPÖ proliferated (see, for instance, Luther 2000; Howard 2000; Mény and Surel 2002). While this galvanized many populist and antiestablishment supporters of the FPÖ, it may have made duties of public office more complicated. Interviews with several FPÖ members sitting in the Austrian Nationalrat in 2001 and 2002 suggest many were defensive about such charges. One of them suggested that the leftist global media was largely to blame for casting the party in such undeservedly negative light and, when asked about allegations that the FPÖ challenges the democratic order, she responded: That’s nonsense, that’s simply not true! Just take a look at our party’s programme: freedom and independence are our most important values. [The press says such things] because all over the world the journalists are left wing. They simply want to increase the influence of the left wing and help them to grow. (Partik-Pable 2001) Nevertheless, FPÖ members of parliament found themselves and their policy proposals increasingly scrutinized as a result of worldwide interest in the 1999 election. Furthermore, as a result of the coalition negotiations with the ÖVP, the FPÖ seems to have been somewhat domesticated and its more radical impulses contained. The FPÖ remained resistant to EU integration and to a more liberal immigration policy allowing foreign workers entry to fill jobs (Heinisch 2003: 106). However, on many other political issues it largely fell in line with its mainstream conservative counterpart. The FPÖ wanted to be in government and yet the ÖVP bargained from a position of strength as the only party with two majority coalition possibilities. Chancellor Schüssel could have turned back to traditional grand coalition partner the Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPÖ, Sozialdemokratische

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Partei Österreichs). The FPÖ–ÖVP coalition agreement was moderate rather than extremist in its final form (Luther 2003: 137). As one observer describes it, the policies emanating from the new government in 2000 ‘were not the slash and burn neoliberalism that critics alleged’ (Heinisch 2003: 104). Instead a balanced budget by 2002 became an administration goal. Even though the FPÖ widely took credit for the Kindergeld policy providing a stipend paid to all mothers, adopted in July 2001 under the FPÖ–ÖVP government, this programme also remained consistent with a long-term ÖVP commitment that all mothers regardless of their employment status should be entitled to monetary compensation (Heinisch 2003: 105). The FPÖ began visibly to fall apart by 2002. Internal party factions became publicly apparent leading to a party conference in September 2002 in the small Austrian town of Knittelfeld, Styria. The senior FPÖ leader, Vice Chancellor Susanne Riess-Passer, did not attend. In fact, attendees represented the more ultranationalist conservative wing of the party led by Haider. Haider asserted the need for an extreme-right turn in the party. In response, many of the highest officeholding and more moderate leaders of the party resigned in protest, including Riess-Passer and Finance Minister Karl-Heinz Grasser (who was later reappointed in this position by the ÖVP) along with the chairman of the FPÖ parliamentary club, Peter Westenthaler. This resulted in Chancellor Schüssel’s dissolution of the coalition, calling for new elections. Although the FPÖ–ÖVP governing coalition was renewed following elections in 2002, the FPÖ had slipped to just over 10 per cent of the popular vote. This probably resulted from internal feuds throughout the campaign cycle covered by the media. Party leadership changed hands three times after Riess-Passer stepped aside in the months before the November 2002 elections. Social Affairs Minister and Haider loyalist Herbert Haupt landed the job of leader of the party heading into the elections (Luther 2003: 143). In short, the FPÖ fell apart leading into this election due in part to the internal coup d’état attempted by Haider in Knittelfeld. Haider left the party completely and disappeared for a year or so before announcing the founding of his own new party in April 2005, the Alliance for the Future of Austria (BZÖ, Bündnis Zukunft Österreich). Although this party included several elites from the former extreme-right faction within the FPÖ who had followed Haider to form this new party, it won only 4.1 per cent of the vote in 2006 compared with 11 per cent for the FPÖ. In sum, several elements appear to have contributed to a sharp decline in electoral support for the FPÖ in the twenty-first century. Credibility or legitimacy problems present the first hurdle and these begin immediately after the 2000 coalition formation. The sanction by the EU and the scrutiny that followed limited FPÖ opportunities to advance a radical agenda. Second, domestication occurred to the extent that the coalition agreement negotiated with the ÖVP as it bargained from a position of strength produced a fairly modest agenda for change. The biggest initiatives included balancing the budget by 2002 and the social programme providing a stipend for all mothers. Finally, internal factions and crises

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of leadership plagued the party as it imploded amid bickering over critical issues like the party’s agenda and ideological orientation. In the autumn of 2008, a snap Austrian election took place on 28 September with ground gained by both the FPÖ and BZÖ. Extreme-right parties captured centre stage following this election. Both of the parties of the 2006 grand coalition lost seats as a result of this election with gains going to the extreme right. The FPÖ captured 17.5 per cent of the popular vote, with the BZÖ under Haider’s leadership increasing to 10.7 per cent. While numbers for the two parties individually remain lower than any of the FPÖ returns since 1990, this election clearly suggests dissatisfaction with mainstream parties that advantages the extreme right in Austria. However, despite early participation in coalition talks with the ÖVP by the FPÖ leader Heinz-Christian Strache and BZÖ leader Haider, by late October a return to grand coalition looked increasingly likely. A further complication arose in the untimely death of BZÖ leader Haider in an automobile accident just days after the press was announcing favourable coalition talks between the ÖVP, FPÖ and BZÖ. The global financial crisis prompted grand coalition talks initiated by the ÖVP according to Der Standard (2008).Then the so-called Österreich-Gespräch or Austria dialogue ensued through which the two mainstream parties came together in several sessions to discuss common ground on potential legislative issues that would require a two-thirds majority. The government was formed in early December 2008, officially returning the SPÖ–ÖVP grand coalition to power. Austria’s far right appears poised to recover its national-level legislative seat share, down since the split between the two parties. FPÖ fortunes appear more optimistic than those of the BZÖ whose Gallup poll numbers for September 2011 reflect less support presently than in 2008 (neuwahl.com). For the FPÖ, however, key trends suggest a level of recent reversal on several factors contributing to the period of decline.Vienna’s municipal elections of October 2010 may foretell a wider turning point in the far-right recovery process. The historically socialist-leaning capital city of Vienna supported the FPÖ with 27 per cent of the vote (Mestre 2011) coming close to the peak level of support won by Jörg Haider in 1996 of 27.9 per cent. Credit for the Viennese showing may be due to a certain degree of un-domestication resulting from time spent recently in opposition to the ÖVP–SPÖ grand coalition as reflected in strong anti-Muslim rhetoric from the FPÖ throughout 2010. Additionally, credibility has improved through the now more seasoned leadership of Heinz Christian Strache. Recent Gallup poll trend data showed only two parties in Austria gaining ground in terms of their popularity since the 2008 elections: the FPÖ and the Greens (neuwal.com). The poll estimates a 6.5 percentage point gain for the FPÖ over support levels in 2008 with an estimated electoral mandate gain of twelve given present levels of support. Present indications favour a trend of continued growth for these two smaller parties with the FPÖ seemingly back on track.

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Extreme-right decline in France after 2002 The French National Front (FN, Front National) is one of the most enduring and consistent extreme-right parties in Western Europe. It had the earliest breakthrough election in 1983 with local-level offices gained in Dreux. It then went on to build a base of around 10 per cent of the popular vote that it maintained and increased over time until 2002. As with Haider in the Austrian case, the success of the FN owes much to a charismatic leader, Jean-Marie Le Pen. This section considers party leadership and other factors contributing to trends in FN support.

The rise of the National Front Jean-Marie Le Pen called the early years in the life of the FN a period of ‘crossing the desert’ (DeClair 1999: 42). With this reference he indicated the difficulty encountered in constructing a viable extreme-right party in France, from the founding of the FN in 1972 until its initial signs of stability and growth in the early 1980s. Le Pen confronted loose groupings of nationalists, authoritarians, and ethnocentrists remaining from the Vichy period, and faced the task of consolidating them while also expanding the base to include other constituent groups. The FN benefited from the strategic planning and positioning of issues by party elites such as Bruno Mégret, former deputy to party general secretary Carl Lang. Mégret is credited with influencing much of the ideology of the party beginning in the late 1980s. He cultivated a more intellectual basis for party positions working with neo-conservative think tanks such as the Club de l’Horloge (DeClair 1999: 27). Such connections fostered legitimacy for the FN and enhanced the credibility of extreme-right ideas (Williams 2006: 82). The French FN has long aimed to win seats in the EP. In the 1980s the FN became one of the first extreme-right parties to have delegates elected to the EP, beginning in 1984. The EP held value as a place for extreme-right parties to gain power and influence, according to an EP delegate from the FN: Once they are elected, a member of the [European] parliament looks always to be re-elected but also to increase the power, the competence of the institution that he belongs to, because it increases his power also. (Gollnisch 2002) In some instances, the EP becomes a place for extreme-right parties to network with other extreme-right parties. Even when they do not agree on all matters, in the EP they can find strength in larger numbers of sitting delegates than in their home countries in many cases. But anyway we have contacts [in the EP]. We have an alliance with the Flemish party in Belgium, which is 100 persons, together with us. And the first party in Antwerp, and we also belong to the same group as the

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Northern League in Italy, although we are not regionalists, we are in favour of maintaining the unity of the state, but that is for France. (Gollnisch 2002) However, the delegate went on to explain that some extreme-right parties fear these cross-national alliances, thinking that they will thereby be stigmatized as extreme-right. The problem is that demonization is so strong that everybody fears everybody. For example Haider in Austria and Fini. I would say Berlusconi himself and his friend are in a way stronger than Fini about immigration. And Haider, Fini, they do not want to have too many contacts with us because they fear that at home all of these lobbies, the media, maybe left wing lobbies or Jewish etc. will put pressure on them. ‘You ally yourself with the racist, fascist, anti-Semitic Le Pen.’ So in my opinion they are completely wrong. (Gollnisch 2002) The FN had a strong showing in the second EP, taking twelve seats. The party has continued to prioritize EP elections, and has never dipped below nine seats throughout the 1990s. It has remained consistently the largest extreme-right party delegation to the EP since 1984, surpassed only once by the Italian National Alliance party in 1999. Throughout the 1990s, the FN steadily gained ground. In 1986 it had won 9.7 per cent of the popular vote on the first ballot and had steady gains in 1988 and 1993; by 1997 it attained its highest returns at 15 per cent. While Le Pen’s charisma and Mégret’s party strategy proved critical, another factor in this growth included reaching out to new constituent groups to grow the base of support for the party. One such opportunity emerged with working-class voters of the former communist left. From the early 1980s, communists in France modified their ideological position to move into alliances with the centre-left socialists (Hayward 1990). As they moderated, radicals favouring more revolutionary politics became disgruntled. The FN began to court these disgruntled working-class voters. The 2002 FN election campaign aimed to appeal to the working-class voter (Ceccaldi 2002; Gollnisch 2002). While direct vote transfers from the French Communist Party (PCF, Parti Communiste Français) to FN may not be measurable, the FN was able to expand its base and attract the traditional PCF constituent, namely young, working-class males. At the same time, the errors and perceived moderation of the mainstream right opened up political space for the FN. It continued its populist appeals to attract voters away from the mainstream parties while courting new voters from the far left. The goal became expansion in any direction by the twenty-first century. An additional factor in its rising success comes in its strategic positioning on the immigration issue. The FN in France has been characterized as the role model for

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other extreme-right parties in terms of its strategy on the immigration issue (Marcus 1995; Minkenberg 1998; Schain 1999; Williams 2006). Martin Schain has argued that the FN took a non-issue in France in the early 1980s, immigration, and made it a core issue in terms of party strategy but, more importantly, made it a key concern in the public consciousness (Schain 1999). Immigration became a funnel issue through which all other concerns of the day were driven rhetorically and strategically by the FN (Williams 2006). Immigrants became the scapegoats for a range of social problems in France including crime, the deficiencies of education and health care, or indeed any other problem of the day. FN Delegate General Bruno Gollnisch portrayed the link between immigrants and crime in a personal interview: If you take the security problem you have to take some rules of procedure, you have to build jails, you have to have better treatment of small criminality, you have to reverse the trend of immigration because it is obvious that there is a link, not a 100% link, but a link between immigration and criminality given the fact that people come here that have completely lost their roots in a society. (Gollnisch 2002) Deputy Director of Legal Affairs for the FN, Marcel Ceccaldi, echoed Gollnisch’s explanation of the link between social problems and immigration: All the crime and insecurity comes from immigration. But the papers only say ‘young’ people not immigrants. But the French people know it is the immigrants even though the papers do not say so. (Ceccaldi 2002) The FN capitalized upon public fear of immigrants, blaming them for social problems, utilizing a populist mobilization technique of anti-establishment appeals, and claiming to offer the necessary solutions. The strategy proved beneficial as FN support rose throughout the 1990s. In 2002, when Jacques Chirac was re-elected as French President, Jean-Marie Le Pen received the second highest percentage of the popular vote on the first ballot.

The fall of the National Front A moderating trend emerges in considering the twenty-first-century modifications in FN rhetoric and policy positions. One key shift has been a more conciliatory attitude towards Jews, and a strategic retreat from the language of anti-Semitism among party members. The rise of anti-Islamism following the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States and the subsequent ‘war on terror’ contributed to the rise of anti-Islamism across Europe as well. A flip-side of the increasing antiIslamic emphasis in anti-immigrant rhetoric is that it brings former out-groups like

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the Jews in. This came through in conversations with FN leaders during personal interviews. Yes, [after 11 September 2001] there has been more, there has been certainly an anti-Arabic, anti-Muslim trend in society. Which, by the way, we did not encourage. We did not support this trend. We did not say all Muslims are terrorists. Although we were the first [party] to state 20 years ago that we would one day have a problem with Islam, radical Islamism and so on. But I think that in this field we did well, in fact Le Pen was right, more or less. And it is now allowed [permissible] to criticize some aspects of Islam, which was absolutely a kind of taboo because every religion was supposed to be equal in dignity and so on. We were very moderate by the way when they [the media] asked for our reaction. And also there is a change that is very important. There is a change in Jewish opinion. (Gollnisch 2002) Just as anti-immigrant positions have become virtually synonymous with antiMuslim positions in party rhetoric, so prominent party members such as Marine Le Pen have overtly extended an olive branch to Jews. She is reported to have indicated a desire to travel to Israel and she joined the European Parliament’s friendship caucus with Israel (Simon 2005). Through both the 2002 and 2007 election campaigns, the FN did not appear to be as flamboyant as it had in the past. Its language was seemingly more measured and its positions seemed closer to those of the mainstream. In 2002, Le Pen did advance to the second round run-off for the presidency against Jacques Chirac.Yet, one likely side effect of this result may be that the party had to move to the centre in preparation for the run-off to attempt to widen its appeal. Furthermore, in 2006 the FN declined participation in media debates and Le Pen kept a much lower profile than he had in 2002. He allowed other party leaders like Marine Le Pen and Bruno Gollnisch to provide the public face of the party throughout the campaign. In part, this presented a different and arguably more moderate face of the party. A second factor that may be affecting the FN’s loss of ground is issue co-optation. Mainstream right-wing parties began to react in the late 1990s to the ground that they lost to the FN by taking back some of the issue space and voters that had defected to the FN. They did this in 2002 and 2007 by moving their own positions further to the right on issues such as law and order and immigration. Sarkozy made one of his first policy changes in office after he was elected president in 2007 by creating a new government Ministry of National Identity and Immigration (Bell and Criddle 2008: 191). Martin Schain argued in 2002 that FN issues had been co-opted by mainstream parties (Schain 2002). This was a key strategy of the mainstream parties in their attempt to contain and weaken the rising support for the FN that had persisted through the 1990s. In personal interviews, elites of the FN indicated precise instances where their key policy positions had been co-opted by

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the mainstream right, many of which date back to the late 1980s during the initial FN ascendancy (see Williams 2006: 105–6). A high-profile leadership struggle surfaced in 1998 and 1999 with a much publicized dispute between Mégret and Le Pen.This resulted in Mégret leaving the FN to form a new party, the National Republican Movement (MNR, Mouvement National Républicain) and the FN taking a turn further to the right. However, more recently the leadership question appears to be producing a moderating effect. Leadership succession came to a head at the party congress in Nice in April 2003. As Jean-Marie Le Pen was then seventy-seven years old, he indicated his intention to step down as head of the party. He was expected to step down naming a successor at the subsequent party congress in 2006 (Barth 2003a); however, this did not happen and a power struggle ensued through the 2007 election campaign. Top contenders for the job included Delegate General Bruno Gollnisch and party activist and daughter of Jean-Marie Le Pen, Marine Le Pen. If Le Pen decided to pass the torch to his daughter, he stood to alienate top intellectuals in the party as well as members of the conservative party base. If he designated Gollnisch as his successor, he would be choosing a leader of the past rather than a rising star in the party with fresh ideas. The difference between Gollnisch and Marine Le Pen is striking ideologically. Gollnisch maintains the more traditional stance that is true to the party origins as a party with pro-Nazi leanings. In late 2004, Gollnisch was still quoted as saying ‘there is not a serious historian who still totally agrees with the conclusions of the Nuremberg Trials’, going on to suggest that the magnitude of the Holocaust genocide had been exaggerated (Simon 2005). On the other hand, Marine Le Pen is seeking a somewhat innovative and more moderate image for the party. In October 2004, she expressed sympathy for the plight of Jews and she denounced antiSemitism in an interview on French radio (Simon 2005). She condemned the remarks made by Gollnisch just prior to her radio interview. In an interview published in Valeurs magazine in September 2008, Le Pen appeared to be giving the nod to his daughter, announcing his plans to step aside before the next elections according to an article in the International Herald Tribune (2008). Le Pen had shown clear signs over recent years that he was positioning his daughter to succeed him. In the months prior to the party convention in 2003, in a six-hour meeting of the nominating committee, Le Pen recommended that his daughter be chosen as the party’s main candidate in regional and European elections in 2004 rather than Gollnisch (Le Monde 2003). Prior to this move, Le Pen named Marine Le Pen as vice president of the party, placing many of her supporters on the party executive committee at the party congress (Barth 2003b). However, Gollnisch remained favoured among certain members of the party, especially among the traditional base of support, including the more extreme-right nationalist wing of the party. Previously when they have faced off head to head within the party, Gollnisch has come out on top. For instance, when both jockeyed for the top position on the Central Committee of the party, Gollnisch won the position while Marine Le Pen came in thirty-fourth. This suggested that naming Marine as

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successor could produce some in-fighting and a backlash within the party. In January 2011, Marine Le Pen officially emerged as party leader, having secured the needed two-thirds votes at the party congress to succeed her father. In sum, at least three factors appear to have dampened the success of the FN in the twenty-first century. First, the party appears to be moderating its stance on core issues that have traditionally delineated the party. Second, the mainstream right appears to have effectively stolen some of the issue space of the FN as the Union for a Popular Movement (UMP, Union pour un Mouvement Populaire) of Chirac and Sarkozy moved steadily to the right in the 2002 and 2007 elections. The UMP has particularly emphasized law and order politics and restrictions on immigration, two key issues of the FN, in both campaigns. The mainstream right co-optation attempts began in the late 1980s continuing through the 1990s, however with little impact on the electoral fortunes of the FN during that period.The 1980s and 1990s have been characterized as a period of party polarization in France with expanding opportunities for small parties to compete (see, for instance, Cole 2003 and Knapp 2004). By contrast, the UMP performance in 2002 and 2007 alongside declining support for many smaller parties, including the FN, suggests a return to consolidation on the right. Third, a disruptive effect emerged with a high-profile leadership transition as Jean-Marie Le Pen stepped down as party leader. Leadership transition could potentially be quite pronounced in its disruptive effect since the FN is a party that has only ever had one official party leader since its foundation, and membership is divided in loyalties over the successor. Early indications in the spring of 2011, one year ahead of the 2012 national elections, suggest an FN revival following its leadership transition. A surge in FN popularity in public opinion polls shows Marine Le Pen’s support surpassing projected candidates of both the mainstream right and mainstream left (The Economist 2011). Ségolène Royal, the Socialist presidential candidate in 2007, indicated in a television interview that Marine Le Pen would be a ‘more credible and dangerous candidate than her father’ (Moffett 2011). Marine Le Pen’s more moderate branding of the FN could potentially alienate its traditional base that remains tied primarily to issues of identity politics. Yet her image, appeal and political acumen thus far bode well for the electoral success of the FN in 2012. While her task will be maintaining the internal party balance to avoid a split like the Austrian one in 2005, this party appears to have made a right turn in a normative sense.

Conclusion Examination of the trajectory of the rise and recent fall of extreme right-wing parties in Austria and France reveals common factors despite different circumstances. In both cases, growth accompanied the emergence of a charismatic leader who came to embody the party. Additionally, both parties went through a process of solidifying the base with a nationalist, anti-immigrant appeal. In Austria, Haider cultivated the extreme-right core of the party, alienating more liberal holdovers from the early 1980s and the direction was fuelled by the Waldheim Affair.

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moderation co-optation expand base

leader change

gain in EP populism solidify base leadership

FIGURE 16.1

Trajectory comparison of the FPÖ and FN

In France, Le Pen’s Deputy Delegate General, Bruno Mégret, identified a lack of intellectualism underlying stale nationalist appeals and set about linking the FN to more credible think tanks. And both parties then sought expansion to new constituents and beyond national borders in the EP. A central focus of this chapter has also been to consider whether these factors are fading, or no longer producing sustained success in the twenty-first century. This chapter suggests that the period of electoral decline identified in each case may in fact be due to a reversal of factors operating in the period of growth. Lines could easily be drawn in Figure 16.1 connecting factors in the rise with their counterparts in the fall. Leadership changes (the departure of Haider and Le Pen) reverse the key leadership factor with uncertain implications at this juncture. The populist, nationalist, anti-immigrant appeal proved unsustainable, losing veracity as the FPÖ entered coalition government and faced compromise and power sharing. Likewise the FN experienced co-optation, fuelling a mainstream right-wing consolidation of power by the UMP. Finally, both parties confronted factions and faced splits to form the BZÖ and MNR, and Marine Le Pen must carefully guard against such a split in the FN as it moves forward. While splits occurred at different times and with different effects, they underscore a common problem. The expansionist aim of the growth stage brought new constituencies into the party, producing factions and forcing both parties to sidestep contentious issues and moderate their stance. As both parties appear poised to return to a sustained upward trajectory of support, they may do well to keep this lesson in mind.

References Art, D. 2006. The Politics of the Nazi Past in Austria and Germany. New York: Cambridge University Press. Barth, E. 2003a. ‘A Nice, les délégués du Front national plébiscitent Bruno Gollnisch et isolent Marine Le Pen’, Le Monde, 22 April.

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–––– 2003b. ‘Pour compenser l’influence de M. Gollnisch, M. Le Pen impose des partisans de sa fille à la direction du FN’, Le Monde, 23 April. Bassett, R. 1990. Waldheim and Austria. New York: Penguin Books. Bell, D.S. and Criddle, B. 2008. ‘Presidentialism Enthroned: The French Presidential and Parliamentary Elections of April–May and June 2007’, Parliamentary Affairs, 61: 185–205. Bunzl, J. 2002. ‘Who the Hell is Jörg Haider?’, in R. Wodak and A. Pelinka (eds), The Haider Phenomenon in Austria. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, pp. 61–66. Ceccaldi, M. 2002. ‘Personal Interview. National Front Deputy Director of Legal Affairs’. Conducted at party headquarters in St. Cloud, France, 22 January. Cole, A. 2003. ‘Stress, Strain and Stability in the French Party System’, in J.A.J. Evans (ed.), The French Party System. New York: Manchester University Press, pp. 11–28. DeClair, E. 1999. Politics on the Fringe: The People, Policies and Organization of the French National Front. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Der Standard. 2008. ‘Erster rot-schwarzer Verhandlungs’, Der Standard, 14 October. Retrieved 15 October 2008 from http://derstandard.at/?url=/?id=1220460646413. Eatwell, R. 2003. ‘Ten Theories of the Extreme Right’, in P. Merkl and L. Weinberg (eds), Right-Wing Extremism in the Twenty-First Century. London: Frank Cass, pp. 47–73. –––– 2005. ‘Charisma and the Revival of the European Extreme Right’, in J. Rydgren (ed.), Movements of Exclusion: Radical Right-wing Populism in the Western World. New York: Nova Science Publishers, pp. 101–20. Gollnisch, B. 2002. ‘Personal Interview. National Front Party Delegate General and Member of the European Parliament’. Conducted at party headquarters in St. Cloud, France, 22 January. Hayward, J. 1990. ‘Ideological Change: The Exhaustion of the Revolutionary Impetus’, in P. Hall, J. Hayward and H. Machin (eds), Developments in French Politics. New York: St. Martin’s Press, pp. 15–32. Heinisch, R. 2003. ‘Success in Opposition – Failure in Government: Explaining the Performance of Right-Wing Populist Parties in Public Office’, West European Politics, 26: 91–130. Howard, M.M. 2000. ‘Can Populism be Suppressed in a Democracy? Austria, Germany and the European Union’, East European Politics and Societies, 14: 18–32. International Herald Tribune. 2008. ‘Le Pen to Stand Down as Head of French Far-Right Party’, International Herald Tribune, 11 September. Retrieved 14 September 2008 from http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/09/11/europe/france.php. Kitschelt, H. 1995. The Radical Right in Western Europe: A Comparative Analysis. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Knapp, A. 2004. Parties and the Party System in France: A Disconnected Democracy? New York: Palgrave. Le Monde. 2003. ‘M. Gollnisch cède la place à Mme Le Pen en Ile-de-France’, Le Monde, 9 May. Luther, K.R. 2000. ‘Austria: A Democracy under Threat from the Freedom Party?’, Parliamentary Affairs, 53: 426–42. –––– 2003. ‘The Self-Destruction of a Right-Wing Populist Party? The Austrian Parliamentary Election of 2002’, West European Politics, 26: 136–52. Marcus, J. 1995. The National Front and French Politics: The Resistible Rise of Jean-Marie Le Pen. New York: New York University Press. Mény, Y. and Surel, Y. (eds) 2002. Democracies and the Populist Challenge. New York: Palgrave. Mestre, A. 2011. ‘Marine Le Pen cherche à nouer des alliances avec les partis d’extrême droite européens’, Le Monde, 10 June.

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Minkenberg, M. 1998. ‘Context and Consequence: The Impact of the New Radical Right on the Political Process in France and Germany’, German Politics and Society, 48: 1–23. Moffett, S. 2011. ‘Le Pen’s Daughter Takes Party Helm’, Wall Street Journal, 17 January. Retrieved 14 March 2011 from http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100014240527487035 51604576085830320266312.html. Müller, W.C. 2000. ‘Election Reports: the Austrian Election of 1999: A Shift to the Right’, West European Politics, 23: 191–200. –––– 2002. ‘Evil or the “Engine of Democracy”? Populism and Party Competition in Austria’, in Y. Mény and Y. Surel (eds), Democracies and the Populist Challenge. New York: Palgrave, pp. 155-75. Neuwahl.com 2011, 2 September. Austrian Gallup poll data. Retrieved on 9 September 2011 from http://neuwal.com/index.php/2011/09/02/wahlumfrage-osterreich-spo28-ovp-24-fpo-24-grune-14-bzo-5-gallup-02-09-2011/. Norris, P. 2005. Radical Right: Voters and Parties in the Electoral Marketplace. New York: Cambridge University Press. Partik-Pable, H. 2001. ‘Personal Interview. Freedom Party Deputy to the Nationalrat’. Interview conducted at her office in the Parliament’s Club of the Nationalrat, Vienna, 29 November. Rydgren, J. 2003. The Populist Challenge: Political Protest and Ethno-Nationalist Mobilization in France. New York: Berghahn Books. –––– 2007. ‘The Sociology of the Radical Right’, Annual Review of Sociology, 33: 241–62. Schain, M. 1999. ‘The National Front and the French Party System’, French Politics and Society, 17: 1–16. –––– 2002. ‘The Impact of the French National Front on the French Political System’, in M. Schain, A. Zolberg and P. Hossay (eds), Shadows over Europe: The Development and Impact of the Extreme Right in Western Europe. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 223–43. Sichrovsky, P. 2001. ‘Personal Interview. Freedom Party delegate to the European Parliament’. Conducted during the Freedom Party Congress at the Hotel Intercontinental, in Vienna, 3 December. Simon, N. 2005. ‘Sympathy for the Devil?’ Lebanon Wire, The Jerusalem Report, 3 January. Retrieved 18 August 2007 from http://www.lebanonwire.com/0501/050301JREP.asp. The Economist. 2011. ‘They Can’t’ Keep Her Down’, 19 March (print edition). Retrieved 21 March 2011 from http://www.economist.com/node/18398631?story_id=18398631. Williams, M.H. 2006. The Impact of Radical Right-Wing Parties in West European Democracies. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Wodak, R. and Pelinka, A. (eds) 2002. The Haider Phenomenon in Austria. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers.

PART V

From ‘Local’ to ‘Transnational’

17 RIGHTS, ROOTS AND ROUTES Local and transnational contexts of extreme-right movements in contemporary Malta Mark-Anthony Falzon and Mark Micallef

Introduction The archipelago state of Malta (316 km2 with a population of 402,000) is the European Union’s smallest member state. Since its independence from Britain in 1964, the Maltese polity has been characterized by a bi-partisan see-saw formulation that leaves little space for smaller political groupings. The two main parties are the centre-left Partit Laburista (PL, Labour Party, currently in opposition with 33 parliamentary seats) and the Christian-Democrat Nationalist Party (PN, currently in government with 34 seats); the Greens, locally incarnated as Alternattiva Demokratika (AD, Democratic Alternative, no seats), have been actively involved in national politics, with scant electoral success, since 1989. Arguably the three major political processes of these last two decades have been the accession to the EU in 2004, the liberalization of the economy post 1987, and the pluralization and subsequent proliferation of the media in the 1990s.The last, coupled with the burgeoning of new technologies of communication, has made it increasingly possible for emergent movements to engage with the public sphere. The rise of the local extreme right belongs within this context. Largely in response to unprecedented influxes of sub-Saharan irregular migrants, a small and highly diverse number of individuals, groups and political actors peddling extremeright ideas have been making their presence felt since 2002 or so, reaching a peak in 2004–5. This chapter is an attempt to describe and understand the dynamics of the Maltese extreme right. We first describe and contextualize, from/in a local perspective, the elements making up this heterogeneous category; we then go on transnationally to locate it within much broader processes, ideas and practices. Our underlying argument is that sui generis studies of local movements, albeit of ethnographic interest, are hardly comprehensive ways of understanding the extreme right, in Malta or elsewhere.

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A note on research design: this chapter is based on fieldwork in Malta from 2002 to date. Our main data sources were: first, a number of in-depth interviews with the protagonists and followers of the local extreme right; second, participant observation sessions at various events organized by extreme-right circles; third, extensive and regular ‘observation’ of online forums and websites (see Jacobson 1999), notably the well-known Vivamalta forum1 and the Imperium Europa website;2 and, fourth, observation of public meetings and the local print and broadcasting media.

The extreme right in contemporary Malta: the actors, roles and script The key characteristic of the contemporary Maltese far right is its heterogeneous and invertebrate nature. Nonetheless, one may discern four fairly coherent threads (see Table 17.1), here listed and described in descending order of extremeness. Imperium Europa is formally a one-man show set up and run by Norman Lowell, by far the most prominent extreme-right personage in contemporary Malta. As a notion, Imperium Europa (elaborated on at length in Lowell’s 2003 book of that title) originally proposed the ethnic cleansing of the whole of Europe (‘from Ireland to Vladivostok’) to achieve an exclusively ‘Europid’-inhabited continent. In recent years this has been broadened to incorporate North America, South Africa and ‘huge swathes’ of Latin America – what Lowell envisages as ‘two white rings encircling the globe’. Lowell’s ideology presents all the trappings of global neo-Nazi and white supremacist beliefs: Holocaust denial and a rabid anti-Semitism (in a nod to the Nazi film The Eternal Jew [Der ewige Jude, 1940], he describes Jews TABLE 17.1 Taxonomic sketch of activity and ideology among the contemporary Maltese

extreme right

Participation in elections Conservatism Palingenetic mythology White supremacism Anti-Semitism Patriotism Anti-immigration Transnational connections Spectacle and performance

Imperium Europa

Vivamalta

Alleanza Nazzjonali Azzjoni Repubblikana Nazzjonali

Sporadic

No

No

Ambiguous Very strong

Ambiguous Strong Variable Mild

Moderate to strong No

Very strong Very strong Ambiguous Very strong Strong

Strong Variable Variable Very strong Strong

No No Very strong Strong Moderate

No No Strong Strong No

Very important

Important

Moderate

Weak

Strong

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as ‘sewer rats’), racism (particularly that addressed at ‘negrids’), hard-line antiimmigrationism, and, importantly, a palingenetic vision for the revival of a preChristian spirituality (‘cosmotheism’) of which Malta, with its heritage of Neolithic sites, would be a foremost exponent. Lowell also talks of a ‘planetary imperium’ to be born of a ‘cataclysmic crisis’ in 2012, the winners of which will be a global white ‘spiritual’ elite inhabiting a ‘sacred geography’ punctuated with ‘power points’ which include Malta, Stonehenge and Monte Rosa. A retired banker, Lowell had been flirting with Maltese public opinion for a couple of decades before really attempting to take centre stage. By 2004, and riding the crest of the immigration issue, his vitriolic attacks on blacks, Jews, immigrantfriendly non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and the Church state hegemony, galvanized his role as a spokesman for the emergent extreme right, not least thanks to a mushrooming of Internet forums as well as his regular television appearances on a small private station, which aired a series of political debates featuring the minor candidates of the EU parliamentary election of that year. The press largely reacted with contempt; at the same time, however, it displayed a bemused fascination with his eccentric persona (Vassallo 2006). The attitude changed to an active indifference, even censorship, in the run-up to the March 2008 general election. This later attitude of negation was fuelled in large part by a realization, on the part of the mainstream, that the media coverage Lowell had been given in 2004, despite it having been largely negative, had inadvertently raised his profile and made him something of an anti-establishment icon. In this sense Lowell’s success at the 2004 polls (he failed to get elected but got a very respectable number of votes) must have served as an eye opener that the extreme right was potentially a political actor to be reckoned with. At the time of writing (spring 2008, revised 2011) Lowell’s popularity is at a low ebb. He retains a regular presence on the Vivamalta website, to which he is ‘affiliated’, and has kept up his contacts with like-minded movements in Britain and the US. His visibility in the Maltese public sphere, however, has decreased. On 27 March 2008 Lowell became the first Maltese to be handed a jail sentence (two years, suspended for four) for incitement to racial hatred. Even so, following a period of uncertainty as to whether Lowell’s conviction precluded him from electoral politics, Imperium Europa trebled its first-count votes to 3,637 in the June 2009 Euro-parliamentary elections. Vivamalta, essentially a website which brings together, through its online forums, a number of individuals whose views, though strongly divergent in substance on most counts, tend to converge on the themes of race, immigration, and sympathy for Norman Lowell’s performances and rhetorical style (if not necessarily his views). Vivamalta attracts hundreds of Maltese and foreign visitors weekly, of whom around 30 are regulars (though this number has recently been on the wane). It has also produced an ‘affiliated’ political candidate (apart from Lowell, that is), a university student3 who contested and performed miserably in the March 2008 elections. Alleanza Nazzjonali Repubblikana (ANR, National Republican Alliance) was set up in 2005 and all but disbanded in 2007. The ANR presented itself as a pressure

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group which aimed to ‘defend and promote the identity, integrity, and interests of the Maltese nation’, defined as ‘Latin, European, and Roman Catholic’.4 Its two main lines of attack were a conservatism based on ‘traditional’ models of nation and family, and a strong anti-immigrationist stance. The two were clearly linked as immigration was represented as the main threat to ‘Maltese’ models of family and values. The ANR enjoyed several months of fairly high-profile presence in the public sphere, notably through public meetings and television appearances. Azzjoni Nazzjonali (AN, National Action’) was a political party set up in 2007 with an aggressive nationalist, conservative and anti-immigrationist agenda (which attracted most ANR members to its ranks, rendering the pressure group redundant). AN was the brainchild of Josie Muscat, a prominent gynaecologist, private medical care entrepreneur and former Nationalist MP. Following a poor showing in the 2009 EP elections, AN was formally dissolved in 2010.

Convergences: putting the Maltese extreme right in local context In this section we are interested, first, in exploring how the four movements described above are related and, second, in linking them to a heuristic socio-political context. The first element of convergence concerns genealogy, in the sense that a significant number of individuals who got involved in the more moderate ANR and AN were first attracted to the extreme right by the performances of Norman Lowell. There is of course a high turnover rate and people come and go and commute between the movements, often doctoring their discourse accordingly. Thus an AN political candidate might show a moderate countenance to immigration in a television debate, and a hard-line one in his online ‘avatar’. One might add that as individuals move from more to less extreme – and therefore closer to the mainstream – they tend to disown Lowell, sometimes publicly. Lowell himself has responded by denouncing both AN and especially ANR as minions of an international Jewish plot. Formally, then, one notes a sustained difference between the broad-ranging ideas of Norman Lowell (and, by osmosis, some of the regulars on Vivamalta) and the conservative, ultra-nationalist views of the ANR and AN. On an informal level, however, the boundaries between the four movements are less easily definable. Besides genealogy, the second and by far the most important centripetal force, that has fostered a convergence of thought and action, is immigration – more specifically, the mass immigration of sub-Saharans (known generically, popularly and unflatteringly as klandestini). One should note that since sub-Saharan immigrants arrive in Malta by sea, often on overloaded rickety boats that appear out of nowhere at random places along the coast, there is a strong element of spectacle about them (Falzon forthcoming). Besides, in an island context, this dynamic lends itself to metaphors of ‘invasion’. The concentration of immigrants in fortified ‘detention centres’, and later in ‘open centres’ (the largest one of which happens to be situated on one of the busiest roads in Malta), makes them even more visible. Be that as

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it may, all four extreme-right movements are strongly anti-immigrationist (though their proposed solutions vary from blasting boatloads of immigrants in the case of Norman Lowell to suggestions that Malta ought to ignore international asylum laws and ‘get tough’ on immigration in that of AN) and their fortunes tend to fluctuate in tune with the volume of immigrant arrivals in Malta – or, more accurately, with the prominence given it by the mainstream media and parties. Put broadly, the local response to irregular migration has shifted from initial sympathy and commiseration when landings started in 2001, through outright contempt within the space of two to three years, to a cautious sense of co-existence of sorts by 2007. (In early 2009, probably as a reaction to spectacular mass arrivals, things began to sour again.) Anti-immigration rhetoric reached a peak in 2004–5. A news item broadcast on national television in the summer of 2005, for instance, compared the ‘invasion’ by migrants to a jellyfish infestation of the Maltese coast that was making the news at the time (Sammut 2007). Newspapers published stories of ‘weapons’ confiscated at immigrant detention camps, the potential terrorist threat of migration, and black prostitutes roaming the streets and spreading HIV (Texeire 2006).5 The tension was fuelled not only by the sheer number of migrants and the dramatic context in which they found themselves in Malta, but also by a palpable expectation that the situation could be resolved given political will and decisive administration. If the European Union was not willing to help with what the government described as ‘burden sharing’, then Malta would have to take matters into its own hands, the popular call went. That is exactly what the extreme right’s exponents had on offer with their talk of sinking migrant boats ‘14 miles out’ (Lowell), ‘cleaning the streets’ of klandestini (ANR), and, more recently, having them ‘shipped to Brussels’ (AN). Nonetheless, a series of turning points tripped the momentum which the movement was beginning to harness. The most relevant came in autumn 2005, when ominous racist graffiti appeared at roadsides, along with minor vandalism to public property. The situation escalated in early 2006 into a series of arson attacks on Jesuits and prominent journalists – named enemies of the extreme right for their championing of immigrants’ rights. Whether any of the formal movements described earlier were responsible for these arsons is irrelevant (nobody was ever charged). The point is that the incidents broke the extreme right’s back after a number of its affiliates were arrested and interrogated for their suspected involvement. Many members defected and, along with the arrest and charging of a number of protagonists for incitement to racial hatred, the whole debacle had a negative effect on the extreme right’s standing in public opinion, not least since clergy had been targeted in the attacks. The timing of general elections in Malta on 8 March 2008 could not have been more providential in that it allowed us to test our long-held contention that the extreme right’s star as a formal and political actor in Malta was on the wane. Immigration got hardly a mention during the campaign, despite polls showing it was generally a salient issue among the electorate. This was partly because it was

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supplanted by more ‘seasonal’ topics (there are usually no migrant crossings in March due to rough seas), and also because of a tacit consensus among the main parties to steer clear of partisan debate on immigration. As the polls predicted, the situation proved disastrous for AN, which, with its talk of being able to break through Malta’s entrenched political bi-polarity and of having the support of a silent majority, had poured substantial funds into the campaign. In an election with one of the lowest turnouts in recent years (93 per cent – still very high compared to that in most Western democracies), the minor parties and independent candidates, but especially the extreme right, fared dismally. The incumbent Nationalist Party won 49.34 per cent of the vote over the Labour Party’s 48.79, leaving little ground for any third party. Significantly, ‘protest’ voters preferred to abstain rather than vote for the extreme right or other parties. AN managed 1,461 votes or 0.5 per cent of the total votes cast. Following the result, leader Josie Muscat resigned, stating publicly that it was ‘not worth it’ (he later reconsidered although the party was eventually dissolved). Norman Lowell, on his part, seemed more realistic about his prospects, and went on record as saying that his candidature was more a token of ‘final resistance’ (to the country’s ‘takeover’ by immigrants) than anything else. He polled a mere 84 votes. This performance contrasts with recent ones in Europe. Linden and Klandermans (2007), for example, talk of a rise of extreme-right sentiments in the Netherlands in the 1990s, as witnessed, inter alia, by successful electoral results. Likewise Virchow (2007) describes the success of the German extreme right in the 2004 elections and ascribes it to a general disenchantment with politics, allowing extreme-right parties to win over protest votes; he also cites their focus on bread-and butter-issues like unemployment and reductions in social security, and their strong anti-immigration stance. By 2009 the subject of immigration was again catapulted into the Maltese public sphere. Hot on the heels of a summer which saw a record number of migrant landings, the first months of 2009 were characterized by an unusually high number of crossings. Some 150 migrants from Africa landed in January, while February saw a record 489. This time, however, mainstream politicians seemed to be taking up the issue, pulling the proverbial rug from under the extreme right’s feet. On the day 227 immigrants were brought ashore, the leader of the opposition called for an urgent discussion in parliament; the prime minister agreed in principle but denied the matter was especially urgent. Meanwhile, a pariah government back-bencher declared, at odds with official government rhetoric, that Malta was ‘full up’ and that migrants should have been sent back to Libya summarily. And candidates for the June 2009 Euro-parliamentary elections, no doubt primed by their constituents, put immigration on their campaign agendas. For its part, AN put forward a ten-point proposal which suggested, among other things, that immigrants in detention should be put to forced labour. Not many people seem to have noticed. Put simply, this and later developments of the main parties appropriating the immigration debate appear to have sealed the fate of the

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extreme right in Malta, at least for the foreseeable future. This matches what happened to the Greens, who saw ‘their’ environmentalist agenda being carved up by the two main parties in the late 1990s. Despite the connection between the fortunes of the various movements and immigration, it would be mistaken to frame the Maltese extreme right in the context of immigration alone. One also senses that at the heart of its emergence lies a profound rejection of the Maltese establishment. On the level of the members, it is a protest against what they perceive as a stale and inauthentic sense of national identity. Just as other emergent extreme-right parties have done on the Continent (Heinisch 2003), the local movement actively and somewhat paradoxically projects itself as a marginal and disenfranchised group (in the sense of being non-mainstream) which claims to defend, and therefore speak for, the rights of the silent majority – even though it is fundamentally positioned against it. The discursive field of the movement happens to dovetail, in substance, with the theory of Maltese sociologist Godfrey Baldacchino (2002) who argues that the national interest in Malta has been hijacked by the country’s all-powerful sociopolitical institutions, the Church and the two main Political Parties, which he calls ‘the Troika’. In practice, this means that the public sphere and any civil expression within it is channelled through the discourse of these mammoth institutions, outside which all else is marginalized (see Falzon 2007). The Troika, in other words, comes to represent the primary anchor of identity, acting as an intermediary for the sense of being Maltese.The parties become the quintessential expression of national identity and national interest, as well as the political avenue sanctioned by it. For one to be Maltese, one must be either a Nationalist or a Labourite, and definitely a Catholic or have some relation (whichever way) to Catholicism. Perhaps the shortest route to locating the discourse of the extreme right within this set of relations is through a favourite metaphor in Lowell’s repertoire, namely that of ‘il-ġaħan Malti’ (‘the Maltese ġaħan’). ‘Ġaħan’ is a folk simpleton who, in Lowell’s rhetoric, comes to symbolize a mentally comatose Maltese culture. At the same time, and somewhat paradoxically, ġaħan is called upon to shake off the slumber foisted upon him by the establishment. The ġaħan metaphor, which also found its way into the rhetoric of AN’s Josie Muscat during the 2008 electoral campaign, thus represents a parody of Maltese society, a caricature of the inability of the Maltese to think independently, in their own interests. In Lowell’s terms, the Maltese ġaħan has been hijacked by ‘the two parties and the KKK’ (‘KKK’ stands for ‘Knisja Kattolika Korrotta’, ‘Corrupt Catholic Church’; Lowell also describes the two parties as ‘lesbian prostitutes sharing the same bed’). It is worth noting that, on their part, AN and ANR completely sidestepped the criticism levelled at the Church. The formation of the ANR and later AN under the banner of Catholic conservatism came in large part as a response to the perceived sterility of the polity; it was a marked shift away from Lowell’s neo-paganism, visceral racism and anti-Semitism, in favour of a more pragmatic ideological line. The so-called ‘split’ happened roughly during the summer of 2005, when the

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different factions of the movement, until then a rather compact if nebulous group, began openly criticizing each other, primarily on the leading far-right Internet forum, the now-defunct AveMelita. In sum, the extreme right in Malta amply displays what Griffin (1991) calls the ‘basic features’ of such movements, namely organizational complexity and ideological heterogeneity. It can be seen as a mélange of ideas, personalities and practices which articulate themselves along the lines of the four movements. At the same time, it does show a sense of convergence on a small number of central themes, which affords it both strength and vulnerability. Its main weakness is that it will most likely remain on the margins of Maltese politics, especially as it loses its main battle horse (anti-immigrationism) to the main parties. That said, it may well prove capable of a sustained if minor presence by putting on the national agenda issues which would not otherwise be broached by the mainstream parties.

How ‘Maltese’ is the Maltese extreme right? On the one hand, our object is ‘Maltese’ in that it is located in Malta, is made up mostly of Maltese people, and is embedded in the historical and contemporary realities of the Maltese polity. On the other, a number of factors make it clear that a localistic and exceptionalist heuristic will not suffice. In the following two sections we shall, first, look at some of the mechanisms of transnational interactions that characterize the Maltese extreme right, and, second, discuss the ways in which its key attributes exhibit a homology with similar movements elsewhere. A good number of extreme-right actors draw on biographies of mobility and interaction with similar groups in various countries. In the case of Norman Lowell, for instance, his white supremacist ideas were moulded in the 1970s in what was then Rhodesia. Lowell spent several months immersed in the racial politics that characterized that country at the time, and he regularly refers to the experience as having been of epiphanic significance to his thought and beliefs. It gives him a claim to ‘understanding blacks’ and their ‘inherent’, racially defined ‘inferiority’. More recently Lowell has been to London several times to give speeches at gatherings of the New Right group, a small UK-based extreme-right organization of sorts centred on palingenetic white supremacism and British ultranationalism.6 (Interestingly, the New Right’s journal is called New Imperium.) A number of other individuals have biographies of mobility and displacement; some are of transnational parentage or have non-Maltese partners, while others have worked and/or lived in countries where they came across local extreme-right groups. A detailed description of the Maltese extreme right’s transnational connections is beyond the scope of this chapter but suffice it to mention the example of links (through direct relations, correspondence or published literature) with various neo-Nazi groups such as The Order (a US white-supremacist and anti-Semitic terrorist organization active in the 1980s), as well as more moderate movements. Lowell, for example, has corresponded with Britain’s Oswald Mosley (he claims to have

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‘stacks of his letters’), insiders of the French Nouvelle Droite, Austria’s Jörg Haider, as well as a host of US extremists (notably The Order’s David Lane, regarded as a martyr by neo-Nazis worldwide). At a recent public meeting, he claimed that Malta has been chosen (by extreme-right movements in Europe) as the venue for the launching of the anthem of a ‘new Europe’, in effect George Lehmann’s Ave Europa. The second factor which enables and fosters the local extreme right’s transnational connections is information technology. Let us first establish that the Internet has been a pivotal element behind the recent rise of the movement in Malta, for various reasons. First, the Internet is a facet of the public sphere which is inherently very hard to control. This means that it is open to anti-Semitic, racist and other extremist (and potentially incriminating) discourses, which are otherwise censored by editors of mainstream media. Second, online communities constitute a ‘safe’ venue for interaction, not least because interlocutors can, and generally do, use ‘avatars’ to mask their identity.7 The crucial point, however, is that the Internet, being literally a world wide web, re-territorializes interaction (see, for instance, Featherstone 1995, Hannerz 1996 and various contributions in Inda and Rosaldo 2002) and renders the local transnational. In our case, it means that the extreme right is embedded in transnational networks. The Vivamalta online forum in particular attracts posts from neo-Nazis, white supremacists, neo-Fascists and ultranationalists based in a number of locations worldwide. It also regularly carries links (in alternative cyber jargon, ‘opens threads’) to like-minded movements and invites users of the forum to discuss extreme-right issues. With respect to the ANR, they were ‘affiliated’ (though the exact relation is vague at best) to the Center for Vigilant Freedom, a US-based but largely online8 organization which targets the ‘Islamist threat’. Norman Lowell, for his part, has benefited greatly from the Internet – indeed, one might say he has in good measure been produced in and of it. His speeches, usually made available online through YouTube9 and/or Maltese-run websites,10 have proved very popular among local youth for their caustic and eccentric assaults on the establishment. Some of his speeches and writings in English are known beyond Malta, recently through his presence on the UK-based white-supremacist Internet Majority Rights radio.11 The upshot, and this is worth emphasizing, is that despite being linked in piecemeal fashion and in various ways to local contexts (through criticism of the Catholic Church, sub-Saharan immigration or anti-Semitic verbal assaults on ‘infiltrated’ national politics), Maltese extreme-right ideas and discourses are anything but ‘local’.

Transnational homologies There is another level, apart from that of content, at which the local extreme right goes well beyond exceptionalist frameworks. In fact, and in spite of the particularities of context, in terms of structure the extreme right in contemporary Malta is markedly homologous with similar movements elsewhere. In this sense, the recent

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special issue of the Journal of Contemporary Ethnography (which included case studies of extreme-right movements from a number of locations) constitutes a useful reference point. In her editorial chapter, Blee (2007) identifies a number of common factors which we found to be readily applicable to the Maltese case. The first factor is an emphasis on individual motivations and practices which goes well beyond a requisite nod to ‘agency’. As Blee puts it, it is essential to differentiate ‘the external façade of the far right from its internal dynamics’ (2007: 122). In the case of the Maltese extreme right, one notes, first, the importance of individual entrepreneurship, and, second, the marked disjunctures between the regular formal façade and the variegated informal interior. Norman Lowell, for example, can be seen as a ‘cultural entrepreneur’ in Barth’s (1969) sense, a mongerer of ‘organized culture difference’ (i.e. identity) by bringing together, through his individual biography and experiences, a number of strands of discourse and practices; Josie Muscat represents another significant agent. Further, although subscribers do cross paths at a number of important junctions, one notes a very pronounced heterogeneity of ideas and practices – both between and within the various movements. This gives rise to constant sparring, online as well as in other contexts. It also means that it is very difficult for the extreme right to evolve into a structured unified movement (or at least number of movements) with a clear and sustained political line of action. In this vein, a fact that never ceased to surprise us during our fieldwork was that even hardened followers of Lowell, who hardly ever missed an event or went a day without posting online, told us that, on account of his esoteric views, they would not consider voting for him in a general election. Blee’s (2007) second point concerns emotions. She privileges, as many scholars do, the role of emotions in the making of extreme-right movements. Given the recent spate of literature rehabilitating emotions into social theory (see, for instance, Williams 2000; Milton and Svašek 2005), as well as the obvious emotionality of extreme-right performance, this is hardly groundbreaking. However, she adds that it is important to realize that it is not just the ‘expected emotions of hostility, persecution, and anger’ that matter, but equally those of ‘pride, amusement, and sensuality’ (Blee 2007: 123). The co-existence of these contrasting sets of emotions should not come as a surprise; on the contrary, it is a well-trodden point that the sacred is created through a process of loss – in Bataille’s (1972) words, ‘Pleasure only starts once the worm has got into the fruit, to become delightful happiness must be tainted with poison.’ Hansen (1999), for instance, writing about the farright Hindu nationalist Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS, National Volunteers Organisation) in India, notes how a collective ‘grandiose self ’ – that is, a community organized around enjoyment (jouissance) – is based not least on a sense of constant threat of ‘theft of enjoyment’ by outside groups. In our case there is no doubt that emotions, including those of ‘pride, amusement, and sensuality’, are a defining aspect of the local extreme right. It is in fact hardly a case of ideology uniting the Maltese extreme right, but rather one of people with different agendas rallying around a field of emotionality emanating in

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part from individual charismatic selves. Weber defined charismatic authority as stemming from ‘a certain quality of the individual personality by virtue of which he is set apart from ordinary men and treated as endowed with supernatural, superhuman, or at least specifically exceptional powers or qualities’ (1947: 358). Lowell clearly fits the bill as an exceptional figure in the eyes of many followers; at the same time he has never really exerted ‘authority’ in a classical Weberian sense (i.e. as a form of leadership power), acting instead as a charismatic coagulant for an otherwise nebulous following. In part this is because he has never quite modified his ideas to achieve a more respectable image, as other extreme-right leaders have done elsewhere in Europe (Eatwell 2002). The heart of Lowell’s charisma is its symbolism; an emotive dynamic which gives his circle (and the wider group he influences) an essentially ritualistic character. While the members’ broad endorsement of the movement is meaningful and directed, their political actions are ritualized, in the sense that the ‘identity’ of the group’s actions as a whole (the gatherings and the form that support takes in Lowell’s public performances) is ‘non-intentional’ and archetypal (Humphrey and Laidlaw 1994). Emotions of anger and frustration abound and are typically directed at immigrants, NGOs and political incompetence; these co-exist with a generous supply of emotions of ‘pride, amusement, and sensuality’ generated by Lowell’s irreverent wisecracks and his professed love of wine, women and song.12 In other words, the movement only represents the aspirations of the members in symbolic-emotive rather than concrete terms, a sort of protest-by-proxy, rallied around banners to which the members only subscribe in form. The gatherings and the online activity become rituals in themselves, wherein the subversive context is provided by the proximity to Norman Lowell and his performances, and not through some expectation that the activities will lead to the social changes prescribed by his ideology. Third, Blee (2007) generalizes about attempts by extreme-right movements to reconcile extremist agendas that are consistent with their internal ideologies, with more moderate tactics that appeal to a wider base of remits (and possibly voters). In the Maltese case, there are some important differences. As mentioned earlier, Norman Lowell has never sought to go moderate. At the same time, he has attempted to resolve the tension between palingenetic global scenarios and the more mundane agendas of locality by differentiating between the ‘imperium’ and ‘dominium’ spheres which would come into being post-2012 (his formula is: imperium = aggressive masculinity = world empire; dominium = caring femininity = local communities). At the other end of the spectrum, AN took pains to present a respectable façade and adopt a ‘moderate’ stance on, say, immigration. But then, AN was a Political Party that relied on people’s votes for its success, while Lowell seems more interested in the dictates of the ‘cosmic will’. (As mentioned earlier, he has never taken his local political programme very seriously – on the contrary, he talks of ‘entering the fray holding our noses’.) In sum, our case confirms Blee’s observation and shows that the degree of modification may be linked in part to the actual political practices of the groups in question.

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Blee’s (2007) fourth point concerns what she calls the ‘centrality of culture’ as in music, clothing, style, bodily disciplines, ritual and performance. Again, her generalization is very much applicable in our case. With respect to Norman Lowell, the sensational effect of his ideas certainly played an important role. However, a significant chunk of his following was won on the grounds of his persona and performances. Besides his idiosyncratic sartorial style, which includes jackboots, a range of walking sticks and, often, a tie wrapped around his neck like a scarf, Lowell presents himself as a misunderstood Nietzschean idealist, a victim of his own anachronistic chivalry. His public performances, which often take place in pubs and restaurants, attract substantial crowds for their entertainment value. Usually propped on some sort of stage giving him extra presence, Lowell typically blends his vitriolic attacks on ‘negrids’, Jews and society’s sacred cows with a dose of acerbic political satire, of which there is a serious dearth in Malta. In these settings he is both spectacle and object of admiration for his audience. One senses a feeling of awe at the display of brazen irreverence which most spectators deem themselves incapable of. Further, his claims to physical prowess and endurance, both legacies of his earlier interest in the martial arts, strike a chord with members of his inner circle as well as with more distant spectators. The whole point about Lowell’s charisma is his idiosyncrasy, and as such he has not spawned any direct imitators. Indirectly, however, many of the individuals drawn to the extreme right – notably his close circle and regulars on the Vivamalta forum – are able to participate in his ideals of chivalry and martial ‘spirituality’ through various means. Online avatars are often chosen along these lines, and typical ones include ‘Baron Ironblood’, ‘Norman Soldier’, ‘Neverwinter’ and ‘Praefectus’; these names are invariably accompanied with hyperbolic martial images. In part, the importance of such images derives from their role as symbols on which individuals and groups with highly divergent ideas converge, thus fostering a semblance of ‘community’ (see Cohen 1985). The scholarship on the extreme right has rightly focused on choreographed events as collective venues for specialized performance of extreme-right sentiment. Virchow (2007), for instance, has written about the prominent part played by the Deutsche Stimme (Voice of Germany) Festival, as well as others organized by the National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD, Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands) and neo-Nazi ‘groupuscules’, as performative venues for recruiting, holding and activating followers and enhancing the collective identity of the German extreme right. In the Maltese case such specialized events have been lacking, with very few exceptions. Lowell’s public speeches are very much one-man shows in which the audience is spectatorial rather than participative. Perhaps more relevant are the monthly barbecues organized by Imperium Europa and Vivamalta at a secluded spot in the countryside, and typically attended by the inner circle and a small number of transients. These barbecues are publicized on the Vivamalta website as venues for the participants to sit around a logfire sipping wine and holding conversations on ‘spirituality’ and ‘high politics’, thus ‘renewing’ their ‘bond’ ‘in tune with the cosmos and Mother Nature’.

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Conclusion (T)he genus ‘fascism’ shows no sign of becoming extinct. Like some wounded hydra, it continues to sprout new progeny. (Griffin 1991: 182) Bardèche (1961, as cited in Griffin 1991: 172) holds that, although fascism will phenotypically vary from movement to movement because ‘each nation has its own way of saving itself ’, it has in common a palingenetic myth of a new and coming ‘Third Order’ for the West – ‘[e]ither the West will go under like a “drowning old man” or “the order of Sparta” will be reborn in a totally new form’ (Griffin 1991: 172). Griffin (1991: 177) goes on to argue that, due to the resilience of the palingenetic myth, ‘even if fascism will always be successfully marginalised by mainstream politics … there is every indication that it will remain a permanent component of the ultra-right in democratised or democratising societies, providing an inexhaustible well of organised xenophobia and ultra-nationalism’.13 We contend that, if it is at all possible to generalize about extreme-right movements, it must be in the direction of drawing up a list of tropes from which individual movements, be they local or transnational or (as is common) both, will ‘pick and choose’ depending on a number of key variables – the historical circumstances of locality and/or region, the nature of the public spheres within which they develop, and, crucially, the vagaries of individual cultural entrepreneurship. Methodologically, four main objects of analysis emerge: first, identifying which tropes are chosen by a particular movement; second, the dynamics of choice; third, the process/es by which they are embedded in local contexts; and, fourth, the lack of/success and consequentiality of the venture. Take Norman Lowell’s anti-Semitism, for instance. Lowell often describes Jews as, among other things, a ‘green-eyed black octopus’ with its tentacles wrapped around the world. He also refers to them as ‘mischief makers’ and proceeds to cobble together ‘evidence’ that they were behind a number of wars, the ascribed rationale being a sort of divide-and-rule vis-à-vis Europeans. While this imagery may sound entertaining and original to his audiences, it is in fact stodgy fare. The idea that Jews, especially the Rothschild banking family, are a kind of ‘vast, black octopus’, originated with ‘Coin’ Harvey in the US in the 1890s; and the suggestion that Jews were involved in fomenting wars between European states is at least as old as a number of late-nineteenth/early twentieth-century commentators, including the Liberal J.A. Hobson (see Ferguson 1998: 20–21). Clearly, the advance of new technologies of communication and mobility makes this ‘shopping’ more possible than ever before; it also enables the re-territorialization of these tropes. In the case of the contemporary Maltese extreme right, the tropes of anti-Semitism, white supremacy, social conservatism, ultra-nationalism and palingenetic myth have been embedded, wholesale or in part, in a local context characterized by strong Catholic and pro-European roots, and a Church–party hegemony. Partly because of this very context, the process may not have struck a

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sustained chord with the electorate, and the far right remains a marginal political actor. It is still, however, very much the recognizable progeny of the wounded hydra.

Notes 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

13

http://www.vivamalta.org. http://www.imperium-europa.org. http://www.pathforger.com. Party statute at http://www.anrmalta.info. One should note that the press was to some extent polarized on the issue, with sections of it championing the rights of immigrants. See founding member Troy Southgate’s website at http://www.myspace.com/troy southgate. Although Lowell’s recent conviction was based in part on online evidence which he had posted in his name. http://www.vigilantfreedom.org. http://www.youtube.com. Notably http://www.sandrovella.org, a Maltese satirical website. http://www.majorityrights.com. Lowell’s entertainment value is not to be underestimated. His speeches are among the most frequently accessed online material locally, and from time to time he is invited to give speeches to circles of work colleagues and such, that are in no sense of the term far right; in these situations he is seen as hearty after-dinner entertainment. He also regularly boasts that his circle attracts beautiful women – as he put it, ‘women may vote Left, but they sleep Right’. One should note that Griffin is specifically referring to ‘fascism’ rather than the ‘extreme right’. He defines fascism as ‘a genus of political ideology whose mythic core in its various permutations is a palingenetic form of populist ultra-nationalism’ (1991: 26).

Bibliography Baldacchino, G. 2002. ‘A Nationless State? Malta, National Identity and the EU’, West European Politics, 25(4): 191–206. Barth, F. 1969. ‘Introduction’, in F. Barth (ed.), Ethnic Groups and Boundaries: The Social Organisation of Culture Difference. London: Allen & Unwin, pp. 9–38. Bataille, G. 1972 [1966]. My Mother (translated from the French Ma Mère by Austryn Wainhouse). London: Cape. Blee, K.M. 2007. ‘Ethnographies of the Far Right’, Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, 36(2): 119–28. Cohen, A.P. 1985. The Symbolic Construction of Community. London: Routledge. Eatwell, R. 2002. ‘The Rebirth of Right-Wing Charisma? The Cases of Jean-Marie Le Pen and Vladimir Zhirinovsky’, Totalitarian Movements and Political Religions, 3(3): 1–23. Falzon, M.A. 2007. ‘God Protect Me from My Friends: Prelates, Politicians, and Social Welfare in Contemporary Malta’, Journal of Mediterranean Studies, 17(1): 47–72. –––– (forthcoming). ‘Immigration, Rituals, and Transitoriness in a Mediterranean Island’, Journal of Ethnic & Migration Studies. Featherstone, M. 1995. Undoing Culture: Globalization, Postmodernism and Identity. London: Sage. Ferguson, N. 1998. The House of Rothschild: Money’s Prophets 1798–1848. New York: Penguin.

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Griffin, R. 1991. The Nature of Fascism. London: Pinter. Hannerz, U. 1996. Transnational Connections: Culture, People, Places. London: Routledge. Hansen, T.B. 1999. The Saffron Wave: Democracy and Hindu Nationalism in Modern India. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Heinisch, R. 2003. ‘Success in Opposition – Failure in Government: Explaining the Performance of Right-Wing Populist Parties in Public Office’, West European Politics, 43(9): 91–129. Humphrey, C. and Laidlaw, J. 1994. The Archetypal Actions of Ritual: An Essay on Ritual Action as Illustrated by the Jain Rite of Worship. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Inda, J.X. and Rosaldo, R. (eds) 2002. The Anthropology of Globalization: A Reader. Oxford: Blackwell. Jacobson, D. 1999. ‘Doing Research in Cyberspace’, Field Methods, 11(2): 127–45. Linden, A. and Klandermans, B. 2007. ‘Revolutionaries, Wanderers, Converts, and Compliants: Life Histories of Extreme Right Activists’, Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, 36(2): 184–201. Lowell, N. 1999. Credo:The Book for the Very Few. Malta: JPS Books. –––– 2003. Imperium Europa:The Book that Changed the World. Malta: JPS Books. Milton, K. and Svašek, M. (eds) 2005. Mixed Emotions: Anthropological Studies of Feeling. Oxford and New York: Berg. Sammut, C. 2007. ‘The Ambiguous Borderline between Human Rights and National Security: The Journalist’s Dilemma in the Reporting of Irregular Immigrants in Malta’, Global Media Journal: Mediterranean Edition, 2(1): 1–9. Texeire, F. 2006. At the Gate of Fortress Europe: Irregular Immigration and Malta. Unpublished report for the Institute for Political Studies of Rennes, France. Vassallo, R. 2006. Maltese Media and the Hard Right: A Critical Analysis of Newspaper Articles about Malta’s Neo-Nazi Phenomenon 2000–2005. Unpublished MA dissertation, School of Journalism, Media and Cultural Studies, University of Cardiff . Virchow, F. 2007. ‘Performance, Emotion, and Ideology: On the Creation of “Collectives of Emotion” and Worldview in the Contemporary German Far Right’, Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, 36(2): 147–64. Weber, M. 1947. The Theory of Social and Economic Organization. New York: Oxford University Press. Williams, S. 2000. Emotion and Social Theory: Corporeal Reflections on the (Ir)rational. London: Sage.

18 CROSS-NATIONAL IDEOLOGY IN LOCAL ELECTIONS The case of Azione Sociale and the British National Party1 Andrea Mammone and Timothy Peace

Introduction Extreme-right parties in Europe have gone beyond their former status as a marginal, or even exotic, phenomenon in electoral politics. For the last twenty years, in virtually all countries of the European Union (EU), such parties have shown themselves capable of electoral success, gaining policy concessions from governing parties or even determining the actual process of policy making and influencing the public debate on key issues. Even in Britain, traditionally seen as one of the few outlying cases where the extreme right could not penetrate, the situation has evolved. Since the British National Party (BNP) has been led by Nick Griffin, it has experienced a continual, though hardly spectacular, growth at the local level, leading to the election of a number of local councillors, a member of the London Assembly and two MEPs. It started to receive support from parts of the electorate that one would not normally associate with such a party and the strategy of the BNP in recent years has been to move beyond the classical enclaves of extreme-right support. In Italy, Azione Sociale (AS, Social Action) led by Alessandra Mussolini, similarly had representatives in local government across Italy and had also been represented in the European parliament. Since the parliamentary elections of 2008, it has been a constitutive part of Silvio Berlusconi’s Popolo della Libertà (PDL, People of Freedom) coalition. In March 2009 AS became completely merged within the PDL along with other parties on the Italian right such as Forza Italia and Alleanza Nazionale (AN, National Alliance), although its members still maintain a certain level of independent activism.2 Despite being forced to camouflage somewhat its neo-fascist identity within this new party, it has received notable benefits in terms of media coverage which go well beyond the election of Mussolini to the Italian parliament. In this chapter we analyse the political discourse of both the BNP and AS during local elections. The aim is to highlight what unifies these two parties, placing

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emphasis on the transnational similarities of the extreme right across European borders, in particular ultra-nationalism and xenophobia. Our analysis is based on party literature including both manifestos and other electoral material such as campaign flyers as well as statements made by party leaders in the media. We gathered campaign material used during the local elections of 2006 including that circulated on the Internet of both the national party and local sections or affiliates. We have thus chosen to link a localist dimension with a cross-national focus. We also wish to show that, setting aside the impact of immigration and the processes of ‘ethnic competition’ (well described in this volume by Goodwin), the progression of the extreme right could also be due to an apparent external moderation of their political discourse and the abandonment of references to a more radical (explicitly fascist or neo-fascist) past. However, we consider these particular parties to still represent authentic cases of neo-fascism (and not as mere ‘populist’ or ‘national-populist’ parties), albeit with a veneer of respectability. Finally, we conclude with some reflections on the public reception of these parties and their leaders in the media.

The extreme right in Italy and Great Britain Italy represents an obvious reference point for scholars of the extreme right and not only because of the historical development of fascism, the regime of Benito Mussolini and the short-lived Salò republic. It is also the nation in which, during the immediate post-war period, fascists reorganized themselves into several different strands (which often interacted with each other): clandestine and terrorist groups (fascismo clandestino), veterans support associations, political activism through the infiltration of smaller existing movements and the creation of the most wellknown European neo-fascist party – the Movimento Sociale Italiano (MSI, Italian Social Movement) (Mammone 2005, 2007). More recently, the country has witnessed the promotion of politicians who were prominent members of the MSI to ministerial and other influential political positions such as the mayoralty of Rome. This has coincided with the rise of the ethno-regionalist and xenophobic Lega Nord (LN, Northern League) which has held a number of important portfolios within the various governments led by Silvio Berlusconi’s administration. Alessandra Mussolini, the granddaughter of the Duce, was first elected to the Italian parliament in 1992 for the MSI which then became Alleanza Nazionale in 1995. Mussolini left AN in 2003 due to disagreements with its leader Gianfranco Fini and created her own political movement – Alternativa Sociale (Social Alternative). This included other extreme-right forces such as Forza Nuova (New Force) and the Fronte Sociale Nazionale (National Social Front) and also had the support of MSI-Fiamma Tricolore (MSI-FT, Tricolour Flame). Her own party Libertà d’Azione (Freedom of Action) was also naturally a part of this coalition and was later renamed Azione Sociale. Alternativa Sociale was an attempt to federate the disparate archipelago of Italian neo-fascist movements and parties, a project which eventually failed due to their extremely fractious nature and that of the political personalities behind them. Despite this failure to create a single entity,

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these parties still routinely collaborate with each other. For example, Roberto Fiore, leader of Forza Nuova, maintains strong links with Mussolini.3 Incidentally, he also enjoys a personal friendship with BNP leader Nick Griffin. Fiore and Griffin were both active in the International Third Position and influenced by the ideas of Italian Julius Evola (Mammone and Veltri 2011b: 408).4 Griffin’s parents are also linked with an English language school in London owned by Fiore (Cobain and Taylor 2008). Both the BNP and AS have a well-structured ideology which we argue can be identified as neo-fascist, with an authoritarian conception of law and order and a mythological representation of the past. These core values are synthesized in their respective mission statements published on the party websites.5 AS can certainly be classified as a neo-fascist party for its professed ideology, its core values (tradition, family, motherland, race, work), its glorification of both fascist and neo-fascist icons and its identification with the historical experience and related mythology associated with the regime of Benito Mussolini. The neo-fascist label was not disputed by the party’s leaders and supporters, a fact that would be hard to deny given its public activities which included pilgrimages to the tomb of Mussolini and the commemoration of certain key historical dates from the fascist past. In fact, in 2008 after AN leader Gianfranco Fini made a statement about the value of anti-fascism, Alessandra Mussolini turned up in parliament with a t-shirt bearing the slogan ‘Con orgoglio dalla parte sbagliata’ (‘Proud to be on the wrong side’ – where the ‘wrong side’ was interwar fascism). Labelling the BNP as fascist or neofascist, as many analysts have traditionally done, is now much more problematic. Griffin admits that the party comes from a fascist past but argues that it can no longer be considered as such because it opposes a large central state and warns of the dangers of excessive state power. He first used the term ‘21st Century popular nationalism’ at the launch of their manifesto for the general election of 2005, a document which broke new ideological ground for the party. However, a number of scholars have tended to treat this evolution of the party’s doctrine with a certain amount of scepticism. Nigel Copsey, one of the foremost experts on the BNP, has argued that ‘neo-fascist’ continues to be the most correct label and that the party’s recent ideological positioning should not be taken at face value (Copsey 2007). The extreme right in Britain, of which the BNP is currently the most influential component, traces its origins to the British Union of Fascists (BUF) led by Sir Oswald Mosley. This party had strong ties with the Italian Fascists, and Chiara Chini (2008) has revealed the extent of these links and the funding Mosley received from the regime of Benito Mussolini. After 1945, Mosley collaborated with other ‘orphans’ of Nazi-fascism such as Evola, the American Francis Parker Yockey and the Frenchman Maurice Bardèche. He founded the Union Movement in 1948 and attempted to modernize the Imperialist ideology of the extreme right by promoting a new pan-European vision of fascist nationalism through the development of the ‘Europe a Nation’ policy. This was based on the idea of a united Europe of the white race with its common values and superior civilization that would dominate

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and exploit the colonies still controlled by the Imperial powers of the continent. The international activism of neo-fascists such as Mosley, Bardèche and others such as Ernesto Massi – and the important contribution of the founding of the MSI – led to a series of international meetings such as those held in Rome in 1950 and Malmö in 1951. This culminated in the creation of the European Social Movement, an alliance between extreme-right forces in Europe and an early example of neofascist transnationalism and internationalism (Mammone 2011a). In 1954 the League of Empire Loyalists was founded by conservatives opposed to the dissolution of the British Empire; this group was instrumental in the founding of the National Front (NF) in 1967 which for many years remained the main party of the British extreme right. The heyday of the NF was in the late 1970s when it regularly marched in the streets and often clashed with anti-fascists. By taking a much firmer line on immigration, Margaret Thatcher managed to neuter the threat of the NF and it entered the doldrums. Today’s BNP was founded in 1982 as a result of a split within the NF. For a long period, the BNP was considered by many as nothing more than a joke, a small clique of extremists with no serious hope of electoral success. Britain was often hailed as the only major Western European country that had no significant party of the extreme right, which had essentially ‘failed’ (Cronin 1996). As Copsey (2004) explains, however, a modernization process was initiated from 1999 onwards when Nick Griffin became party leader. The Cambridge graduate attempted to modify the violent and threatening image of the BNP with its focus on ‘activities’ (street violence). Out, too, went the use of overt racist language associated with that old-style image; even the term ‘race’ was replaced by the term ‘identity’. A genuine electoral strategy was then formulated based on grass-roots campaigning and exploiting local grievances. Such a strategy has been the hallmark of success and a tried and tested formula of extreme-right parties across Europe. The MSI had attempted a similar strategy of legitimization with its Destra Nazionale project at the beginning of the 1970s, a strategy that was subsequently adopted by French neo-fascists in 1972 when they created the Front National (FN) (Mammone 2008). Griffin in turn used Jean-Marie Le Pen as his model to follow and the fruits of the party’s modernization were already evident at the May 2002 local elections, when the BNP won three council seats in Burnley.6 In local elections the following year they won seven seats there and a further six in other towns, and by 2004 the total number of councillors had grown to twentyone. The party narrowly missed out on electing an MEP in 2004 (Renton 2005) and in the 2005 general election it contested 119 seats and won 192,850 votes, a huge improvement on the 47,129 votes it had gained in 2001. By 2010 the BNP was fielding 338 parliamentary candidates and received 563,743 votes, thus demonstrating consistent progress. It has however been unable to elect any MPs because of the electoral system and the number of local councillors it elects also fluctuates with the electoral cycle. In 2006 the BNP went from a total of twenty councillors to forty-six and then in 2010 it was reduced to nineteen representatives in local government.

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‘Localism’ and ethnic competition There are a number of good reasons to study the behaviour of extremist parties at the local level. The first reason is that local elections, as well as second-order elections such as those for the European Parliament, offer an opportunity for small parties to come to the fore. The most emblematic case involving the extreme right remains the FN, which in 1982 gained over 10 per cent of the vote in five cantons in local elections in France. From this first success, the FN steadily rose to prominence, culminating in Le Pen’s arrival at the second round of the 2002 presidential election. Such electoral successes are often the fruit of years of grass-roots political activity. Second, the deep entrenchment of an extremist party at a sub-national level may allow it to put into practice its political philosophy, promote community debates on themes that it considers crucial (immigration, public security), and even exert pressure ‘from below’ on national policies (see Veugelers in this volume). Martin Schain (2006: 287) has noticed how ‘decentralised structures – regions and municipalities – are reinforced by strong local party units and local notables to give these structures important policy-making roles. These structures, then, can be used as leverage to magnify the influence of the extreme-right in national politics.’ This has indeed been the case for AS which, since joining the PDL, has given the party the opportunity to have representatives in local and regional bodies as well as influencing the political agenda at the national level. This is already evident with the current anti-immigrant climate in Italy as well as the creation of vigilante squads which have been encouraged by politicians such as Mussolini and the leader of the LN Umberto Bossi. A third element to note about the local level is that these parties need to be selective about the seats they contest and therefore organize their often meagre campaign resources in a targeted manner. The BNP targets economically deprived towns in the north of England such as Bradford, Burnley and Oldham, which have significant numbers of South Asian origin Muslim residents. It also focuses on the East End of London, another area of ‘ethnic competition’ between different groups. In such places it is more likely that voters of the so-called ‘white working class’ will take into consideration the possibility of voting for the extreme right (see also Goodwin in this volume). The electorate is also more likely to vote for such parties at the local level as a means of punishing the established parties for what they see as the neglect of their concerns. Nick Griffin acknowledged this in an interview with the BBC after the 2006 local elections, claiming that ‘at local elections the public can let their real feelings out’.7 However, in parliamentary elections, which are seen as more important, electors may be less willing to give their vote to a minor party with little chance of winning seats (particularly under the first-past-the-post electoral system). By attaching itself to local concerns, the BNP has been able to achieve the status of a respectable political actor in some areas of England, despite the fact that at the national level the party remains a political pariah. Indeed, it has been shown that many BNP voters tend to differentiate the party at a local level and the way

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in which it is presented nationally. Well-known members of local communities are often selected as candidates and as James Rhodes (2006: 18) noted, ‘the BNP can gain legitimacy at a local level while still being labelled fascist nationally’. Extremist parties feel freer to express their ‘true ideas’ at the local level. Examining local election pamphlets often reveals stark differences from those used nationwide. The political message does not need to appeal to a wide and diverse electorate but can rather focus on the needs and fears of the voters who feel alienated and ignored by mainstream parties. One flyer produced by a local section of AS for the 2006 local elections declared that immigrants and gypsies (Roma) ‘should be thrown into the sea!’. This came before the national backlash against the Roma in Italy (Sigona 2010) which subsequently gave Alessandra Mussolini the opportunity to declare in an interview that she would like to expel them all from the country.8 The 2006 local elections were an enormous success for the BNP. Whereas before these elections the party had twenty town councillors (and four parish councillors), it gained another thirty-three bringing the total to fifty-three. The party received a total of 229,000 votes and averaged 19.2 per cent of the vote in the 363 wards it contested. In Barking and Dagenham (East London), it polled 41 per cent of the vote in the wards it contested compared to Labour’s 34 per cent. The BNP billed these elections as a ‘referendum on Islam’ in an effort to capitalize on the tragic events in London on 7 July 2005. The fear of Islam has no doubt helped to fuel support for the BNP, although it had started targeting Muslims even before 9/11. Due to the salience of public fears about terrorism, the party has shifted its attention to focus almost exclusively on what it sees as the threat posed by Muslims. In the party magazine Identity, Griffin (2006: 1) told his followers that ‘this is the threat that can bring us to power. This is the Big Issue on which we must concentrate in order to wake people up and make them look at what we have to offer all round.’ In 2006, local elections also took place in Italy, although they were on a relatively small scale so it is difficult to assess the relevance of the results. For AS, these elections could not be considered as particularly successful as it failed to elect any local representatives and gained only around 0.6 per cent of the national vote (7,600 votes). Even if we ignore the fact that turn-out was low for these elections, it was of course extremely difficult for AS to make any kind of breakthrough because of the sheer amount of competition on the extreme right in Italy.The presence of AN and LN, which both draw large support and campaign on an antiimmigration platform, means that the potential vote of AS was naturally reduced. It also had to compete with the various other small extremist parties, thus compounding the problem, and this could explain the decision to join the PDL in 2009. This does not, however, mean that AS represents an insignificant political force. Being part of a wider centre-right coalition has allowed it to influence national policy. In fact, in recent years its political discourse towards immigrants and other minorities in Italy has been adopted by mainstream politicians. Rather than electoral progress, as in the case of the BNP, this has been the major achievement of AS and in particular its leader Alessandra Mussolini. It does not find itself an isolated voice when it attempts to exploit public fears about immigrants, asylum seekers

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and Muslims. It is joined by other extremist parties as well as the governing Lega Nord. In fact, LN has taken the lead in the denigration of Islam in Italy which has been a key mobilizing theme in its campaigns. Roberto Calderoli, formerly a minister in Berlusconi’s cabinet, has become a symbol of opposition to the building of new mosques in Italy. He has taken a pig for a walk on areas designated for mosque construction, thus symbolically desecrating the land intended for this purpose. Such ideas have been supported by Alessandra Mussolini who suggested throwing salami and other kinds of meat made from pigs in areas where new mosques are due to be built (ANSA 2007).

Nation and tradition Ideologically, the nationalism that both AS and the BNP espouse can be included in the ideal-type that Ramón Máiz (2003: 261) defines as ‘organicist nationalism’, a concept ‘in which the nation is fundamentally defined by extremely determinist criteria which entails that the national community is internally homogeneous and exclusive’. The nation is thus envisaged as a natural entity that entails a neat distinction between ‘us’ – who have a historic attachment to the motherland, and ‘them’ – outsiders who no matter how long they live in the country, can never become real citizens. AS and the BNP emphasize the importance of national identity, and the pureness of the nation or community’s ‘soul’, displaying an almost blind faith in the superiority of the white race. This ultra-nationalist approach is not, of course, something new in the history of Europe. It was the main ideological bedrock of European fascism and post-war neo-fascism. It descends from the idea of a nation, and its deep virtues, located entirely above the individual human beings from which it is composed. This nation is perceived as a holistic unit in which the community is a collective actor characterized by its homogeneity. Neo-fascist parties emphasize the similarities, common traditions, roots and aspirations of ‘the people’ − similar to the holistic vision of the national community promoted by historical fascism. The BNP, for instance, states that a major party aim is ‘to foster and promote a feeling of national and cultural unity amongst our people’.9 Correspondingly, following a clear neo-fascist tradition, AS promoted what it called italianità (Italianess). The nation is associated with a community based on blood lines which shares similar values and belongs to a glorious and mythological past. The importance of ‘tradition’ is paramount within this organicist nationalism. Party activists often believe in the central role of family values and are consequently opposed to homosexuality, pornography and abortion – themes that were well rooted in the neo-fascist philosophy of the MSI. The family, for instance, is often represented as the imagined ethnic nation in miniature. The BNP boasts of the fact that it is the only party to hold ‘family festivals’ and AS supports all policies and initiatives which it claims support the traditional family such as the Family Day demonstrations against the proposed law in favour of civil unions. It has also fought to maintain the presence of crucifixes in public buildings such as schools. This approach is perhaps unsurprising in Italy where the Catholic Church still plays an

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important role in national politics. The BNP, on the other hand, seems to view religion as a means of recuperating a lost cultural heritage even if churches in the UK across all denominations have always strongly condemned the party. Its literature is firmly rooted in a certain nostalgia for the past and as part of its local education policy it seeks to ‘press for the preservation or reintroduction of morning assemblies based on Christian worship, in order to ensure that children are not cut off from our religious and cultural heritage’ (British National Party 2006a: 10). It also intends to promote the celebration of the patron saints days of what it calls the ‘British family of nations’. The importance of local traditions and heritage is closely tied and interwoven within their promotion of nationalism. This even extends to the promotion of local agricultural products. In fact, agriculture is, somewhat bizarrely, the first theme of Azione Sociale’s 2006 local election manifesto (Azione Sociale 2006a: 2). This seemingly innocent concern for local produce is explained in the manifesto as a means of economic protectionism against ‘third world products’ which are apparently damaging the local economy and causing potential health risks. In a similar vein, the BNP advocates giving schoolchildren one free item of fruit per day, ideally ‘a locally grown apple or pear’ (British National Party 2006a: 10). The primordial virtues of tradition and fatherland are supposedly able to counterbalance the perversions of modern life that are destroying the past and its sacred principles. This approach to modernity is reminiscent of Evola’s radical philosophy, but also the fascist ‘alternative modernity’.10 Extreme-right parties usually reject the authority of the European Union as it is an obvious challenge to national political sovereignty and economic independence. The BNP and AS are no exception, although Alessandra Mussolini’s party does not always call for the withdrawal of Italy from the EU. However, it strongly condemns the idea of expanding the EU to include those countries ‘which do not have the traditions of European peoples’. This is the case with Turkey: The absurd attempt to enlarge Europe – as if it was only a common market – to countries outside its borders implies a redefinition of the contours of our [European] continent. 3000 years of culture and history exist to remind us of what Europe is … The entrance of Turkey into the EU would distort the cultural and spiritual homogeneity both of Turkey itself and our continent because thanks to the Schengen agreement it would give Turks the right to work in Europe … In our view, the entrance of countries with clear Christian roots should be instead favoured. (Azione Sociale 2006b) The BNP has an identical approach to Turkish candidacy and European enlargement in general, but is much more explicitly anti-EU, denouncing what it calls the ‘voracious technocracy of Brussels’. This is even present in its local election manifesto, which claims that it will ‘challenge the diktats of the European Court’ with regard to corporal punishment in schools (British National Party 2006a: 9).

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Both parties also strongly criticize the economic liberalism of the EU and the free circulation of goods. They are actually in favour of economic protectionism, a classic trait of neo-fascism. This is in contrast to most right-wing ‘populist parties’ which now generally accept economic liberalism. By contrast both these parties oppose economic globalization which they see as leading to the loss of jobs back home and numerous other problems – most notably immigration.

National preference on a local scale In recent years, these parties have tried to promote an allegedly less racist version of their ideology. This is an intellectually elaborated reversal of positive discrimination, infamously described by Jean-Marie Le Pen as la préférence nationale (national preference). This implies privileging the ‘indigenous’ inhabitants of the country and the effective exclusion of foreign migrants and their descendants. This strategy was influenced by the intellectual production of Alain de Benoist and what is known as the Nouvelle Droite (ND).11 The ND replaced the classic theme of anti-egalitarianism with the idea of irreconcilable differences between peoples and cultures, thus promoting a right to be different. In the past, the BNP called for the repatriation of non-whites, but instead it now proposes the ‘introduction of a system of voluntary resettlement whereby those immigrants who are legally here will be afforded the opportunity to return to their lands of ethnic origin assisted by generous financial incentives both for individuals and for the countries in question’ (British National Party 2006a: 6). The same policy has been adopted by AN and, during a protest against extending voting rights to foreigners, AS supporters displayed banners reading ‘Let’s help them go home’. Recent literature produced by the BNP reveals an apparent softening regarding its approach to ethnic minorities, although membership until very recently was only open to white people. It even presents itself as a party trying to defuse racial tensions which government policies have inflamed. In an interesting twist, it condemns ‘equal opportunities’ policies as being racist: The imposition of ‘equal opportunities’ quotas is both unfair on the majority who are discriminated against, and condescending to capable members [our emphasis] of ethnic minorities who are seen as having obtained jobs on account of their colour rather than their personal abilities. Council run ‘equal opportunities’ policies encourage racial tensions and deny the taxpaying public the right to have the best people doing the jobs for which we have to pay. BNP-run councils will move on from racist quotas and discrimination and become ‘Best Possible’ Employers, hiring the best-qualified and suited person possible for each job, regardless of their ethnic origins. (British National Party 2006a: 6) As Roger Eatwell (2006) has pointed out, this is merely a tactic by the party leadership to defuse charges of racism by distinguishing between good immigrants and bad ones, the latter being especially Muslims and new arrivals. For the 2006

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local elections, AS proposed in its electoral programme the principle of national preference: Preference for social services run by the local authorities will be offered to Italian citizens … we cannot deny the fact those who have roots in an area have contributed through successive generations to the creation of these services over the years. On the other hand, foreigners can obviously not claim the same rights to such services. (Azione Sociale 2006a: 12) In the same manifesto the party launched a campaign against multi-ethnic classes in state schools claiming that children of immigrants slow down the education of native Italian children (this policy has also recently been advocated by LN through a proposal on ‘separate classes’). In a very similar vein, the BNP’s 2006 Council Election Manifesto opposed the teaching of minority languages to classes containing any native British children: If minorities want to teach their own children their native languages, they should do so in their own time and at their own expense … where foreign pupils have not achieved a satisfactory standard of English, they should be taught separately rather than being allowed to drag down standards and hold back native English-speakers. (British National Party 2006a: 9) The language used to describe the national community differs slightly between the two parties. AS merely refers to ‘Italians’, although by this we are clearly meant to understand Italians of European origin. In the case of the BNP, in order not to risk the confusion of the label ‘British’ being applied to ethnic minorities, the prefix ‘native’ is generally applied and white Britons are even referred to as the ‘indigenous peoples of these islands’. The use of such terms is a convenient way of avoiding being accused of overt racism. In fact, both parties are aware of certain constraints on what they can say regarding race and hence frequently encourage positions which are not explicitly racist but a kind of Nouvelle Droite inspired ‘differentialist racism’. This represents a kind of intellectually elaborated positive discrimination and recognition of the differences between people. The BNP has shifted from a focus on race to the defence of cultural identity, following the example of the ND. On the frequently-asked-questions section of its website, it is stressed that it does not hate other ethnic groups, in fact ‘they have a right to their own identity as much as we do, all we want to do is to preserve the ethnic and cultural identity of the British people’. This ‘ethnic protectionism’ leads to policy proposals which would be almost humorous if it were not for the seriousness of their content. The BNP states that on winning local power it will: examine closely the licensing policies of the council in relation to taxi and minicab businesses to ensure that the ownership of such firms and the supply

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of drivers bears the closest possible relationship to the average make-up of the local population. This will also apply to other areas of trade where a BNP council has control of licensing including the sale of alcohol, market trading and late hours catering services. (British National Party 2006a: 6) Such a proposal represents nothing more than an attempt to strip certain citizens in Britain of their jobs as these professions (taxi driver, market trader, take-away and local shop owners) are those which are stereotypically identified with immigrants and their descendents from the Indian subcontinent. Such statements are a typical expression of the doctrine of national preference. The BNP has always been skilful in manipulating local grievances in this respect. Its meteoric rise in Burnley was fuelled around concerns over ‘positive discrimination’ in favour of ethnic minorities and the belief that the town council spent disproportionate funds on those areas of the town with a large ‘Asian’ population. The 2006 manifesto promised that ‘different ethnic groups within the population will have money spent on them according to the percentage of the taxpaying population they make up’ (British National Party 2006a: 5). Both parties display an obsession with multiculturalism and its supposed threats and/or failures. The BNP has waged a crusade against multiculturalism for at least the last ten years. This was initially viewed as part of a Jewish conspiracy but now it claims that multiculturalism is one of the effects of globalization and that it wipes out indigenous cultures and identities through homogenization, presented as a form of ‘cultural genocide’ (Copsey 2007: 74). The BNP never misses an opportunity to disparage multiculturalism which it describes as a ‘wicked social engineering experiment’ and openly claims that its recent success is based on people’s frustration with multicultural policies. In a televised interview with the BBC following the announcement of the results of the May 2006 poll, Griffin said: There are genuine concerns about issues relating to immigration, asylum and multiculturalism and the British people … are saying ‘we’ve had enough of the whole multicultural experiment, especially as it’s financed with our taxes without our consent’. (BBC 2006) Such opposition to multiculturalism may be considered as surprising in the case of AS, as Italy is still struggling to decide over the possible introduction of official ‘multicultural’ state policies – and has not yet adopted any clear model of integration for immigrants. Nevertheless, the headline of one issue of the party magazine was ‘the failure of multiculturalism’ using Great Britain and the London bombings as proof of this argument (Landino 2006). Indeed, both parties promote a constant mobilization of xenophobia towards immigrants who symbolize people’s worst fears (social insecurity, criminality, unemployment) and are held responsible for a sense of crisis or decline. According to the section on tourism in the manifesto of AS,

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the number of immigrants who are working on the beaches has even damaged the local economy by discouraging potential tourists (Azione Sociale 2006a: 17).

Conclusion This study has attempted to show the fundamental similarities in both the ideology and local strategies of these two parties. The BNP and AS both promote xenophobia and exploit the fears of ordinary people linked to insecurity, criminality and unemployment. The themes of ‘crisis’, ‘decline’ and ‘fear of the outside enemy’ were elements that, albeit in a radically different historical context, contributed to the success of fascism. Both parties share values which have the hallmarks of the neo-fascist tradition. The current crisis of legitimacy faced by traditional political actors and the distance which separates them from the people they represent, as well as economic instability and the threat of Islamist terrorism, means that parties of the extreme right have fertile ground for progression. The BNP in particular continues to break new ground, first by gaining a seat in the London Assembly in 2008 and then electing two MEPs in 2009 with nearly a million votes nationwide. The party still struggles to achieve the recognition it craves from the media although recent results are making cordon sanitaire tactics even harder to enforce. In October 2009, in the wake of the BNP’s success in the European elections, the BBC was forced to invite Nick Griffin onto its political programme Question Time. The visual media in the past was extremely sensitive to the potential consequences of the BNP’s message. In 2004, the party was forced to edit its party political broadcast and Channel 4 agreed to postpone the showing of a documentary it had made after police warned it could inflame racial tensions and contribute to BNP success in the local elections. Later that same year, the BBC aired its own documentary entitled The Secret Agent which featured speeches which led to Nick Griffin and Mark Collett12 being tried on charges of inciting racial hatred, although they were acquitted in both the trial and subsequent re-trial in November 2006. At election time the party still faces strong campaigns from parties across the political spectrum and anti-fascist groups, and its air time is extremely limited. However, due to the BNP’s recent success, it is harder to justify the exclusion of Griffin and other BNP candidates from speaking on political programmes and other appearances in the media. There was never such a campaign to limit the air time of AS and other neofascist parties in Italy, no doubt a legacy of the controversial relationship Italy still holds with its fascist past (Mammone 2006). Certain politicians still refuse to condemn fascism but are nonetheless selected as candidates for the right-wing PDL.13 Alessandra Mussolini, due to the connection with her grandfather, is treated as a kind of minor celebrity by large sections of the Italian media. She was a regular guest on the reality TV show La pupa e il secchione (Beauty and the Geek), provided the voice for an episode of the Italian version of The Simpsons and is regularly invited onto TV chat shows and political programmes. This could be interpreted as another sign of the crisis in Italian democracy (Mammone and Veltri 2010).

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Nevertheless, AS has of course merged with the PDL and Mussolini must now slightly tone down her rhetoric. In the Italian context, what is perhaps more disconcerting is the fact that politicians from the LN are not only often on TV, but also hold positions of power in both national and local government.14 In spite of the evident differences of the ‘public perception’ of extremism within a democratic system, what has been shown here is that, despite the geographical distance that may separate them, extreme-right parties use an ideology and mobilizing themes which are remarkably similar, demonstrating a certain transnationality of political cultures. This is a reminder of the fact that we are facing a truly European phenomenon, just as interwar fascism was.

Notes 1 An early version of this chapter was presented at the 2007 annual conference of the Association for the Study of Ethnicity and Nationalism (ASEN) in London. 2 This chapter was written before the official creation of the PDL but has since been modified to reflect this situation. 3 When in 2008 Mussolini became an MP in Italy, she vacated her place in the European Parliament which was taken by Fiore. Indeed, they were both in Alternativa Sociale which contested the European Parliament elections in 2004, but at that time only Mussolini and Luca Romagnoli (MSI-FT) were elected. 4 The National Front, and in particular its Political Soldiers faction, was also fascinated with Evola’s ideas. It is worth remembering that Fiore was convicted in Italy for terrorism and spent many years on the run in the UK. 5 See http://www.azionesociale.net (click on Decalogo dei valori) and http://bnp.org.uk/ about-us/mission-statement/. 6 On the BNP’s breakthrough in Burnley, see Rhodes (2009). 7 Video of the interview available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/ 4974870.stm. 8 ‘Ladri e accattoni, via tutti i rom’, La Repubblica, 27 May 2007. 9 On this, see ‘The BNP: Defending Britain’s Heritage, Traditions and Way Of Life’ (British National Party 2006b). 10 For a review of this concept, see Roberts (2009). 11 On the transmigration of the ideas of the ND to Russia, see Peunova’s chapter in this book. For a more detailed discussion of the ND, see Bar-On (2007). 12 Former leader of the youth wing of the BNP who attended the University of Leeds (UK) at the same time as the authors. 13 Mussolini herself was attacked for her decision to join the PDL. Daniela Santanchè a former colleague in AN claimed that this decision would make Benito ‘turn over in his grave’ (Santanchè later also joined the PDL). 14 On the racist approach of the Lega, see Avanza (2010).

Bibliography ANSA 2007. Islam: Calderoli un Maiale-Day anti moschee. 13 September. Avanza, M. 2010. ‘The Northern League and its “Innocuous” Xenophobia’, in A. Mammone and G.A. Veltri (eds), Italy Today. The Sick Man of Europe. London: Routledge, pp. 131–42. Azione Sociale 2006a. Programma politico delle Elezioni Amministrative comunali (Maggio 2006). Ravenna: Azione Sociale Pubblicazioni.

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—— 2006b. Il Programma. Formerly online: http://www.azionesociale.net/index.php? option=com_content&task=view&id=256&Itemid=6. Bar-On, T. 2007. Where have all the Fascists Gone? Aldershot: Ashgate. BBC 2006. ‘Will BNP election gains last?’ BBC News, available at: http://news.bbc.co. uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/4968406.stm. British National Party 2006a. British National Party Council Election Manifesto 2006. Waltham Cross: BNP. —— 2006b. Information Pack. Formerly online: http://www.bnp.org.uk/pdf_files/InfoPack Web.zip. —— 2006c. Mission Statement. Formerly online: http://www.bnp.org.uk/missionstatement/. Chini, C. 2008. ‘Fascismo britannico e fascismo italiano. La British union of fascists, Oswald Mosley e i finanziamenti stranieri’, Contemporanea, 3: 433–58. Cobain, I. and Taylor, M. 2008. ‘Language School Run by Italian Fascist Leader’, The Guardian, 29 February, available at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/ feb/29/thefarright.italy. Copsey, N. 2004. Contemporary British Fascism: the British National Party and the Quest for Legitimacy. Basingstoke: Palgrave. —— 2007. ‘Changing Course or Changing Clothes? Reflections on the Ideological Evolution of the British National Party 1999–2006’, Patterns of Prejudice, 41(1): 61–82. Cronin, M. 1996. The Failure of British Fascism: the Far Right and the Fight for Political Recognition. Basingstoke: Macmillan. Eatwell, R. 2006. ‘Community Cohesion and Cumulative Extremism in Contemporary Britain’, The Political Quarterly, 77(2): 204–16. Goodwin, M.J. 2007. ‘The Extreme Right in Britain: Still an Ugly Duckling but for How Long?’, The Political Quarterly, 78(2): 241–50. Griffin, N. 2006. ‘Our Fight in the Culture Clash’, Identity, March: 1. Landino 2006. ‘Il fallimento del multiculturalismo’, Azione Sociale, 22(7), 30 March: 1. Máiz, R. 2003. ‘Framing the Nation: Three Rival Versions of Contemporary Nationalist Ideology’, Journal of Political Ideologies, 8(3): 251–67. Mammone, A. 2005. ‘Gli orfani del Duce. Fascisti dal 1943 al 1946’, Italia contemporanea, 239–40(2): 249–74. —— 2006. ‘A Daily Revision of the Past. Fascism, Anti-Fascism, and Memory in Contemporary Italy’, Modern Italy, 11(2): 211–26. —— 2007. ‘The Black-Shirt Resistance: Clandestine Fascism in Italy, 1943–1950’, The Italianist, 27(2): 282–303. —— 2008. ‘The Transnational Reaction to 1968: Neo-fascist National Fronts and Political Cultures in France and Italy’, Contemporary European History, 17(2): 213–36. —— 2009. ‘The Eternal Return? Faux Populism and Contemporarization of NeoFascism across Britain, France and Italy’, Journal of Contemporary European Studies, 17(2): 171–92. Mammmone, A. and Veltri, G.A. 2010. ‘A “Sick Man” in Europe’, in A. Mammone and G.A.Veltri (eds), Italy Today.The Sick Man of Europe. London: Routledge, pp. 1–15. —— 2011a. ‘Revitalizing and De-territorializing Fascism in the 1950s. The Extreme Right in France and Italy, and the Pan-national (“European”) Imaginary’, Patterns of Prejudice, 45(4): 279–302. —— 2011b. ‘Il British National Party e l’ideologia neofascista nell’Europa contemporanea’, Studi Storici, 52(2): 393–421. Renton, D. 2005. ‘A Day to Make History? The 2004 Elections and the British National Party’, Patterns of Prejudice, 38(1): 25–45.

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Rhodes, J. 2006. ‘The “Local” Politics of the British National Party’, SAGE Race Relations Abstracts, 31(4): 5–20. —— 2009. ‘The Political Breakthrough of the BNP: The Case of Burnley’, British Politics, 4(1): 22–46. Roberts, D.D. 2009. ‘Fascism, Modernism and the Quest for an Alternative Modernity’, Patterns of Prejudice, 43(1): 91–102. Schain, M.A. 2006. ‘The Extreme-Right and Immigration Policy-Making: Measuring Direct and Indirect Effects’, West European Politics, 29(2): 270–89. Sigona, N. 2010. ‘“Gypsies Out of Italy!”: Social Exclusion and Racial Discrimination of Roma and Sinti in Italy’, in A. Mammone and G.A. Veltri (eds), Italy Today. The Sick Man of Europe. London: Routledge, pp. 143–57.

19 THE TRANSFER OF IDEAS ALONG A CULTURAL GRADIENT The influence of the European New Right on Aleksandr Panarin’s new Eurasianism1 Marina Peunova

Russia is the eastern extreme of a gradation of European Old Regimes running from the more elaborate and developed to the more simple and brutal. In short, she is the backward rear guard of Europe at the bottom of the slope of the West-East cultural gradient. Cited in Evtuhov (2003: 2)

Introduction In his controversial work The Soviet Tragedy: a History of Socialism in Russia, distinguished cultural historian Martin Malia argued that European ideas migrate eastward along a time-contingent gradient of retardation that increases from Western to Eastern European boundaries. In a departure from the perception of Russia as a brother of Oriental despotisms promoted by fellow Sovietologists Richard Pipes and Karl Wittfogel, Malia de-Orientalized and de-Othered Russia by presenting it as an intrinsic part of the Occident, albeit its backward, illiberal and un-modernized part.2 Russia, for Malia, embodies and mirrors Europe’s shortcomings and flaws. In this view, Russia is seen to be Europe’s alter ego, its Mr Hyde, of which Dr Jekyll, or Europe, is afraid yet is enraptured by it. If one disregards its flaws,3 Malia’s concept of a ‘cultural gradient’ is of much relevance to the study of Russian nationalism in a comparative perspective. Similarly to the fate of European socialism, which, when transferred to Russia, served as the foundation for Soviet communism, European ultra-nationalist trends became, during the past two decades, an inspiration for homegrown fantasies about the great Russian nation. The demise of Marxism-Leninism was followed in Russia by the inexorable advent of right-wing extremism. In contemporary Russia, ultranationalists take on and push mutated European Romantic notions of organicism and particularism.

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In this chapter I subject to scrutiny the work of one such Russian intellectual who came under the spell of European ideas. One of the most recognized thinkers in Russia of the two post-Soviet decades, Aleksandr Panarin (1940–2003) developed, towards the end of his life, a cocktail of culturalist, particularist, anti-liberal, anti-Western, imperialist, anti-globalist, Russian Orthodox and geopolitical ideas that meet, on Russian soil, under the umbrella of new Eurasianism. A civilizationist – expansionist and empire-oriented – nationalism,4 new Eurasianism takes its name from the 1920s–1930s movement of Russian émigré scholars who fled Bolshevik Russia and found their new home in European capitals. The new Eurasianist worldview rests on the assumption that Russia is the core of Eurasia, a unique civilization apart from Europe that geographically corresponds to the territory of the former USSR and that is defined by ‘common culture’. A multi-ethnic entity, Eurasia, preach new Eurasianist pundits, is fated to re-become an empire and to achieve a messianic mission in the world. New Eurasianists advance a Russia-driven globalizing project that would counter Western-led globalization. While widely popular in Russia towards the last years of his life, Panarin did not receive due attention in Western scholarship.5 This lack of in-depth analysis of Panarin’s ideas is ever more surprising considering the breadth of literature that focuses on the current guru of new Eurasianism, Aleksandr Dugin.6 While Dugin’s extreme-rightist leanings, his ‘geopolitical pessimism’ (Tsygankov 2005), Aryanism, and occultism, as well as his ties with the leaders of the European New Right (ENR), are not questioned (Laruelle 2006b; Sokolov 2006), the influence of the ENR on Panarin’s work has remained unnoticed. Due to this lack of analysis of Panarin’s work through the prism of European right-wing extremism, Panarin’s views are judged to be more restrained than those of Dugin. This chapter highlights the transformation of Panarin’s thought towards the end of the 1990s from a ‘soft’ liberal nationalism to an anti-liberal nationalism of the extreme right. As I argue, Panarin’s work is heavily indebted to the French Nouvelle Droite (ND) and his new Eurasianism echoes ENR thought. The ideas of Panarin stand as a conspicuous example of the transmission of ideas across state boundaries and the fertilization of Russian nationalism by its European counterpart. In my definition of the extreme right (as it manifested itself in the post-1985 Russian context), I follow Walter Laqueur, who distinguishes radical right-wing groups and persons from mere nationalists by adhering to a simple rule of thumb. A basic difference exists between those who seek the cause of Russia’s misfortunes entirely in the machinations and intrigues of foreign and domestic enemies – and the others, who are willing to engage in introspection, self-criticism, and, where called for, penitence. (Laqueur 1994 [1993]: xv) Alan Ingram echoes Laquer’s argumentation but adds a more nuanced touch to it by noting that Russian ultra-nationalists propagate anti-Semitic and anti-democratic views as opposed to their moderate counterparts (Ingram 1999: 696). This position

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is also shared by Stephen Shenfield, who notes that representatives of the Russian extreme right believe that Russia should follow her own, particularist, path of development and nourish expansionist hopes to recreate a Russian empire, whereas moderate nationalists adhere to pluralism and universal human rights and accept the dissolution of the USSR as a fait accompli (Shenfield 2001: 50).

The European New Right and its reception in Russia A French intellectual, Alain de Benoist first used the term ‘New Right’ in the 1960s in an attempt to disassociate his position from the ‘old’ right. Presented as a reinvigorated rightist movement, the New Right gained supporters among European intellectuals, most notably in Belgium, Germany and Italy. By the 1980s, the ENR lost its initial allure and was reduced to the margins of intellectual life in Europe. New rightist ideas, however, continue to influence extreme right-wing European politics.7 A ‘cultural school of thought’ (Duranthon-Crabol 1988a) with multiple gravity poles, the ENR has inspired a storm of heated theoretical debates.8 Academic swords mainly cross around the question of whether the New Right is the heir of classical fascism (1919–45), with an increasing number of authors accepting Roger Griffin’s definition of generic fascism as a ‘genus of political ideology whose mythic core in its various permutations is a palingenetic form of populist ultra-nationalism’ (Griffin 1993: 26). These scholars assess a wide spectrum of culturalist, ethnocentric, racist and supra-nationalist movements including the ENR through the prism of neofascism, and point out that fascism reproduces in different socio-historical settings. Members of the ENR are ‘ideological entrepreneurs’:9 journalists, philosophers, economists and autodidacts that work towards creating an anti-liberal and antiegalitarian ideology.10 Their overruling goal is to attain Gramscian cultural hegemony: in their pursuit of power over minds, they reject parliamentary politics and resort to metapolitics instead. Understandably, these pundits deny the accusation of fascism, preferring to present their position as a response to the challenges posed by the new left, not the old right.11 By dressing in politically correct clothes, the ENR intellectuals render their arguments more appealing to post-Second World War audiences wary of the gruesome outcomes of fascism. The ENR’s defensive rhetoric, however, falls short of redemption if one examines closely their texts. In their numerous publications, ENR authors repackage and reinvigorate the main premises of the old right, but take their discourse ‘in such idiosyncratic directions away from any discernible revolutionary position that their fascist expectations of rebirth seem to have melted into a diffuse cultural pessimism about the present world order’ (Griffin 2000c: 170). Despite its innocent mask, the ENR represents a real threat to the liberal democratic order of multi-ethnic societies. A few recurrent core ideas permeate the works of ENR intellectuals. They warn of modern Europe’s decadence as it ‘has entered the night of its decline’ (Faye 1985: 15) and hope that a regenerating palingenesis that rests on a return to authentic European traditions and spirituality would be a panacea for the crisis

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(Duranthon-Crabol 1988b); they argue that local cultures and regions have ‘the right to difference’ (le droit à la différence) and call for the preservation of a way of life of organic local communities against globalization that brings, in their view, uniformity; they promote a pan-European identity for the inhabitants of the ‘European empire of the regions’ (Faye 1985: 13, 34). According to the author of the most comprehensive history of the ENR, Tamir Bar-On, the notion of the homogeneous pan-European empire is at the core of the ND’s Weltanschauung (Bar-On 2008). The federation of homogeneous ‘ethnies’ propagated by ENR thinkers would be based on what Martin Lee calls ‘cultural ethnopluralism’ (Lee 1997) or, as PierreAndré Taguieff (1990) puts it, the ‘new cultural racism’. Like their European counterparts, Russian proponents of the New Right are inspired by traditionalism and a call for the return to Russian national values and spiritual foundations. They take as a template European traditionalism as it is used in the discourse of the ENR, but appeal to Russian traditions and religiosity instead. European traditionalism struck the imagination of Russian intellectuals in the 1960s with translations of Julius Evola, René Guenon, Titus Burckhardt, Frithjof Schuon and other traditionalist authors whose works became available to members of the dissident Iuzhin Circle, which congregated in the apartment of a dissident writer, Iurii Mamleev. After Mamleev’s emigration to the United States (forced by the KGB),12 another occultist writer and philosopher, Evgenii Golovin, became the new leader of the circle. He later formed a clandestine organization Chernyi Orden SS (Black Order SS), which included the nascent new Eurasianists Dugin and Geidar Dzhemal’ as members (Dunlop 2004: 41). While traditionalism might have prepared the ground, it was not until the late 1980s–1990s that ENR ideas reached the peak of their popularity in Russia, and it was then that these ideas began fertilizing newly resurrected Eurasianism.13 Similarly to their European confederates, Russian proponents of the New Right aim primarily to attain cultural, not political, hegemony. After his initial – and failed – flirtations with politics during the 1990s,14 Dugin stated that his goal is ‘not to achieve political power, nor to fight for power, but to fight for influence on it’ (Dugin 2001). Despite this seemingly apolitical position, some of the main premises of new Eurasianism have gradually transformed, during Vladimir Putin’s second term (2003–8), from an intellectual epidemic spread across separated groupuscules of intellectuals into generally accepted postulates, the traces of which are found in Political Parties’ programmes and government statements.15 A number of prominent politicians are members of the Mezhdunarodnoe Evrazii’skoe Dvizhenie (International Eurasian Movement) (2001) headed by Dugin.16

Panarin’s ‘translation’ of Nouvelle Droite ideas Panarin’s stratospheric ascendance to the academic Olympus and the popularity that he attained in the public sphere as a maître-penseur of new Eurasianism is all the more striking considering that his name was completely unknown not only in the West but also in Russia until the mid-1980s. Unable to pursue a scholarly

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vocation at Moscow State University (MSU) due to his dissenting views during the Soviet era,17 nor to publish, Panarin was relegated to minor teaching institutions with dubious philosophy departments where he stagnated for two decades prior to perestroika. Panarin resurfaced only in 1984, when he was invited to accept a post at the Institute of Philosophy of the Academy of Sciences. During the next two decades, until his sudden death in 2003, Panarin became something of a celebrity and had many followers among his students. He became Professor and Chair of the Department of Political Science at MSU. He proved to be a powerful speaker and his lectures, which attracted large crowds, were audiotaped. He frequently appeared on television. A prolific writer, he produced a mountain of publications, of both academic and publicist nature. While Panarin, unlike Dugin, did not belong to the traditionalist circle headed by Mamleev and then Golovin during the Soviet era, his position was informed by ND thought, of which he could probably be considered one of the best specialists in late Soviet Russia. Many of the conclusions that Panarin reached in his first published works were carried throughout his later publications. Thus, already in his early (1980–91) articles and two monographs, Stil’ ‘Retro’ v ideologii i politike (kriticheskie ocherki frantsuzskogo neokonservatizma) [The ‘Retro’ Style in Ideology and Politics (Critical Essays on French Neoconservatism)] (1989) and Sovremennyi tsivilizatsionnyi protsess i fenomen neokonservatizma [The Contemporary Civilizationist Process and the Phenomenon of Neoconservatism] (1991), Panarin writes approvingly of the ND’s culturalism and traditionalism while, at the same time, criticizing the New Right for its anti-liberal and hierarchical stance. Interestingly, Panarin started as a supporter of Mikhail Gorbachev’s liberalization reforms and his views during perestroika were similar to those of the members of the Club de l’Horloge, composed of dissenting ND intellectuals who broke with de Benoist and the main ND think tank, the Research and Study Group on European Culture (GRECE). The Club de l’Horloge members embraced ‘liberal nationalism’ (Taguieff 1993: 17) that combined economic ideas of liberty with views on culturebound national identity. It is only in response to the dissolution of the USSR and the social havoc, disintegration of the state, and overall spiritual and ideological crisis that overshadowed Russia during the Boris Yeltsin years that Panarin moved from his initial support of liberalism to rejecting it altogether and deeming liberalism unsuitable for Russia. As he changed his credo from liberalism to ultra-nationalism towards the end of the 1990s, Panarin’s views have come to resemble those of the first generation of the ND represented by de Benoist and the initial GRECE members. Panarin eventually appropriated some of the major building blocks of the discourse of the ND intellectuals as a means to create his anti-liberal new Eurasianist edifice. What might seem a perplexing change of heart on the part of Panarin is in fact paradigmatic of the situation of the Russian intellectual scene during the 1990s. In many ways, Panarin’s metamorphosis was similar to that of a number of other Russian intellectuals who became disillusioned with Yeltsin’s neoliberal reforms and who viewed the separatist ethnic strife that unravelled in Russia and other former Soviet republics as proof that the disintegration of the Soviet empire was a

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tragic mistake. Panarin, however, not only ceded his pro-democratic stance (as was the case with many other intellectuals), but radically shifted to the right: he began accusing the West, Jews (Panarin 2003a: 253–56, 529), and Russian pro-liberal Westernizers (whom he called the ‘Chicago boys’ and ‘the fifth column of the West’) for the destruction of Russia during the Yeltsin era (Panarin 1999b: 76). Panarin’s lamentations became increasingly paranoid towards the end of his life when such events as the 1999 NATO bombing of the former Yugoslavia and the perceived Western support of the Chechen separatist struggle fuelled his suspicions and conspiracy theories about the US’s role in the demise of his country. In his growing extreme nationalism Panarin found inspiration in arguments of the ND, which he propagated at times explicitly, at times obliquely. Echoing de Benoist, Panarin deemed liberal democracy to be a ‘construction based on a consumerist-hedonistic utopia of the world’ and advocated ‘organic democracy’ instead (Panarin 2003a: 147). He agreed with de Benoist’s claim that the key dividing line lies between those who promote a conception of a uni-dimensional world and those who stand for ‘ethnopluralism’ based on the diversity of cultures, between those who defend universal human rights of individuals and those who give precedence to the rights and duties of peoples (de Benoist 1986: 17). Most importantly, Panarin was drawn to the ND’s treatment of culture as ‘a special organizing factor of human existence, the belittling of which is always felt as a loss of the meaning of life’ (Panarin 1989: 157). He believed that cultural differences are a ‘vitally indispensable reserve of mankind’ (Panarin 1999a: 173). Similarly to de Benoist’s arguments against homogenization, Panarin advocated a nation’s ‘right to be different’ (Panarin 1991: 4). In the ND vein, he viewed cultures as closed, impermeable entities that need to maintain their specificity and uniqueness (samobytnost’) as they serve as the foundation of national consciousness (natsional’noe samosoznanie). In his later writings, Panarin presented cross-fertilization between cultures as dangerous and called for cultural autarchy. Panarin was as careful as the ND authors to clear his ideas of racist undertones, and to replace the category of biology with that of culture, which rendered his discourse, like that of the ND intellectuals, culturally racist nevertheless, as he divided the world into non-malleable, culturally defined groups to which he ascribed certain ingrained psychological characteristics that bound these groups to certain beliefs and actions. Panarin’s regionalism resonates with the ND’s pan-European regionalism and de Benoist’s dreams of a ‘Europe of a Hundred Flags’ or a Europe of a multitude of ‘homogenous communities’ (Bar-On 2008). Akin to the ND’s praise of local traditions (de Benoist and la Commission ‘Traditions et Communauté’ 1982), Panarin backed the reinvigoration of the local cultures and folklore of small Russian towns. In proposing to restore a Eurasian empire by uniting the CIS countries into a new federation, he advocates the replacement of ‘national republics’ (the status previously held by the countries of the former Soviet Union during the Soviet period) with ‘regions’ that would be based not on arbitrarily drawn borders but on organic, cultural specificities (Panarin 1994: 160).

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A Russian-style traditionalist, Panarin came to share the ND’s views on the dehumanization of life as the price of modernity, the primacy of culture over economics, and the preservation of national cultural heritage against US-induced commercialization. New Eurasianism, as promoted by Panarin, is analogous with the ND in its anti-globalist stance, as both perceive globalization as a deconstruction of sovereign nation-states and the disappearance of cultural diversity (Panarin 1999c, 2002, 2003b). The Russian nation, as envisioned by Panarin, brings together the Russian people, not as a civic but as an organic community. This ‘natural’ formation is a collectivity held together by a common culture that was formed through the complex process of interaction between geography, climate and history. It is not the state, nor the intelligentsia, but the Russian people (narod) that is ‘the source of material and spiritual wealth, the carrier of main values’ (Panarin 1999b: 102). Narod is thus a guardian of ‘collective’ consciousness, and narodnost’ is coterminous in Panarin’s thought with collectivism and communality (obshchinnost’), as juxtaposed to Occidental individualism (Panarin 2003a: 153). Panarin conceptualized Russia as the core of Eurasia, a civilization apart from both Europe and Asia, but one that has more affinity with Asia than with decadent Europe and the even more decadent US. A Eurasian civilization from Panarin’s dreams is defined by common culture and corresponds to the borders of the former Soviet Union. As a unique multi-ethnic entity, Eurasia, in Panarin’s view, is fated to be an empire and to achieve a messianic mission in the world. The ND ideas on a European ‘spiritual empire of the regions’ and on Europe’s rapprochement with the Third World were of particular interest to Panarin (Ilin and Panarin 1994: 132). In the 1960s–1970s, de Benoist, Guillaume Faye and other ND intellectuals advocated Europe’s alliance with Third World countries: a unified Europe fortified by such a union with the developing world would be strong enough to stand up to the US and the USSR, thus fostering a multi-polar world that would bring to an end Cold War bipolarity (Faye 1985: 103–18; de Benoist 1986). Panarin argued that since Russia was always an empire, it should remain an empire and reject futile efforts to become a nation-state. Panarin’s Eurasian empire that would constitute a part of a continental axis of power and counter the Atlanticist domination of the world is reminiscent of the European empire envisioned by the ND authors. Both Panarin and proponents of the ND are nostalgic for the colonial/imperial past of Russia and France respectively, their nostalgia translating into dreams of rapprochement with the former Soviet Republics and the Third World respectively. Both Russian and French discourses in focus stem from the feeling of resentment – of the dissolution of the USSR in Panarin’s case and of the decolonization of Algeria in the ND case. Panarin’s views on Russia’s role in its neighbourhood, the former Soviet Union, are as unoriginal as they are utopian. Panarin’s fantasia, ‘Eurasia’, thus repeats an age-old narrative on the civilizing mission by the benevolent ‘significant’ nation over ‘less significant’ communities. According to Panarin, Russia should turn its Eurasianist, autarchic and protectionist face towards the

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Occident and its ‘civilizing’ face towards the neighbouring countries that constitute, in Panarin’s view, Russia’s ‘internal Orient’ (vnutrennii Vostok). Panarin thus accused the Occident of being a colonizer of Russia while at the same time calling on Russia to return to its role as colonizer of its neighbours. His otherwise antiOccidentalist stance thus mimics the very Eurocentrism that he so vehemently rejects. There is also an affinity between the ND’s and Panarin’s anti-Americanism. Comparable to the ruminations of the ND, Panarin brought forward in one of his textbooks, approved by the Ministry of Higher Education and still widely read at Russian universities, the concept of the ‘Protestant North’, which he called the ‘referent group’ for the Occident, and which, in its entirety, is a subject of an ‘aggressive political influence of Americanism, a culture of hedonistic individualism, hostile to certain collectivist values, to collectivist heroism and [the] asceticism’ of Russia (Ilin and Panarin 1994: 114). If the ND authors criticized the USimposed post-Second World War order, Panarin held American ‘hedonistic individualism’ and ‘destructive demoralization’ responsible for Russia’s ills (Ilin and Panarin 1994: 116). As a less developed society, Russia, for Panarin, will always be subject to this ‘demoralization’ if it pursues open contacts with the Occident. Panarin, therefore, believed that the Russian culture, as a culture recipient, can only maintain its identity if it resorts to a cultural autarchy vis-à-vis a culture donor, the US (Ilin and Panarin 1994: 117). Panarin presented the Western discourse on human rights as a US-inspired sham that covers ‘real’ American interests: ‘as the only superpower, the US uses this discourse to achieve world dominance and to justify its interference in internal matters of other countries including Russia, thus breaching its sovereignty’ (Panarin 1999a: 180). Similarly, Faye conceived human rights to be an ‘American ideology’, a mercantilist ‘machine of war against political sovereignties’ imposed on Europe and the rest of the world that promotes an American idea of democracy and liberalism (Faye 1985: 77–78). Panarin’s thought was also heavily influenced by the ND’s musings on IndoEuropean heritage conceptualized by the latter as being the groundstone of European culture and civilization (de Benoist 1978: 32–37). Panarin’s numerous works included references to the hierarchical separation of ancient societies into ‘pagan priests’, ‘warriors’ and ‘plowmen’, these myths employed in such a way as to demonstrate their apparent relevance for the analysis of the contemporary world (Ilin and Panarin 1994: 208–9). Based on this mythic notion of Indo-Europeanism, Panarin, for instance, suggested that Russia should develop closer ties with Iran and fantasized about a successful use of ‘all three continental ideas – Southern, Eastern and Indo-European’, the latter allowing Russia ‘to reconstruct its Europeanism, its Petrine heritage … [and] to contribute to the formation of great Russia – the avantgard of Eurasia’ (Panarin 1999c: 269–70). The philosopher, however, never resolved the contradiction between his Gorbachev-era pro-Europeanism and enthusiastic calls for a dialogue of cultures and civilizations, whereby he considered Russia to be an intrinsic part of Europe, indebted to the European spirit of Enlightenment, with his later warring anti-Occidentalism and particularism.

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As seen from the above, Panarin’s views were indebted to a very significant degree to those of the proponents of the ND. At the same time, the two differ on a number of very important accounts. De Benoist and other ND authors are representatives of a non-Catholic, anti-Christian right who impugn Christianity for corrupting the true European essence and extol neo-paganism as the very foundation of ‘authentic’ European culture.18 In the spirit of Friedrich Nietzsche, Evola and Guenon, the neo-paganism of de Benoist and other ND authors is embedded in the illusions of Indo-European heritage, founded on the ‘re-enchantment’ of the world, a concept of ‘a man as a Demiurg’, a ‘master and a creator of his destiny’. Conversely, Panarin’s civilizationist nationalism is founded on Orthodox Christianity, which he sees as the core of Russian culture and a ‘Russian type of consciousness … characterised by religious-Manichean radicalism’ (Ilin and Panarin 1994: 127). The Eurasian empire is to be held together by a distinct idea, Christian Orthodoxy: ‘[t]he absence of such an idea deforms and disorients people’s consciousness in the former Soviet Union’ (Ilin and Panarin 1994: 132). Panarin accuses the Russian elite of being an unfit guardian of the civilizational heritage of Eurasia (Ilin and Panarin 1994: 168). In his earlier works still free of his later geopolitical Armageddonism, Panarin writes that the role of the Church will supplant that of geopolitical military control in Eurasia. In multi-ethnic civilizations, as opposed to nation-states, the role of religions is even more important, according to Panarin, in gluing the structure together (Panarin 1999b: 130). In short, Panarin believed that unless they abandon their neo-pagan atheism and ‘return to religion (as manifested by the great religious traditions embraced by Russia, Iran, and India)’, the proponents of the ND have no political future (Panarin 1999c: 268–69). The most obtuse discrepancy between the ND’s and Panarin’s ideas is their respective perception of the Muslim minorities in Europe and Russia. Peculiarly, Panarin failed to acknowledge that in a Europe envisioned by French New Rightists that he so studiously tried to emulate, there is no place for non-Europeans, and especially no place for Muslims, whereas the concept of ‘Eurasia’ rests on a marriage of Orthodox Christianity and Islam. This marriage is, however, an illusion, as Islam takes a backseat in Panarin’s Eurasia, and Orthodox Christianity assumes a primary, civilizing, role.

Conclusion From 1985 to 2003, Panarin evolved from being a liberal nationalist to embracing apocalyptic geopolitical visions of the war between ‘Occidental’ and ‘Eurasian’ worlds. He came to reject his earlier Europeanism and to argue Russia’s cultural uniqueness and that it did not belong within Europe. He created images of Russian and Occidental ‘civilizations’, each of which he believed to be endowed with a set of traditions and non-malleable values determined by an unalterable ‘cultural code’. In his works he drew an impermeable mental border between Russian and Western ‘civilizations’, whereby the West assumes once again the role of the Other against which Russian ‘differentness’ is highlighted and Russian national identity is

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constructed and measured. Panarin enticed acute cultural relativism by asserting that the ‘West’ and Russia share neither the same culture nor the same values. He now argued that ‘Occidental’ values and cultural practices are ethnocentric and hence unfit to set an example for Russia. Yet at the same time, Panarin’s neo-Eurasianism stands as a striking example of the reflection and permutation of European culture on the Russian intellectual landscape. In his writings, he emulated European-bred ideas of Nouvelle Droite intellectuals. Situating Panarin within the context of the European New Right, and viewing his thought as an instance of the diffusion of European ideas onto Russian soil opens new venues for understanding the prominence of ultra-nationalism in Russia. Like other ideological currents, the Russian extreme right carries a heavy weight of European ideas. For all its vehement anti-Westernism and attempts at self-definition through juxtaposition with Europe, Russian ultra-nationalist discourse is European at its core as it is fertilized by the European extreme right’s grim prophecies of the decline of the West and calls for its rebirth. While rejecting European Enlightenment, Russian ultra-nationalists continue to be greatly affected by Western intellectual currents which, when translated into Russian discourses, assume, more often than not, distorted forms. The very rethinking of modernity is done in Russia through emulating European extreme-rightist, as well as postmodernist, traditions. The parallels between the European New Right and Panarin’s new Eurasianism are an instance of an eastward transmission of European ideas along the cultural gradient and of the Europeanization of Russian ultra-nationalism.

Notes 1

2

An earlier version of this chapter was presented at the 2008 World Convention of the Association for the Study of Nationalities (ASN) on 12 April 2007 (Columbia University, New York). The author is grateful to the Académie suisse des sciences humaines et sociales (Bern, Switzerland) for the travel grant that made attendance at the ASN Convention possible. Pipes condescendingly notes that the notions of law and universal human rights lack deep roots in the consciousness of the Russian people. A Westerner is prone to regard these concepts as innate to man and their absence as intolerable deprivation. In reality, they are the product of a unique cultural tradition that originated in Stoic philosophy and was transmitted to the West through Roman jurisprudence … In the course of its historical evolution, Russia has failed to come within the orbit of classical influence … The average Russian … lacks a consciousness of legality.

3

4

See Pipes (1984: 166). See also Wittfogel (1957). For an insightful account of the Russiaas-Orient trend within Sovietology, see von Hagen (2004). Malia’s universalistic musings on the prescribed ascendance and reception of ‘good’ universalistic European ideas and practices of market and democracy arouse serious reservations, and his definitions of ‘east’ and ‘west’ are hazy and coloured by Cold War-era confrontation. To my knowledge, Marlène Laruelle was the first to introduce the term ‘civilizationist nationalism’, which was adopted by other scholars including Emil Pain. See Laruelle (2007) and Pain (2007: 53).

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5 The exceptions to the paucity of works on Panarin are Laruelle (2006a, 2007), Bazhanov (1999) and Pursiainen (1998). 6 See, for instance, Dunlop (2004), Umland (2007), Shlapentokh (2007) and Shekhovtsov (2008). 7 For a great overview of the ENR, see Bar-On (2007). See also two works by the converts to the New Right: Sunic (1990) and O’Meara (2004). 8 On these debates, see Griffin (2000a). For a critique of this position, see Gregor (2006). See also Taguieff (1994) who argues that with the beginning of the publication of the journal Krizis in 1988 de Benoist broke irrevocably with neo-fascism and the extreme right. 9 Gary Stark applies this poignant term to German Conservative revolutionaries. See Stark (1981). 10 For the ND critique of liberalism, see de Benoist (1979: 84–89). On the ND’s antiegalitarian discourse, see Baccou and Le Club de l’Horloge (1981). See also de Benoist (1978: 24). 11 Griffin and others argue that the New Right aims to render the Old Right more respectable: see Griffin (2000b). Conversely, others believe that the New Right is a cultural reaction to the challenges identified by the new left in the 1960s: for this view, see Minkenberg (1997). 12 Mamleev regained Russian citizenship in 1991. He remains one of the most dedicated new Eurasianists affiliated with Dugin’s International Eurasian Movement. He also gives lectures at New University created in 1998 by Dugin. 13 On the Russian New Right, see Frumkin (2002), Umland (1997, 2002) and Sokolov (2006). 14 Dugin made unsuccessful moves to enter mainstream politics by first allying with the head of the Russian Communist Party Gennadii Ziuganov and later with the NationalBolshevik leader Eduard Limonov. These alliances proved to be political failures. Dugin reached his glory days only in 1997 with the publication of his Foundations of Geopolitics, and especially a year later, when he became an adviser to the Duma Chairman, Gennadii’ Seleznev. 15 Traces of new Eurasianism are found in the discourse on sovereign democracy introduced by Vladimir Putin’s ideologist,Vladislav Surkov. See Surkov (2006). 16 These include the former Minister of Culture Aleksandr Sokolov; the Chairman of the Federation’s Council’s International Relations Committee Mikhail Margelov; the Vice-Speaker of the Federation Council Aleksandr Torshin; former adviser to Vladimir Putin Aslanbek Aslakhanov; former adviser to President Yeltsin and an Ambassador to Denmark Dmitrii Riurikov; former Head of the Ministry of Justice Department on Political Parties and Social Organizations Aleksei Zhafiarov; President of South Ossetia Eduard Kokoiti; former Deputy Foreign Minister and current Ambassador to Latvia Viktor Kaliuzhnii; and Yakutiia (Sakha) Minister of Culture and Rector of the Arctic State Institute of Culture and Art Andrei Borisov. Many prominent personalities were, or still are, associated with Dugin’s movement, including the President of the National Association of Television and Radio Broadcasters Eduard Sagalaev; Odnako (However) TV show host and Editor-in-Chief of the weekly political journal Profil’ (Profile) Mikhail Leont’ev; Head of the Territorial Directorate’s State Committee for Property responsible for Moscow State University Zeidula Iuzbekov; Chief Mufti of the Spiritual Directorate of the Muslims of Russia and European Countries of the CIS Talgat Tadzhuddin; Head of the RF Council of Ambassadors and President of the RussianTurkish Friendship Society ‘Rutam’ Al’bert Chernyshov; Editor-in-Chief of the Russian army newspaper Krasnaia zvezda (Red Star) Nikolai Efimov; President of the consulting firm Neokon and founder of the website Worldcrisis.ru Mikhail Khazin; Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences and Vice-President of the Society of Georgians of Russia Severian Zagarishvili; and Head of the Congress of the Peoples of the Northern Caucasus and Secretary for National Issues of the Union of Writers of Russia Brontoi Bediurov. The Eurasian movement also gained supporters in the Commonwealth of

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Independent States (CIS) countries. Such people as Rector of the Lev Gumilev Eurasian National University of Astana (Kazakhstan) Sarsyngali Abdymanapov; Ambassador of the Republic of Kyrgyzstan to Russia and Head of the Council of Directors of Postnoff Ltd Apas Dzhumagulov; Director of the Academy of Management attached to the Office of the President of Belarus and Director of the Research Institute on the Theory and Practice of Government of the Republic of Belarus Evgenii Matusevich; Rector of the Kyrgyz-Russian Slavic University of Bishkek Vladimir Nifad’ev; Director of the Akhmad Donish Institute of History, Archaeology and Ethnography of the Tajik Academy of Sciences Rakhim Masov; Rector of the Makhambet Utemisov Western Kazakhstani State University of Uralsk Tuiakbai Ryzbekov; and the Leader of the Progressive Socialist Party of Ukraine Nataliia Vitrenko are all members of the movement which, surprisingly, also attracts followers outside the CIS. The currently imprisoned head of the İşçi Partisi (Labour Party) of Turkey Doğu Perinçek; retired French Air Force General and leader of the Forum for France Pierre-Marie Gallois; Director of the Center for Central Asian and Caucasian Studies at Luleå, Sweden, and Editor-in-Chief of the scholarly journal Central Asia and the Caucasus Murad Esenov; Lecturer of the Faculty of Policy Studies of Iwate Prefectural University, Japan, Iukiko Kuroiwa; conspirologist and author of the book Vladimir Poutine et l’Eurasie Jean Parvulesco; Editor-in-Chief of the Milano journal Eurasia: Rivista di Studi Geopolitici Tiberio Graziani; Head of the Congress of Serbs of Eurasia (KSEA) Mila Alečković-Nikolić; and retired General and former functionary of the Serbian Radical Party Božidar Delić are all associated, one way or another, with Dugin. I am grateful to Andreas Umland for compiling this impressive list of Eurasianist personalities. See Umland (2009: 13–17). 17 Vitalii’ Ia. Pashchenko, personal conversation, October 2006, Moscow. Natalia Zarubina, personal conversation, May 2008. See also Zarubina (2005: 26). 18 De Benoist (1990). See also de Benoist (1981).

Bibliography Baccou, P. and Le Club de l’Horloge. 1981. Le Grand Tabou. L’économie et le mirage égalitaire. Paris: Albin Michel. Bar-On, T. 2007. Where Have all the Fascists Gone? Aldershot: Ashgate. –––– 2008. ‘Fascism to the Nouvelle Droite: The Dream of Pan-European Empire’, Journal of Contemporary European Studies, 16(3): 327–45. Bazhanov,V. 1999. ‘A Note on Panarin’s Revansh istorii’, Europe-Asia Studies, 51(4): 705–8. de Benoist, A. 1978. Vue de droite. Anthologie critique des idées contemporaines. Paris: Copernic. –––– 1979. Les idées à l’endroit. Paris: Éditions Libres-Hallier. –––– 1981. Comment peut-on être païen? Paris: Albin Michel. –––– 1986. Europe,Tiers Monde, même combat. Paris: Éditions Robert Laffont. de Benoist, A. and la Commission ‘Traditions et Communauté’ 1982. Les Traditions d’Europe. Paris: Le Labyrinthe. Dugin, A. 2001. ‘Evraziistvo: ot filosofii k politike’. Speech delivered at the founding Congress of the Mezhdunarodnoe Evrazii’skoe Dvizhenie, 21 April. Dunlop, J. 2004. ‘Aleksandr Dugin’s Foundations of Geopolitics’, Demokratizatsiya, 12(1): 41–57. Duranthon-Crabol, A.-M. 1988a. Visages de la nouvelle droite: Le G.R.E.C.E et son histoire. Paris: Presses de la Fondation nationale des sciences politiques. –––– 1988b. ‘La “Nouvelle droite” entre printemps et automne, 1968–86’, Vingtième Siècle. Revue d’histoire, 17: 39–49. Evtuhov, C. 2003. ‘Introduction’, in C. Evtukhov and S. Kotkin (eds), The Cultural Gradient: the Transmission of Ideas in Europe, 1789–1991. Boston: Rowman & Littlefield, p. 1–12.

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Faye, G. 1985. Nouveau discours à la nation européene. Paris: Albatros. Frumkin, K. 2002. ‘Traditsionalisty: Portret na fone tekstov’, Druzhba narodov, 6: 5–41. Gregor, J. 2006. The Search for Neofascism: the Use and Abuse of Social Science. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Griffin, R. 1993. The Nature of Fascism, 2nd edn. London: Routledge. –––– 2000a. ‘Plus ça change! The Fascist Pedigree of the Nouvelle Droite’, in E. Arnold (ed.), The Development of the Radical Right in France 1890–1995. London: Routledge, pp. 217–52. –––– 2000b. ‘Between Metapolitics and Apoltea: The New Right’s Strategy for Conserving the Fascist Vision in the Interregnum’, Modern and Contemporary France, 8(2): 35–53. –––– 2000c. ‘Interregnum or Endgame? The Radical Right in the “Post-Fascist” Era’, Journal of Political Ideologies, 5(2): 163–78. Ilin,V.V. and Panarin, A. 1994. Filosofiia politiki. Moscow: Izd-vo Moskovskogo universiteta. Ingram, A. 1999. ‘“A Nation Split Into Fragments”: The Congress of Russian Communities and Russian Nationalist Ideology’, Europe-Asia Studies, 51(4): 687–704. Laqueur, W. 1994 [1993]. Black Hundred: The Rise of the Extreme Right in Russia. New York: Harper Perennial. Laruelle, M. 2006a. ‘Aleksandr Panarin i “tsivilizatsionnyi” natsionalizm v Rossii’, in A. Verkhovskii’ (ed.), Russkii natsionalizm: ideologiia i nastroenie. [Russian Nationalism: Ideology and Mood]. Moscow: Sova, pp. 165–82. –––– 2006b. Aleksandr Dugin: A Russian Version of the European Radical Right? Washington, D.C.: Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. –––– 2007. La quête d’une identité imperiale. Le néo-eurasisme dans la Russie contemporaine. Paris: Éditions PÉTRA. Lee, M. 1997. The Beast Reawakens. Toronto: Little, Brown, and Co. Minkenberg, M. 1997. ‘The New Right in France and Germany: Nouvelle Droite, Neue Rechte and the New Right Radical Parties’, in P. Merkl and L. Weinberg (eds), The Revival of Right-Wing Extremism in the Nineties. London: Routledge, pp. 65–90. O’Meara, M. 2004. New Culture, New Right: Anti-Liberalism in Postmodern Europe. Bloomington: 1st Books. Pain, E. 2007. ‘Rossiia mezhdu imperiei i natsiei’, Pro et Contra, May–June: p. 53. Panarin, A. 1989. Stil’ ‘Retro’ v ideologii i politike (kriticheskie ocherki frantsuzskogo neokonservatizma). [The ‘Retro’ Style in Ideology and Politics (Critical Essays on French Neoconservatism)]. Moscow: Mysl’. –––– 1991. Sovremennyi tsivilizatsionnyi protsess i fenomen neokonservatizma. [The Contemporary Civilizationist Process and the Phenomenon of Neoconservatism]. Moscow: Rossîiskaia akademîia nauk (RAN). –––– 1994. ‘Vyzov (Geopoliticheskii pessimism protiv tsivilizatsionnogo optimizma)’, Znamia, 6: 149–160. –––– 1999a. Politologiia. O mire politiki na Vostoke i na Zapade. Moscow: Universitet. –––– 1999b. Rossiia v tsivilizatsionnom protsesse. Moscow: Rossiiskaia akademiia nauk. –––– 1999c. Global’noe politicheskoe prognozirovanie. Moscow: Algorithm. –––– 2002. Pravoslavnaia tsivilizatsiia v global’nom mire. Moscow: Algorithm. –––– 2003a. Strategicheskaia nestabil’nost’ v XXI veke. Moscow: Algorithm. –––– 2003b. Iskoushenie globalizmom. Moscow: Russkii natsionalnyi fond. Pipes, R. 1984. Survival is Not Enough. New York: Simon & Schuster. Pursiainen, C. 1998. Eurasianism and Neo-Eurasianism: The Past, Present, and Postmodernity of a Russian Integration Ideology. Helsinki: Finnish Institute of International Affairs. Shekhovtsov, A. 2008. ‘The Palingenetic Thrust of Russian Neo-Eurasianism: Ideas of Rebirth in Aleksandr Dugin’s Worldview’, Totalitarian Movements and Political Religions, 9(4): 491–506.

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Shenfield, S. 2001. Russian Fascism:Traditions,Tendencies, Movements. New York: M.E. Sharpe. Shlapentokh, D. 2007. ‘Dugin Eurasianism: a Window on the Minds of the Russian Elite or an Intellectual Ploy?’, Studies in East European Thought, 59(3): 215–36. Sokolov, M. 2006. ‘Novye pravye intellektualy v Rossii. Strategii legitimatsii’, Ab Imperio, 3. Stark, G. 1981. Entrepreneurs of Ideology: Neoconservative Publishers in Germany, 1890–1933. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. Sunic, T. 1990. Against Democracy and Equality: The European New Right. New York: Peter Lang. Surkov, V. 2006. ‘Nasha rossii’skaia model’ demokratii nazyvaetsia ‘suverennoi demokratiei. Briefing at the United Russia Party Headquarters’, Moscow, 28 June. Retrieved on 1 April 2008 from http://www.edinros.ru/news.html?id=114108. Taguieff , P.-A. 1990. ‘The New Cultural Racism in France’, Telos, 83: 109–22. –––– 1993. ‘Origines et métamorphoses de la nouvelle droite’, Vingtième Siècle, 40: 3–22. –––– 1994. Sur la nouvelle droite: jalons d’une analyse. Paris: Descartes et Cie. Tsygankov, A. 2005. ‘Natsional’nyi’ liberalizm Aleksandra Panarina’, Svobodnaia Mysl’, 9: 100–17. Umland, A. 1997. ‘The Post-Soviet Russian Extreme Right’, Problems of Post-Communism, 44(4): 53–61. –––– 2002. Toward an Uncivil Society? Contextualizing the Recent Decline of Extremely RightWing Parties in Russia. Cambridge, MA: Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University. –––– 2007. ‘Alexander Dugin, the Issue of Post-Soviet Fascism and Russian Political Discourse Today’, Russian Analytical Digest, 14(6): 2–5. –––– 2009. ‘Fascist Tendencies in Russia’s Political Establishment: the Rise of the International Eurasian Movement’, Russian Analytical Digest, 60: 13–17. von Hagen, M. 2004. ‘Empires, Borderlands, and Diasporas: Eurasia as Anti-Paradigm for the Post-Soviet Era’, American Historical Review, 109(2): 445–68. Wittfogel, K. 1957. Oriental Despotism: A Comparative Study of Total Power. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Zarubina, N. 2005. ‘Biografiia Aleksandra Sergeevicha Panarina’, in Kul’turnoe nasledie kak osnova natsional’noi’ identichnosti. Pervye Panarinskie chteniia. Moscow: GASK.

20 TRANS-EUROPEAN TRENDS IN RIGHT-WING EXTREMISM Michael Whine

Introduction This chapter examines the effects that the easing of Europe’s borders and the development of information and communications technologies are having on the outlook and activities of right-wing extremists. It will argue that these developments are the new ‘enablers’ allowing white supremacists and neo-Nazis to connect and move closer to the cooperation that earlier extremists argued for, but failed to accomplish. Of course right-wing extremists are not the only political activists who benefit.The extreme left has always been internationalist, and anti-globalization protestors communicated and organized across borders to stage demonstrations and riots in Gothenburg (2000), Genoa (2001) and elsewhere. The extreme right, however, has not, and attempts to create enduring international collaboration have been less successful. This chapter’s focus is on white supremacists, neo-Nazi groups and the youth cultures they frequently recruit from, rather than parties, although there may be links between them. Their lifestyles are a consequence of easier movement and the adoption of contemporary cultures, most notably music and clothing. A trend towards focused terrorist violence is also emerging.

European collaboration In 1997, Leonard Weinberg cautioned that the danger posed by the extreme right should not be minimized, notwithstanding its lack of enduring political success in Western Europe. He noted its dynamism and suggested that extremists’ exploitation of popular nationalist sentiment is limited and declining, and their concerns now focus on the presence of large numbers of non-European immigrants whose presence is perceived to be an economic and cultural threat. He observed that

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‘in some cases the rightists depict themselves as the defenders of European civilization now threatened by Ottoman or Moorish invaders’. He also observed the growing animus toward the United States: ‘Not uncommonly these extreme rightists use the United States as a negative reference point. It is precisely America’s evolving multiculturalism that they wish to avoid for their own countries’ (Weinberg 1997: 279). In 1995, Peter Merkl suggested that the contemporary extreme right in Europe is largely new, and should be investigated accordingly. He noted the readiness with which many young right-wing activists, and even politically unconnected skinhead gangs and soccer hooligans, reached for the old Nazi or fascist labels and utilized their flags and symbols while representing a new entity. Young people, particularly in post-Communist states, have grown up in a state of confusion amid collapsing political and social values.They have therefore eagerly seized on ready-made images of ethnic identity, especially in an extreme form (Merkl 1997: 23). Anthony Smith suggested that it is the ethnic vision that now underpins Europe’s nationalisms. He noted that ethnicity fills up the ‘nationalist concept space’ in a manner that leaves little room for other looser conceptions or discourse of the nation. The idea that nations may be plural rather than culturally homogeneous still makes little headway among Europe’s extreme right. It is the French concept of ethnie that predominates with its basis in common racial, cultural, religious and historical experience (Smith 1995: 23). This leaves no room for new immigrants, particularly those who openly preserve their religion and culture. We therefore see an emerging pan-European extreme-right identity, which claims to be based on common European histories, identities and cultures in reaction to the increasing presence of new migrants and which is at times attracted to and influenced by the American extreme right, but also repelled by American cultural and economic hegemony. The extreme right failed to establish trans-European institutions before the War. Italian and British fascists attended an International Conference of Fascist Parties in 1932, and representatives from France, Norway and Ireland attended the 1934 Fascist International Congress in Montreux (Bar-On 2003: 233). During the Spanish Civil War, British and other European sympathizers joined the Friends of National Spain, and members of the Irish Blue Shirt Movement joined the Spanish Foreign Legion to fight against the Republic (Keene 2001: 2–7). But nothing enduring was created and the Axis alliance was primarily a strategic one. Further attempts to collaborate were made after 1945 when former Nazis and neo-Nazis sought to build a new Europe. Unlike the political unity sought by Western powers, theirs was a unity based on pan-Europeanism in the face of an ethnic, rather than a strategic threat. For a few, the idea of uniting with the Soviet Union against China also proved attractive. Latterly the preoccupation has been to unify against the US and globalizing influences and to remove immigrant (particularly Muslim) communities. European collaboration among extreme-right groups after the Second World War was particularly driven by the concern to unite against the nationalisms that

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had long torn it apart, and as a reaction to the mounting threat from the Soviet Union. Its proponents were former Nazis and their sympathizers. Among them was Francis Parker Yockey, the American lawyer seconded to the war crimes trials who fled to Ireland after he openly sympathized with those he was prosecuting. He argued in Imperium that the age of narrow nationalism was dead and that the organic development of a new Europe was necessary to save Western civilization. He wrote that: This is addressed to all Europe, and in particular to the culture bearing stratum of Europe. It summons Europe to a world-historical struggle of two centuries’ duration. Europe will partake in this struggle either as a participant or as the booty for marauding powers from without. If it is to act, and not merely suffer in this series of gigantic wars, it must be integrated and there is only one way this can occur. (Yockey 1948) In 1947 Yockey joined Sir Oswald Mosley’s attempt to build a covert European network, but broke away in 1949 to establish the European Liberation Front (ELF) with the aim of building an authoritarian united European state. Over the next three years he travelled between Europe and America, but the differences among the groups, and their often contradictory aims, led him to abandon the effort and to move to Egypt in 1953 where he joined forces briefly with former SS Colonel Otto Skorzeny and former Nazi Major General Ernst Otto Remer (Lee 1997: 87–97). Whereas the ELF sought a pan-European front of Western states, Skorzeny and other former Nazi officials strove to build links with the Arab world and Latin America. He influenced the formation and development of the Spanish Circle of Friends of Europe (CEDADE, Círculo Español de Amigos de Europa), the neoNazi group that continues to host European neo-Nazis at its annual gatherings.The motivating impetus here was to build a worldwide neo-Nazi international network together with potential allies in the Arab world, brought together by their shared hatred of communism and Jews (Lee 1997: 156; Michael 2006). A third collaborative attempt was initiated by former Belgian Nazi collaborator Jean Thiriart who established the Jeune Europe movement in the 1960s to unite European nationalists, but with the realization that the trappings of Nazism had to be discarded if the young were to be attracted. In particular he advocated a white Europe from the Atlantic to the Urals but without the US. He forged an alliance with Adolf von Thadden, the German National Democratic Party (NDP) leader, and with Juan Perón, the exiled Argentinian dictator, then living in Madrid. Both urged the militarization of the white struggle against communism and non-European migration into Europe. Thiriart also incorporated elements of leftist thinking into his evolving ideology and adopted the Palestinian cause. Yasser Arafat’s Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) was seen at that time as the vanguard of the left struggle against US imperialism, and indeed neo-Nazis, as well as leftists, went to Lebanon and Syria for terrorism training in Palestinian

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camps (Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs 1976). Thiriart’s works were also translated into Russian and influenced the post-war redevelopment of National Bolshevik ideology that re-emerged after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Whereas the earlier proponents of pan-Europeanism excluded Russia from their plans, later activists sought to incorporate it. The Danish neo-Nazi, Povl Riis Knudsen, who succeeded George Lincoln Rockwell in 1967 as leader of the World Union of National Socialists, wrote after his 1978 visit to Russia that: The racial consciousness of the Russians, who are the dominant nation in the Soviet Union, definitely promises a better prospect for the survival of the Aryan race than the visions of liberal and conservative American politicians … It is true, of course, that Communism does not support racial principles in theory – but with Communism theory and practice are very different things. (Lee 1997: 167) By 1983, Remer, who had returned to Germany, began to advocate collaboration with Russia to counter the threat from Asia. He too argued that communism should be no impediment, and in doing so influenced later generations of neo-Nazi ideologues seeking a united Europe. This younger generation, however, were also influenced by the anti-Americanism and anti-capitalism of the emerging new left (Lee 1997: 209–11). Latterly it has been the Italian Roberto Fiore of the New Force (Forza Nuova) and former German NDP leader Udo Voigt who have promoted European and European–Russian cooperation. In a spring 2008 joint press statement, they praised former President Putin’s muscular Russian nationalist policies. This followed Fiore’s invitation to representatives of the Russian extreme right to meet in Rome in November 2007, to assist in ‘choosing the guidelines of international politics for the next few years … and the end of American unipolarism and the birth of a European pole’. Fiore added that ‘for those who have eyes to see, it is clear that it is in Moscow reside our hopes for a new Europe’ (Bernabei 2008: 3). Some Russian extreme-right groups promote ties with Europe based on perceived shared racial and cultural identities, and there has been an increasingly apparent ideological transfer from East to West and evidence of national Bolshevist influences on European groups (Mathyl 2002). They stand in contrast to the Eurasianism of Aleksander Panarin and Aleksander Dugin. The former rejected cross-fertilization between Europe and Russia, while the latter additionally seeks alliances in the Middle East to offset American unipolar domination (Peunova 2008; Stack 2008). The ‘Ideological Principles’ of the Northern Brotherhood sum up the views of those seeking ties: By positioning ourselves as pragmatic defenders of Russian nation interests, we can’t skip consideration of more general context. And in this context we

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are identically determined as white racists … Therefore, in being developed now world fight of continents, races and civilisations, we support the fight of white humanity for survival, for the saving of white mankind which is now under the threat of elimination or dissolution of its identity in the mainstream of Southern colourful invasion. (Northern Brotherhood 2007)1 Jaroslav Krejci noted in the early 1990s that extreme-right groups were cultivating friendly and mutually supportive contacts, as they were becoming racially rather than ethno-linguistically oriented. In this way he suggested they are now making common cause: They therefore pose as determined defenders of the purity of European culture, a culture the very spirit of which they fail to understand … The new emerging identities have similar but also different roots to the class and identification politics that gave rise to Fascism and Nazism. Identity and exclusion feed on each other, even as social and economic pressures move Europe towards a more plural type of society. (Krejci 1995: 17) The political and class struggles of communists and fascists, the pursuit of strong totalitarian states and the reaction to mass unemployment is not what now unites contemporary right-wing extremists. They are motivated more by the negative economic and political effects of globalization and the prospect of unemployment brought about by the transfer of economic activity to low-cost producers, reaction to a US-dominated uniform culture, and the presence of new migrants whose cultures and religions are seen as alien to Europe. Despite some diminution of American extreme-right influence, it is worth recording that some streams maintain a foothold. Christian Identity retains offshoots in Sweden, Belfast and London, as does the Church of the Creator in Sweden.2 Two Americans have worked to strengthen transatlantic links. The first was the late William Pierce, founder of the National Alliance, who encouraged links with the BNP and NDP, and who told the NDP youth congress in October 1999 that ‘it is essential – not just helpful, but necessary – for genuine nationalist groups everywhere to increase their degree of collaboration across national borders’ (Pierce 2002, n.d.). The other is former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke, whose appeal to the American and European right to join together in his booklet Is Russia the Key to White Survival?, was a product of his visits there and to Ukraine, which began in 1995 (Duke 2000). These led him to establish groups to encourage transatlantic cooperation, the most recent of which is the European-American Unity and Rights Organization (EURO) (Anti-Defamation League 2001; Lee 2003). Changing social and economic conditions and these personal initiatives are promoting a convergence of right-wing activity and many groups are beginning to look and sound similar. Merkl noted in 1997 that ‘the new radical right (on both

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sides of the Atlantic) voice opposition to the rule of unresponsive Eurocrats in exactly the same way as the American right voices opposition to the decision makers of Washington’ and that ‘If a Euro American radical right has not emerged as yet, one certainly appears on the horizon’ Merkl (1997: 25–29) However, for many European right-wing extremists the United States is a negative reference point and it is precisely America’s evolving multiculturalism they wish to avoid for their own countries.

Enabling processes I now turn to the processes that are enabling collaboration. In previous publications, I have indicated that elements within the American extreme right had been the first to use the Internet to enable communication across vast distances, and at about the same time the German extreme right sought to use it to organize events and to evade scrutiny by law enforcement. I had also noted that the Internet enhanced capacity to unify disparate groups advocating violent extremism (Whine 1999, 2000, 2007; BfV 2000). According to the German security service: The Internet has become the most important medium of communication for right wing extremists, who use it to present themselves, make verbal attacks, carry on internal debates, and to mobilise attendance at their rallies and demonstrations. (BfV 2003: 24) The Dutch Racism and Extremism Monitor notes that: Many (Internet) forums form collaborative networks, some tighter than others, often with a hierarchical structure, in which all sorts of activities are undertaken or initiated, just as in ‘real’ organisations. These activities can be exclusively digital, but they can also take place in the real world or in a combination of the two. (van Donselaar and Rodrigues 2006) In the twenty-first century the static medium of websites is increasingly being replaced by interactive e-mailing lists, discussion forums and the Web 2.0 social networks, such as MySpace, Facebook and the YouTube video-sharing site. Researchers on both sides of the Atlantic are now noting that neo-Nazis are increasingly using social networking platforms to infiltrate and recruit the next generation. Chris Wolf of the American Anti-Defamation League has commented that: In today’s Web 2.0 world with user generated content, social network sites like Facebook and MySpace, mobile computing and always-on connectivity, every aspect of the Internet is being used by extremists of every ilk to repackage old hatreds and to recruit new haters … The emergence of new

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Internet technologies and their adoption by online haters is much more pernicious than the static websites most of us have been focussing on over the years. (Wolf 2008) The first interactive extreme-right website was established by the American Stormfront in 1998, and in 2000, ‘Stormfront Nederland en Vlaanderen’ was established to link Dutch and Belgian neo-Nazis and, although it never achieved the importance of its American originator, it has served as a forum for promoting hate speech (van Donselaar and Rodrigues 2006). Redwatch and similar sites are the cause of mounting concern in Europe. They name anti-Nazi opponents and journalists and publish their home addresses with the implicit expectation of them being physically attacked as has happened in the UK, Poland and the Czech Republic.3 In Spain, complaints by a human rights organization that one of its leading officials, and his home address, were listed on the site of the National Alliance again led to a police investigation, though no charges have been brought to date (Alianza Nacional 2008). In Russia, similar websites have circulated the names and home addresses of judges, prosecution service officials and public figures, causing the General Prosecutor’s office to initiate a criminal investigation into their activity in March 2008 (SOVA Centre 2008). Many of these sites are sophisticated, hosted abroad and mirrored elsewhere to avoid legal sanctions. One US-hosted Russian site, vdesyatku.net, was closed after complaints, but others, nordrus.org and nordrus.info, for example, are mirrored in both the US and in Singapore, and are now believed to be working on yet another fall-back site.4 The second enabling process flowed from the Schengen agreements of 1985 and 1990. These abolished checks at the internal borders of five of the initial signatory states (Belgium, France, Germany, Luxembourg and the Netherlands) and created a single external border. Common rules regarding visas, right of asylum and checks only at external borders were adopted to allow the free movement of persons within them. A further eight states (Austria, Denmark, Finland, Greece, Italy, Portugal, Spain and Sweden) signed the agreements between 1990 and 1996. The UK and Ireland are now also party to some aspects of the agreements (Europa 2009). The net effect of Schengen has been to allow Europeans to travel around, and to work within, the area without border checks or other restrictions, as the architects of the agreements planned. Coupled with substantially cheaper travel costs, Schengen has facilitated trans-European migration and short-term visits in a way that was inconceivable to previous generations. Fans now think nothing of crossing Europe to watch a football match or a concert.

Trends The most obvious manifestations of these currents and enabling processes are: international gatherings, clothing, music and violence. Pan-European associations also

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promote closer contact. One, the European National Front, was founded in 1999, and named after Yockey’s organization. It claims Bulgarian, Dutch, French, German, Greek, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian and Spanish affiliates and in August 2006 mobilized up to 10,000 supporters for the Deutsche Stimme festival in Sachsen, Germany (Southgate 1999; European National Front 2006; AIVD 2004). Meetings to mark historic anniversaries, such as Hitler’s birthday, attract international participants. The annual August Wunseidel memorial march in Bavaria to commemorate Rudolf Hess started in 2001 and attracted over 4,500 international participants in 2004. In 2005 it was banned on the basis that the organizers’ intention was to glorify Nazism (Klein 2005; Taschel 2007). The annual Dresden march commemorating the Allied bombing, organized by the German NPD, attracted over 3,000 in 2005, up to 6,000 in 2008, and thousands were again expected in 2009. Participants include skinheads and neo-Nazis from all over Europe. The annual December march through the Stockholm suburb of Salem commemorating the murder of White Power supporter and skinhead Daniel Wretstrom in 2000, acted both as a unifying point for the Swedish extreme right, and attracted participants from elsewhere in Europe (The Local 2007). But the numbers of foreign participants in national manifestations may now be falling because of exclusions by national law enforcement agencies. However, parade bans in one country can lead to their transference elsewhere, allowing neighbouring groups to link. German neo-Nazis marched with the Dutch People’s Union (NVU, Nederlandse VolksUnie) through Dutch towns and cities in 2001 and 2002, enabling them to evade a ban in Germany (AIVD 2001, 2002; van Donselaar and Rodrigues 2006).5 Mass movement from Eastern and Central Europe into the European Union, however short-lived and temporary, has also encouraged right-wing extremists to establish liaisons and bases beyond their national boundaries, as happened when Polish extreme-right groups held meetings in London in 2007 and 2008. The transnational clothing brands adopted by skinheads and neo-Nazis such as Lonsdale, Pit Bull and Thor Steinar, promote a common identity within the extreme right. Groups using these brands, sometimes referred to as ‘Lonsdale youth’ (or Gabbers in the Netherlands), were not initially a target for recruitment by neo-Nazi groups, in part because of their drug use (van Donselaar 2004; AIVD 2004).6 The German security service describes the relationship between skinheads and neo-Nazis as an ambivalent one; the immediate attraction for skinheads is a lifestyle based on action and spontaneous violence, with easy access to drugs and music. Only rarely did they develop firmly held ideological views or target their political efforts in any more specific sense. But the picture has changed in recent years as more have become radicalized and they now constitute an important recruitment arena (BfV 2003: 41; BfV 2005: 51–53; van Donselaar and Rodrigues 2006). Therefore at a local level, skinhead clothing and music provide a route into neo-Nazism and a transnational identity. According to a German security service assessment, they now play ‘an important role in consolidating groups of right-wing youth willing to use violence’ in the Netherlands, Sweden and Germany (BfV 2004: 23).

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There is no suggestion that the clothing brands’ owners are complicit in the promotion of right-wing extremism. Their sales strategies, however, clearly recognize potential markets, and rely on accepted neo-Nazi and Norse symbols. For this reason Mediatex, the German manufacturer of Thor Steinar, successfully resisted a lawsuit brought by the Norwegian government which sought to ban their promotional use of the Norwegian flag, although the company later decided not to use the national symbol of Norway (Wroe 2008; Thor Steinar 2007). The third trend, skinhead or white power music, provides a unifying ideology, a common language, and a perfect example of globalisation. Developed in 1980s Britain, White Power music has grown into a multimillion Euro industry, and helps to fund violent extremist groups. According to Interpol the industry was worth £3.4 million a year in 1999, and it certainly grew for some years thereafter (White Pride Worldwide 2001; BfV 2005: 58–69).7 Devin Burghardt has noted that ‘the music scene has created international ties where there were none, and has inspired an ideological pan-Aryanism that has broken down the walls between racist groups’ (Burghardt quoted in White Pride Worldwide 2001). The Swedish security service likewise regards music as ‘one of the most important tools when it comes to spreading the movement’s ideas’ (SAPO 2002; see also Glaser and Pfeiffer 2007). Disks are recorded in one country, pressed in a second and retailed in a host of others and concerts attract international audiences. For example, Hammerfest 2000 organized near Atlanta, NJ by Panzerfaust Records and Resistance Records, drew fans from Austria, Canada, France, Ireland, the Netherlands and Spain, and bands from the UK (White Pride Worldwide 2001). The transnational nature of the production and distribution processes were revealed in February 2003 when a shipment of inflammatory CDs was seized at Frankfurt airport. They had been produced by a German neo-Nazi domiciled in Thailand who had sent them to Sweden for distribution in Germany and elsewhere (BfV 2003: 46). William Pierce recognized the transnational possibilities of attracting young alienated racists and neo-Nazis, and the money-making potential of music. In 1999 he purchased the Swedish Nordland Records and merged it with his successful Resistance Records. During 2000, he sought a business deal with Hendrik Mobus, a German neo-Nazi. In a radio broadcast on 9 September 2000, Pierce stated that they had planned to ‘establish new outlets in Europe’ for (Pierce’s) records and were discussing ‘the role of music in our overall effort’. Their grand plans, however, were never properly realized and Pierce died shortly thereafter (White Pride Worldwide 2001). The progenitor of the White Power music scene, Blood and Honour (B&H), founded by the late Ian Stewart Donaldson in the late 1980s, has grown from its UK origins into a trans-European and transatlantic movement with offshoots in the Netherlands, Belgium, Sweden, the UK and the US (Lowles 2001). Recent internal schisms, however, have now resulted in two B&H international associations: one aligned to the traditional skinhead network; the other closely aligned to the political and more extreme Combat 18, Terrormachine and the Racial Volunteer Force (RVF). Although their activities take place in a mostly non-political

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twilight zone, some adherents moved into overt political activity in spring 2006, when Dutch and German members attempted to lay a wreath at the German military cemetery in Ysselsteyn near Limburg, prior to a concert organized by B&H Flanders. Arrests of Belgian B&H members in the same year reportedly averted a planned terrorist attack (Renard 2008; see also AIVD 2006: 53). According to Merkl, There is little doubt that the vast majority of new recruits to the various European radical right groups is male, lower class and very young. (Merkl 1997: 36) In the case of East Germany, the extreme youth of many extreme-right activists makes them more vulnerable to anti-foreigner rock music. Helmut Willen’s 1,400 person case study noted that over 75 per cent of skinheads are under 21 years and that 50 per cent of these are under 18 years. The lack of education as well as the extreme youth of violent racists in Germany appears to be replicated in Sweden and the Netherlands (Merkl 1997: 27). Realization at government levels that rock music events were acting as an incubater for racist violence has led to police action, and in recent years their number has declined and the number of concerts played by foreign groups in Germany, for example, has fallen (BfV 2003: 45). However, there has been no diminution in the number of concerts played by German groups in Germany itself, despite large-scale banning of CDs and skinhead literature (Raabe 2007).

Street violence to terrorism The fourth by-product of these processes is the trend to violence. Street violence has always been part of the neo-Nazi scene: it provides a focus for hatred and thereby draws in new adherents, but the emerging trend involves a move beyond the anti-foreigner street violence of the 1990s towards a more focused violence, which includes terrorism, and which is spurred by different reasons (Merkl 1997: 17). Tore Bjorgo noted in 1995 that the increasing support for xenophobic and radical-right parties enabled the growth of militant neo-Nazi organizations and networks which targeted asylum seekers and visible minorities within Europe. He further observed that groups perceived as ‘right wing’ or ‘racist’ often turned out to have no connections with extreme political organizations, and only a rudimentary idea of any ideology. He suggested that defining the essence of right-wing extremism in terms of one single issue, value or philosophical idea would prove to be a frustrating exercise. Rather, he suggested, that theirs ‘is an anger against perceived outsiders, or the state, which could take a violent path’ (Bjorgo 1995: 2). At the same time, the late Ehud Sprinzak suggested that violent, extreme rightwing groups are organized around the belief that the object of their intense opposition is a priori illegitimate, that they do not belong to the same humanity as themselves, and should therefore be kept in an inferior legal state, expelled or

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even eliminated. He further observed that their violence may be directed towards the ‘inferior’ group, or it may be directed against the political authority which has allowed such a situation to develop (Bjorgo 1995: 4). Evidence in recent criminal trials and security services’ reports suggests that elements within the extreme right are preparing and training for what they perceive to be a coming war for ‘white survival’. Few criminal justice agencies publish data on this specifically, or differentiate it from other forms of violent crime, but the exceptions are the Swedish and German security services (BfV various years; SAPO various years; for background, see Bjorgo 1995). Their reports note that within established extreme-right bodies there are now individuals, or small groups, who are planning and preparing for acts of terrorism using firearms and improvised explosive devices that are more sophisticated than petrol bombs or other forms of missile previously associated with extreme-right violence. This new trend stands in stark contrast to earlier perceptions when several European security services reported an ambivalence towards the use of violence. The move to terrorism is not perceived to be a substantive challenge to the state, but rather an attack on symbols of the state and a reaction to the influx of migrants, particularly Muslims. In Sweden, for example, four neo-Nazis were charged in early 2005 in connection with a terrorist plot to attack the parliament building and schools, but for evidentiary reasons were convicted only of causing criminal damage (SAPO 2005: 5). The Swedish security police therefore noted in 2006 that: Both the White Power scene and the autonomous scene contain actors who have shown that they are prepared to use threat, violence or force to attain their political objectives. In some cases their actions are directed against authorities or Political Parties represented in parliament. (SAPO 2006: 23) This new trend is neither widespread nor does it involve large numbers, but is the consequence of a small minority acting out their extreme ideology. It is, however, planned and coordinated at a national and an international level, and it is the Internet that enables and strengthens the processes. A Europol report noted in 2006 that: Although violent acts perpetrated by right-wing extremists and terrorists may appear sporadic and situational, right-wing extremist activities are organised and transnational. (Europol 2007: 4)8 The inspiration for many is the ‘leaderless resistance’ model of small cells or single individuals (‘lone wolves’) using terror tactics to resist central government suggested by US extreme-right theoretician Louis Beam, and the messages contained in The Turner Diaries and Hunter, two novels written by William Pierce, under the pseudonym of Andrew Macdonald. The former depicts a violent revolution to

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overthrow the US federal government and to exterminate Jews and non-whites; the latter describes a targeted assassination campaign of couples in inter-racial marriages and civil rights activists carried out by a Vietnam War veteran who is drawn into a white nationalist group planning insurrection (Beam 1992; Macdonald (1978, 1989). The murder of Theo van Gogh, and the 7 July London bombings galvanized neo-Nazi groups around Europe although the immediate reaction did not lead to the extreme violence that security agencies predicted. There was, however, an increase in low-level violence, and anti-Muslim demonstrations in many countries, especially in the Netherlands and the UK. The Dutch security service and the annual Dutch Racism and Extremism Monitor both reported a discernible move by activists to ‘tougher, violence-prone neo-Nazi groups’ which are ‘just a fraction removed from terrorism’ (AIVD 2005, 2006, 2007; van Donselaar and Rodrigues 2006). The acquisition of arms, bomb-making materials and military manuals has been noted in several states, although the degree to which they will use them is another matter, and their possession may be more apparent than their willingness and capability to deploy them. During April and July 2005, the German authorities confiscated large caches of arms and explosives in raids on the homes of neo-Nazis, but commented afterwards that the intention appeared to have been to stockpile arms rather than use them immediately. They also noted that some right-wing extremists reject terrorist activity which could lead to increased surveillance by the state (BfV 2005: 50). In the UK, the police also foiled a succession of terrorist plots initiated by extreme-right activists.9 Nevertheless, the German authorities report that extreme-right activists are increasingly prepared to resort to violence, to obtain weapons and to engage in paramilitary exercises, as training for terrorism (BfV 2004: 39–41; BfV 2005: 49–50). The willingness to employ extreme violence in defence of European ‘values’ is apparent in the ideology of several groups, among them the British Patriots of the White European Resistance (POWER), which emerged in 2006, and which claims supporters in Croatia, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Serbia, Switzerland, Slovenia and Sweden. The British police have reported: There is no intelligence to suggest that POWER is instrumental in influencing known or alleged ‘Lone Wolf ’ operatives. However POWER is a relatively new group who are difficult to regionalise and who have links to continental Europe. (Association of Chief Police Officers 2008: 1) The POWER website states that: We began in Great Britain but are a pro European movement with members in all European countries … We were formed as a last chance movement to preserve our individual nations and to unify Europe and build the great nations and Europe we once had … We are not a Political party, and would

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consider ourselves freedom fighters, not the left wing version of the term freedom fighters. Which are called Terrorists, we are defenders of the European culture. However we urge people to support National Socialism … We are firm believers in the policies of Oswald Mosley and strongly support all of his theories on the state of Europe. (http://www.14power88.com/vonherman/vwar/page.php?id=6) POWER identification of the enemy is shared with like-minded groups: The western world we feel is under threat from not only Jewish corruption but also from mass immigration, drug imports, religious divide, gun crime, Islamic hatred and multiculturalism in general, we firmly support all of Europe but refuse to accept that we owe any African anything … We stand alongside every European nation that wishes to remove non whites from their land. (http://www.14power88.com/vonherman/vwar/page.php?id=6) The Racial Volunteer Force (RVF) is a second trans-European group which emerged from the UK-based Combat 18, with branches in the UK, Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands, and which declares itself to be an international ‘militant Pro White Organisation’, with its own European council. It hints that it will resort to violence and warns its members that they must think long and hard before joining (http://wwwrvfonline.com/house.htm). The Dutch security service identified its members as ‘strongly ideologically developed’ and capable of playing an important role in furthering and cementing contacts (AIVD 2006: 52). The terrorist threat is not perceived to be a substantive challenge to the state, but rather an attack on the symbols of the state and a reaction to the influx of migrants, particularly Muslims. It is not a widespread trend, nor is it coordinated and planned at any central point. Rather, it is the consequence of small groups acting out their extreme ideology. The 2008 Europol report on terrorist threats within the European Union identified an increasing number of extreme-right terrorist plots in the UK during the past ten years by individuals classified as ‘lone wolves’ who share ‘an ideological or philosophical identification with an extremist group, but do not communicate with the group they identify with’ (Europol 2008: 39). They follow the models proposed by Beam and Pierce. It is against this background that the case of Anders Behring Breivik should be considered. A political activist since his late teens who was considered unfit for military service, he hung around Norway’s far right without ever engaging organizationally with it, although he was a member of the anti-immigration Progress Party for some years. He likewise created online links with the English Defence League and a Swedish far-right forum. But his drift toward violence led to others distancing themselves from him, and his terrorism plans appear to have been developed, and carried out, alone. Nevertheless, the Norwegian Police Security Service

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warned in its Annual Threat Assessments in both 2010 and 2011 that there was a risk of terrorism from far-right activists, made easier by the easy access to firearms (PST 2010, 2011).

Conclusion Contemporary cultural, economic and racial challenges within Europe have allowed extremists to become more active once again. They have particularly spurred the growth of extreme nationalism and closer trans-European cooperation among extreme-right groups. These processes are enabled by the growth of ICTs and the ease of travel, and their outward manifestations are seen in the meetings, rallies and clothing adopted by many. The enabling mechanisms also allow the move to violence. In these developments the European extreme right has been influenced by, and has copied, its counterparts in the US. Yet at the same time they have also opposed the globalizing and Americanizing influences on Europe which are regarded as a danger to European ethnic and cultural identity. The outward manifestations of youth cultures should not be seen as a threat in themselves. The disparate and often confrontational nature, and historical tendency to splinter within the extreme right, reduce any political impact, but their violence is real and growing and does not involve large numbers, only isolated individuals or small cells. This is emerging as a clearly defined trans-European threat. In these activities the extreme right is achieving some of its goals and developing the realities that early proponents sought, but failed to realize.

Notes 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

See also Northern Bortherhood (n.d.). Belfast-published books promoting the US Christian Identity Movement were on sale at the Orange Street Congregational Church, Leicester Square, London in September 2008. Redwatch – the site the traitors love to hate, http://www.redwatch.org/index2.html. See also Taylor (2006) and ATL (n.d.). Private communication between SOVA and author, 25 April 2008. For continuing liaison between German extreme-right groups and others, see International Connections section in successive BfV annual reports. For background on the origins and international connections of the skinhead movement, see Anti-Defamation League (1995). For useful background, see also Ware and Back (2002). See also PET (2006). The Turner Diaries were a formative influence on former BNP and Combat 18 member David Copeland, the London Nail Bomber, who was imprisoned for life in 1999 for planting three bombs in London which killed three and injured over 200. Lance Crossley, a Nazi sympathizer from Manchester, was imprisoned for six years for possessing an arsenal of guns and explosives in 2001; David Tovey, BNP sympathizer, was imprisoned for 11 years for possessing weapons in 2001; Alan Boyce, a former BNP and NF member, was convicted of planning a bombing campaign against a local immigrants’ hostel in 2006; Robert Cottage, a former BNP local election candidate, was imprisoned in 2007 for stockpiling bomb-making chemicals for what he perceived

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to be the imminent war between British citizens and foreign migrants; Nathan Worrell, a far-right sympathizer, was imprisoned in 2008 for amassing bomb-making chemicals; Martyn Gilleard, the British People’s Party leader, was imprisoned in 2008 for making nail bombs and possession of ammunition for a firearm. It was stated that his computer password was ‘Martyn1488’, the 14 being a reference to the far right slogan ‘We must secure the existence of our race and a future for the white people’ coined by the late David Lane, an American white supremacist. Police found that he had researched bombmaking techniques on the Internet, bought explosives materials and made four nail bombs with the intention of bombing mosques (BBC News 25 July 2008).

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Klein, M. 2005. ‘Hess March Banned in Wunseidel’, Searchlight, October. Krejci, J. 1995. ‘Neo-Fascism – West and East’, in L. Cheles, R. Ferguson and M. Vaughan (eds), The Extreme Right in Western and Eastern Europe, 2nd edn. London: Longman, pp. 1–12. Lee, M. 1997. The Beast Reawakens. London: Little, Brown and Co. —— 2003. ‘The Wandering Jew Hater’, Intelligence Report, Southern Poverty Law Center, AL. Retrieved on 18 April 2008 from http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/ article.jsp?sid=21. Lowles, N. 2001. White Riot – the Violent Story of Combat 18. London: Milo Books. Macdonald, A. 1978. The Turner Diaries. Hillsboro, WV: National Vanguard Books. —— 1989. Hunter. Hillsboro, WV: National Vanguard Books. Mathyl, M. 2002. ‘The National Bolshevik Party and Arctogaia: Two Neo Fascist Groupuscules in the Post-Soviet Political Space’, Patterns of Prejudice, 36(3): 62–76. Merkl, P.H. 1997. ‘Why Are They So Strong Now? Comparative Reflections on the Revival of the Radical Right in Europe’, in P.H. Merkl and L. Weinberg (eds), The Revival of Right-Wing Extremism in the Nineties. London: Frank Cass, pp. 17–46. Michael, G. 2006. The Enemy of My Enemy – The Alarming Convergence of Militant Islam and the Extreme Right. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas. Northern Brotherhood 2007. ‘Ideological Principles of Northern Brotherhood’, 31 July 2007. Retrieved on 26 April 2008 from http://www.nordrus.info/tactics/detail. php?ID=1624&print=Y. ——. (n.d.). ‘Appeal to the Right Organisations and White Nations of the Europe’. Retrieved on 26 April 2008 from http://www.nordrus.info/tactics/detail.ph?ID= 1632&print=Y. PET (Politiets Efterretningstjeneste) [Danish Security Intelligence Service] 2006. Counterextremism. Retrieved on 9 December 2006 from http://www.pet.dk/English/ Operational_tasks/extremism.aspx?udskriv+1. Peunova, M. 2008. ‘An Eastern Incarnation of the European New Right: Aleksandr Panarin and the New Eurasionist Discourse in Contemporary Russia’, Journal of Contemporary European Studies, 16(3): 407–19. Pierce, W. 2002. ‘William Pierce: A Political History’, Southern Poverty Law Center Intelligence Report, 107. Retrieved on 25 May 2008 from http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/ article.jspid=35printable=1. ——. (n.d.). Extremism in America Series: New York: Anti Defamation League. Retrieved on 25 May 2008 from http://www.adl.org/learn/ext_us/Pierce.asp. PST (Politiets Sikkerhets Tjenester) [Norwegian Police Security Service] 2010, 2011. Annual Threat Assessment 2010, and 2011. Retrieved on 22 August 2011 from http://www.pst. politiet.no/Filer/utgiverser/trusselvurderinger%20engelsk/Unclassified%2 and http:// www.pst.politiet.no/Filer/utgivelser/trusselvurderinger%20engelsk/Unclassified_tu. Raabe, J. 2007. ‘Nazi Music Empire Expands’, Searchlight, May. Renard, T. 2008. ‘Belgium and the Netherlands Ring in the New Year under the Shadow of Terrorism’, Terrorism Focus, 5(2). SAPO (Säkerhetspolisen) [Swedish Security Service]. 2002, 2005, 2006. Annual Report. Stockholm: SAPO. Smith, A. 1995. ‘The Dark Side of Nationalism: The Revival of Nationalism in Late Twentieth-Century Europe’, in L. Cheles, R. Ferguson and M. Vaughan (eds), The Extreme Right in Western and Eastern Europe, 2nd edn. London: Longman, pp. 13–19. Southgate, T. 1999. Manifesto of the European Liberation Front. Retrieved on 17 January 2009 from http://www.rosenoire.org/articles/elf.php.

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SOVA Centre 2008. ‘The Neo-Nazi Groups threaten State and Public Officials’, SOVA Centre, Press Release, 30 April Moscow. Retrieved on 10 May 2008 from http://xenosova-center.ru/6BA2468/6BB41EE/AFFE0C7. Stack, M. 2008. ‘Russian Nationalist Advocates Eurasian Alliance Against the US’, Los Angeles Times, 4 September. Taschel, S. 2007. ‘Ban Shatters Hess Commemoration Plans’, Searchlight, October. Taylor, M. 2006. ‘Web of Hate’, The Guardian, 4 October. Retrieved on 21 July 2008 from http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2006/oct/04/news.g2/print. The Local. 2007. ‘Sweden Deports German Skinheads’, The Local: Sweden’s News in English, 9 December. Retrieved on 7 February 2009 from http://www.thelocal.se/5747/ 20061209. Thor Steinar 2007. Thor Steinar New Portal – Startseite. Retrieved on 31 July 2007 from http://www.thorsteinar.net/pages/posts/thor-steianr-chef-doch-nicht-vor-gericht11.php. van Donselaar, J. 2004. ‘The Lonsdale Problem’, Monitoring Racism and Extremism. Amsterdam: Leiden University. van Donselaar, J. and Rodrigues, P.R. (eds) 2006. Racism and Extremism Monitor: seventh report. Amsterdam: Anne Frank House and Leiden University. Ware,V. and Back, L. 2002. Out of Whiteness. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Weinberg, L. 1997. ‘Conclusions’, in P.H. Merkl and L. Weinberg (eds), The Revival of Right-Wing Extremism in the Nineties. London: Frank Cass, pp. 271–81. Whine, M. 1999. ‘Cyberspace – A New Medium for Communication, Command and Control by Extremists’, Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, 22(3): 231–45. —— 2000. ‘The Use of the Internet by Right-Wing Extremists, in B. Loader and D. Thomas (eds), Cybercrime: Law, Security And Privacy in the Information Age. London: Routledge, pp. 76–95. —— 2007. ‘Common Motifs on Jihadi and Extreme Right Websites’, in Hypermedia Seduction for Terrorist Recruiting, NATO Science for Peace and Security Series, vol. 25. Amsterdam: IOS Press, pp. 234–50. White Pride Worldwide 2001. Intelligence Report, Fall, Southern Poverty Law Center, AL, p. 24. Wolf, C. 2008. Presentation at the Global Summit on Internet Hate Speech, International Network Against Cyberhate, French Embassy, Washington, D.C., 18 November. Wroe, D. 2008. ‘Norway Sues Clothes Firm Popular with Neo-Nazis’, The Telegraph, London, 16 October. Yockey, F.P. 1948. Foreword to Imperium. Retrieved 30 December 2008 from http:// reactor-core.org/imperium.html.

INDEX

Abramowicz, M. 65–6 activism of the extreme right 327–8 Adamson, K. 71 Agir party 64 Ahmadinejad, Mahmoud 167, 197 Åkesson, Jimmy 243 Alaluf, M. 67 Albert, M. 5 Aldrich, R. 34–5 Alduy, Paul 45 Alleanza Nazionale (AN) 80, 85–9 alterity: embodied 54–6; linguistic 52 Amorim, Fernando Pacheco de 97 Anglada, Joseph 121 anti-Americanism 310, 320 anti-globalization protests 317 anti-Semitism 11, 74–5, 128–9, 151, 166, 190–201, 219, 263, 265, 274, 285, 304 Antonescu, Ion 178 Arafat,Yasser 319 Arias, Carlos 111 Arkan, Željko Ražnatović 164 Arreckx, Maurice 38–40, 44–5 Arriaga, Kaúlza de 101 Art, D. 69 al-Assad, Basher 197 asylum seekers 241–2, 326 Austria see Freiheitliche Partei Österreichs Aydın, Koray 236 Azione Sociale (AS) 7, 10, 288–300 Bahçeli, Devlet 229, 231 Baldacchino, Godfrey 279

Balibar, Étienne 5, 56 Bandera, Stepan 191 Bardèche, Maurice 285, 290–1 Barking and Dagenham 21–2, 25–8, 293 Bar-On, Tamir 4, 306 Barth, Karl 282 Bastien, Marguerite 63–4 Bataille, G. 282 Bayle, M. 36 Beam, Louis 327, 329 Belgium 62–76 Benoist, Alain de 9, 102, 296, 305, 308–11 Berlusconi, Silvio 80–1, 288–9 Betz, H.G. 176 Bihr, Alain 3 Bin Laden, Osama 195–6 Bjorgo, Tore 326 Blee, K.M. 282–4 Blocher, Christopher 212–13, 217 Bölükbaşi, Osman 230 Bosnia-Herzegovina 147–53 Bossi, Umberto 79–80, 90, 292 Bowyer, R. 159 Breivik, Anders Behring 242, 329 Brichta, A. 176 British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) 299 British National Party (BNP) 7, 10, 17–29, 288–99; emergence of 19–20; local case studies on 21–8; social basis of support 20–1 Brito, Antonio Jose de 95 Brooks, Harry 24

INDEX

Brussels 72–3 Bulgaria 162, 169 Burghardt, Devin 325 Burnley 21–5, 28, 291, 298 Caetano, Marcelo 95–6, 101, 106, 111 Çakmak, Fevzi 228 Calderoli, Roberto 294 Calvão, Alpoim 99 capital punishment 234–5 Carrero, Luis 110–11 Carter, E. 176, 186 Catholic Church 110, 279, 294–5 Ceccaldi, Marcel 263 Centro Bull, A. 78 charismatic leadership 174–80, 185–6, 255, 262, 283–4 Chechnya 166, 308 Chini, Chiara 290 Chirac, Jacques 263–6 Circulo Español de Amigos de Europa (CEDADE) 9, 116, 118, 319 Club de l’Horloge 307 Coelho, José Pinto 104–5 Collett, Mark 299 colonialism 44 Communal, René 38 community politics 20, 27 Constantinescu, Emil 180 Copenhagen Criteria for EU membership 234, 236 Copsey, Nigel 290–1 corruption 45, 80 Croatia 144–7, 151–3, 162–3 cultural differences 308; see also multiculturalism ‘cultural gradient’ concept 303, 312 cultural influence of the extreme right 11 Czech Republic 167, 170 Czechoslovakia 160–1 da Cruz Rodrigues, António 103–4 Dagenham see Barking and Dagenham Dapić, Anto 146 da Silva, Bernado Guedes 102 Davies, P. 41 Dayton Peace Accords 148–9 De Witte, H. 69 Delmonte, F. 38 Delwit, P. 66, 75–6 democracy 232–7; consociational 214, 216; liberal 308 Demol, Johan 72 Denmark 239–43, 247–50 Dewinter, Filip 69–72, 75

335

Diabo (newspaper) 100–1 Dillen, Karel 73–4 Dodik, Milorad 148–9 Dokuz Işık Doktrini 230 Dontsov, Dmytro 190 Dos Santos, Alves 72 Dragišić, Z. 165 Dugin, Aleksandr 193, 304–7, 320 Duke, David 116–17, 198, 321 Dzhemal, Geidar 306 Eanes, Ramalho 104 East Berlin 48–58 Eatwell, Roger 152, 176, 215, 296 Ecevit, Bülent 235 Emilio, Rodrigo 96 emotions, role of 282–3 English Defence League 12, 329 ETA organization 111, 114 ethnic compensation theory 18 ethnicity 318 Eurasianism 192–4, 198; see also new Eurasianism European Court of Human Rights 258 European Court of Justice 295 European Parliament (EP) 4, 256–7, 261–4, 267 European Union (EU) 4, 83–4, 104, 119, 121, 233–5, 258–9, 277, 295–6 Evans, J.A.J. 45 Evian Accords (1962) 36 Evola, Julius 290, 295, 306, 311 Falco, Hubert 44 fascism: definitions of 3, 305; survival of 285–6 Faye, Guillaume 306, 309–10 Féret, Daniel 63–5 Ferreira, Zarco Moniz 102 Fini, Gianfranco 289–90 Fiore, Roberto 290, 320 Flood, C. 33, 35 Ford, R. 21 Forest organization 66 Forza Italia 80–1, 85–9 France see Front National, French; Nouvelle Droite; Toulon Franco, Francisco 109–17 Frêche, Georges 44–5 Freiheitliche Partei Österreichs (FPÖ) 10, 254–60, 267 Frey, H. 33, 35 Froidevaux, D. 218 Front National, Belgian (FNB) 63–76

336

INDEX

Front National, French (FN) 6–7, 9–10, 28, 33–4, 38–45, 116, 128, 231, 254, 261–7, 291–2 Funar, Gheorghe 178–85 Futuro Presente (magazine) 102 Gamborino, Salvador 119 Garoufalias, Petros 127 De Gaulle, Charles 35–8 Gentile, P. 210 Gilbert, M. 78 Girón, José Antonio 111 Glistrup, Mogens 241 globalization 296, 298, 306, 309, 321, 325; see also anti-globalization protests Gollnisch, Bruno 261–5 Golovin, Evgenii 306 Goodwin, M.J. 21, 26 Gorbachev, Mikhail 192, 307 Goux, Christian 41 Grasser, Karl-Heinz 259 Greece 9, 124–37 Griffin, Nick 288–93, 298–9 Griffin, Roger 280, 285, 305 Guardia Nazionale Italiana 12 Güner, Agah Oktay 229 Güngör, Ali 231 Habermas, Jürgen 215 Hagen, Carl 241 Haider, Jörg 182, 212, 255–6, 259–60, 267, 281 Hainsworth, P. 225 Hansen, T.B. 282 Harmel, R. 175 Haupt, Herbert 259 Heinisch, R. 259 Henriques, José Luis Paulo 104 Heper, Metin 227, 237 Hess, Rudolf 324 Hitler, Adolf 191 Hobson, J.A. 285 Holocaust denial 116–17, 265, 284 Honsik, Gert 116 human rights 231–7, 308, 310 Hungary 161, 169–70 Hussein, Saddam 167 Iaramenko,Vasyl 196 Ilin,V.V. 311 immigration and immigrant issues 6, 18, 20, 23, 26–7, 50, 57–8, 65–7, 70, 83, 87–90, 118–19, 122, 128–30, 133–4, 239–50, 256, 262–4, 274–80, 296–9, 317–18 Ingram, Alan 304

Internet resources 281, 322, 327; Facebook 322; MySpace 322; social networking platforms 322 Ioannides,Yiannis 135 Irving, David 116–17 Islamophobia 6, 67–8, 75, 120, 166–7 Italy see Azione Sociale; Lega Nord Ivaldi, G. 71 Jamin, Jérôme 5 Janda, K. 176–7 Jeune Europe movement 319 Jilge, Wilfried 199 Johannisthal 51, 54, 56 Johns, R. 71 Johnson, M. 20 Journal of Contemporary Ethnography 281–2 Journal of Contemporary European Studies 1 Juan Carlos, King of Spain 112–13 Junger, Ernst 192 Karamanlis, Constantine 127 Karatzaferis, George 124–6, 129–31, 135–6 Karlsson, Bert 242 Keleş, Irfan 235–6 Khyzhniak, I. 196 Kitschelt, Herbert 18, 45, 86–7, 176, 186 Kjaersgaard, Pia 241 Klandermans, B. 278 Knudsen, Povl Riis 320 Kobach, K.W. 216 Koch, Roland 57 Komšić, J. 150 Koopmans, Ruud 218, 240 Korchyns’kyi, Dmytro 194 Köse, Ismail 235 Kosovo 150–1, 164–5, 245 Kotleba, Marian 169 Kovalenko, Aleksandr 193–4 Kravchuk, Leonid 196 Krejci, Jaroslav 321 Kreuzberg 53 Kriesi, H. 210 Kul’chyts’kyi, S. 190–1 labels, use of 2 Labour Party, British 18, 24 Lafontaine, Oscar 57 Lane, David 281 Lang, Carl 261 Lange, Anders 241 Laqueur, Walter 304 Lausanne Treaty 235–6 Lavarde, Alain 119 Le Chevallier, Cendrine 43

INDEX

Le Chevallier, Jean-Marie 38, 41–4 Lee, Martin 306 Lega Nord (LN) 2, 8, 10, 78–90, 289, 294, 297, 300; attitudes of supporters 85–9; historical evolution of 79–82; party platform 82–5 Lehmann, George 281 Lenin,V.I. 196 Lenkavs’kyi, Stepan 191 Le Pen, Jean-Marie 34, 38, 40–3, 65, 75, 198, 257, 261–7, 291–2, 296 Le Pen, Marine 264–7 Lepper, Andrzej 197–8 Linden, A. 278 Lowell, Norman 274–85 Luk’’ianenko, Levko 196, 199 Mackie, T. 175 McLaren, L. 20 Máiz, Ramón 294 Malia, Martin 303 Malta 273–86 Mamleev, Iurii 306 Mamy, Bernard 38 Mannheim, Karl 33 Mardin, Ş. 226–7 Marković, Mirjana 164 Martynets,Volodymyr 190 Massi, Ernesto 291 Maurer, Ueli 212, 217 Mediatex (company) 325 Mégret, Bruno 43, 261–2, 266–7 Meijerink, F. 174, 177 Mel’nyk, Andriy 191 Mény,Y. 216 Merkel, Angela 57 Merkl, Peter 12, 318, 321–2, 326 Miller, B.A. 28 Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi (MHP) 225–37 Milošević, Slobodan 149–50, 164 Mizhrehional’na Akademiia Upravlinnia Personalom (MAUP) 11 Mobus, Hendrik 325 Monteiro, Manuel 105 Mosley, Sir Oswald 280–1, 290–1, 319, 329 Mudde, Cas 143, 147, 151, 174, 177, 210, 213, 225 multiculturalism 73–4, 87, 90, 219, 298, 318 Múrias, Manuel Maria 101–2 Muscat, Josie 276–9, 282 music industry 325–6 Mussolini, Alessandra 288–95, 299–300 Mussolini, Benito 161, 289–90

337

National Front (NF), British 17–20, 25, 291 nationalism 3–4, 63, 68–70, 74–5, 103, 128, 143–4, 148–54, 160, 162, 177, 198, 215, 228, 232, 254, 303, 312, 318–21, 330; ‘liberal’ 307; ‘organicist’ 294 Nazi New Order 4, 73; see also neo-Nazism neo-liberalisn 241, 307 neo-Nazism 17, 116, 168, 274, 280, 284, 317–28 Neukölin 53–6 New Democracy (ND): Greek 124–7, 136–7; Swedish 242 new Eurasianism 304–12, 320 New Right thinking 305–7, 312 Niekisch, Ernst 193 Nietzsche, Friedrich 311 Nikolić, Tomislav 150, 152 Nogueira, Florentino Goulart 96 Nogueira, Jaime 102 North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) 104, 121 Northern Brotherhood 320–1 Norway 239–43, 247–50, 325, 329–30 Nouvelle Droite (ND) 9–10, 296–7, 304, 307–12 Nuremberg Trials 265 Öcalan, Abdullah 235 Ochsenberger, Walter 116 Organisation armée secrète (OAS) 36, 38 Ottoman Empire 226–7 ‘Overforeignization’ 218–20 Palestinian Liberation Organization 319 Panarin, Aleksandr 11, 304–12, 320 pan-European associations 323–4 Papadopoulos, George 128 paramilitarism 12, 159–71; definition of 159–60; linked to vigilante activities 167–70; in post-communist conflicts 163–6; prior to 1989 160–3 Partik-Pable, H. 258 Patriots of the White European Resistance (POWER) 328 Pauker, Ana 191 Pavelić, Ante 146 Pavliuk, Mykola 196 Paxton, Robert 3 Pearson, G. 23 Pedahzur, A. 176 Peron, Juan 319 Pétain, Philippe 35–6

338

INDEX

Peyrat, Jacques 44–5 Piat,Yann 38–40 Pieds-Noirs 34–8, 42–4 Pierce, William 321, 325–9 Piñar, Blas 114 Pinto, J.N. 100 Pipes, Richard 303 Plevris, Kostas 129 Poland 161 ‘political opportunity structure’ concept 239–40 Popular Orthodox Rally (LAOS), Greece 124–5, 129–37 populism 7, 78–9, 84, 88, 90, 104, 131, 209, 214–20, 249–50, 254, 256, 296 Portugal 95–107; old and new radicalism in 103–4; period of democratic consolidation 102–3; period of normalization 100–2; resurgence of the radical right 104–6 ‘positive discrimination’ 298 Poulet-Dachary, Jean-Claude 43 Powell, Enoch 18 Pridham, G. 107 Primo de Rivera, José Antonio 117 Prodi, Romano 82 Psomiades, Panayiotis 135 Putin,Vladimir 320 racial hierarchy 70–1 Racial Volunteer Force 329 racism 5–6, 50, 65, 119, 219, 235, 240, 274–5, 296–7, 308, 326; culturization of 58 Rea, A. 65, 67 Reagan, Ronald 102 refugees 245–6 religious freedom 243–5 Remer, Ernst Otto 319–20 Rhodes, J. 23, 293 Riess-Passer, Susanne 259 Roberto, José Luis 119 Rockwell, George Lincoln 320 Rodrigues, P.R. 328 Roma population 167–70, 293 Romania 162, 173–86 Rose, R. 175 Rosenberg, Alfred 191 Royal, Ségolène 266 Rozakis, Christos 130 Rua (newspaper) 100–1 rule of law 231–4, 237 Russia 165–8, 303–12, 320, 323; see also Soviet Union Rüttgers, Jürgen 57

Sadaune, Alain 65 Salazar, Antonio de Oliveira 95, 104 Sanches Osório, José 98–9 Sarkozy, Nicolas 264, 266 Schain, Martin 263–4, 292 Scheepers, P. 69 Schengen agreements 323 Schmid, Samuel 212 Schüssel, Wolfgang 258–9 Sentandreu, Juan Garcia 121 Serbia 144, 149–54, 162–5 Šešelj,Vojislav 150, 152 Shcherbatiuk, Anatolii 195, 197 Shchokin, Heorhii 195–7 Shenfield, Stephen 304–5 Shkil, Andrii 193, 199 Shukhevych, Iurii 194, 199–200 Shukhevych, Roman 191 Sichrovsky, P. 257 skinheads 168, 324–6 Skorzeny, Otto 319 Slovakia 161, 169 Smith, Anthony 318 Smith, S. 25 Soares, Mario 97–8 social Darwinism 58 Sofianopoulos, Sotiris 129 Sokol organization 160–1 Soviet Union 318–19; see also Russia Spain 109–22 Spinola, Antonio de 96–9 Sprinzak, Ehud 326–7 Stalin, Joseph 196 Stalinism 192, 196, 198 Statham, P. 218 Steger, Norbert 255 Steinlauf, Michael 192 Stets’ko, Iaroslav 191 Stolcke,Verena 6 Strache, Heinz-Christian 260 Suárez, Adolfo 113 Surel,Y. 216 Sweden 239–50, 324–7 Switzerland 209–21 Swyngedouw, M. 71 Tabără,Valeriu 180, 183 Tadić, Tonči 146 Taguieff, Pierre-André 306 Tarasiuk, Boris 196, 200 Tarrow, S. 239 Taylor, M. 12 terrorism 326–9 Thadden, Adolf von 319 Thatcher, Margaret 102, 291

INDEX

Thiriart, Jean 319–20 Tiahnybok, Oleh 201 Tomás, Francisco J. 121 Toulon 33–46 Trémolet de Villers, Jacques 42 Trucy, François 38–41, 44–5 Tudman, Franjo (and Tudmanism) 144–6 Tudor,Vadim 178–83 Türkeş, Alparslan 228–9 Turkey see Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi Tymoshenko,Yulia 196, 199

Wachtmeister, Ian 242 Waldheim, Kurt 255–6, 266 Weber, Max 283 Weinberg, Leonard 317–18 Westenhaler, Peter 259 Widfeldt, Anders 240 Widmer-Schlumpf, Eveline 212 Wiesenthal, Simon 194 Willen, Helmut 326 Wittfogel, Karl 303 Wolf, Chris 322–3 Wretstrom, Daniel 324

Ukraine 2, 166, 189–201 Valkeniers, Bruno 73 van Biezen, I. 174, 183 van Donselaar, J. 328 van Gogh, Theo 328 Varela, Pedro 116–17 Vienna 260 vigilante activities 12, 167–70 violence of the extreme right 328 Virchow, F. 278, 284 Vitovich, Oleh 194 Vitrenko, Natalya 194 Vlams Belang (VB) 8, 28, 63–4, 69–76 Voigt, Udo 320 Vorides, Makis 128–9

xenophobia 6, 10, 65, 89, 118–21, 137, 147–51, 154, 170–1, 177, 198, 239–40, 243, 248, 285, 298–9, 326 Yanukovych,Viktor 200 Yeltsin, Boris 165, 307–8 Yiannakou, Marieta 135 Yockey, Francis Parker 290, 319 YouTube 322 Yugoslav state 162–3 Yushchenko,Viktor 196–200 Zionism 192, 195–8 Žirinovskij,Vladimir 164–7, 193–4

339