tag:theconversation.com,2011:/africa/topics/far-right-politics-21933/articlesFar-right politics – The Conversation2023-12-22T09:46:07Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2202432023-12-22T09:46:07Z2023-12-22T09:46:07ZAs France moves to limit the rights of migrants, research reveals just how reliant on them it is<p>Once again, France finds itself in the grip of a political crisis. After the pension reform of June, which prompted more than <a href="https://theconversation.com/pension-reform-in-france-macron-and-demonstrators-resume-epic-tussle-begun-over-30-years-ago-198354">1 million people to take to the streets</a>, president Emmanuel Macron’s framework immigration bill passed on Tuesday December 19. It will now be sent to be reviewed by the <a href="https://www.aa.com.tr/en/europe/french-president-to-send-disputed-immigration-law-to-constitutional-council-for-review-validation/3088157">Constitutional Council</a>, a body tasked with verifying legislation’s compatibility with the country’s constitution, in a move that could see some of its measures cancelled.</p>
<p>Voted through the national assembly with the support of the far-right and conservatives, the <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/french-immigration-bill-tightens-welfare-benefits-foreigners-2023-12-20/">legislation tightens the screws on the rights of foreigners and of French citizens of migrant descent</a> across an unprecedented number of areas. Among the most emblematic measures features the end of the sacrosanct principle of <em>Jus soli</em>, whereby any child born on French soil is granted French nationality regardless of their parents’ origins. Instead, the child will now be able to benefit from citizenship rights until their 18th birthday, upon which they will need to officially demonstrate their will to become French. Welfare benefits also now depend on a five-year stay in the country, while undocumented migrants stand to lose free transport and automatic residency permits when working in low-wage, understaffed sectors. According to the <a href="https://www.francetvinfo.fr/societe/immigration/projet-de-loi-immigration-ce-que-contient-le-texte-negocie-entre-la-majorite-presidentielle-et-la-droite-largement-durci-par-rapport-a-la-version-initiale_6251754.html">latest text</a>, local prefects would have discretion as to whether or not to grant the permits. </p>
<p>The latter move comes three years after the COVID pandemic revealed the importance of immigrant workers in <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/social/main.jsp?langId=en&catId=89&furtherNews=yes&newsId=9630">“critical sectors”</a>, including health, transport and agriculture.</p>
<p>In the wake of the bill, our latest research helps us reflect on the reasons behind the numbers of immigrants in such sectors. According to a study by the (<a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/cepii-2912">CEPII</a>), a research centre focused on the world economy, immigrant workers in France feature heavily among cleaners and home helps, but also hospital doctors.</p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/dossier-limmigration-en-france-quels-enjeux-218289">Dossier : l’immigration en France, quels enjeux ?</a>
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<p>But France is hardly an exception. A year before the start of the COVID crisis, foreign-born workers, and in particular non-EU immigrants, were proportionally <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/00197939231173676">more likely to work in critical sectors</a> than native-born workers in most EU countries.</p>
<h2>France is no exception</h2>
<p>Our research began by comparing the probability of native and immigrant workers being employed in essential sectors, taking into account a number of characteristics such as age, gender, professional experience, education levels and marital status. Can these factors explain the differences observed?</p>
<p>Our results show that, for an equivalent profile, the disparities between immigrants and native-born people are still largely visible. In almost two-thirds of EU countries, the probability of working in essential sectors is higher for immigrants than for natives. This is particularly true of Italy, the United Kingdom (included in our study along with Switzerland and Norway) and the Nordic countries. This probability is 5% higher for an immigrant worker in France, and rises to 12% in Sweden. The exception is Luxembourg, where the difference is negative.</p>
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<p>When we look at low-skilled jobs in key sectors (<a href="https://www.oecd.org/coronavirus/policy-responses/Covid-19-and-key-workers-what-role-do-migrants-play-in-your-region-42847cb9/">as defined by the OECD</a>), the <a href="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/GxqmA/1/">gap is even more marked</a>. Immigrants, for example, are over-represented in the cleaning sector in three quarters of the countries surveyed. In other key sectors such as transport or health, the difference is less marked, but immigrants remain over-represented in half the countries surveyed, particularly in the UK, Denmark, Germany, Italy and Sweden.</p>
<p>If individual characteristics are not enough to explain this over-representation, then what are the reasons that lead immigrants to hold low-skilled jobs in key sectors? One plausible explanation lies in the structural disadvantage of immigrants on the labour market due to the institutional, linguistic, legal or discriminatory obstacles they may encounter.</p>
<h2>Those who emigrated as adults</h2>
<p>Our study thus analyses the way in which the over-representation of foreign-born workers evolves as a function of characteristics specific to immigrants and likely to influence their economic integration.</p>
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<p>On the one hand, <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0927537122000719">the age at which foreign-born workers emigrated</a> is largely correlated with their employment rate. Immigrants who emigrate at a younger age to their host country benefit for the most part from a comparative advantage in learning the language of the host country and a <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0014292119300200">cultural and educational background better suited</a> to their integration into the labour market.</p>
<p>With the exception of Denmark, Sweden, and the United Kingdom, our results indicate that the over-representation of immigrants in essential sectors thus exclusively affects immigrants who emigrated to their host country after the age of 15.</p>
<h2>Place of birth and place of graduation</h2>
<p>We also know that education and professional experience acquired abroad remain <a href="https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/209957">less valued than those obtained in the host country</a>. Immigrants trained abroad are therefore <a href="https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/1293de83-en/index.html?itemId=/content/component/1293de83-en">more likely</a> to find themselves unemployed or in jobs for which they are overqualified than immigrants with qualifications obtained in their host country.</p>
<p>For an equivalent profile, there is no difference between foreign-born workers with qualifications obtained in Belgium, France, Spain, Austria and Switzerland compared with workers born in these countries, unlike their counterparts with foreign qualifications. The latter are much more likely to work in essential sectors.</p>
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<p>Finally, in the EU, immigrants from other EU member countries occupy jobs on the labour market that are fairly similar to those of natives for the same profile, while the employment prospects of non-EU immigrants appear to be <a href="https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/jep.35.2.49">significantly lower</a>. This is due in particular to the <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2214658X1630006X">racial and ethnic discrimination</a> they suffer.</p>
<p>Place of birth seems to matter as much as place of graduation: the probability of an immigrant born in an EU country working in a key sector is identical to that of a native of Belgium, Spain, Ireland and Norway. In the UK, Sweden, Denmark and Germany, it is higher but still significantly lower than that of non-EU immigrants.</p>
<h2>Where does the bill stand in all this?</h2>
<p>Additional analyses support the hypothesis that the over-representation of immigrants in key sectors is due to their less favourable position on the labour market.</p>
<p>This over-representation is more likely to be observed in countries where the core sectors are distinguished from the rest of the national economy by a greater demand for labour, a significant number of part-time employees, active job-seeking, a high degree of over-qualification and low professional status. The proportion of employees earning less than the median of the income distribution is particularly high.</p>
<p>Given the pitfalls we have identified, which penalise both the host countries, which deprive themselves of the real skills of the immigrants present on their territory, and the immigrant workers themselves, the regularisation of illegal foreign workers envisaged in the first draft of the government’s bill would have had little chance of changing the situation.</p>
<p>Conversely, opening up the status of civil servant to non-Europeans – as proposed by the <a href="https://www.sens-du-service-public.fr/communiques">civil servants’ collective Le Sens du service public</a> – could, for example, improve the professional mobility of non-EU workers and their integration into the labour market, with economic benefits for all concerned.</p>
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<p><em><a href="https://nikolajbroberg.org/">Nikolaj Broberg</a>, economist and analyst in the OECD’s Education and Skills Directorate, co-authored this article.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/220243/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jérôme Gonnot ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>In the wake of France’s controversial immigration bill, one scholar compares France’s reliability on immigrant workers in key sectors against the rest of Europe.Jérôme Gonnot, Maître de conférences en économie à l’Université catholique de Lille-Espol, Institut catholique de Lille (ICL)Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2177572023-11-20T12:19:36Z2023-11-20T12:19:36ZArmistice Day counter-protests: how government rhetoric and police failings could be linked to far-right violence<p>On Armistice Day 2023, a pro-Palestine march was held in London for the fifth time since the beginning of the Israel-Palestine war. As well as demonstrators looking to join the protest, around 2,000 far-right activists and football hooligans descended on London too. Their goal, as members of the UK far right put it, was to “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/nov/11/suella-braverman-accused-of-fuelling-far-right-violence-near-cenotaph#:%7E:text=Robinson%2C%20the%20English%20Defence%20League,route%20avoided%20the%20Whitehall%20area.">defend”</a>“ the <a href="https://theconversation.com/palestine-march-some-opponents-are-politicising-the-cenotaph-to-sow-divisions-and-it-could-work-217462">Cenotaph</a> from the pro-Palestine marchers. </p>
<p>Among their number were the former leader of the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/nov/12/tommy-robinson-israel-hamas-war-could-mark-return-of-far-right-figure">English Defence League</a>, Tommy Robinson, along with members of both <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/far-right-violence-police-protest-armistice-b2445467.html">Turning Point UK</a> (the British offshoot of the eponymous US organisation, that aims to promote right-wing politics in UK education) and the <a href="https://hopenothate.org.uk/2023/11/10/revealed-its-war-the-violent-messages-from-far-right-groups-set-to-descend-on-london-this-weekend/">British Movement</a> group. </p>
<p>Groups of fans from Chelsea, West Ham and other football clubs joined too. These counter-protesters rallied at Victoria, Westminster and Embankment stations before the march set off. </p>
<p><a href="https://metro.co.uk/2023/11/11/nine-police-officers-injured-cenotaph-clashes-far-right-mobs-19810072/">Violence</a> broke out when the counter-protesters transgressed a cordon around the Cenotaph. They scuffled with police in Chinatown and were rebuffed at Westminster and Vauxhall bridges, where they tried to clash with pro-Palestinian protesters. Nine police officers were injured and 92 were detained. </p>
<p>This came after the former home secretary Suella Braverman published a <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/pro-palestine-protest-london-met-police-cbqnxbtv3">comment article</a> on November 8 2023 in the Times in which she characterised the repeated pro-Palestine protests as "problematic” events, mobilising “tens of thousands of angry demonstrators”. </p>
<p>She wrote: “Now as we approach a particularly significant weekend in the life of our nation, one which calls for respect and commemoration, the hate marchers —- a phrase I do not resile from —- intend to use Armistice Day to parade through London in yet another show of strength.”</p>
<p>Many far-right protest events result in relatively little, or only low level, physical violence. My <a href="https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/mono/10.4324/9781315143774/anti-islamic-protest-uk-william-allchorn">research</a> into policing, policy and the far right shows that while violence isn’t inevitable, outbreaks of violence are usually the result of poor choreography and planning on the part of authorities.</p>
<h2>Choreography of protests and counter-protests</h2>
<p>Sociology talks about “<a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/26330024221085981">situational dynamics”</a>“. This, sociologist Anne Nassauer explains, refers to "interactions, interpretations, and emotions” of the people taking part, from the moment the situation (here, the protest) begins, to the outcome (here, the violence). </p>
<p>Recent research also shows that <a href="https://crestresearch.ac.uk/resources/reciprocal-radicalisation/">reciprocal radicalisation</a> between activists and any relevant counter-movements can escalate. This can lead to tit-for-tat confrontations and violence.</p>
<p>On November 11, a group of counter-protesters discovered a route through a police line around the Cenotaph. Suddenly they vastly outnumbered the ten police officers. </p>
<p>This is what Nassauer <a href="https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Situational_Breakdowns/YAuXDwAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&printsec=frontcover">describes</a> as a “situational breakdown”. The activists found themselves able to change the dynamic of power, resulting in what political scientist Sabine C. Carey <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/4148070">describes</a> as an “oppositional dynamic” developing between the counter-protesters and the police. This opposition then <a href="https://www.law.uh.edu/blakely/advocacy-survey/Conflict%20Escalation%20Glasl.pdf">hardened</a> throughout the day. </p>
<p>Beyond what happened on the day itself, the prospect of such a violent escalation was also shaped by what was said before, within far-right spaces or by politicians seeking to politicise Remembrance Day and sow divisions.</p>
<h2>Divisive rhetoric and violence</h2>
<p>Braverman’s comments had <a href="https://hopenothate.org.uk/2023/11/10/revealed-its-war-the-violent-messages-from-far-right-groups-set-to-descend-on-london-this-weekend/">ratcheted up</a> the <a href="https://hopenothate.org.uk/2023/11/10/revealed-its-war-the-violent-messages-from-far-right-groups-set-to-descend-on-london-this-weekend/">rhetoric</a> being voiced in far-right online forums that weak politicians and police would not sufficiently defend national monuments.</p>
<p>Robinson, meanwhile, posted a video on X (formerly Twitter), <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/nov/08/far-right-groups-call-on-supporters-to-oppose-pro-palestine-march-on-armistice-day">urging</a> his followers to show support for the armed forces by turning up at the Cenotaph. He insisted the goal was “to show that British people aren’t happy”.</p>
<p>Braverman’s comments and Robinson’s interventions are likely, in my view, to have added to the momentum needed for violence to erupt on the streets on November 11 2023.</p>
<p>There is also a more holistic way to view the events that unfolded. Sociologists and political scientists see violence escalation as an outcome of interactions across multiple <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1023/B:RYSO.0000038611.01350.30">relational fields</a>. </p>
<p>That is, first, among activists themselves. And then between activists and a host of counterparts, including counter-movements, security forces, political and cultural elites and the general public. </p>
<p>The fact that some parallel interests were perceived between the counter-protesters and vocal politicians had an important bearing on the violence that ensued. It led to what can be termed an “<a href="https://crestresearch.ac.uk/projects/anti-minority-activism-violent-domestic-extremism/">emboldened pathway</a>”: far-right activists become and remain more violence-oriented when the media and highly visible political figures appear to validate their cause. </p>
<p>This is due, in part, to the far-right activists’ belief that they enjoy the support of both key political allies and those parts of the public about which they are concerned. We can see this in the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/nov/08/far-right-groups-call-on-supporters-to-oppose-pro-palestine-march-on-armistice-day">online support</a> the counter-protesters received from football hooligans. </p>
<p>Those charged with maintaining public order did not plan adequately. This poor choreography meant that law enforcement was not able to counter the activists’ violent intent. </p>
<p>There will likely be more counter-demonstrations if more pro-Palestine demonstrations go ahead. Those in power should take note of how divisive rhetoric can incite violent responses.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/217757/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>William Allchorn does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Suella Braverman’s comments and Tommy Robinson’s interventions added the momentum needed for violence to be meted out by far-right counter-protesters on London streets on Armistice Day.William Allchorn, Honorary Visiting Senior Fellow, Policing Institute for the Eastern Region, Anglia Ruskin UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2156012023-10-25T19:10:24Z2023-10-25T19:10:24ZLegal in one state, a crime in another: laws banning hate symbols are a mixed bag<p>Queensland has now joined several other states in <a href="https://statements.qld.gov.au/statements/95214">outlawing extremist hate symbols</a>. </p>
<p>Far-right and neo-Nazi groups pose a significant ongoing threat to national security, in <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-05-24/concerns-of-rise-in-right-wing-extremist-groups-in-australia/102388498">Australia</a> and <a href="https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/understanding-global-right-wing-extremism">globally</a>. It is crucial to counter their hateful ideology, which has no place in Australian society.</p>
<p>However, banning specific symbols and gestures is a tricky thing to do. </p>
<p>So with each state going its own way, how are these laws working together? And importantly, how will we know if they’re effective?</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/would-a-law-banning-the-nazi-salute-be-effective-or-enforceable-198143">Would a law banning the Nazi salute be effective – or enforceable?</a>
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<h2>What are the laws across the country?</h2>
<p>Over the last 16 months, Victoria, NSW and Tasmania have enacted laws banning the public display of Nazi symbols and salutes. Victoria was the first; it chose initially to <a href="https://www.premier.vic.gov.au/nazi-hate-symbols-now-banned-victoria">ban only the Nazi Swastika </a>. </p>
<p>Last week, it expanded this to include <a href="https://www.legislation.vic.gov.au/bills/summary-offences-amendment-nazi-salute-prohibition-bill-2023">any symbols used by the Nazi party</a>, including paramilitary arms like the SS.</p>
<p><a href="https://dcj.nsw.gov.au/news-and-media/media-releases-archive/2022/public-display-of-nazi-symbols-banned-in-nsw-1.html">New South Wales</a> and
<a href="https://www.premier.tas.gov.au/site_resources_2015/additional_releases/nazi-symbols-and-salutes-now-prohibited-in-tasmania">Tasmania</a> ban “Nazi symbols”, which is likely broader than the Victorian law. The courts will have a bigger say in whether something qualifies as one. </p>
<p>This should be simple enough for the most recognisable, such as the Swastika or Schutzstaffel (SS), but the question will be trickier if the law is enforced more broadly.</p>
<p>For example, neo-Nazi groups often use numbers like 14 (to indicate a 14-word white supremacist slogan) or 88 for “Heil Hitler” (because H is the 8th letter of the alphabet). The Anti-Defamation League maintains a large <a href="https://www.adl.org/resources/hate-symbols/search">database</a> of these sorts of hate symbols. </p>
<p>It is unclear which could provide the basis for a charge under NSW and Tasmanian law.</p>
<p>In Tasmania, the same <a href="https://www.parliament.tas.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0033/68766/2_of_2023.pdf">law bans Nazi gestures</a>. That was the first Australian law to criminalise the Sieg Heil salute, followed by <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-10-21/victoria-police-nazi-salute-offence-new-laws/103005966">Victoria</a>. </p>
<p>Neo-Nazi groups use the salute in public places to intimidate, <a href="https://theconversation.com/would-a-law-banning-the-nazi-salute-be-effective-or-enforceable-198143">spread fear</a>, raise their profile and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/apr/27/australia-nationwide-ban-nazi-salute-insignia-would-help-prevent-far-right-radicalisation-asio-intelligence-agency-says">recruit new members</a>. </p>
<p>These laws all target public displays of Nazi ideology. This would include, for example, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/jan/19/police-seize-neo-nazi-paraphernalia-raids-south-east-queensland">hanging a Nazi flag from a bridge</a>, or waving Swastika signs at a neo-Nazi rally, but not <a href="https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/queensland/this-can-t-stand-hateful-neo-nazi-messages-left-in-brisbane-letterboxes-20230110-p5cbho.html">letterbox drops</a> or possessing Nazi paraphernalia at home.</p>
<p>All the laws include exemptions where symbols are displayed for legitimate <a href="https://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/amid-australian-ban-on-nazi-symbols-asian-faith-groups-seek-to-reclaim-the-swastika-from-its-nazi-association/kiq813hhl">religious</a>, artistic, legal, historical, or educational purposes.</p>
<p>The federal government has also put forward its own <a href="https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Bills_Legislation/Bills_Search_Results/Result?bId=r7048">national ban laws</a>, but those are yet to pass parliament.</p>
<h2>How do Queensland’s laws compare?</h2>
<p>In two key ways, Queensland’s laws take a broader approach.</p>
<p>First, the <a href="https://documents.parliament.qld.gov.au/tp/2023/5723T390-BC17.pdf">laws do not list any prohibited symbols</a>. In fact, they do not mention anything about the Nazi party or its symbols. Instead, a list will be made and updated in regulations.</p>
<p>This will, in theory, allow the Queensland government to <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-10-12/qld-hate-symbols-laws-explainer/102965556">adapt to new hate symbols</a> as the need arises. But it’s unusual to give the executive so much power in determining the scope of a crime.</p>
<p>No one knows, at this point, what the laws will actually ban. It is a crucial aspect of the <a href="https://www.ruleoflaw.org.au/what-is-the-rule-of-law/">rule of law</a> that laws state clearly when conduct is a crime. </p>
<p>To ban a symbol or gesture, the Attorney-General must first consult with the chair of the Crime and Corruption Commission and the Human Rights and police commissioners. </p>
<p>She can recommend a symbol be listed if she is satisfied that it is <a href="https://documents.parliament.qld.gov.au/tp/2023/5723T390-BC17.pdf">“widely known”</a> to represent an ideology of “extreme prejudice”. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/does-australia-need-new-laws-to-combat-right-wing-extremism-196219">Does Australia need new laws to combat right-wing extremism?</a>
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<p>Given the <a href="https://www.adl.org/resources/hate-symbols/search">large numbers of hate symbols</a> used by extremist groups, with varying degrees of public knowledge about them, seeking clear advice on this question could prove difficult. </p>
<p>Second, Queensland’s approach is not limited to public displays. It includes publishing and public distribution. The main question is whether a member of the public might reasonably feel menaced, harassed or offended. </p>
<p>This will give law enforcement tools to address a wider range of behaviours, such as handing out neo-Nazi flyers in public, but it raises some difficult questions. </p>
<p>It is not clear, for example, whether publication would include posting on social media, or whether public distribution would include <a href="https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/queensland/this-can-t-stand-hateful-neo-nazi-messages-left-in-brisbane-letterboxes-20230110-p5cbho.html">letterbox drops</a>, as the content cannot be seen from a public place.</p>
<p>Whether members of the community might feel menaced, harassed or offended will be clear where a group uses recognisable Nazi symbols, hate speech and physical intimidation in public spaces. But it will be a trickier question elsewhere. </p>
<p>For example, a lot of far-right content online is more subtle, spreading effectively through <a href="https://gnet-research.org/2023/07/28/schrodingers-joke-the-weaponisation-of-irony-and-humour-in-the-alt-right/">memes and humour</a>.</p>
<h2>How consistent are the laws?</h2>
<p>Victoria, Tasmania and NSW’s laws are broadly consistent, with Queensland as a clear outlier. </p>
<p>However, there are key differences.</p>
<p>For example, it will now be an offence to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/mar/16/queensland-to-ban-nazi-swastika-tattoos-as-part-of-crackdown-on-hate-symbols">display a Nazi tattoo</a> in Queensland and NSW, but not in <a href="http://classic.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/vic/consol_act/soa1966189/s41k.html">Victoria</a> and <a href="https://www.parliament.tas.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0033/68766/2_of_2023.pdf">Tasmania</a>.</p>
<p>The penalties also vary significantly, ranging from three months imprisonment in Tasmania (or six months for a repeat offence in a short time), to six months in Queensland, to 12 months in NSW and Victoria.</p>
<p>These inconsistencies are not necessarily a bad thing. </p>
<p>One of the benefits of a federal system is that states can create different laws and later fall in line if best practice emerges. </p>
<p>But it does suggest a degree of experimentation, with no consensus on the most effective approach.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/far-right-groups-have-used-covid-to-expand-their-footprint-in-australia-here-are-the-ones-you-need-to-know-about-151203">Far-right groups have used COVID to expand their footprint in Australia. Here are the ones you need to know about</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>How will we know if the laws are effective?</h2>
<p>In any state, neo-Nazi groups may simply <a href="https://theconversation.com/would-a-law-banning-the-nazi-salute-be-effective-or-enforceable-198143">avoid prosecution</a> under these laws by adapting the symbols, slogans and gestures they use.</p>
<p>For example, they already use the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/oct/03/ok-sign-gesture-emoji-rightwing-alt-right">“OK” hand symbol to indicate white power</a>. It would be difficult, even under Queensland’s approach, to ban this otherwise mundane gesture.</p>
<p>However, if the groups are prevented from using their most recognisable and intimidating symbols, it will rob them of key recruitment tools and reduce their ability to spread fear and hatred.</p>
<p>A group of white supremacists using the OK hand symbol and signs saying 14 and 88 is still intimidating, but less so than the same group using the Swastika and Sieg Heil salute.</p>
<p>In addition, the laws will allow police to disrupt and arrest those who pose a threat to our communities. This will need to be done in a way that does not escalate tensions at a public rally or protest.</p>
<p>In any case, the criminal law serves a moral purpose as well as a practical one. These developing laws send a clear signal that Nazi ideology has no place in Australian society.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/215601/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Keiran Hardy does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Queensland is the latest state bring in laws banning neo-Nazi and far-right symbols, but no one knows yet precisely what will be banned. Here’s how the laws differ across the country.Keiran Hardy, Senior Lecturer, Griffith Criminology Institute, Griffith UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2147022023-10-04T17:06:30Z2023-10-04T17:06:30ZFar-right poised to score big at next European elections<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/551289/original/file-20230929-17-y6jzfd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=11%2C47%2C3982%2C2616&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Far-right are fast taking root in France, Italy, Portugal, Austria, Belgium, Spain and Finland.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/fr/image-photo/rome-italy-october-23-2022-giorgia-2228022383">Alessia Pierdomenico/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>A little over a year since leader of <a href="https://theconversation.com/giorgia-melonis-win-in-italy-proves-even-a-seemingly-successful-government-can-fall-victim-to-populism-191278">Fratelli d'Italia Georgia Meloni rose to power in Italy</a>, the latest data spells out a clear message: she is not the only ultraright politician surfing on voters’ anxieties. In fact, we may be entering a <a href="https://www.economist.com/leaders/2023/09/14/a-fresh-wave-of-hard-right-populism-is-stalking-europe?utm_medium=cpc.adword.pd&utm_source=google&ppccampaignID=18151738051&ppcadID=&utm_campaign=a.22brand_pmax&utm_content=conversion.direct-response.anonymous&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIr679_tfXgQMVhejVCh1hOAI0EAAYASAAEgLeIfD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds">new cycle of far-right extremism across the continent</a>, with heavy stakes for the next European elections in June 2024.</p>
<h2>A far right moment</h2>
<p>Recent results are eloquent. Last year, in France, Marine Le Pen won an all-time record-high 41.5% of the vote in the second round of the presidential election. In Hungary, <a href="https://theconversation.com/viktor-orban-hungarys-controversial-authoritarian-prime-minister-secures-yet-another-term-in-national-election-180466">Fidesz </a> took 54% of the vote in the parliamentary elections, landing Viktor Orbán a fourth consecutive term. In <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/sweden-government-far-right-alliance-ulf-kristersson-euroskeptic-migration-climate-eu/">Sweden</a>, Jimmie Åkesson’s anti-immigrant Sweden Democrats came second with 20.5% of the vote, emerging as new allies for Kristersson’s Moderates.</p>
<p>Elsewhere in Europe, far-right parties are setting roots in countries like <a href="https://www.euractiv.com/section/politics/news/portugals-third-political-force-among-prominent-hate-organisations/?_ga=2.135169649.1768408080.1696262250-1974928266.1696262249">Portugal</a>, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jul/21/how-spains-conservatives-joined-forces-with-far-right-vox">Spain</a> and <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2023/06/16/finland-to-get-right-wing-government-with-far-right_6032446_4.html">Finland</a>, winning substantial support and entering government at local or national level.</p>
<p>They currently top the polls in <a href="https://www.euronews.com/2023/05/08/polls-suggest-austrias-populist-freedom-party-is-on-course-to-lead-the-country">Austria</a> and <a href="https://www.belganewsagency.eu/elections-2024-the-rise-of-the-far-right-in-belgium">Belgium</a>. </p>
<p>In Eastern and central Europe, the far right is on the rise in Estonia, Croatia, Romania and Bulgaria. Notwithstanding <a href="https://www.euronews.com/2023/10/01/polands-opposition-supporters-mass-in-warsaw-two-weeks-before-election">opposition parties’ historical, one-million-strong demonstration in Warsaw</a>, the radicalized conservatives of the PiS are still on track to win the next legislative elections in Poland, with 38% of voting intentions, flanked by the <a href="https://ecfr.eu/article/hanging-in-the-balance-how-the-polish-far-right-could-swing-the-next-election/">Confederation</a>, a heterogeneous extremist group which could win up to 11% of the vote. In Slovakia, the ultra-nationalists of the <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/slovaks-choose-between-pro-russian-ex-pm-fico-pro-western-liberals-2023-09-29/">Slovak National Party</a> (SNS) have entered the country’s national council, and they may form a coalition with Robert Fico’s populist and pro-Russian SMER party.</p>
<h2>Multiple layers of resentment</h2>
<p>Instead of weakening the far right, the war in Ukraine has created new political opportunities for these parties. Their nationalist and anti-establishment rhetoric resonates with growing political discontent among citizens, along with popular demand for authoritative and strong leadership.</p>
<p>According to the region, ultraright politicians have taken a variety of stances toward Russia. Parties such as Marine Le Pen’s Rassemblement National (RN) in France, Chega in Portugal, and the Dutch PVV have shifted their positions on Putin’s regime, rapidly condemning Russia’s invasion.</p>
<p>Nowadays the far right is riding the economic anxieties of working and middle-class voters affected the most by the economic fallout of the war. Many of these parties, like the French RN, the Italian Lega, the Flemish Vlaams Belang, Chega in Portugal and the Czech SPD, have criticized the <a href="https://www.populismstudies.org/ecps-report-the-impact-of-the-russia-ukraine-war-on-right-wing-populism-in-europe/">sanctions</a> imposed on Russia as primarily hurting their country’s ‘people’, while calling for more social protection and welfare.</p>
<p>Of course, the post-Covid-19 pandemic period is particularly ripe for populist gains: many of these parties, such as Austria’s <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/austria-schallenberg-far-right-anti-vaxxers/">FPÖ</a>, the Polish Confederation, and the <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/02/12/germany-vaccines-soviets-afd/">AfD</a> in Germany, fiercely opposed health measures, and have been silently <a href="https://revistaidees.cat/en/losers-in-the-crisis-europes-radical-right-wing-in-the-covid-19-pandemic/">capitalizing on public discontent</a> during the health crisis.</p>
<p>Finally, the surge in support for the far right bears witness to the persistence of cultural and identity-based concerns related to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/27/world/europe/germany-immigration-control.html">immigration</a>, Islam and multiculturalism. Such issues continue to deeply divide European electorates, as illustrated by current immigration debates in France, Germany, Italy, Austria and the UK. Meanwhile, the Italian island of <a href="https://worldcrunch.com/migrant-lives-1/lampedusa-far-right-meloni-le-pen">Lampedusa</a> is once again making the headlines, fuelling fears of new waves of immigration.</p>
<p>The European elections of June 2024 are likely to see the far right entrench itself more deeply into the political landscape. <a href="https://www.politico.eu/europe-poll-of-polls/">National voting intention polls suggest</a> that far right parties could clinch up to 180 seats in the European Parliament, compared with just about 130 in the current legislature (see Table).</p>
<h2>Voting intentions and seat projections for far-right parties in Europe</h2>
<p>The Fratelli d'Italia, RN in France, Germany’s AfD and Spain’s Vox should emerge as the big winners, with 27, 25, 18 and 9 seats, respectively. Marine Le Pen has already begun a diplomatic blitz to rally her <a href="https://www.euractiv.com/section/politics/news/le-pen-praises-salvinis-previous-anti-migration-efforts-tackling-meloni/">European far-right allies</a>, and recently launched an offensive against Giorgia Meloni, her main rival for far-right leadership in Europe.</p>
<p>Two former heavyweights, Poland’s PiS and Matteo Salvini’s Lega in Italy, are on the other hand likely to suffer losses in the June 2024 ballot, with an anticipated 22 (-5) and 7 (-18) seats, respectively. In Hungary, Viktor Orbán is set to secure about his 2019 level of support, but is still isolated within the European far right.</p>
<p>Finally, new far-right parties are set to enter the European Parliament: the Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR), Chega in Portugal, the Slovak National Party, the Danish Democrats, possibly also Éric Zemmour’s <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/en/politics/article/2023/09/07/marion-marechal-to-lead-eric-zemmour-s-party-in-european-elections_6127815_5.html">Reconquête</a> in France.</p>
<h2>Cutting cordon sanitaires</h2>
<p>While essentially reflecting national political dynamics, the current wave of the far right reveals similar trends across Europe, most evidently the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jun/30/far-right-on-the-march-europe-growing-taste-for-control-and-order">mainstreaming of such parties</a>.</p>
<p>In many countries, far-right parties have achieved a strategic equilibrium between government <a href="https://esprit.presse.fr/article/gilles-ivaldi/l-extreme-droite-au-centre-44261">credibility and radical politics</a>. They have toned down their extremism to broaden their electoral appeal and rise to power, most notably by softening their Euroscepticism and by distancing themselves from <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/vladimir-putin-giorgia-meloni-relationship-russia-italy-not-friends/">Putin’s </a> Russia. Meanwhile, these parties have maintained their <a href="https://www.cairn.info/revue-materiaux-pour-l-histoire-de-notre-temps-2021-1-page-16.htm">typical nationalist and authoritarian ideology, combined with anti-establishment populism</a>, which allows them to continue to thrive on voter resentment and anger.</p>
<p>Such <a href="https://www.gisreportsonline.com/r/europe-conservative-wave/">a move toward the centre ground of European politics</a> has facilitated political cooperation with parties of the mainstream right in countries like Italy, Finland, Sweden, and Spain. Soon Austria may be added to the list, and possibly Belgium where the growing popularity of the Vlaams Belang is putting the country’s <em>cordon sanitaire</em> under greater strain. Even the German CDU seems now inclined to venture down the dangerous path of forming <a href="https://english.elpais.com/international/2023-09-22/success-of-far-right-afd-party-reveals-cracks-in-germanys-democratic-firewall.html">local alliances with the AfD.</a>.</p>
<p>Far-right ideas are infusing the mainstream right as illustrated by the radicalization of parties such as the ÖVP in Austria, the VVD in the Netherlands, and what is left of the Republicans (LR) in France after their 2022 presidential debacle. Such contagion has been most visible in the co-optation of far right’s restrictive immigration policies in those countries.</p>
<p>This complex interplay of forces is key to understanding upcoming reconfigurations at the European level.</p>
<h2>How European parliamentary blocs could evolve</h2>
<p>The current layout of far-right European parliamentary groups shows a persistent divide between the more “mainstream” Atlanticist parties affiliated with Giorgia Meloni, the Spanish Vox, and Polish PiS within the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR), on the one hand, and the Identity and Democracy (ID) group, on the other hand. Since its formation in 2019, the ID group has become the main hub for previously pro-Russian far-right and extremist parties around Marine Le Pen, Matteo Salvini, the Austrian FPÖ, and the AfD. Other far right, pro-Russian parties such as Orban’s Fidesz remain with the Non-Inscrits (unaffiliated).</p>
<p>Bolstered by her success in Italy, Giorgia Meloni is seeking a rapprochement with the European People’s Party (EPP), which would pull the ECR toward the centre of European politics. Parties like Vox, the Finns, the Latvian National Alliance, and the Romanian AUR are expected to join, which would bring the ECR group to about 80 seats. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.euractiv.com/section/future-eu/opinion/melonis-balancing-act/">Meloni’s strategic downplay</a> of European and immigration issues certainly opens the door to a broader alliance of the European right. This, however, remains conditional to EPP demands. The chair of the European parliamentary group, Manfred Weber, has clearly indicated that future EPP allies should respect the rule of law and unequivocally support Ukraine, <a href="https://notesfrompoland.com/2023/06/26/polish-government-condemns-german-epp-leaders-call-to-replace-ruling-party-in-poland/">singling out the Polish PiS</a> for its illiberal drift. Additionally, the internal dynamics of the EPP, particularly current disagreements between the CDU (Germany’s Christian Democratic Union) and the CSU (Christian Social Union in Bavaria), may change the course of the group’s trajectory in the next months.</p>
<p>Further to the right, Marine Le Pen and Matteo Salvini will need to rely on their traditional allies in Austria and Belgium, while seeking new partners in Slovakia and Portugal, even perhaps initiating talks with Viktor Orbán. The current configuration and reputation of the ID makes it difficult for Le Pen in particular to distance herself from far-right extremism, which will be essential to her bid to win the next French presidency. Among other challenges, the ID will confront accommodating extremist parties, including a now more powerful yet politically cumbersome AfD that has become nothing less but a <a href="https://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/dangerous-liaisons-the-true-proximity-of-germany-s-afd-to-neo-nazis-a-e69c51d3-4b3c-49d2-8d54-d7b0a19c3f9a">refuge for neo-Nazis</a> in Germany.</p>
<p>While many things may change before June 2024, as illustrated by <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/24/world/europe/spain-election-vox-party.html">Vox’s setback in the last Spanish elections,</a> the current tide of the far right possibly indicates a shift of Europe’s political centre of gravity. Despite their ‘normalization’, far-right parties remain the primary source of opposition to the foundational values and principles of the European Union, most evidently within the ID group which is likely to continue with its project of a ‘Europe of free and independent nations’.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/214702/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Les auteurs ne travaillent pas, ne conseillent pas, ne possèdent pas de parts, ne reçoivent pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'ont déclaré aucune autre affiliation que leur organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>More than a spectre, the latest data shows the far-right is a reality set to bear heavily onto the June 2024 European elections.Gilles Ivaldi, Chercheur en science politique, Sciences Po Andreu Torner, Doctorant en Relations Internationales, Universitat Ramon LlullLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2114572023-08-16T15:40:38Z2023-08-16T15:40:38ZAre Europeans really democrats?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/542339/original/file-20230725-15-b29u3n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C2723%2C1802&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Many Europeans aren't happy with the way their country's politics are run. Does this mean they could accept to live in a regime other than a democracy? Photo taken at a protest against pension reform, 2019.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/jmenj/49268357162/in/album-72157689446880593/">Jeanne Manjoulet / Flickr</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In France, the year 2022 saw the government repeatedly resort to <a href="https://theconversation.com/french-governments-long-record-of-bypassing-parliament-a-brief-history-of-article-49-3-202185">Article 49.3 of the constitution</a> to force unpopular reforms through parliament. The date of 16 March, in particular, marked the 100th time under France’s Fifth Republic that the executive chose to use these special powers. With this in mind, many French people now perceive their political system as undemocratic. Elsewhere in Europe, several countries have gone on to develop more or less authoritarian political systems over the past two decades, notably Poland and Hungary. In almost every country on the continent, <a href="https://www.cairn.info/revue-materiaux-pour-l-histoire-de-notre-temps-2021-1-page-16.htm">far-right parties are gaining momentum</a>.</p>
<p>Alongside this, political elites, especially parliamentarians, are <a href="https://theconversation.com/pourquoi-a-t-on-ou-pas-confiance-dans-les-responsables-politiques-72483">heavily criticised</a> for being corrupt, too out of touch with their population’s wants and needs, and incapable of passing effective legislation. A number of countries have experienced youth revolts <a href="https://www.cairn.info/revue-informations-sociales-2011-3-page-60.htm">betraying social malaise</a>, including France in its working-class suburbs. <a href="https://www.consilium.europa.eu/fr/infographics/terrorism-eu-facts-figures/">Terrorist attacks</a> are also weakening European societies. It therefore appears European democracies are in crisis.</p>
<p>Beyond the events on which the media focus their attention, what can we learn about the values of Europeans and more particularly about their attachment to democracy?</p>
<p>A large number of European countries are members of the <a href="https://www.touteleurope.eu/fonctionnement-de-l-ue/l-union-europeenne/">European Union</a>. They are therefore expected to organise themselves in accordance with the fundamental principles set out in the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaties_of_the_European_Union">Union treaties</a>.</p>
<p>According to <a href="https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CELEX%3A12012M002">Article 2</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“The Union is founded on the values of respect for human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, the rule of law and respect for human rights, including the rights of persons belonging to minorities. These values are common to the Member States in a society in which pluralism, non-discrimination, tolerance, justice, solidarity and equality between women and men prevail.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>A fine programme, but the <a href="https://europeanvaluesstudy.eu">surveys</a> carried out among Europeans show that they are far from being as democracy-minded citizens as the treaties set them out to be. The collective research I have just overseen, <a href="https://www.pug.fr/produit/2045/9782706151620/les-europeens-et-leurs-valeurs"><em>Europeans and Their Values: Between Individualism and Individualisation</em></a> (in French, <em>Les Européens et leurs valeurs. Entre individualisme et individualisation</em>) clearly shows this. It is based on an analysis of the results of the <a href="https://europeanvaluesstudy.eu">European Values Studies</a> (EVS), a major survey carried out by European researchers every nine years to monitor changes in values in different parts of the continent (nearly 60,000 people interviewed in 34 countries between 2017 and 2020).</p>
<h2>Some positive trends, others less so</h2>
<p>The data reveals that, contrary to what many people think, the values of <a href="https://theconversation.com/comment-la-solidarite-se-reinvente-en-temps-de-crise-155248">solidarity</a> are slowly gaining ground, notwithstanding temptations of individualistic withdrawal. Individuals’ desire for autonomy and freedom to choose their own lives is asserting itself strongly in the areas of the family, politics, work and even religion.</p>
<p>But Europeans’ attachment to democracy is less obvious, as our survey shows. Virtually all Europeans say they are supportive of the democratic system, and three quarters consider it important to live in a country organised on this basis. 57% would like to have a greater say in their needs at work and in their daily environment. Expectations of democracy are therefore high. But criticism and dissatisfaction are predominant: only a third of Europeans believe that their country is governed democratically, and only 20% are satisfied with the way the political system works. This is a sign of a crisis in representation.</p>
<h2>Only 38% are “exclusive democrats”</h2>
<p>It is important that we put Europeans’ apparent enthusiasm for democracy into perspective. Indeed, for many, the choice of the democratic system is not exclusive. 52% of them would accept a government made up of experts who take decisions, 32% would welcome the power of an <a href="https://theconversation.com/la-france-penche-t-elle-vers-plus-dautoritarisme-184569">authoritarian leader</a> and 14% might even support a military regime. In total, only 38% of “exclusive democrats” find democracy good but other systems bad. In a fairly large part of the population, democratic values are not deeply rooted. Were a political crisis to occur, the pull toward an anti-democratic system may be strong.</p>
<p><iframe id="0QsCn" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/0QsCn/1/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>While many Europeans view democracy positively, they do not all have the same conception of it. Central features of representative democracy (free elections, civil rights, equality of men and women) are considered essential by most.</p>
<p>Some are also attached to economic aspects. For them, help for the unemployed, redistribution through taxation and income equalisation are also essential aspects of a democracy. These economic expectations are higher in Southern Europe and Russia.</p>
<p>[<em>More than 85,000 readers look to The Conversation France’s newsletter for expert insights into the world’s most pressing issues</em>. <a href="https://memberservices.theconversation.com/newsletters/?nl=france&region=fr">Sign up now</a>]</p>
<p>Finally, the survey tested three characteristics usually considered to be undemocratic: obedience to those in power, the army taking power, and the regulation of politics by religious authorities. Admittedly, these values are not often considered essential to a democracy. But 57% of Russians and 45% of southern Europeans consider obeying those in power to be a strong feature of democracy. This principled obedience to those in power does not sit well with criticism or protest of those in power, both fundamental democratic rights.</p>
<h2>Where are people most attached to democracy?</h2>
<p>There are far more exclusive democrats in the Nordic countries and in western and southern Europe than in the east of the continent, particularly in countries that joined the EU in the early 2000s. And the exclusive attachment to democracy does not seem to have changed much in 20 years.</p>
<p>According to the map, democracy appears to be fairly solid in the Czech Republic, Lithuania and Estonia, while it is much more fragile in Croatia and Romania (only 10% and 8% exclusive democrats respectively). This is problematic given that these two countries are members of the European Union and must therefore respect its values.</p>
<p>In Western Europe, the Germans and the Swiss are clearly more attached to democracy than the French. The French are hardly more exclusive democrats than the average European: while 89% think that democracy is a good system, 48% say the same for an expert-led government, 23% for the authoritarian power of a strongman and 13% for a government of the army.</p>
<p><iframe id="yKNuh" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/yKNuh/2/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>In Russia, given Putin’s leadership, the survey results may come as a surprise. The level of exclusive democrats is as high in Russia (41%) as in several other European countries, notably France (40%). 81% of Russians consider democracy to be a good system. 32% would accept the government of an authoritarian leader and 19% of Russians would accept a military government. The level of support for a regime of experts is particularly low compared with many countries: only 38% would accept it, which sounds like a disavowal of the technocrats in the presidential entourage, <a href="https://www.cairn.info/revue-futuribles-2022-1-page-37.htm">judged to be responsible for everything that goes wrong</a>.</p>
<p>All in all, democracy in many EU countries is more fragile than many people might think. Politicians and civil society actors should consider ways of strengthening citizens’ attachment to the democratic system. In a context where elected representatives are heavily criticised, democracies need to re-legitimise themselves.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/211457/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Pierre Bréchon ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>Sweeping new research shows many Europeans could accept to live under a non-democratic regime.Pierre Bréchon, Professeur émérite de science politique, Sciences Po Grenoble, Auteurs historiques The Conversation FranceLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2073852023-06-30T10:51:06Z2023-06-30T10:51:06ZWhy the impacts of climate change may make us less likely to reduce emissions<p>The wildfires raging across Canada’s south-eastern province of Quebec are <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-65850628">unprecedented</a>. A warm, dry spring allowed the tinder to accumulate and lightning storms in early June lit the match, <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-65837040">dramatically escalating</a> 2023’s fire season. </p>
<p>As the smoke spread south it spawned apocalyptic skies over the north-eastern US and placed over 100 million people under <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jun/07/new-york-air-quality-alerts">air quality alerts</a>, putting New York City in the <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2023/06/07/weather/new-york-air-pollution-canada-wildfires-climate-wednesday/index.html">top spot</a> of a global league table of cities with the most polluted air.</p>
<p>Canadian scientists <a href="https://cdnsciencepub.com/doi/10.1139/cjfr-2019-0094">warned about</a> the role of climate change in fuelling wildfires in 2019. Climate change may not cause fires, but it does significantly <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-65837040">increase the likelihood</a> they will occur and, globally, wildfires are expected to <a href="https://www.unep.org/news-and-stories/press-release/number-wildfires-rise-50-2100-and-governments-are-not-prepared">increase by 50%</a> this century.</p>
<p>One might hope, at least, that as these increasingly acute effects of climate change are felt by wealthy, high-emitting countries, people will be persuaded to act with the conviction necessary to avert the climate crisis, which threatens the <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2019/01/16/health/climate-change-health-emergency-study/index.html">lives of millions</a> and the <a href="https://theconversation.com/study-finds-2-billion-people-will-struggle-to-survive-in-a-warming-world-and-these-parts-of-australia-are-most-vulnerable-205927">livelihoods of billions</a>.</p>
<p>However, as I argued in <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/global-sustainability/article/why-the-impacts-of-climate-change-may-make-us-less-likely-to-reduce-emissions/EEB33A2E7ED25E621872DF39122D7A52">a recent paper</a>, the hope underlying this assumption could be misplaced. As the effects of warming are felt more substantially, we may instead vote into power people committed to making the problem worse. </p>
<p>This is because of an overlap between the broader effects of climate change and factors that have aided the rise of nationalist, <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13510347.2019.1601705">authoritarian, populist leaders</a> across Europe, the US, Brazil and elsewhere, particularly <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/may/31/across-europe-the-far-right-is-rising-that-it-seems-normal-is-all-the-more-terrifying">in recent years</a>.</p>
<h2>The broader consequences of climate change</h2>
<p>Climate change is widely expected to bring a range of <a href="https://www.carbonbrief.org/in-depth-qa-the-ipccs-sixth-assessment-on-how-climate-change-impacts-the-world/">impacts</a>, from the increased frequency and severity of storms, droughts, floods, heatwaves and crop failures to the wider spread of <a href="https://theconversation.com/hard-evidence-will-climate-change-affect-the-spread-of-tropical-diseases-37566">tropical diseases</a>. But it will also bring less obvious problems related to inequality, migration and conflict. Together, these could create a world of deepening inequality and instability, rapid change and perceived threats – an environment in which authoritarian leaders <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1048984307000367">tend to thrive</a>.</p>
<p>Climate change threatens to widen inequalities within and between countries. In fact, <a href="https://www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1073/pnas.1816020116">evidence suggests</a> that it already has. This is because <a href="http://carbonbrief.org/us-flooding-increase-will-disproportionately-impact-black-and-low-income-groups/">poorer people</a> are typically <a href="https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.aar5809">more exposed</a> to the effects of climate change and more <a href="https://annalsofglobalhealth.org/articles/10.1016/j.aogh.2015.08.008">vulnerable to harm</a> as a result of them. </p>
<p>Poorer countries, and poorer people in wealthy countries, face a <a href="https://www.un-ilibrary.org/content/papers/25206656/147">vicious cycle</a> in which their economic situation leaves them stuck in the areas most exposed to extreme weather and prevents them from recovering. In contrast, the rich can smokeproof their homes, hire private firefighters, run their air conditioning without worrying about the bill – or simply buy a house elsewhere.</p>
<p>Climate change is also expected to <a href="https://theconversation.com/environmental-disasters-are-fuelling-migration-heres-why-international-law-must-recognize-climate-refugees-173714">increase migration</a>. Estimates of the number of people expected to migrate in response to climate change are highly uncertain, due to compounding social and political factors, and discussion in the media has sometimes tended towards <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2012.09.009">alarmism</a> and <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-019-0633-3">myth</a>.</p>
<p>Although most movement is also expected to occur <a href="https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/entities/publication/2c9150df-52c3-58ed-9075-d78ea56c3267">within countries</a>, there is likely to be a significant increase in people moving from <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/environment-and-development-economics/article/climate-variability-and-international-migration-an-empirical-analysis/2E8E75DD1ACD25980E098B575B0D461C">poor to rich countries</a>. By mid-century, a significant number of people in places such as South Asia may be exposed to heat waves that <a href="https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.aaw1838">humans simply cannot survive</a>, making migration the only possible escape.</p>
<p>Finally, climate change is expected to heighten the risk of conflict and violence. Wars may break out over basic resources <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-deadly-duo-climate-change-and-conflict-are-fuelling-nigerias-food-insecurity-crisis-206042">such as water</a>. At a <a href="https://theconversation.com/violence-and-mental-health-are-likely-to-get-worse-in-a-warming-world-169547">smaller scale</a>, <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40641-019-00121-2">violence and crime</a> could <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10584-015-1566-0">increase</a>. Research has shown that even tweets are <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2542519622001735">more hateful in the heat</a>.</p>
<h2>Authoritarian populism</h2>
<p>Right-wing politicians have successfully <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0261379411000722">exploited the narrative</a> around these issues which climate change is inflaming: <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0014292119300418">immigration</a>, <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-politics/article/trump-and-the-populist-authoritarian-parties-the-silent-revolution-in-reverse/FE06E514F88A13C8DBFD41984D12D88D">economic inequality</a> and <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09557571.2019.1575796">global insecurity</a>. Their promises to reverse falling living standards for a selection of the public, relieve stress on (underfunded) public services and protect the nation from external threats invariably involve appeals to close borders and scapegoat migrants. </p>
<p>These leaders are also <a href="https://www.sv.uio.no/c-rex/english/groups/compendium/what-is-the-relationship-between-the-far-right-and-environmentalism.html">anti-environmentalist</a>. <a href="https://www.versobooks.com/en-gb/products/2520-white-skin-black-fuel">Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin and Jair Bolsanaro</a> have fetishised traditional industries such as coal mining, abandoned global challenges in favour of national pursuits and are openly sceptical of, or outright deny, human influence on the climate.</p>
<p>The absence of a global consciousness and a willingness to cooperate, which is inherent to this politics, would make maintaining a safe climate <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0959378016300838">almost impossible</a>.</p>
<h2>The freedom that’s left</h2>
<p>This is a bleak vision. But it’s offered as a warning, not a forecast, and there are good reasons not to be pessimistic.</p>
<p>One reason is that there is <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/political-science-research-and-methods/article/do-natural-disasters-help-the-environment-how-voters-respond-and-what-that-means/EE56E76D32DC096EF81512D84A685E44">some evidence</a> that experiencing extreme weather increases support for climate action. So the effects of climate change may not just push people away from an appropriate political response.</p>
<p>More importantly, climate change doesn’t directly cause things like migration, conflict and violence. Instead, it makes them more likely through interactions with existing social and political issues such as government repression, high unemployment or religious tensions. This is both good news and bad news.</p>
<p>First, the bad news. Researchers suggest that <a href="https://theconversation.com/armed-conflict-and-climate-change-how-these-two-threats-play-out-in-africa-193865">poverty and inequality</a> are more important drivers of conflict and migration than climate change. But these are themselves amplified by climate change. So climate change may play a role in conflict and migration that is not yet understood.</p>
<p>The good news is that these complex interactions between environmental conditions and our political and social life show us that the future is, to a large degree, still ours to decide. In the <a href="https://www.stockholmresilience.org/publications/publications/2016-04-18-the-trajectory-of-the-anthropocene-the-great-acceleration.html">anthropocene</a> humans have become an agent of planetary change – we can determine the future of the environment. But the environment will not determine ours. Nonetheless, understanding how climate change may indirectly influence politics is crucial to finding a politics appropriate to the challenges we face.</p>
<hr>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="Imagine weekly climate newsletter" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
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<p><strong><em>Don’t have time to read about climate change as much as you’d like?</em></strong>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joel Millward-Hopkins receives funding from the Leverhulme Trust. </span></em></p>The populist right has made hay with social tensions climate change is likely to exacerbate.Joel Millward-Hopkins, Postdoctoral Researcher in Sustainability, University of LeedsLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2057612023-05-17T23:07:34Z2023-05-17T23:07:34ZIn Meloni’s Italy, young Black men are particularly at risk of ending up on the street<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/526920/original/file-20230517-9960-anjh1k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=17%2C11%2C3816%2C2752&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Groups of refugees from war-torn regions gather in Milan's Central Station. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/fr/image-photo/milan-italy-november-10th-2016-groups-514008019">Alexandre Rotenberg/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Italy is in the grip of a housing crisis, and has been for years. It’s not as if the problem had gone unnoticed. There has been no shortage of articles in the <a href="https://milano.repubblica.it/cronaca/2023/05/04/news/ilaria_lamera_tenda_politecnico_protesta_caro_affitti_milano-398739819/">national</a> – or even <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/may/12/italy-students-protest-over-cost-housing-high-rents">international</a> – media over students’ struggle to access affordable accommodation. Over the past days, they have taken to pitching tents outside university buildings, as part of a growing protest movement against high rents. Begun by Ilaria Lamera, an engineering student at Milan Polytechnic who found it impossible to find a room under 600 euros, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/may/12/italy-students-protest-over-cost-housing-high-rents">the demonstration has since spread to Milan, Rome, Florence, Bologna, Padua and Cagliari</a>.</p>
<p>In Bologna, where I am writing from, rising student numbers and Airbnb rentals have snatched away the prospect of a home for many. But young adults are also grappling with another, less publicised issue: that of the ongoing racism toward those construed as “foreign” or “other”. The phrase “no foreigners” is a common refrain when looking for rental accommodation in Bologna. This racial discrimination is normalised by estate agents. It is <a href="http://amsdottorato.unibo.it/9218/">presented as if it were a form of “eligibility” criteria for landlords</a>, like a requirement for an employment contract and references. As if it were totally normal and acceptable for landlords not to want to rent to “foreigners”, by which they mean those who are racialised, and not me, as a white British woman – also a “foreigner”. Sometimes, this is made even clearer. For example, when a housing volunteer at a <a href="https://www.centroastalli.it/rete-territoriale/centro-astalli-bologna/">local charity assisting migrants</a> arrived at a flat viewing together with a young Black African man, they were told by an estate agent: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Madam! You should have told me you were asking on behalf of an African! We don’t rent to Blacks here.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Launched in 2022 and funded by the <a href="https://www.leverhulme.ac.uk/">Leverhulme Trust</a>, my current research at the University of Bologna examines the longer-term fate of young men from West Africa who arrived in Italy as children seeking asylum, and hence are bureaucratically labelled as “unaccompanied minors”. While much ink has been spilled over the experiences of unaccompanied minors as <em>children</em>, less is known about what happens after they turn 18. Yet, it is at this moment that the rights they are accorded as children, including accommodation, may be lost. In my <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1440783321993918">latest paper</a>, drawing on my PhD research undertaken between 2017-2018, I analyse what happens after they become adults and must leave the reception centre that hosted them as children in a <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/anti.12873">socio-political landscape that is increasingly anti-migrant</a>.</p>
<p>This is based on ethnographic participant/observation in a reception centre for unaccompanied minors in Bologna while working as a volunteer keyworker for eight months between May 2017 and December 2018. In-depth and repeat interviews were conducted with 12 young African young men (six Gambians, four Nigerians, a Ghanaian and a Somalian), aged between 16 and 21. My current research involves a return to my fieldwork site after four years and involves interviews with five of the young men (two Nigerians and three Gambians) to assess their longer-term outcomes as adults.</p>
<h2>On the record</h2>
<p>The local council has launched the <a href="http://www.comune.bologna.it/centrozonarelli/spad-sportello-antidiscriminazioni/">SPAD Anti-discrimination Help Centre</a> to deal with racial discrimination, but this is in its infancy and under-reporting remains an issue. The first <a href="https://www.comune.bologna.it/notizie/giornata-mondiale-contro-discriminazioni-razziali-2023">SPAD report</a> documents reports of discrimination, and housing is found to be the second most prevalent area in which discrimination occurs. The young men in my study present a weary resignation to the continuing racism they face in the housing sector (and elsewhere).</p>
<p>Innocent*, who is now 22 and arrived in Italy as a twelve year old from Nigeria tells me he has been looking for a place to rent for months. Frequently, he is told by estate agents things such as “the owner is elderly, they don’t want any foreigners”, or “They are afraid because you are Black”.</p>
<p>Innocent goes on to tell me he is regularly stopped for no reason by the police around the station when getting the train to work. They ask him for his residence permit. I ask him how this makes him feel:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Really upset, also because of the housing situation. Us Blacks, we’re nothing here.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Edrisa, a young Gambian who is now 22 came to Italy when he was sixteen, reflects on the difficulties of finding a place to live once outside the reception system. Playing on the Italian name for a residence permit (<em>permesso di soggiorno</em>, meaning a permit to stay), he tells me that many migrants, including him, have “a permit to stay but no place to stay, it doesn’t make sense. It is not right”. This seemingly <a href="https://www.ilpost.it/2023/02/18/senzatetto-lavoratori-bologna/">contradictory situation</a>, of migrants who are employed, paying taxes, and have the legal right to stay, but cannot find a house, is widespread.</p>
<p>Edrisa explains that despite having regular work on construction sites, as a qualified builder, he was homeless for nearly four months, crashing with friends, sometimes even sleeping in his work van.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“It is really difficult for a foreigner to find a house here, actually, not all foreigners but if you are Black… Italians don’t want to rent to Black migrants. It is so difficult.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>For Edrisa this is due to a combination of the housing crisis and the racism he faces as a young Black man in Italy. He maintains racism is due to the stereotyping of Africans as backwards and threat, compounded by the constant negative imagery of Black and Brown bodies arriving via sea. The <a href="https://series.francoangeli.it/index.php/oa/catalog/book/791">public discourse</a> on immigration in Italy is characterized by the stigmatization of racialised migrants who are framed as inferior and threat.</p>
<h2>Beyond landlords, racism has long tainted Italy</h2>
<p>Clearly, however, it is not feasible to suggest that racism merely pertains to landlords <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1354066119858388">as an individual mentality or exception from the norm</a>. Rather, we must dig deeper into the ongoing colonial legacies of racism that become visible in the act of renting. As the anthropologist Bruno Riccio observed over ten years ago, “culturalist” readings of difference have led to <a href="https://www.editions-ulb.be/en/book/?GCOI=74530100426670#h2tabtableContents">residential segregation and discrimination in the Italian housing market</a>. This “rental racism” builds upon the <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-51391-7_3">“fertile soil”</a> of racism rooted in Italian colonialism and fascism and is then embedded within a historically rooted racial landscape. Rent should be understood not solely as an economic transaction, but a <a href="https://radicalhousingjournal.org/2019/editorial/">social relation embedded in emplaced social, cultural, political and material conditions</a>. </p>
<p>This is starkly evident in the recent declaration by Italy’s Agriculture and Food Sovereignty Minister Francesco Lollobrigida that <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-65324319">Italy’s low birth rate meant Italians are facing “ethnic replacement”</a>. Italy’s Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni, also a member of the far-right Brothers of Italy political party, has <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-65324319">made similar remarks in the past</a>. According to the OHCHR’s (2019) <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Countries/IT/ItalyMissionReport.pdf">“Report of mission to Italy on racial discrimination”</a>, the worst years for racially motivated attacks were 2009 and 2018; both periods in which the public discourse was particularly anti-migrant. During the far-right Lega’s election campaign in 2017-18, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/feb/28/italys-intelligence-agency-warns-of-rise-in-racist-attacks">racially motivated attacks in Italy tripled</a>. The leader of the Lega, Matteo Salvini, is now a Minister in the coalition government.</p>
<p>The coalition government recently introduced a new immigration law, the Cutro Decree (decreto Cutro), named after the Calabrian town close to where <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/mar/09/protests-as-meloni-cabinet-meets-near-scene-of-deadly-shipwreck-cutro-italy">at least 72 people died in a shipwreck in February this year</a>. The new law is controversial and has received widespread criticism from <a href="https://ecre.org/mediterranean-controversial-cutro-decree-approved-by-parliament-as-italy-sees-continued-increase-of-arrivals-death-toll-of-2023-breaks-1000-as-ngo-struggle-to-save-lives-under-dramatic/">human-rights organisations, concerned about the increased precarity and irregularity that would be created</a>. </p>
<p>Naming a law which brings in increasingly restrictive immigration practices after a shipwreck that some <a href="https://www.hrw.org/the-day-in-human-rights/2023/02/27">rights organisations</a> argue resulted from the very same government’s harsher laws, together with wider EU policies, is deeply problematic. While the law does not directly affect the young men in my study, its effects are pervasive and increase the ongoing hostility toward racialised migrants, just like <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/ill-wind-weathering-impact-far-right-government-italy/">previous immigration legislation brought in under a far right party</a>. The divide between “us”
(white Italians) and “them” (racialised migrants) keeps on widening.</p>
<p>In Bologna, like other gentrifying global cities in the Global North, the mobility of elites stand in stark contrast to those who are racialised, unable to access the city, which increasingly risks <a href="https://www.scielo.br/j/ts/a/wv4Pj5n9HJqNv7J7R3RpyWP/">becoming a spectacle of elite privilege and tourist consumption</a>. The local council recently launched a <a href="https://www.comune.bologna.it/notizie/giornata-mondiale-contro-discriminazioni-razziali-2023">“local action plan for an anti-racist and intercultural city”</a>, and has made attempts to regulate Airbnb; <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13683500.2018.1504899">recognised as a challenging</a> feat. However, for Bologna to become a city in which more than the porticoes are ‘open’ to young racialised migrants, what is really needed is a deeper conversation on racism in Italy, particularly as manifested at the political level.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>All names are pseudonyms.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/205761/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sarah Walker ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>As student protests against high rents unfurl across Italy, one academic points out one of the groups most likely to end up on the streets under a far-right government: young black men.Sarah Walker, Visiting postdoctoral researcher and adjunct professor, Università di BolognaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1931102022-11-10T02:06:54Z2022-11-10T02:06:54ZExtremists use video games to recruit vulnerable youth. Here’s what parents and gamers need to know<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/494561/original/file-20221110-22-gdzirx.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C25%2C1917%2C1051&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Clinton Crumpler/Flickr</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Reports of far-right extremists trying to recruit young people through video games have raised concerns for parents, guardians and youth alike. </p>
<p>In October, a statement from Australian Federal Police <a href="https://www.afp.gov.au/news-media/media-releases/extremist-recruitment-reaching-young-australian-gamers">said officers had</a> seen evidence of extremist groups trying to recruit young people through online games. In one instance, a teen had shared a video game recreation of the 2019 Christchurch attack.</p>
<p>Another recent example came from online gaming platform Roblox, in which some users had set up recreations of the <a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/subscribe/news/1/?sourceCode=TAWEB_WRE170_a&dest=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theaustralian.com.au%2Fnation%2Fplayers-posing-as-nazis-discovered-in-popular-childrens-video-game%2Fnews-story%2F16ae0c4f0002d0eabff2dd6b96b7c2d1&memtype=anonymous&mode=premium&v21=dynamic-high-control-score&V21spcbehaviour=append">Nazi Third Reich</a>.</p>
<p>Extremist groups, including jihadists and neo-Nazis, have a history of using video games to spread messages of hate. And while this doesn’t mean all gamers will be exposed, or radicalised if they are, it’s still a concern for security agencies the world over. Parents, guardians and gamers should be aware of the risks.</p>
<h2>Is far-right extremism in gaming a problem?</h2>
<p>Violent video games are sometimes blamed for acts of <a href="https://dana.org/article/do-violent-video-games-lead-to-violence/">terrorist violence</a>, especially when perpetrators are identified as gamers. However, although some studies have found violent games can cause players to become <a href="https://www.psypost.org/2022/01/people-who-frequently-play-call-of-duty-show-neural-desensitization-to-painful-images-according-to-study-62264">desensitised to violent images</a>, decades of research have not shown a link between violent games and violent behaviour <a href="https://www.health.harvard.edu/newsletter_article/violent-video-games-and-young-people.">in real life</a>.</p>
<p>That said, far-right extremists have long used games and gaming platforms to try to spread hateful ideologies. </p>
<p>There are many different beliefs that might fall under the label “far right”, but generally these ideologies are united in being anti-democratic, racist and against multiculturalism and equality. </p>
<p>Since as early as 2002, American neo-Nazi organisations have been creating and selling their own “<a href="https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/intelligence-report/2002/games-extremists-play">white power” games</a>, and modifying existing popular games to suit their agenda. Extremists will also <a href="https://home-affairs.ec.europa.eu/networks/radicalisation-awareness-network-ran/publications/extremists-use-gaming-adjacent-platforms-insights-regarding-primary-and-secondary-prevention_en">try to recruit</a> through in-game chat functions and gaming-adjacent platforms (such as where games are streamed).</p>
<p>In 2002, American neo-Nazi leader <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwjPwuDl_437AhUR93MBHWptCi0QFnoECAoQAQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.supremecourt.gov%2Fopinions%2FURLs_Cited%2FOT2010%2F08-1448%2F08-1448-14.PDF&usg=AOvVaw33SGbmp1Z4D7Mdmt5SV10V">Matt Hale said</a>, in regards to recruiting people to his white supremacist “church”:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>If we can influence video games and entertainment, it will make people understand we are their friends and neighbours.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In 2018, violent <a href="https://www.nationalsecurity.gov.au/what-australia-is-doing-subsite/Pages/National-Socialist-Order.aspx">terrorist group</a> Atomwaffen Division (also called the National Socialist Order) was <a href="https://www.vice.com/en/article/zmwg38/atomwaffen-division-steam-youtube">found posting freely</a> on the gaming platform Steam, before eventually being banned. A year later in 2019, the US Anti-Defamation League <a href="https://www.adl.org/steamextremism">raised the alarm</a> about extremist content still spreading on Steam. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/494563/original/file-20221110-19-2uqmf2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A screenstill of a Call of Duty scoreboard after a match." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/494563/original/file-20221110-19-2uqmf2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/494563/original/file-20221110-19-2uqmf2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/494563/original/file-20221110-19-2uqmf2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/494563/original/file-20221110-19-2uqmf2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/494563/original/file-20221110-19-2uqmf2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/494563/original/file-20221110-19-2uqmf2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/494563/original/file-20221110-19-2uqmf2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Many gaming franchises, including the Call of Duty franchise, have online modes that let players connect and chat with others from all over the world.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/bfsminid/2774567451/">Sam Delon/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The tactics far-right extremists use to recruit</h2>
<p>Former white supremacist Christian Picciolini <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/8umemf/i_am_christian_picciolini_a_former_white/">has explained on Reddit</a> how far-right extremist recruiters target “marginalised youth” using popular games such as Fortnite, Minecraft and Call of Duty. </p>
<p>They “drop benign hints and then ramp up” when players are “hooked” on their message, Picciolini said. Of his own experience of being recruited, he said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>They appealed to my desperate need for identity, community and purpose. I was bullied and they provided safety. I was lonely and they provided family. That’s how they draw people in, with a sense of belonging and ‘humanitarianism’.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Far-right extremists will often interpret games to suit their own positions. For instance, they’ll point to the inherent superiority of a fantasy game species, such as elves, to draw false and racist parallels with reality.</p>
<p>They’ll also use gaming to find and build connections with others who share their views. By playing together they can reinforce each other’s beliefs, bond over “<a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-07-15/alt-right-groups-video-games-radicalising-young-men-extremism/101212494">dark humour</a>” and use the game to act out violent fantasies. </p>
<p>And while moderating sites to remove extremist content is important, it’s complex to do in democracies for a range of <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?hl=en&lr=&id=OadeEAAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PR9&dq=moderation+extremism+limits+digital&ots=Ea5c1nRy_E&sig=ohQyttckPLdM2Drw8_A91PIKp9M&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=moderation%20extremism%20limits%20digital&f=false">technical, legal and ethical reasons</a>. Moderation should not be relied on as the only method for addressing far-right extremism online. </p>
<p>Extremists can also find ways to avoid moderation, such as by using coded language. For instance, <a href="https://www.adl.org/resources/hate-symbol/1488">88 and 1488</a> are both associated with neo-Nazism – but most people wouldn’t know it.</p>
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<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/can-gaming-addiction-lead-to-depression-or-aggression-in-young-people-heres-what-the-evidence-says-168847">Can gaming 'addiction' lead to depression or aggression in young people? Here’s what the evidence says</a>
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<h2>What can we do about it?</h2>
<p>As counter-terrorism expert Greg Barton recently <a href="https://7news.com.au/lifestyle/parenting/stark-warning-for-parents-from-afp-after-online-childrens-games-are-linked-to-terrorist-groups-c-8567631">told Channel 7</a>, far-right extremists aim to prey on young, vulnerable young people as part of a potential radicalisation process:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>It’s the sort of predatory behaviour where they’re trying to win their confidence that’s the concern. The video, the games, that’s just the bait to get them hooked.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>As you’d expect, extremists use plenty of other hooks too. These include gyms and <a href="https://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/mark-joined-a-mens-fitness-club-now-its-become-an-armed-neo-nazi-cell/30p74jicx">fitness groups</a>, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2021/oct/17/eva-wiseman-conspirituality-the-dark-side-of-wellness-how-it-all-got-so-toxic">wellness culture</a> and even <a href="https://home-affairs.ec.europa.eu/pages/page/factbook-far-right-extremism-december-2019_en">animal rights and environmentalism</a>. So recruitment via games is part of a wider problem. </p>
<p>Parents, guardians and young gamers can take protective steps – the first of which is to understand that extremist ideologies online can have an impact in the real world. It’s also important to remember video games themselves are not a cause of extremism, and both security services and parents should avoid <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwjPxJjN4Y77AhUf83MBHfykCZIQFnoECBYQAQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fec.europa.eu%2Fhome-affairs%2Fsites%2Fdefault%2Ffiles%2Fwhat-we-do%2Fnetworks%2Fradicalisation_awareness_network%2Fabout-ran%2Fran-c-and-n%2Fdocs%2Fran_cn_conclusion_paper_videogames_15-17092020_en.pdf&usg=AOvVaw1WOhmWKi-9-AnInWe0xjVT">thinking as such</a>. </p>
<p>Further, not all young people who come into contact with extremist material or far-right extremists online will become radicalised. In fact, some people <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0886260517747599">become more prosocial</a> when they encounter extremist propaganda. In other words, they think less aggressively and more empathetically towards others.</p>
<p>Millions of people play video games, but only a tiny proportion are radicalised towards violent ideologies or acts. </p>
<p>The best thing parents and community can do is be aware of the risks and be involved in the lives and interests of young people – especially when navigating the online world. This isn’t always easy, but the Australian eSafety Commissioner <a href="https://www.esafety.gov.au/parents/issues-and-advice/parental-controls">has some tips</a> on how to do this. </p>
<p>The US-based Western States Centre, which works against bigotry, also has a <a href="https://www.westernstatescenter.org/caregivers">toolkit for parents and caregivers</a> on engaging with extremism and conspiracy theories. According to one of the authors, former educator and diversity consultant Christine Saxman, debating young people will likely not work:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>You want to be on that critical thinking journey with them, not fighting them.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The Australian Federal Police also <a href="https://www.afp.gov.au/news-media/media-releases/extremist-recruitment-reaching-young-australian-gamers">details warning signs</a> that might indicate someone is being drawn into far-right extremist beliefs. These include becoming distant from friends and family, and using violent, angry or abusive language (especially towards minority groups or public figures). </p>
<p>For more information you can visit the Australian government’s <a href="https://www.livingsafetogether.gov.au/seek-help-and-report">Living Safe Together</a> website. </p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/australia-bans-video-games-for-things-youd-see-in-movies-but-gamers-can-access-them-anyway-122183">Australia bans video games for things you'd see in movies. But gamers can access them anyway</a>
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<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/193110/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Helen Young does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>For decades extremist groups – especially the far right – have used gaming and game-adjacent platforms to try to radicalise gamers.Helen Young, Lecturer, School of Communication and Creative Arts, Deakin UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1908662022-09-23T09:03:29Z2022-09-23T09:03:29ZGiorgia Meloni and the return of fascism: how Italy got here<p>The rise of far-right politician Giorgia Meloni has left many outside Italy asking how her brand of what many argue is fascism can achieve such prominence in a country that has experienced life under the dictatorship of Benito Mussolini. The answer can be traced back to a recent normalisation of reactionary politics.</p>
<p>In truth, the existence of a far-right government in Italy is <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1994/04/29/world/after-50-years-fascists-return-to-italian-government.html">not entirely without precedent</a> in the post-war era. Between 1994 and 2011 a speciously <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/riding-the-populist-wave/italy-the-mainstream-right-and-its-allies-19942018/444EB29D3CBA1E12FCCCC820DD60500C">labelled “centre-right” alliance</a> – consisting of Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia (FI), various iterations of a small Christian democratic or centrist wing, Umberto Bossi’s Northern League (LN) and Gianfranco Fini’s National Alliance (AN) – governed Italy four times. The National Alliance was the predecessor party to <a href="https://www.sv.uio.no/c-rex/english/news-and-events/right-now/2022/the-italian-right-ahead-of-the-2022-general-electi.html">Meloni’s Brother’s of Italy</a></p>
<p>Berlusconi takes a revisionist view of <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-21222341">Mussolini’s role in Italian history</a>. He believed him to be one of Italy’s “greatest statesmen” and an essentially <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-italy-berlusconi-gaffes-idUKTRE7AB0Z720111112">“benign dictator”</a> who had “done good things for Italy”. This provided a counter-narrative that contradicted the reality of the Italian republic’s anti-fascist foundations. That, in turn, was exploited by the far right.</p>
<p>The Northern League first emerged as a series of parties seeking greater autonomy for Italy’s prosperous northern regions. And the National Alliance was the latest iteration of a neo-fascist tradition which has roots in the Italian Social Movement (MSI) established by veterans of Mussolini’s Italian Social Republic in 1946.</p>
<p>Both parties helped bring far-right and reactionary policies <a href="https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/mono/10.4324/9780203875742/re-inventing-italian-right-stefano-fella-carlo-ruzza">into the mainstream</a> as coalition partners in Berlusconi-led administrations.</p>
<p>The balance of power in this alliance shifted decisively between 2013 and 2017 when Matteo Salvini took the reins of the Northern League. He gradually abandoned regionalism for nationalism and appealed to the far and extreme right, adopting the slogan <a href="https://www.thelocal.it/20180124/italians-first-far-right-northern-league-matteo-salvini-donald-trump-2018-election/">“Italians First”</a>, which was previously used by the neo-fascist party <a href="https://www.affaritaliani.it/politica/lega-diventera-prima-gli-italiani-ma-uno-slogan-registrato-da-casapound-557908.html">Casa Pound</a>. The (now renamed) League partnered with the Five Star Movement to govern as what was euphemistically termed a “populist” coalition between 2018 and 2019. </p>
<h2>Extreme views packaged as ‘common sense’</h2>
<p>This was a period which saw, among other reactionary policies, a <a href="https://ecre.org/salvini-decree-approved-by-italian-senate-amid-citizens-protests-and-institutional-criticism/">“security decree” </a> which tightened immigration regulations, limited the right to asylum and made the expulsion of migrants and revocation of citizenship easier. The decree was ultimately overturned in 2020 but by that time it had already served as a symbolic victory for Salvini.</p>
<p>Back in 2017, Salvini promised Italian voters a <a href="https://www.facebook.com/salviniofficial/photos/a.278194028154/10155320986293155/?type=3">“common sense revolution”</a> – a trope which soon became central to his party’s political messaging. The idea was to bring far-right ideology into the <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13569317.2021.1949829">mainstream</a> by portraying extreme, racist policies as “normal” ideas based on views shared by “ordinary Italians”. </p>
<p>Like many populist far-right politicians, he thrived on the idea that he was saying out loud what “everyone was really thinking”. Salvini claimed to be putting <a href="https://twitter.com/LegaSalvini/status/1439952256418394113">“Italians first”</a> – although he really meant white, Catholic, straight Italians from “traditional” (read mother and father) families. He also promoted closing borders and <a href="https://twitter.com/matteosalvinimi/status/1280554027646935041">clearing migrant camps</a>.</p>
<p>Salvini’s common sense image, while deeply flawed, initially proved a successful electoral tactic. But by 2019 he started to lose control of the narrative, largely thanks to a series of miscalculations. </p>
<p>The first of these was his ill-fated decision to pull the plug on the government he had formed in coalition with the Five Star Movement in 2018. Fuelled by hubris induced by strong polling figures and in the hope of triggering elections, Salvini withdrew support for the government. But his gamble did not pay off. He instead consigned his party to the opposition benches.</p>
<h2>Meloni profits from Salvini’s tactics</h2>
<p>Salvini’s losses have been Meloni’s gains and the balance of power on Italy’s political right has once again shifted away from the League. With Salvini spending the past two years lending his parliamentary support to the government, Meloni has been able to position herself as having been <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/europe/20220914-we-ve-tried-them-all-except-meloni-far-right-leader-tipped-to-become-italy-s-first-female-pm">“alone in opposition”</a> – and therefore as being more in touch with “real Italians”.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, she has capitalised on his success at bringing far-right and reactionary ideas further into the mainstream.</p>
<p>A key element of Salvini’s “common sense” strategy was downplaying the threat of fascism and arguing that calling for law and order or stronger borders is <a href="https://twitter.com/matteosalvinimi/status/964598412288065536">not fascistic</a>. This has created the perfect conditions for neo-fascists to thrive. </p>
<p>Meloni has been free to claim that her party has shaken off its <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/aug/11/scepticism-over-giorgia-melonis-claims-fascism-is-history-in-italian-far-right">fascist past</a> even as she espouses obviously hardline views. What might be termed a <a href="https://www.psa.ac.uk/psa/news/matteo-salvini-giorgia-meloni-and-%E2%80%98post-fascism%E2%80%99-political-logic">post-fascist strategy</a> is unfolding. </p>
<p>Meloni can gaslight the public by making fascist assertions while claiming fascism no longer exists. Importantly, those who warn that fascism is making a comeback are derided as irrational.</p>
<p>This is all exemplified in the dog whistle references to Mussolini that have characterised the 2022 election campaign. Both the League and Brothers of Italy have deployed campaign slogans <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-fYJOoqyMf0">first used</a> in the <a href="https://www.psa.ac.uk/psa/news/matteo-salvini-giorgia-meloni-and-%E2%80%98post-fascism%E2%80%99-political-logic#:%7E:text=Mussolini%E2%80%99%2C%20while%2C%20Meloni%E2%80%99s-,%E2%80%98ready%20for%20victory%E2%80%99,-also%20harks%20back">fascist era</a>. The latter has even kept the <a href="https://culturico.com/2021/11/12/post-fascism-in-italy-so-why-this-flame-mrs-giorgia-meloni/">tricolour flame logo</a> used by its predecessors, the neo-fascist MSI.</p>
<p>Meloni <a href="https://www.facebook.com/giorgiameloni.paginaufficiale/posts/no-al-matrimonio-tra-persone-dello-stesso-sesso-sarebbe-una-spesa-enorme-per-lo-/10153287497622645/">opposes same-sex marriage</a>, wants to put significant curbs on <a href="https://twitter.com/GiorgiaMeloni/status/1568874880468140032">access to abortion</a> to address the “emergency” of Italy’s <a href="https://www.lagazzettadelmezzogiorno.it/news/italia/779530/meloni-denatalita-e-vera-emergenza.html">declining birth rate</a> and has made explicit references to Europe’s supposed “Judeo-Christian” roots. The latter is a common Islamophobic trope that has long formed a key part of European far-right ideology. </p>
<p>Her racism is also evident in a depiction of immigration as an invasion – via calls for a naval blockade and portrayal of “undocumented migration” as a UN plot. This plays willingly on racist <a href="https://www.resetdoc.org/story/the-poisonous-roots-of-the-great-replacement-theory/">“great replacement”</a> narratives.</p>
<p>Meloni’s success may shock, but it should not surprise. She is a canny social media operator and expert strategist but her path has been cleared by many figures that came before her. Salvini now follows her lead but his work to shift the <a href="https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2015/04/what-overton-window-politics">Overton window</a> of what is mainstream in politics has made her the politician she is today. That was a process that took years and unfolded in front of our very eyes.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/190866/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>George Newth works for University of Bath</span></em></p>The return of fascist discourse has been several decades in the making and owes a lot to Matteo Salvini.George Newth, Lecturer in Italian Politics, University of BathLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1808192022-04-08T16:12:28Z2022-04-08T16:12:28ZBehind French election tweets, the far right is hidden in plain sight<p>During the 2017 French presidential election, Emmanuel Macron was the darling of digital democracy. With his calls for a “startup nation,” the future head of state placed technology at the centre not only of his programme but also of his <a href="https://frenchcrossroads.substack.com/p/startup-president-part-3?s=r">campaign</a>.</p>
<p>The now-president’s digital performance in the run-up to this year’s election has been much less clear-cut. It’s left-wing Jean-Luc Mélenchon who’s been trying to push the technological envelope, going so far as to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/apr/06/jean-luc-melenchon-hologram-french-election">appear in the form of a hologram</a>, while Macron concentrated on shifting his programme to the right. And while he still leads in the polls, his <a href="https://www.politico.eu/europe-poll-of-polls/france/">margin is slipping</a>. Indeed, five years after Macron took office, far-right candidates have been more effective than Macron at exploiting the Internet and social networks.</p>
<p>In the newly published book <a href="https://www.epflpress.org/produit/1047/9782889154548/l-illusion-de-la-democratie-numerique"><em>L’illusion de la démocratie numérique. Internet est-il de droite?</em></a> (EPFL Press), I argue that conservatives dominate online. While the Internet may have been a key part of left-leaning movements, such as the Arab Spring or Occupy Wall Street, the right dominates the online world thanks to factors such as its popular bases, hierarchical organisations, capital, as well as social inequality. The French presidential elections are a case in point.</p>
<h2>The French Internet: a political genealogy</h2>
<p>But before we turn to the current elections, it is worth revisiting French politics’ digital history. France is no newcomer to digital politics, with the egalitarian use of the 1980s pre-web French <a href="https://daily.jstor.org/thank-minitel-for-the-french-election/">Minitel computers for political information</a> paving the way to current global networks. Imagining the early web as a bastion of left-leaning French politics led by Macron is overly simplistic, though, as the National Front was the first political party in France to have a web presence, as well as an army of trolls working behind the scenes.</p>
<p>But it would be a mistake to view Le Pen’s support as artificial or top-down. She has been the sleeper in this current election, pulling ahead in the polls. While digital media eyes were on Zemmour, Le Pen boasts a strong base of support throughout the country, both online and offline. From Facebook groups, Twitter, down to WhatsApp channels, she dominates her rival. Despite extensive coverage in international media outlets, the former <em>Figaro</em> columnist has fewer than 400,000 Twitter followers, versus 2.7 million in the case of Le Pen.</p>
<h2>Zemmour and Le Pen</h2>
<p>Both have launched their campaigns amid a rightward turn of French politics, as voters increasingly resent the gap between their purchasing power and that of previous generations. While Zemmour and Le Pen have both clearly capitalised on such sentiments, scapegoating immigrants subtly or explicitly, there are differences between them.</p>
<p>Throughout his campaign, Zemmour has deployed an openly Islamophobic rhetoric that closely mirrored that of a <a href="http://hatemeter.eu/">research project tracking online anti-Muslim hatred</a> between 2018 and 2020. Zemmour’s movement, Reconquête (“Reconquer”) echoes the theme of a supposed “invasion” by immigrants that marked the 2016 US presidential campaign. Like former US president Donald Trump, Zemmour asserts the need to make France “great again”.</p>
<p>Le Pen also privileges imagery celebrating “traditional France”, including its agricultural heritage. Unlike Zemmour, she has confined most of her speeches to bread-and-butter issues, directly appealing to much of the working-class and rural <em>gilets jaunes</em> base. The movement started out in 2018 as a fuel-tax occupations in mostly small towns stopping traffic and morphed into a series of mostly urban marches. Once focused on cost-of-living issues, the protesters’ demands became diverse and sometimes contradictory ideologically, and the movement lost steam in late 2019 when the pandemic hit.</p>
<h2>Popular bases</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/456985/original/file-20220407-21-mlmngx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/456985/original/file-20220407-21-mlmngx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/456985/original/file-20220407-21-mlmngx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=534&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456985/original/file-20220407-21-mlmngx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=534&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456985/original/file-20220407-21-mlmngx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=534&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456985/original/file-20220407-21-mlmngx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=672&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456985/original/file-20220407-21-mlmngx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=672&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/456985/original/file-20220407-21-mlmngx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=672&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In advance of the French election, Eric Zemmour has been sinking in the polls relative to Marine Le Pen, and so has sought to dismiss them.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Eric Zemmour/Twitter</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Too many people on the left present right-wing leaders as puppet masters and downplay the role of organised people on the ground. The fantasy is that by somehow getting rid of these leading online influencers, whether Zemmour or Le Pen, or even Putin or Trump, that the right-wing digital base will disappear.</p>
<p>The reality is in fact the opposite. These leaders built their movements on existing networks and groups. These include everything from the far-right component of the <em>gilets jaunes</em> to Civitas, Action Française, and even elements of the Catholic Church. Institutions like these are more likely to have a solid network of political supporters that are in constant communication, as well as have dedicated armies of volunteers to post and promote online content relevant to its members.</p>
<p>This finding of the role of organisations, and especially what I found in the United States in how hierarchical organisations dominated online as opposed to the myth of horizontal digital activism. Simply put, conservative groups are more likely to be hierarchical, as compared to many of those on the left, and this enables more online engagement.</p>
<h2>A media ecosystem benefiting the far right</h2>
<p>But it is not just individual groups peppered throughout France, or any other country, that enable conservative digital activism. Key to the circulation of social media information is how these groups work in sync with an ecosystem of other like-minded organisations. As in the United States, conservative media outlets are growing in France: the far-right media empire of <a href="https://www.vivendi.com/en/biography/vincent-bollore/">Vincent Bolloré</a> includes CNews, which propelled Zemmour into the nightly TV spotlight, while the media conglomerate of <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/20200122-bernard-arnault-france-s-wolf-in-cashmere-billionaire">Bernard Arnault</a> pushes free-market ideas. And the content they produce and personalities they promote feed directly into conservative social-media feeds, despite – and because of – conservative claims that the media censors them.</p>
<p>By contrast, the left in France is fragmented and does not work as effectively as the far right does with all types of media outlets. This has a direct relationship with what works – and doesn’t – in terms of virality on social media. Conservative conceptions of <em>freedom</em> play better on platforms that favour simplistic, short, and provocative posts, whether it is “freedom” from immigrant “invasions” or from “mask mandates.” The left focuses more on principles such as <em>fairness</em>, and the messages are inherently more nuanced and dispersed. Whether it is the environment, gender rights, anti-racism, or LGBTQ+ issues, the broad coalition of ideas can lead to fuzzy messaging. So in today’s digital era, the left has a bigger hill to climb, and France is no exception.</p>
<p>So this is how ideology, even in its own right, fuels the digital activism gap I found in my research in why conservatives dominate online.</p>
<h2>Inequality</h2>
<p>Now for the last factor that we also see in France: inequality. The Internet was supposed to be a place where everyone can come together on the same playing field, but this is not the case. But how does this map onto the French working-class increasingly voting for Le Pen?</p>
<p>As the saying goes, the devil is in the details. Not included in polls of Le Pen’s working-class base are the members of the working-class who do not vote or those who are not citizens and thus can’t vote. As it is defined in surveys, the working class in France also does not include other low-wage workers or those unable to work. The digital divide in access and skills, for example, is still strong in France, especially in rural areas. The cliche of far-right supporters is that they are duped, uninformed, and uneducated, but in my research and with Zemmour’s base, it’s key to see the dominance of middle to upper-class “well-educated” voters that he has captured.</p>
<h2>The right’s big money</h2>
<p>Questions have also swirled around who may be financing Zemmour’s glitzy campaign of slick posters, synced social media, and well-orchestrated rallies. Certainly, conservatives are more likely to have these resources, both individually and organisationally. And this kind of big money is key to digital <em>production</em> of online content, but it does not automatically result in digital <em>participation</em>. It takes people on the ground who believe and support these far-right philosophies to keep the social media content flowing. It is not just individual supporters. Political organisations, whether parties or civil society groups, that have a lot of resources can harness the power of platform algorithms by paying staff (or trolls) to engage online or can afford the high-tech software and other gadgets to sustain digital participation.</p>
<p>The result, then, of differences in institutions, ideologies, and inequalities offline is a dominance of the far right online. The bottom line is that offline power results in online power, and with conservatives having and gaining power, it is an uphill battle for those on the left.</p>
<hr>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/310261/original/file-20200115-134768-1tax26b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/310261/original/file-20200115-134768-1tax26b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=158&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310261/original/file-20200115-134768-1tax26b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=158&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310261/original/file-20200115-134768-1tax26b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=158&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310261/original/file-20200115-134768-1tax26b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=198&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310261/original/file-20200115-134768-1tax26b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=198&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310261/original/file-20200115-134768-1tax26b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=198&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><em>Created in 2007 to help accelerate and share scientific knowledge on key societal issues, the AXA Research Fund has been supporting nearly 650 projects around the world conducted by researchers from 55 countries. To learn more, visit the site of the <a href="https://www.axa-research.org">Axa Research Fund</a> or follow on Twitter <a href="https://twitter.com/axaresearchfund?lang=fr">@AXAResearchFund</a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/180819/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jen Schradie ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>While many progressive movements have organised online, conservatives dominate because of better organisation, capital, and social inequality. France’s presidential elections are a case in point.Jen Schradie, Digital Sociologist, Sciences Po Paris, Sciences Po Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1769302022-02-13T13:13:56Z2022-02-13T13:13:56ZCanada should be preparing for the end of American democracy<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/445789/original/file-20220210-13-mgmq84.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C12%2C4193%2C2678&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A Donald Trump supporter flies a Trump flat a trucker convoy protest against COVID-19 restrictions in Toronto.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nathan Denette</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The United States is on the precipice of becoming a failed democratic state. In January 2021, pollster John Zogby conducted a survey that showed <a href="https://zogbyanalytics.com/news/997-the-zogby-poll-will-the-us-have-another-civil-war">46 per cent of Americans believe that the U.S. is headed toward another civil war</a>.</p>
<p>As Canada’s closest neighbour <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/06/11/pew-research-global-opinion-us-democracy/">fractures at the seams and slides toward dangerous forms of authoritarianism</a>, we should be deeply worried. As someone whose research has tried to explain how and why democracy works, I am deeply worried. </p>
<p>We should be planning our possible responses and preparing for what comes next. Failing to do so will put our own democracy at risk — as we’re witnessing right now <a href="https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/feds-ready-to-act-should-foul-play-be-detected-in-trucker-convoy-funding-says-public-safety-minister-1.5771551">with the so-called freedom convoy in Ottawa and its nefarious funding</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A smiling woman waves a 'Let’s Go Brandon' flag." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/445792/original/file-20220210-19-18z58m4.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/445792/original/file-20220210-19-18z58m4.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=422&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445792/original/file-20220210-19-18z58m4.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=422&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445792/original/file-20220210-19-18z58m4.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=422&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445792/original/file-20220210-19-18z58m4.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=531&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445792/original/file-20220210-19-18z58m4.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=531&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445792/original/file-20220210-19-18z58m4.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=531&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A person waves a ‘Let’s Go Brandon’ flag, code for an expletive against U.S. President Joe Biden used by supporters of former president Donald Trump, in Ottawa during the so-called freedom convoy.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The worst-case scenario in the U.S. — blood in the streets — isn’t necessarily the most likely, but we ought to resist the tendency to assign too low a probability to events that could have serious, catastrophic consequences. </p>
<p>Some of the most constructive academic work in the middle of the 20th century, after all, was motivated by doom-saying around nuclear war (Thomas Schelling’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tnys7k8c7uU">Nobel Prize work on game theory</a>, for example). </p>
<p>More recently, <a href="https://climate.nasa.gov/effects/#:%7E:text=The%20IPCC%20predicts%20that%20increases,time%20as%20global%20temperatures%20increase.">predictions about the devastation that will result from the climate crisis</a> are being used to drive public policy and political debate. Will all the predictions bear out? Maybe not, but the intellectual exercise of preparing for the worst can improve our decision-making and position Canada to succeed in times of crisis. </p>
<h2>Jan. 6 just a prelude?</h2>
<p>For some reason, systematic and dispassionate analyses of what will happen if or when the American experiment with democracy ends have not happened, either in Canada or the U.S.</p>
<p><a href="https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/01/what-will-it-take-to-stop-a-2024-election-coup.html">Many are engaged in the battle to prevent the right wing from stealing the next U.S. election</a>, but this is only one, narrow concern. Spend an hour listening to someone like <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/01/03/dan-bongino-and-the-big-business-of-returning-trump-to-power">Dan Bongino</a>, a former Secret Service agent and Donald Trump supporter, and you’ll come away certain that the violence we all saw on Jan. 6, 2021, was not an isolated event but the beginning of something bigger. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Rioters climb a wall into the U.S. Capitol with a Trump flag in the foreground." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/445790/original/file-20220210-27-rqblsp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/445790/original/file-20220210-27-rqblsp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445790/original/file-20220210-27-rqblsp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445790/original/file-20220210-27-rqblsp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445790/original/file-20220210-27-rqblsp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445790/original/file-20220210-27-rqblsp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445790/original/file-20220210-27-rqblsp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Rioters loyal to Donald Trump climb the West Wall of the the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 6, 2021.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The trucker convoy is one small example of what can happen here when the dangerous forms of anti-democratic rhetoric south of the border spread into Canada.</p>
<p>The people in Ottawa aren’t protesters, they’re occupiers. They reject the use of democratic rhetoric in favour of authoritarian rhetoric, and they aim to dismantle the system that makes protest and free speech possible in the first place. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/what-the-freedom-convoy-reveals-about-the-ties-among-politics-police-and-the-law-176680">What the 'freedom convoy' reveals about the ties among politics, police and the law</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>What happens when that anti-democratic rhetoric becomes the norm in the U.S.? The combination of media outlets like Fox News that have far-reaching impact and <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-is-legitimate-political-discourse-and-does-it-include-the-jan-6-attack-on-the-capitol-176513">anti-democratic, authoritarian rhetoric</a> is exactly a recipe for the contagious spread of the kinds of behaviours that can threaten our own democracy. </p>
<p>What are the likeliest problems? Most obviously, violent rhetoric tends to fuel violent actions. We will see violent rhetoric normalized by cultural figures like Tucker Carlson <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/10/28/violent-rhetoric-continues-permeate-gop/">but also U.S. politicians.</a> </p>
<p>Imagine Fox News no longer playing the role of a media outlet that’s welcoming to the fringe voices of the far right, but instead is the formally sanctioned voice of the state. The more violent, extremist rhetoric becomes the norm, the more danger and violence we’re likely to see.</p>
<p>What will happen when Carlson turns his attention to Canada as a target and radicalizes our own citizens <a href="https://www.justsecurity.org/77078/the-propaganda-playbook-a-section-by-section-dissection-of-tucker-carlsons-communication-strategy/">with the authoritarian rhetoric he regularly employs?</a></p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1490906729902927874"}"></div></p>
<h2>Critical questions for Canada</h2>
<p>Can we, should we, regulate American media if they are clearly driving the rise of authoritarianism and the spread of propaganda aimed at ending free, liberal democracy? How do we treat American broadcast media and social media if they become obviously responsible for hastening the end of liberal values like equality, reason and the rule of law?</p>
<p>How will Canada combat the virulent spread of propaganda and misinformation when it comes directly from a government pretending to be democratic while enacting fascism?</p>
<p>What if American journalists wedded to the ideals of free speech, objectivity and professional standards of fairness become targets of state violence? Will we protect the right to a free press? How? </p>
<p>If American elections become obviously rigged, what will our role be in monitoring that kind of democratic backsliding? </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/445795/original/file-20220210-45987-v4hi8n.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A man with dark hair listens as an older man with orange-ish hair talks at him, seemingly angry." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/445795/original/file-20220210-45987-v4hi8n.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/445795/original/file-20220210-45987-v4hi8n.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=364&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445795/original/file-20220210-45987-v4hi8n.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=364&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445795/original/file-20220210-45987-v4hi8n.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=364&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445795/original/file-20220210-45987-v4hi8n.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=457&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445795/original/file-20220210-45987-v4hi8n.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=457&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445795/original/file-20220210-45987-v4hi8n.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=457&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Donald Trump talk at a plenary session at the NATO Summit in England in December 2019.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>What about American citizens still committed to the rule of law and the basic tenets of liberal society? Will they seek asylum in Canada by the millions? </p>
<p>How do we negotiate trade deals with an ideological, irrational state? We’ve had some preparation for this during Donald Trump’s one term as president, but he was still constrained by a semi-functioning system of checks and balances. What happens when that system is dismantled?</p>
<h2>Ripple effects</h2>
<p>We need a national conversation on these urgent questions. Our security, our economy and our culture are so deeply enmeshed with the U.S. that any significant change there will have ripple effects here. </p>
<p>Those ripples may turn into a tsunami should the changes be as radical and dire <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/jan/19/america-biden-trump-authoritarinism">as some predict</a>. </p>
<p>Such a national conversation will require us to shore up our own democracy and to learn how to regulate and prevent the spread of authoritarian rhetoric, hate speech and other forms of misinformation in the U.S.</p>
<p>We must be ready and able to champion the values and advantages that are afforded by living in a democracy. We might avoid the worst, but the preparation will make Canada a stronger, freer, safer country.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/176930/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Robert Danisch receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. </span></em></p>With the apparent slide towards authoritarianism in the U.S., Canada must be ready and able to defend and champion our democracy.Robert Danisch, Professor, Department of Communication Arts, University of WaterlooLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1767852022-02-09T15:52:47Z2022-02-09T15:52:47ZCandice Bergen’s nod to Trump is a sign of Canada’s descent, but the Charter may save us<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/445253/original/file-20220208-12-g24h6m.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C26%2C4421%2C2872&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Interim Conservative Leader Candice Bergen finishes her remarks during an emergency debate in the House of Commons on the situation in Ottawa.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang </span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Prior to becoming interim leader of the Conservative Party of Canada, <a href="https://www.macleans.ca/politics/who-is-candice-bergen-the-interim-conservative-leader/">MP Candice Bergen</a> was among the more vocal members of caucus to push former leader Erin O’Toole into an explicit embrace of the so-called freedom convoy that’s now occupying Ottawa.</p>
<p>CTV quoted Bergen echoing, almost verbatim, former U.S. president <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/08/trump-defends-white-nationalist-protesters-some-very-fine-people-on-both-sides/537012/">Donald Trump’s description</a> of the <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/james-alex-fields-driver-deadly-car-attack-charlottesville-rally-sentenced-n1024436">2017 Unite the Right Rally in Charlottesville, Va., which ended violently</a>, as having <a href="https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/bergen-pushed-o-toole-to-back-convoy-saying-there-are-good-people-on-both-sides-sources-1.5768337">“good people on both sides.”</a></p>
<p>The problem is that in both cases, this is untrue. There aren’t two sides or shades of grey when a protest is associated with symbols of <a href="https://theconversation.com/canadas-freedom-convoy-exposes-political-missteps-and-donald-trumps-ominous-legacy-175898">white supremacy, the desecration of national monuments</a>, the staging of a <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-91/clip/15892466">mock Indigenous drum circle</a> and accounts of <a href="https://www.thestar.com/opinion/editorials/2022/02/07/police-and-government-response-to-the-ottawa-occupation-has-been-a-shambles.html">verbal intimidation and abuse</a> of regular citizens. </p>
<p>There are also no shades of grey when one side embraces public health to protect the most vulnerable and the other side, through their own actions, endangers public health by flouting public health regulations and spreading misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines. </p>
<p>Far-right authoritarian populism of the type associated with events like Charlottesville and the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol has admirers in Canada. Plainly. Some of the truckers fly Trump flags and <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/candice-bergen-maga-hat-1.5865727">Bergen has been photographed wearing a MAGA hat</a>. Canada is not exactly America’s moderate little cousin to the north. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1489072640484593666"}"></div></p>
<p>Events like the so-called freedom convoy don’t just harm communities and individuals, they do serious damage to the body politic. We are all injured by the spread of misinformation about public health matters like COVID-19 or issues like catastrophic climate change caused by carbon consumption. But we’re also injured by false and destructive narratives about the Constitution and the rule of law. </p>
<h2>‘Lacking in merit’</h2>
<p>As a professor of jurisprudence and the rule of law, I predict violations alleged by the freedom convoy protesters will be found deeply lacking in merit once the dust has settled and the various Charter claims have wound their way through the courts.</p>
<p>Even fairly restrictive COVID-19 health protocols are unlikely to breach someone’s Charter rights in a way that entitles them to a court-ordered remedy. That’s because all individual rights and liberties in the Charter are subject to a proportionate balancing against the broader public good — none more obvious than scientific and data-driven assessments of risks posed by a virus that’s killed almost six million people worldwide, including more than 34,000 Canadians, in two years.</p>
<p>In fact, the very first provision in the Constitution of Canada is <a href="https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/csj-sjc/rfc-dlc/ccrf-ccdl/check/art1.html">Sec. 1 of the Charter explicitly stating</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Charter challenges to pandemic-related public health protocols enacted by both <a href="https://www.canlii.org/en/ca/fct/doc/2021/2021fc621/2021fc621.html?resultIndex=1">the federal</a> and <a href="https://www.canlii.org/en/bc/bcsc/doc/2021/2021bcsc512/2021bcsc512.html?resultIndex=1">provincial governments</a> are slowly being decided. They show very little promise for those asserting Charter rights violations due to COVID-19 health protocols. In most cases, Sec. 1 will stop any claim in its tracks. </p>
<p>So while Canada’s Constitution will not permit the RCMP to smash down the door of vaccine holdouts and violate their bodily integrity by forcing them to get the jab, it permits the weighing of individual rights to freedom of religion and conscience against the risk of worsening a public health crisis and creating an even greater loss of life. </p>
<p>So far, however, the truckers have not even explicitly stated which of their particular Charter rights they believe are being violated and how. </p>
<h2>Blaming the wrong person</h2>
<p>The federal government’s requirement that truckers crossing the Canada-U.S. border must be vaccinated is aligned with the same requirement by American authorities.</p>
<p>But beyond the fundamental weakness of any Charter objection to vaccine mandates for cross-border truckers lies an even broader weakness to the truckers’ rallying cry: “Fuck Trudeau.” </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="A protester holds a sign that says fuck trudeau" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/445277/original/file-20220209-26-1m842fk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/445277/original/file-20220209-26-1m842fk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=408&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445277/original/file-20220209-26-1m842fk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=408&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445277/original/file-20220209-26-1m842fk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=408&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445277/original/file-20220209-26-1m842fk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=512&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445277/original/file-20220209-26-1m842fk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=512&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/445277/original/file-20220209-26-1m842fk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=512&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A protester holds a sign during the so-called freedom convoy rally against COVID-19 restrictions on Parliament Hill.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>He is not to blame.</p>
<p>Beyond the border, the federal government doesn’t have jurisdiction over much of what the protesters are objecting to.</p>
<p>The provinces are on the front lines of the response to COVID-19 in terms of the management of health care, the regulation of private businesses and most other aspects that play a major role in how the pandemic is affecting day-to-day life for Canadian citizens. That’s how federalism works. </p>
<p>Trudeau, the focus of the truckers’ ire, has become a puzzling far-right obsession similar to how Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton became the focus of wild-eyed conspiracy mongers south of the border. The fixation on Trudeau personally is a symptom of extremism. It is reactionary and irrational in the extreme. </p>
<h2>Trump-admiring Conservatives</h2>
<p>Now that the Conservatives have traded O'Toole for Bergen and firebrand Pierre Poilievre is waiting in the wings, American-style, Trump-admiring Conservatives are poised to take over the Official Opposition here in Canada. Canadians should be alarmed. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1490115382157398030"}"></div></p>
<p>Trouble is, there are no both sides when one side cannot abide scientific facts or make a cognizable legal argument. The truckers in Ottawa and their supporters are not good-faith activists or empowered citizens. </p>
<p>They have not done their research. They don’t understand the Charter, federalism or the rule of law. They are selfish and entitled because they understand freedom in a purely individualistic sense. The convoy, like <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/coutts-traffic-border-1.6343280">the escalating blockade on the Canadian side of the U.S. border in Coutts, Alta.,</a> is a sign that Canada is on the cusp of its own Charlottesville or Jan. 6.</p>
<p>We are fools to think ourselves immune.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/176785/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jeffrey B. Meyers does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The trucker convoy is a sign that Canada is on the cusp of its own Jan. 6, with Conservatives taking a page from Donald Trump’s playbook.Jeffrey B. Meyers, Lecturer, Faculty of Law, Thompson Rivers UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1708382021-11-11T10:24:06Z2021-11-11T10:24:06ZEric Zemmour: Jewish heritage is a useful tool for the French far right<p>French commentator Eric Zemmour has risen to political notoriety off the back of anti-Muslim hatred and anti-migrant incitement before even officially announcing his candidacy in the 2022 French presidential elections.</p>
<p>One recent <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/new-poll-puts-zemmour-round-two-french-vote-behind-president-macron-2021-10-22/">poll</a> placed Zemmour at 16% – which would translate into a second-round run off between him and current president Emmanuel Macron, knocking out far-right candidate Marine Le Pen.</p>
<p>Zemmour sits firmly to the right of his rival Le Pen. He has convictions for inciting racial hatred and is an open proponent of the <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/13684302211028293">“great replacement”</a> conspiracy theory. This suggests white people are being ethnically cleansed by Muslim migrants and Jewish puppet-masters, and has emerged as the ideological underpinning for attacks including the Pittsburgh Synagogue shooting in 2018 and the Christchurch Mosques shooting in 2019.</p>
<p>Zemmour has made various <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/25/world/europe/eric-zemmour-france-jewish-bernard-henri-levy.html?referringSource=articleShare">ahistorical comments</a>, including that Vichy France, the regime that collaborated with the Nazis during the second world war, actually “protected French Jews”. He has also <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/global/2021/oct/30/rise-of-far-right-puts-dreyfus-affair-into-spotlight-in-french-election-race">questioned</a> the innocence of Alfred Dreyfus, who was falsely convicted for treason in a notorious example of 20th century antisemitism. His stock in trade has become to give oxygen to antisemitic conspiracy theorists. </p>
<p>It may therefore seem surprising that Zemmour is himself of Jewish heritage. He is the descendent of Algerian Berber Jewish immigrants. </p>
<h2>‘Double punishment’</h2>
<p>Yonathan Arfi, vice president of the Representative Council of French Jews, describes it all as a <a href="http://www.crif.org/fr/content/blog-du-crif-eric-zemmour-la-double-peine-des-juifs-fran%C3%A7ais">“double punishment</a>. First, French Jews have to hear the false narratives Zemmour espouses, then they have to deal with the fact that these words have come from someone who is identified as coming from Jewish heritage himself – which adds a false air of legitimacy to the claims. </p>
<p>There are questions over how much Zemmour actually engages with his Jewish identity – but, as philosopher <a href="https://laregledujeu.org/2021/10/18/37786/ce-que-zemmour-fait-au-nom-juif/">Bernard-Henri Lévy</a> argues, that has become irrelevant. Despite rigorous criticism from the Jewish community, "what Mr Zemmour does, whether he likes it or not, [is] in the Jewish name”. </p>
<h2>The emergence of a Jewish far right</h2>
<p>Zemmour is not the first Jewish person to engage with far-right politics, or to run for election. In federal elections in Germany this year, for example <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/.premium.HIGHLIGHT-why-jews-join-the-german-far-right-1.10269252">Marcel Goldhammer</a>, vice-chairman of Jews in the Alternative for Germany - an organisation aligned with the far-right party - stood as a candidate representing a tiny but vocal collection of radical-right German Jews. </p>
<p>Jewish people sign up to far-right parties for many of the same reasons as the wider population. They might oppose immigration or be ultra-nationalist in their thinking. But the fact that these movements so often thrive off the back of antisemitism and Holocaust revisionism makes Jewish involvement a puzzling hypocrisy.</p>
<p>Collective identity theory helps explain this puzzle. Sociologist David Snow <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5749/j.ctt46npj4.19?refreqid=excelsior%3A64a39bfbd6c4b312961f6fd94acea34e&seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents">notes</a> that everyone carries multiple collective identities, some of which are prioritised over others. This is what is termed an “identity salience hierarchy”. In this case, some Jews appear to have constructed collective identities which include the far right and prioritise political ideology over other aspects of Jewish identity. </p>
<p>Some buy into deliberately skewed assertions that Muslim or migrant communities are the sole cause of rising antisemitism. Instead of combating far-right antisemites, they they are espousing their ani-Islamic message.</p>
<h2>Questionable alliances</h2>
<p>Jean-Marie Le Pen, backing Zemmour over his own daughter, <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/marine-le-pens-father-backs-far-right-rival-eric-zemmour-for-presidency-72zl2lhhl">reflected that</a> “the only difference between Eric and me is that he is Jewish. It is difficult to call him a Nazi or fascist. This gives him more freedom”. Whether it is Zemmour’s intention or not, he is being presented by the French extreme right as a champion of their cause. They are absolutely clear that his Jewish identity is a helpful tool to deflect accusations of racism. </p>
<p>In the course of my research, I came across multiple illustrative comments on right-wing forums on 4chan’s politics boards, where Zemmour was described as “100% /ourjew/”. One user praised Zemmour, who “despite being Jewish, seems to truly love France”. Another added that he “recognises his Jewish identity but he doesn’t let that stop him from speaking out again <strong>[sic]</strong> Jewish influence and mass immigration”.</p>
<p>However, other extreme-right figures view Zemmour as a trojan horse for Jewish control. To them, he is living confirmation of great replacement conspiracy theories. <a href="https://www.splcenter.org/hatewatch/2019/05/01/prolific-alt-right-propagandists-identity-confirmed">Eric Striker</a> a US-based alt-right propagandist (who is widely believed to be a persona) posted to his large Telegram following that “Zemmour is hostile to French racial and Catholic-centred nationalism, is an open Jewish supremacist, and is using throwing out some red meat about ethnic decline to mask his actual policy proposals, which are liberal, globalist, and Zionist neo-conservativism”. Despite attempts to cosy up to the far right, Zemmour will still only be seen by some as an immigrant and a Jew. </p>
<p>Overt Nazism is often still seen as the only indicator of far-right sentiment. But a careful public relations transformation is underway. Extremists such as Zemmour have the capacity to attract votes from portions of the electorate who support his policies, but do not consider themselves to be fascists or racists. His identity reassures them of this belief. </p>
<p>He has helped high-profile far-right figures in their quest to move the Overton window, making it politically acceptable to espouse hateful views in mainstream politics. Whether Zemmour ever does really end up making an electoral impact, the precedent is already being set. The strategic use of far-right philosemitism (a suspicious love of Jews based on stereotypes) remains an urgent threat for Muslim and Jewish communities alike.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/170838/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Hannah Rose receives funding from the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation, where she is a Research Fellow. She also holds a fellowship at the Institute for Freedom of Faith and Security in Europe, and is a trustee of the Union of Jewish Students. </span></em></p>The French commentator’s heritage is providing a useful patina for extreme views.Hannah Rose, Research Fellow at the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation; PhD Candidate in War Studies, King's College LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1694302021-10-17T15:59:57Z2021-10-17T15:59:57ZÉric Zemmour: the far-right polemicist’s ideas have a long history in France<p>In October 2021, the far-right presidential candidate Éric Zemmour was on the heels of Marine Le Pen, <a href="https://www.bfmtv.com/politique/elections/presidentielle/presidentielle-macron-en-tete-zemmour-a-16-mais-derriere-le-pen-selon-un-nouveau-sondage_AD-202110150490.html">polling 16%</a>. However, in the <a href="https://www.bfmtv.com/politique/elections/presidentielle/presidentielle-macron-en-tete-zemmour-a-16-mais-derriere-le-pen-selon-un-nouveau-sondage_AD-202110150490.html">latest survey by BFMTV</a>, dated 5 April, his support has nearly fallen by half, to just 9%.</p>
<p>What changed everything was Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. A backer of the traditional values espoused by the Kremlin, Zemmour’s long-standing call for closer diplomatic ties with Moscow and criticisms of NATO have <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/le-monde-in-english/article/2022/02/28/collateral-electoral-damages-of-war-in-ukraine_6115563_5026681.html">backfired</a>. Having committed a first political blunder in December by “betting Russia would not invade Ukraine,” the candidate haemorrhaged further support when he recently rejected the possibility of hosting Ukrainian refugees. Meanwhile, Marine Le Pen has also managed to overtake him as the champion for living standards, at a time when the <a href="https://theconversation.com/economic-fallout-from-ukraine-war-could-give-le-pens-social-populist-strategy-an-edge-179863">economic fallout from the war</a> continues to skim off Zemmour’s natural supporters.</p>
<p>Regardless of his position, the candidate will have left a deep mark on the presidential campaign by shifting public discourse further to the right. A few days ahead of the first round of the elections, political scientist Alain Policar walks us through his most popular – and controversial - ideas. </p>
<hr>
<p><em><strong>Lire cet article en français:</strong> <a href="https://theconversation.com/eric-zemmour-une-histoire-francaise-169213">Éric Zemmour: une histoire française</a></em></p>
<hr>
<h2>The ‘Great Replacement’ theory</h2>
<p>Throughout the campaign, Zemmour has openly promoted the “Great Replacement” theory – a racist belief, popular on the far-right in Europe, the US and the UK, that white people will soon be “replaced” by non-white, non-European immigrants.</p>
<p>The head of Reconquête, who has been convicted by the French courts twice for <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/societe/article/2019/09/20/eric-zemmour-definitivement-condamne-pour-provocation-a-la-haine-raciale_6012389_3224.html">inciting racial hatred</a>, would have us believe that France’s greatness is built upon its position at the top of a “<a href="https://www.acrimed.org/Eric-Zemmour-rehabilite-les-races-avec-video">hierarchy of cultures</a>”. This position turns a blind eye to the horrors of French colonial racism, considering it a necessary price for offering colonised people their moral enlightenment.</p>
<h2>Assimilation and separatism</h2>
<p>In Zemmour’s view, French life and French values are under threat from Islam. He argues that France is contaminated by “<a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/politique/article/2021/02/25/vous-presentez-une-loi-qui-est-tout-a-fait-positive-apres-marine-le-pen-gerald-darmanin-poursuit-le-debat-face-a-eric-zemmour_6071114_823448.html">separatism</a>”.</p>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/frances-new-separatism-law-stigmatises-minorities-and-could-backfire-badly-162705">“Separatism”</a> is a loaded term in France. It was once used to <a href="https://www.franceculture.fr/histoire/separatisme-de-lanti-france-chez-les-soviets-a-lislam-en-passant-par-la-negritude">describe anti-colonial struggles</a>, particularly those in Algeria and has been the standard accusation thrown at Jewish people since antiquity, and <a href="https://www.maisondulivre.com/livre/9782204069236-judeophobie-attitudes-a-l-egard-des-juifs-dans-le-monde-antique-peter-schafer/">forms the basis of much modern anti-Semitism</a>. But it is also current government policy to root out “separatism” through a new law promoting “respect for the principles of the Republic”.</p>
<p>Zemmour is also an ardent supporter of <a href="https://www.lefigaro.fr/vox/politique/eric-zemmour-separatisme-ce-projet-de-loi-qui-refuse-de-considerer-la-realite-20210205">assimilation</a> of migrants to France. His endorsement of assimilation should not be surprising, particularly when we recall that this word was once used to justify the <a href="https://www.cairn.info/les-frontieres-de-l-identite-nationale--9782707169365-page-25.htm">race-based politics</a> evident in the privileges enjoyed by French colonists, which turned them into a quasi-aristocracy; a race apart.</p>
<p>In fact, <a href="https://journals.openedition.org/chrhc/956">American historian Tyler Stovall</a> observed that colonists were more inclined to call themselves “white” or “European” than French. He writes:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“It was in the colonies that understandings of the French national idea first became confused with the racial idea of whiteness.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Yet upholding assimilationism in Zemmour’s view would also imply the non-assimilation of certain groups. He regularly argues, for example, that <a href="https://www.rtl.fr/actu/politique/immigration-l-islam-n-est-pas-compatible-avec-la-france-selon-zemmour-7900076221">Islam is not compatible with the Republic</a> – the opposite of assimilationist politics.</p>
<p>This is also an idea with deep roots – it should be remembered that to obtain French citizenship in 1958, Algerian Muslim women were required to remove their headscarves during inauguration ceremonies. What better way to illustrate that you had to stop being a Muslim woman to become a French one?</p>
<h2>False universalism</h2>
<p>Zemmour’s pronouncements may be incendiary, but through them we can see that the old idea of a French nation defined in racial terms has had a lasting influence on contemporary debate.</p>
<p>One such idea is that of “universalism”, which holds that the national characteristic of being French supersedes any other identity an individual may have. But if immigrants are asked to defer to French traditions based on an assumption that such traditions are inherently universal, universalism becomes not a form of humanism that embraces diversity, but rather a nationalistic symbol.</p>
<p>This is how <a href="https://www.cairn.info/la-fracture-coloniale--9782707149398-page-137.htm">Achille Mbembe</a> described the concept in a <a href="https://www.editionsladecouverte.fr/la_fracture_coloniale-9782707149398">2005 article</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Having long upheld the ‘republican model’ as the perfect vehicle for inclusion and the emergence of individuality, we have ultimately turned the Republic into an imaginary institution, and underestimated its original capacity for brutality, discrimination and exclusion.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>A harsh judgement, perhaps, but French history (long before the establishment of the Republic) attests to this racialised dimension. When it uses national identity as the guiding light of the republican cause, universalism has been seriously misled, to the point of forfeiting all substance.</p>
<p>It is worth noting that this version of universalism can appear in other guises, particularly in <a href="https://www.editionsbdl.com/produit/comment-peut-on-etre-cosmopolite">anti-cosmopolitanism</a>, which slanders society’s incorrigible utopians and blindsided bleeding hearts. This is precisely the tone adopted by Éric Zemmour.</p>
<p>One might even hypothesise that hiding behind this false universalism is a hatred of the universal, exemplified in the famous quote by Joseph de Maistre in his <a href="https://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Livre:Maistre_%E2%80%93_Consid%C3%A9rations_sur_la_France_(Ed._1829).pdf"><em>Considerations on France</em> (1796)</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“In my life I have seen Frenchmen, Italians, Russians, and so on. I even know, thanks to Montesquieu, that one can be Persian. But as for man, I declare I’ve never encountered him.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In much the same way, Zemmour presents us with a fragmented world that offends his own obsession with purity – his simultaneous hatred of intermingling and <a href="https://livre.fnac.com/a209544/Henry-Mechoulan-Le-Sang-de-l-autre-ou-l-Honneur-de-Dieu">a fear of sameness</a>.</p>
<p>Three years ago, my colleague and I wrote <a href="https://theconversation.com/eric-zemmour-un-symptome-107288">an article</a> about Zemmour’s place in the public arena in France, and how we should resist his impoverished, extremist rhetoric. While Zemmour is likely to have his campaign come to an early end, many of his ideas continue to live through Marine Le Pen. More provocative than his rival, the former journalist may have unwittingly <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.fr/entry/comment-zemmour-a-permis-a-le-pen-daccentuer-sa-dediabolisation_fr_623ed6c2e4b0e340f6a3593d">given her the means</a> to make it to the second round herself – and possibly to Elysee Palace.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/169430/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alain Policar ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>Zemmour’s statements about universalism, assimilation and “separatism” have deep roots in the history of the French Republic.Alain Policar, Chercheur associé en science politique (Cevipof), Sciences Po Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1655682021-08-17T11:22:17Z2021-08-17T11:22:17ZThe south of France is a Marine Le Pen stronghold – but has she hit a ceiling?<p>With eight months to go until the next French presidential election, it’s possible that the 2022 contest will once again come down to a choice between Emmanuel Macron and far-right leader Marine Le Pen.</p>
<p>If she is to advance to the second round, as she did in 2017, Le Pen will rely on her party strongholds in the north and south of the country. In particular, the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur region, known as PACA, where the Rassemblement National (formerly the Front National) has patiently established itself as a force over the course of many years.</p>
<p>PACA is composed of six departments: Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, Alpes-Maritimes, Bouches-du-Rhône, Hautes-Alpes, Var and Vaucluse. It includes large cities such as Marseille, Nice and Toulon, as well as those with strong symbolic or cultural significance such as Avignon and Cannes.</p>
<p>It was in 1995 that the Front National first won three important cities in the region during municipal elections: Toulon, Orange and Marignane, adding <a href="https://livre.fnac.com/a990906/Virginie-Martin-Toulon-la-noire">Vitrolles in 1997</a>. The cities fell to the far-right due to a combination of historical mismanagement and growing dissidence, though some have since returned to more traditional parties.</p>
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<p>In the 2017 presidential election, Le Pen won the first round with 28% of the vote in PACA, while Macron came third. Le Pen lost the second round to Macron, gaining 45% of votes to Macron’s 55%.</p>
<p>These electoral moments have allowed the Rassemblement National to establish itself firmly in the region, securing support, consolidating networks, hiring more employees, attracting volunteers, <a href="https://www.cairn.info/revue-critique-internationale-1999-3-page-169.htm?contenu=resume">getting involved with local organisations</a> and establishing <a href="https://theconversation.com/lenracinement-comme-valeur-politique-declin-des-partis-retour-des-notables-161845">a more respectable image</a> for itself.</p>
<h2>The anti-immigrant vote</h2>
<p>How did the far-right become so established in the south? More than any other issue, the vote is united around the issue of <a href="https://theconversation.com/le-rassemblement-national-par-ses-electorats-161836">immigration</a> which <a href="https://theconversation.com/le-fn-et-la-parano-a-identitaire-52183">aggregates</a> almost all Rassemblement National voters, whatever their disagreements may be on other subjects such as the economy. My research has <a href="https://www.cairn.info/revue-francaise-de-science-politique-2019-2-page-223.html">shown</a> just how crucial this point has been in building <a href="https://www.editions-harmattan.fr/index.asp?navig=catalogue&obj=livre&no=1698&razSqlClone=1">support for the far-right</a> in this region since 2000.</p>
<p>The term “immigration” must be analysed in its complexity for the electorate in PACA. It is strongly linked with cultural, cultural, economic or historical markers of identity in the region. And unlike <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/les-decodeurs/article/2017/05/10/presidentielle-le-vote-fn-est-il-concentre-dans-des-zones-avec-peu-d-immigres_5125715_4355770.html">in other parts of France</a>, in PACA there is a <a href="https://books.google.fr/books?hl=fr&lr=&id=IbHZCgAAQBAJ">strong correlation</a> between areas with higher rates of immigration and those where there is a significant far-right vote.</p>
<p>The other key point lies in the rejection of Islam in its most visible forms among far-right voters, notably women who wear the veil and the presence of halal shops.</p>
<p>Some people – especially older voters – feel that the Provençal identity, which is not confined to the Provence department but <a href="https://livre.fnac.com/a990906/Virginie-Martin-Toulon-la-noire">runs through the region</a>, is being disturbed by waves of migration.</p>
<p>French-origin repatriates who left Algeria after it secured independence, while <a href="https://www.cairn.info/revue-pole-sud-2016-2-page-119.htm">not a homogeneous voting bloc</a>, are a significant component of the far-right vote in PACA, due to their historical rejection of Charles de Gaulle who they see as having “given up” Algeria. Today this community is ageing and the historical trauma is gradually fading, but the connections have left their mark and their votes often <a href="https://popups.uliege.be/2295-0311/index.php?id=189&file=1">goes to the extreme right</a>.</p>
<p>Rassemblement National voters are receptive to the link often drawn between immigration and delinquency by party leaders. “Crime is the consequence of immigration”, Marine Le Pen stated in <a href="https://www.lepoint.fr/politique/insecurite-et-immigration-le-pen-repart-a-l-attaque-contre-l-executif-11-01-2018-2185860_20.php">2018</a>, an argument that is now widely used in relation to <a href="https://youtu.be/O6ud72ZjcG8">immigration and terrorism</a></p>
<p>This electorate also remains partly convinced by the words of Marine’s father and party founder Jean Marie Le Pen, who served as a regional councillor in PACA and spoke of immigrants taking jobs from “French” people. But the argument is less present today in view of two elements: on one hand, Marine Le Pen now links employment to the wider issue of globalisation, which she says destroys jobs; on the other, the expressions “Islamists” and “migrants” have come to replace the terms <a href="https://www.nouvelobs.com/presidentielle-2017/20170202.OBS4761/au-fn-on-ne-dit-plus-arabes-ou-immigres-sait-on-jamais.html">“Arabs or immigrants”</a> used in the past.</p>
<p>Certainly, at the heart of the party, the white supremacist idea of the <a href="https://www.adl.org/resources/backgrounders/the-great-replacement-an-explainer">“great replacement”</a> remains appealing, but there is no longer any question of singling out “Arabs”, because second-generation immigrants formerly categorised as such are now seen as <a href="https://www.lepoint.fr/politique/ces-musulmans-seduits-par-le-fn-07-10-2015-1971307_20.php">potential far-right voters</a>.</p>
<h2>Respectability politics</h2>
<p>Whereas in some parts of the country, Le Pen and her party are seen as an anathema even to those on the right, in PACA the relationship between the traditional right, Les Républicains, and the Rassemblement National is more porous.</p>
<p>It is in this context that Thierry Mariani, who has spent his entire political career on the right of French politics, has become a key candidate for the Rassemblement National. After suggesting Les Républicains consider <a href="https://www.lejdd.fr/Politique/thierry-mariani-il-faut-un-accord-avec-le-fn-3595874">agreements</a> with Le Pen’s party in 2018, this native of Orange ended up joining the Rassemblement National list for the European elections in 2019. He was top of the electoral list for PACA in the 2021 regional elections.</p>
<p>Mariani is well known and well rooted in the region, particularly in Vaucluse: he was for a long time a councillor of the department and has been mayor of Valréas. In the 1990s, he was a regional councillor for PACA and then served as minister for transport during the presidency of Nicolas Sarkozy.</p>
<p>As head of the electoral list in the regional elections, Mariani offered the Rassemblement National a <a href="https://www.franceculture.fr/emissions/le-reportage-de-la-redaction/du-fn-au-rn-dix-ans-de-dediabolisation">veneer of respectability</a>, part of a process of rehabilitation of the party initiated by Marine Le Pen since she became leader in 2011.</p>
<p>Mariani did not win PACA as expected in the 2021 regional elections, which were marked by <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-undisputed-winner-of-the-french-regional-elections-abstention-163545">record high levels of abstention</a>, but by his presence alone, he contributed to a growing feeling that the far-right is no longer taboo or <a href="https://jean-jaures.org/nos-productions/2022-evaluation-du-risque-le-pen">repellent</a> in France.</p>
<p>Still, his failure will give the Rassemblement National pause for thought ahead of the 2022 presidential poll. Has the party hit a ceiling for electoral success? Have other parties successfully found a way to block it from winning in the second round of elections?</p>
<p>Marine Le Pen remains a serious contender for the upcoming presidential elections. But it would seem that the competition is getting tougher for the Rassemblement National. There is the candidacy of Éric Zemmour, who threatens to outflank the party on the extreme right. Then there is Florian Philippot, Le Pen’s former campaign director, who is now riding the wave of the <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/politique/article/2021/08/07/florian-philippot-tente-de-surfer-sur-le-mouvement-anti-passe-sanitaire_6090797_823448.html">anti-health pass movement</a>, as well as her traditional rival, Nicolas Dupont Aignan. The ranks of the far-right challengers are filling up and risk splitting Le Pen’s vote in France.</p>
<p>As for PACA, though the region remains a bastion for the Rassemblement National, it is not the indispensable base many had thought before the regional elections.</p>
<p>It seems the points of weakness are multiplying for the Le Pen.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/165568/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Virginie Martin ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>The south-eastern region of France known as PACA has long been a centre of power for the far-right, but recent failures in the regional elections bring its future into question for Marine Le Pen.Virginie Martin, Docteure sciences politiques, HDR sciences de gestion, Kedge Business SchoolLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1569932021-03-19T12:37:26Z2021-03-19T12:37:26ZDutch elections: Mark Rutte wins another term but fragmented results mask continuing popularity of the far right<p>For the fourth time in a row, the liberal-conservative party VVD has <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-56436297">won the Dutch general elections</a>. Prime Minister Mark Rutte, one of the longest serving leaders in Europe, will hold on to that status despite a <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-56393820">tumultuous year</a>. </p>
<p>The VVD’s victory was predicted but the electoral gains made by one of its coalition partners in the last government – the social liberal D66 – were more surprising. Led by Sigrid Kaag, a multilingual former diplomat and ardent supporter of the European Union, D66 has become the second largest party in the Netherlands. That could force Rutte to orientate his future policy in a more pro-European direction. </p>
<p>As Rutte ruled out any form of cooperation with the two main radical right-wing parties – <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/geert-wilders-4827">Geert Wilders’</a> Party for Freedom (PVV) and Forum for Democracy (FVD) – he will have to engage with others. And in an increasingly fragmented political landscape, the VVD has more parties to choose from than ever. The 150-seat Dutch parliament will have 17 parties after this election result. It might take a while to form the government but it will probably end up being a broad continuation of the last. That means the VVD and D66 working with the Christian Democrats (who lost a few seats). They’ll need one other party to obtain a parliamentary majority. </p>
<p>But anyone thinking these results spell the end of nationalist-populist movements in the Netherlands should look closer. The PVV lost a few seats but if you combine its vote share with those of two other more recently established radical parties – JA21 and FVD (the only party that campaigned on anti-lockdown and anti-vaccination rhetoric) – the Dutch far right has won more seats than ever before.</p>
<h2>Beware the opposition</h2>
<p>In such a fragmented political landscape, opposition is a competitive yet interesting place to be. Holding a governing coalition together is difficult at the best of times, but Rutte has to tread the line between a large number of parties. That leaves space for radical right parties to continue to build their electoral prospects while presenting themselves as outsiders. They can propose radical change and criticise the government over an array of issues – including the poor quality of welfare state services, financial aid being sent to other countries and a lack of law and order – without having to assume any responsibilities. </p>
<p>Both within the Netherlands and beyond, this diversity of issues enables the far right to thrive. That’s because their constituency, too, is highly diverse. </p>
<p>To better understand the diversity behind the radical right vote, I travelled through France and the Netherlands for several years, holding <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/roads-to-the-radical-right-9780198863632?lang=en&cc=en">in-depth interviews</a> with 125 citizens who supported Wilders and France’s Marine Le Pen. The backgrounds of the voters I spoke with differed enormously. Some were highly educated, others less so, Some were old, some were young. Some were millionaires living in penthouses and others were unemployed and in social housing. </p>
<p>Voters with different profiles turned out to hold very different motives for voting for the same party. For instance, citizens I met in socially disadvantageous positions (low levels of education and income) principally claimed that they were unfairly disadvantaged with respect to migrants and asylum seekers. They particularly spoke about social housing, health care and elderly care in this context.</p>
<p>By contrast, small business owners and employees in the private sector were less likely to believe that they received too little. Instead, they said they felt they gave too much, especially to non-native outgroups who were believed to violate their work ethic – such as “lazy Greeks”, “profiteers in Brussels”, and “fortune seekers” benefiting from their tax contributions. Other voters I spoke to from the more well-off segments of society primarily voted PVV based on ideological considerations. They were denouncing non-native outgroups (especially Muslims), who they felt lacked the willingness to assimilate into (and so threaten) the native majority culture.</p>
<p>The key to understanding Wilders’ continuing electoral appeal, and that of his political allies, lies in the particular way in which he taps into these
variegated demands. He invokes an overarching opposition between native-versus-foreign in different issue domains, including identity, European integration, Islam, security and welfare chauvinism. </p>
<p>Like other nativist leaders, he opposes a broad “us” – including, in his case, the “hardworking”, “elderly”, “Judeo-Christian” as well as “ordinary” Dutch – to a broad range of non-native outgroups (“them”), that would threaten “our” traditions, freedom, identity and prosperity. Precisely this overarching opposition allows his diverse voters to identify themselves with the same nativist agenda.</p>
<p>In other words, Wilders’ boundaries between “us” and “them” are multiple and flexible (as the PVV-leader recently illustrated, during the COVID crisis, when attacking the Dutch government’s decision to financially support Italians rather than its own population). Yet they are all based on the same nativist principle, according to which “our people” should be put first. </p>
<h2>Post-pandemic politics</h2>
<p>Rutte has held onto his popularity by presenting himself as the national crisis manager who pragmatically steered his country through the pandemic. But at some point, a debate on political accountability will unavoidably unfold, including questions on how well prepared his government was for the crisis. This blame game might negatively affect the next government, especially if the composition of the coalition is similar to the last government.</p>
<p>At some point other political issues will return to the fore and the far right will be on more comfortable political ground. When migration begins to rise again after the pandemic, for example, Wilders will be reminded of how he soared in the polls during the refugee crisis of a few years ago. Similarly, the nativist right will see an opportunity in any talk of post-pandemic financial “solidarity” between European nations.</p>
<p>Comfortably installed in the opposition benches, Dutch MPs on the radical right will be more numerous than ever. They shouldn’t be expected to fade into obscurity in the years to come.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/156993/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Koen Damhuis does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>There will be 17 parties in the 150-seat parliament – and the radical right holds more of them than ever.Koen Damhuis, Assistant Professor, Utrecht University School of Governance, Utrecht UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1529702021-01-14T23:45:44Z2021-01-14T23:45:44ZWhy social media platforms banning Trump won’t stop — or even slow down — his cause<p>Last week Twitter <a href="https://blog.twitter.com/en_us/topics/company/2020/suspension.html">permanently suspended</a> US President Donald Trump in the wake of his supporters’ violent storming of Capitol Hill. Trump was also suspended from <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/07/donald-trump-twitter-ban-comes-to-end-amid-calls-for-tougher-action">Facebook and Instagram indefinitely</a>.</p>
<p>Heads <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/08/technology/twitter-trump-suspended.html?">quickly turned</a> to the right-wing <a href="https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Justice/2021/0111/As-tech-giants-recoil-from-Trump-and-Parler-is-free-speech-at-risk">Twitter alternative</a> Parler — which seemed to be a logical place of respite for the digitally de-throned president. </p>
<p>But Parler too was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/11/parler-goes-offline-after-amazon-drops-it-due-to-violent-content">axed</a>, as Amazon pulled its hosting services and Google and Apple removed it from their stores. The social network, which has since <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2021/01/11/parler-amazon-antitrust-suit-457579">sued Amazon</a>, is effectively shut down until it can secure a new host or force Amazon to restore its services. </p>
<p>These actions may seem like legitimate attempts by platforms to tackle Trump’s violence-fuelling rhetoric. The reality, however, is they will do little to truly disengage his supporters or deal with issues of violence and hate speech. </p>
<p>With an election vote count of 74,223,744 (46.9%), the magnitude of Trump’s following is clear. And since being banned from Twitter, he <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-01-13/us-president-donald-trump-says-impeachment-absolutely-ridiculous/13053120">hasn’t shown any intention</a> of backing down. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/aLjfWxy2qjo?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">In his first appearance since the Capitol attack, Trump described the impeachment process as ‘a continuation of the greatest witch hunt in the history of politics’.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Not budging</h2>
<p>With more than <a href="https://www.tweetbinder.com/blog/trump-twitter/">47,000 original tweets</a> from Trump’s personal Twitter account (@realdonaldtrump) since 2009, one could argue he used the platform inordinately. There’s much speculation about what he might do now.</p>
<p>Tweeting via the official Twitter account for the president @POTUS, he said he might consider <a href="https://au.pcmag.com/social-media/84771/trump-considers-building-his-own-social-media-site-after-twitter-ban">building his own</a> platform. Twitter promptly removed this tweet. He also <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/world/north-america/donald-trump-permanently-banned-from-twitter-20210109-p56suo.html">tweeted</a>: “We will not be SILENCED!”.</p>
<p>This threat may come with some standing as Trump does have avenues to control various forms of media. In November, <a href="https://www.axios.com/trump-fox-news-digital-media-competitor-25afddee-144d-4820-8ed4-9eb0ffa42420.html">Axios reported</a> he was considering launching his own right-wing media venture. </p>
<p>For his followers, the internet remains a “<a href="http://link-springer-com-443.webvpn.fjmu.edu.cn/chapter/10.1007%2F978-3-319-64388-5_1">natural hunting ground</a>” where they can continue gaining support through spreading racist and hateful sentiment.</p>
<p>The internet is also notoriously hard to police – it has no real borders, and features such as <a href="https://theconversation.com/facebooks-push-for-end-to-end-encryption-is-good-news-for-user-privacy-as-well-as-terrorists-and-paedophiles-128782">encryption</a> enable anonymity. Laws differ from state to state and nation to nation; an act deemed illegal in one locale may be legal elsewhere.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1349158728155611137"}"></div></p>
<p>It’s no surprise groups including fascists, neo-Nazis, anti-Semites and white supremacists were <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/aug/31/far-right-alt-right-white-supremacists-rise-online">early and eager adopters</a> of the internet. Back in 1998, former Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard David Duke <a href="https://www.damemagazine.com/2017/10/19/twitter-and-white-supremacy-love-story/">wrote</a> online:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I believe that the internet will begin a chain reaction of racial enlightenment that will shake the world by the speed of its intellectual conquest.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>As far as efforts to quash such extremism go, they’re usually too little, too late. </p>
<p>Take <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10576100903259951?scroll=top&needAccess=true">Stormfront</a>, a neo-Nazi platform <a href="https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/extremist-files/group/stormfront">described as</a> the web’s first major racial hate site. It was set up in 1995 by a former Klan state leader, and only removed from the open web 22 years later in 2017.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/social-media-giants-have-finally-confronted-trumps-lies-but-why-wait-until-there-was-a-riot-in-the-capitol-152820">Social media giants have finally confronted Trump's lies. But why wait until there was a riot in the Capitol?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>The psychology of hate</h2>
<p>Banning Trump from social media won’t necessarily silence him or his supporters. Esteemed British psychiatrist and broadcaster Raj Persaud <a href="https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/trump-social-media-ban-narcissism-violence-by-raj-persaud-2021-01">sums it up</a> well: “narcissists do not respond well to social exclusion”. </p>
<p>Others have highlighted the <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/trump-twitter-ban-parler-gab-b1785515.html">many options</a> still available for Trump fans to congregate since Parler’s departure, which was used to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/09/technology/apple-google-parler.html?">communicate plans</a> ahead of the siege at Capitol. <a href="https://thenewdaily.com.au/news/world/us-news/2021/01/13/trump-social-media-gab/">Gab</a> is one platform many Trump supporters have flocked to. </p>
<p>It’s important to remember hate speech, racism and violence predate the internet. Those who are predisposed to these ideologies <em>will</em> find a way to connect with others like them.</p>
<p>And censorship likely won’t change their beliefs, since extremist ideologies and conspiracies tend to be heavily spurred on by <a href="https://fs.blog/2017/05/confirmation-bias/">confirmation bias</a>. This is when people interpret information in a way that reaffirms their existing beliefs.</p>
<p>When Twitter <a href="https://theconversation.com/qanon-believers-will-likely-outlast-and-outsmart-twitters-bans-143192">took action to limit</a> QAnon content last year, some followers took this <a href="https://twitter.com/Questionwhatis1/status/1285815686737154050">as confirmation</a> of the conspiracy, which claims Satan-worshipping elites from within government, business and media are running a “deep state” against Trump.</p>
<h2>Social media and white supremacy: a love story</h2>
<p>The promotion of violence and hate speech on platforms isn’t new, nor is it restricted to relatively fringe sites such as Parler.</p>
<p>Queensland University of Technology Digital Media lecturer Ariadna Matamoros-Fernández describes online hate speech as “<a href="https://eprints.qut.edu.au/104184/">platformed racism</a>”. This framing is critical, especially in the case of Trump and his followers.</p>
<p>It recognises social media has various algorithmic features which allow for the proliferation of racist content. It also captures the governance structures that tend to favour “free speech” over the safety of vulnerable communities online. </p>
<p>For instance, Matamoros-Fernández’s <a href="https://eprints.qut.edu.au/104184/7/104184.pdf">research</a> found in Australia, platforms such as Facebook “favoured the offenders over Indigenous people” by tending to lean in favour of free speech. </p>
<p>Other <a href="https://research-management.mq.edu.au/ws/portalfiles/portal/135775224/MQU_HarmfulContentonSocialMedia_report_201202.pdf">research has</a> found Indigenous social media users regularly witness and experience racism and sexism online. My <a href="https://research-management.mq.edu.au/ws/portalfiles/portal/92634728/MQU_Cyberbullying_Report_Carlson_Frazer.pdf">own research</a> has also revealed social media helps proliferate hate speech, including racism and other forms of violence.</p>
<p>On this front, tech companies are unlikely to take action on the scale required, since controversy is <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jan/11/trump-twitter-ban-capitol-attack-facebook-youtube-google">good for business</a>. Simply, there’s no strong incentive for platforms to tackle the issues of hate speech and racism — not until not doing so negatively impacts profits. </p>
<p>After Facebook indefinitely banned Trump, its market value <a href="https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/facebook-twitter-stock-price-trump-ban-capitol-riots-twtr-fb-2021-1-1029965338">reportedly</a> dropped by US$47.6 billion as of Wednesday, while Twitter’s dropped by US$3.5 billion.</p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/profit-not-free-speech-governs-media-companies-decisions-on-controversy-101292">Profit, not free speech, governs media companies' decisions on controversy</a>
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<h2>The need for a paradigm shift</h2>
<p>When it comes to imagining a future with less hate, racism and violence, a key mistake is looking for solutions within the existing structure. </p>
<p>Today, online media is an integral part of the structure that governs society. So we look to it to solve our problems.</p>
<p>But banning Trump won’t silence him or the ideologies he peddles. It will not suppress hate speech or even reduce the capacity of individuals to incite violence. </p>
<p>Trump’s presidency will end in the coming days, but extremist groups and the broader movement they occupy <a href="https://time.com/5927685/white-supremacism-threat-outlast-trump/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=editorial&utm_term=ideas_politics&linkId=108691555">will remain</a>, both in real life and online. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/reddit-removes-millions-of-pro-trump-posts-but-advertisers-not-values-rule-the-day-141703">Reddit removes millions of pro-Trump posts. But advertisers, not values, rule the day</a>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Bronwyn Carlson receives funding from The Australian Research Council. She is also the recipient of an unrestricted gift from Facebook for research. </span></em></p>Fascists, neo-Nazis, anti-Semites and white supremacists have historically been agile adopters of the internet — and they know how to use it to their advantage.Bronwyn Carlson, Professor, Indigenous Studies, Macquarie UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1529302021-01-12T13:44:13Z2021-01-12T13:44:13ZCapitol riots: Ashli Babbitt and the far-right radicalisation of women<p>In the wake of the attack on the US Capitol, there has been a lot of discussion of the role of the 35-year-old US Air Force veteran <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/01/10/ashli-babbit-air-force-veteran-california-shot-dead-plain-clothes/">Ashli Babbitt</a>, who was one of the five people killed during the violence that day. Right-wing posters on social media platforms took little time to transform the woman from part of a group that the president-elect Joe Biden called “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/07/joe-biden-trump-mob-domestic-terrorists">domestic terrorists</a>” to a symbol of American patriotism, a woman who had spent half her life defending her country and was now standing up for her beliefs in direct action.</p>
<p>The rest of the world has been slower to understand her. After all, the far right is usually characterised as dominated by <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/aug/17/why-is-the-far-right-dominated-by-men">angry white men</a> – a perception only bolstered by the notoriety of militia including the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-54352635">Proud Boys</a>. </p>
<p>While this is not an unreasonable generalisation when it comes to highly visible activists – as any glance at pictures from the Capitol attack supports, women like Babbitt are not aberrations or exceptions. Even in the most violent, extreme corners of the far right, women have been on the frontline for decades, despite being a significant minority. But violent activism is not their usual role – rather they are effective organisers. One of the key groups behind the “Save America March” was the group known as <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/09/pro-trump-dark-money-groups-organized-the-rally-that-led-to-deadly-capitol-hill-riot.html">Women for America First</a>.</p>
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<p>Far-right media is littered with female voices including <a href="https://www.npr.org/2017/08/20/544134546/the-women-behind-the-alt-right">Lana Lokteff</a> and <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexandrasternlicht/2020/06/19/far-right-uk-commentator-katie-hopkins-permanently-banned-from-twitter-for-hateful-conduct/">Katie Hopkins</a>. In Europe we’ve seen women leading in far-right politics, such as <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-europe-37961391">Marine Le Pen</a> of France’s National Rally and <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-47750137">Jayda Fransen</a> of Britain First. These are relatively mainstream spaces, where these women speak as journalists and politicians, not violent actors or direct enablers and there is no suggestion that all these women are involved in illegal activity. But there has always been an important place for women, often behind the scenes, in facilitating, organising and inspiring hate movements.</p>
<h2>What women want</h2>
<p>At a glance, this seems baffling. The far-right world isn’t just violent and macho, it’s often <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/2016/12/14/13576192/alt-right-sexism-recruitment">outright misogynistic</a>, calling for a return to traditional times where women stayed at home and obeyed the men in their lives. But while this can be an article of faith for many of these movements, it tends to be anti-immigration and anti-government activism that are their key recruitment messages. And it is often causes such as these that bring women into groups despite their misogyny. Women largely get involved with the far right for the same reasons men do – most commonly radicalised by a fear of losing what they have and feel entitled to keep.</p>
<p>As a researcher of women in the far right, I once expected to find a smattering of lone, pitiable, naive individuals. But my work now dives into their online and offline communities and finds women expressing, perpetuating and organising hate with as much agency and vitriol as men. </p>
<p>Women are as capable as men of experiencing <a href="http://bostonreview.net/race/jonathan-m-metzl-politics-white-anxiety">white anxiety</a>, a sense their historically superior position in society is threatened. Even if the ideology of the far right puts them second to men, that’s still a privileged position above non-white people in a white supremacist society. The enforcement of this racialised hierarchy is a role that women have played throughout history. Some will accept this as a compromise, while others rationalise this as still being in their self-interest.</p>
<p>More than that, some parts of far-right movements can appeal more to women than to men. Women in the far right are quick to rally against racialised threats to families and to children, such as the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/dec/19/home-office-report-grooming-gangs-not-muslim">debunked myth of Pakistani “grooming gangs”</a> in the UK cities of Rotherham and Oxford. </p>
<p>Babbitt was a <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-election-2020/ashli-babbitt-capitol-trump-qanon-b1784388.html">supporter of QAnon</a>, whose grab-bag of conspiracy theories includes a call to <a href="https://newhumanist.org.uk/articles/5718/qanon-is-undermining-vital-child-protection-work">“save the children”</a> from alleged child-trafficking rings. This conspiracy has long been at the heart of the movement and has seen particular traction with women. </p>
<h2>Supporting and inspiring</h2>
<p>Men in the far right also benefit from the presence of women, who play a valuable role in image rehabilitation. The involvement of women makes a group seem less threatening and more appealing to outsiders who might be otherwise wary of the far right’s reputation. Extreme views can <a href="https://peacelab.blog/2020/07/on-the-frontline-the-under-told-story-of-women-in-extremist-movements">seem more socially acceptable</a> when they come from women. Women are able to speak more freely in direct recruitment, and sometimes men are brought into far-right groups because the women in the group <a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520240551/inside-organized-racism">first approached their wives and partners</a>.</p>
<p>The white supremacist core of the far right holds women in a particularly privileged place. As wives of their warriors and mothers of future white children, they are expected to <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/330093800_Shieldmaidens_of_Whiteness_Alt_Maternalism_and_Women_Recruiting_for_the_FarAlt-Right">stay at home and commit to the family</a>. Here they are idealised as the perfect image of domesticity to be cherished and protected. The best-known slogan of the white supremacist movement is <a href="https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/extremist-files/individual/david-lane">David Lane’s 14 words</a>: “We must secure the existence of our people and a future for White children.”</p>
<h2>Transformed into a symbol</h2>
<p>As with all far-right rhetoric, the framing of women <a href="https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/9/9/149/htm">shifts depending on circumstance and convenience</a>. Even now they depict Babbitt alternatively as a brave patriot and martyr, or a murdered innocent. There have been attempts to co-opt the <a href="https://www.aapf.org/sayhername">#SayHerName meme</a>, which was created to <a href="https://www.thelily.com/maga-is-trying-to-co-opt-sayhername-its-a-slap-in-the-face-black-women-say/?">draw attention to Black female victims</a> of police brutality and anti-Black violence. </p>
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<p>It is essential we move beyond shocked confusion at the mere involvement of a woman. Just as those observing right-wing social media <a href="https://theconversation.com/far-right-activists-on-social-media-telegraphed-violence-weeks-in-advance-of-the-attack-on-the-us-capitol-152861">saw the attack coming</a>, those examining women in the far right have <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jan/24/women-far-right-gender-roles-radical-right-migrant-muslim">seen the likes of Ashli Babbitt before</a>. </p>
<p>These women are not aberrations but a part of the far right throughout history. They are not coerced by the men in their lives but are individuals with agency and free will. They are not misled or naive, but just as capable of intense racism and organised hate. The far right may be dominated by men, but to ignore women is to fight these movements with one arm tied behind our backs.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/152930/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Catherine Stinton does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Far-right activists are usually characterised as men. But women have always played an important role in these movements.Catherine Stinton, PhD Candidate, Sociology, University of YorkLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1502392020-11-26T12:32:32Z2020-11-26T12:32:32ZThe end of Golden Dawn: has Greece shown us how to deal with neo-Nazis?<p>When a wave of right-wing extremism hit Greece in 2012, few would have predicted that Golden Dawn, one of the groups involved, would grow to become the third largest party in the Greek parliament. This was the beginning of a long period of <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/522081">turmoil</a> in Greek politics that saw a violent street movement become a viable political force.</p>
<p>But this neo-fascist “fairy tale” ended in what was considered the biggest Nazi trial since Nuremberg. Golden Dawn has been declared a <a href="https://sherloc.unodc.org/cld/en/legislation/grc/penal_code/book_one/article_187/article_187.html">criminal organisation</a> and its leaders <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/b2903dee-cd5f-403e-913e-f6d9ab5e9caa">jailed</a>, because of their involvement in unlawful activities – including murders, attacks on migrants, illegal possession of weapons and racketeering.</p>
<p>The leadership was also found guilty of ordering the <a href="https://forensic-architecture.org/investigation/the-murder-of-pavlos-fyssas">murder</a> of leftist rapper Pavlos Fyssas.</p>
<p>Prior to that, <a href="https://www.npr.org/2012/08/12/158371570/migrants-targeted-amid-rise-of-greek-extremists">another murder attempt</a> on Egyptian fisherman Abuzid Embarak in 2012, showed that the party was deliberately trying to incite violence, something that has been previously described by a number <a href="https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/23655">academics</a> and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/news/2020/mar/03/golden-dawn-the-rise-and-fall-of-greece-neo-nazi-trial">journalists</a> as an attempt to target minorities.</p>
<p>The trial lasted more than five years due to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/21/world/europe/golden-dawn-trial-greece.html">numerous delays</a> and setbacks that turned the whole process into a never-ending chaos. In the meantime, the party was free to stand candidates in general and local elections without restrictions.</p>
<p>In total, 37 members of Golden Dawn were convicted – including leader Nikolaos Michaloliakos and 17 MPs – who have now been convicted and sentenced by the Greek court. Ioannis Lagos, Golden Dawn’s only remaining member of the European parliament, is likely to have his parliamentary immunity revoked any day now. Lagos is best known for <a href="https://www.ekathimerini.com/249452/article/ekathimerini/news/neo-nazi-mep-penalized-for-tearing-up-turkish-flag">ripping up</a> a Turkish flag during a debate.</p>
<h2>Why Golden Dawn was different</h2>
<p>Every European country has fringe groups like Golden Dawn. They are often part of larger <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/26470450">right-wing extremist networks</a> with small but loyal bases.</p>
<p>Golden Dawn went mainstream soon after announcing its first major election campaign. Timing was crucial. The growing political instability in the country meant three general elections were held between 2009 and 2012. All major parties were losing public approval over their handling of the fiscal crisis.</p>
<p>On top of that, the only active far-right party in parliament back then (the Popular Orthodox Rally) had agreed to participate in a provisional coalition government organised by Lucas Papademos to get the country out of crisis. This move was seen as a betrayal by supporters. </p>
<p>The Greek far-right scene seemed <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13608746.2013.782838?src=recsys">weak</a>, allowing Golden Dawn to step in and fill that gap without facing competition. Its monopoly allowed it to act in the most politically aggressive way. It embraced national purity, anticommunism, and promised mass migrant deportations. This rhetoric and an obsession with the refugee crisis started to pay off very quickly.</p>
<p>Calls for more aggressive migration policies <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/d88eab00-5d30-11e5-a28b-50226830d644">became central</a> to its election campaigns. <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/political-analysis/article/waking-up-the-golden-dawn-does-exposure-to-the-refugee-crisis-increase-support-for-extremeright-parties/C50A127CC517968F2D0FA42A2A23FF85">Recent academic findings</a> showed that exposure to the refugee crisis in rural Greece increased support for Golden Dawn. </p>
<p>The party secured a shocking 9.4% of the vote in the European Parliament election of 2014, while in September 2015 it peaked nationally with 7%.</p>
<h2>Who fills the void?</h2>
<p>During the early years of the Greek economic crisis, it looked as though the public was trying to punish the political system through the ballot box. It is widely believed that this age of anger had passed by 2017, which was when Golden Dawn’s downfall began. Greece rejected populism and abandoned fringe politics, allowing mainstream parties to become popular once again.</p>
<p>In the general election of 2019, Golden Dawn <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jul/07/greeks-choose-between-beach-and-ballot-in-first-post-debt-bailout-poll">lost all its parliamentary seats</a> and had to shut down most of its branches to survive financially.</p>
<p>However, the party casts a long shadow and continues to shape Greek politics. The more mainstream New Democracy, for example, has opened its doors to a number of far-right politicians, who ran successful campaigns in the recent election. Some of them had previously expressed strong <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/migration-divides-greek-government-refugees-antonis-samaras-kyriakos-mitsotakis-syriza/">xenophobic</a> and <a href="https://www.ekathimerini.com/215660/article/ekathimerini/news/nd-spokesman-georgiadis-apologizes-for-anti-semitic-comments-in-past">antisemitic</a> views.</p>
<p>Kyriakos Velopoulos’ ultranationalist party Greek Solution, meanwhile, won ten seats in the Greek parliament after a long period of <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/greek-solution-far-right-kyriakos-velopoulos-unorthodox-migration-votes/">campaigning against migrants</a>. Golden Dawn’s spokesperson Ilias Kasidiaris has formed a <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/10/14/923605755/golden-dawn-leader-of-greek-neo-nazi-party-sentenced-to-13-years-in-prison">new movement</a> called Greeks for the Fatherland – even though he, too, is now in jail.</p>
<p>Kasidiaris has attempted to distance himself from neo-Nazi ideology in the wake of the Golden Dawn trial but his commitment to that change is yet to be tested. The same voters who embraced violence and legitimised Golden Dawn for its violent practices could support a similar movement. We might expect any such party to be less aggressive and neo-Nazi than Golden Dawn, but its values will be similar.</p>
<p>Greece has shown us how to deal with neo-Nazis. But when it comes to extremism, it is important to recognise the years of antifascist activism during Golden Dawn’s rise. It was a fight that, at times, seemed like <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/12/18/greek-prosecutor-urges-acquittal-of-neo-nazis-in-murder-trial">a lost cause</a>.</p>
<p>Democracy managed to pass an important test in the prosecution and sentencing of this criminal organisation. The court ruling was enough to eradicate Golden Dawn, but fascist remnants are still out there, reorganising and planning their next move.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/150239/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Georgios Samaras does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Members of the far-right group have been found guilty of crimes including racketeering and murder.Georgios Samaras, PhD Research Associate, Department of European and International Studies, King's College LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1424502020-08-03T11:58:35Z2020-08-03T11:58:35ZTwitter shaming won’t change university power structures<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/349422/original/file-20200724-23-177mrdl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C137%2C2544%2C1636&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Online shaming leads to personal attacks and resignations, not structural change. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://unsplash.com/photos/qKlUdr1qOR8">(Miguel Bruna/Unsplash)</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>“Another one bites the dust,” a colleague quipped. They were responding to news that <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/michael-korenberg-resigns-ubc-1.5621268">Michael Korenberg, chair of the University of British Columbia (UBC) board of governors, had resigned</a>. </p>
<p>Three days earlier, on June 18, an activist group called UBC Students Against Bigotry outed Korenberg for <a href="https://twitter.com/ubc_students/status/1273663974735675393">liking pro-Trump and far-right tweets</a>. The following day <a href="https://pressprogress.ca/ubc-board-chair-regrets-liking-tweet-comparing-black-lives-matter-to-hitlers-paramilitary-wing/">Press Progress ran an article</a>. Soon most major <a href="https://www.straight.com/education/michael-korenberg-resigns-as-chair-of-ubc-board-of-governors-after-he-likes-a-tweet-by">local media had picked up</a> the story. </p>
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<p>Korenberg submitted his resignation following an in-camera meeting of the UBC board of governors on June 20. <a href="https://bog.ubc.ca/statement-from-michael-korenberg/">In his letter, he apologized</a> for his actions. “It is especially critical for the entire institution to demonstrate its absolute commitment to our racialized faculty, students and staff,” he wrote. </p>
<p>Korenberg had been brought onto the board in 2016 by former <a href="https://pressprogress.ca/cbc_news_stops_and_explains_to_viewers_that_christy_clark_bc_liberals_are_actually_conservatives/">right-wing premier Christy Clark</a> to help <a href="http://blogs.ubc.ca/ross/tag/protests/">clean up a governance mess</a>. In 2017, NDP Premier John Horgan kept Korenberg on the board as chair. I served as an elected faculty governor on the board 2017-20. My term ended before Korenberg was ousted. </p>
<p>As a former governor I wasn’t surprised to hear that Korenberg had “liked” conservative voices on Twitter. While we disagreed politically outside the boardroom, Korenberg was a <a href="https://www.ubyssey.ca/news/board-of-governors-after-korenberg-resignation/">moderate on the board and found ways to work across political differences</a>. He was effective at moving UBC through some major changes in governance transparency. He was also instrumental in UBC’s move <a href="https://www.policynote.ca/divest-industry-influence/">away from fossil fuels</a>. </p>
<p>On June 1, less than a month before the Korenberg incident, and in response to society-wide anti-racism protests, UBC president Santo Ono acknowledged in a letter: “<a href="https://president.ubc.ca/letter-to-the-community/2020/06/01/together-against-racism">UBC itself is not immune to racism and injustice</a>.” As an Indigenous person I am well aware that racism has been <a href="https://intheclass.arts.ubc.ca/">a common experience for Indigenous students, staff and faculty at UBC</a>. The university’s ongoing failures to counter systemic and anti-Black racism on campus were spotlit soon after Ono’s letter <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/black-ubc-graduate-student-alleges-racial-profiling-on-campus-1.5611316">due to a racial profiling incident</a>. </p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/living-and-breathing-while-black-racial-profiling-and-other-acts-of-violence-118437">Living and breathing while Black: Racial profiling and other acts of violence</a>
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<p>Korenberg was called out, social media erupted and I can only assume his fellow governors shook their collective head and told him he had to go. Outed, shamed and apologetic, Korenberg was gone. </p>
<p><a href="http://blogs.ubc.ca/ecoknow/">My research as an anthropologist documenting the traditional territory and ecological knowledge of my home, Gitxaaɫa Nation</a>, has taught me that respecting Indigenous rights relies on structures of power not the good will of functionaries or business folk. Individuals might be personally sympathetic, but they are locked within a system already biased against Indigenous authority and jurisdiction. If we want a better world we need to change structures not people.</p>
<h2>Rituals of rebellion</h2>
<p>Public outcries and subsequent resignations or terminations of people like Korenberg suggest our social institutions are responsive to societal change. Anthropologists from the <a href="http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/253421">Max Gluckman</a> school of thought describe these acts as rituals of rebellion that appear to challenge those in authority. </p>
<p>But what Gluckman <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/40400713?seq=1">and other social anthropologists</a> have found is that these rituals merely reinforce power structures. There might be a momentary reversal. Individual leaders might be replaced. The lives of the shamed and called out are disrupted. However, calling out and shaming individuals allows social dissatisfaction to be vented in ways that reinforce existing relations of power.</p>
<p>Sociologist <a href="https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/8490">Feiyu Sun of Beijing University describes how the Communist Party of China (CCP) maintained and solidified its authority</a> <a href="https://doi.org/10.2753/CSH0009-4633470104">through the practice of <em>Suku</em></a>, a political performance used to elicit support and discipline opponents. </p>
<p>A frequent manifestation of <em>Suku</em> was a peasant or worker testifying in front of a crowd and detailing the harm they had experienced at the hands of an accused intellectual, leader or political opponent. It had the appearance of being spontaneous, but was performative and carefully scripted. </p>
<p>A “successful” session ended with the accused publicly confessing to the harm they had caused and professing their support for <a href="https://www.history.com/topics/china/cultural-revolution">the revolution</a>.</p>
<h2>The role of suffering and confession</h2>
<p>What draws me to Fieyu Sun’s work is his analysis of the role suffering and confession play in reinforcing social hierarchy that is linked to the individual destruction of opponents. The CCP example mirrors the current practices of online shaming and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2019/nov/01/call-out-culture-obama-social-media">call-out culture</a>. We see the same outrage, requirement for complete apology and removal of offending individuals. </p>
<p>Both then and now the fundamental structures of societal power are not being challenged or changed. Instead individuals are publicly shamed and then removed from their positions. Then they are replaced with individuals who are members of the same social class.</p>
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<h2>A big business</h2>
<p>UBC might have changed the chair of the board of governors, but governing a university is still big business. </p>
<p>When I was on UBC’s board of governors I witnessed how universities work. </p>
<p>We have fundraising branches (often called development offices) that <a href="https://support.ubc.ca/donor-community/">work hard to cultivate multi-million dollar donors</a>. In a time when <a href="https://doi.org/10.2304/pfie.2004.2.2.2">education is treated as a market enterprise</a>, and universities are expected to justify their outputs in terms that rationalize economic investment, university staff echo larger policy directives that <a href="https://www.ubyssey.ca/opinion/charles-menzies-student-experience-faculty/">speak explicitly about the student experience</a> being critical to maintaining market share in a global competition. University research offices highlight innovation, understood as transferring discoveries into commodities.</p>
<p>Some universities also <a href="https://www.ubcproperties.com/">own real estate firms</a> charged with <a href="http://univercity.ca/about-us/history/">transforming their land into endowment investments</a>.</p>
<p>Voices that call out <a href="https://ojs.library.ubc.ca/index.php/newproposals/article/view/419">the single-minded focus on the university as big business are a minority</a> on university boards of governors. Government appointees come from every field of the business world — law, consulting, finance, tech, real estate and wealth management. Korenberg <a href="https://news.ubc.ca/2018/02/19/ubc-board-of-governors-elects-michael-korenberg-as-new-chair-sandra-cawley-new-vice-chair">has a legal background</a> and <a href="http://www.wreathgroup.com/founder/">founded an investment, merger and acquisitions consulting company</a>.</p>
<p>Even those of us elected to the board are typically drawn from among the university’s management (or those aspiring to become management). The fact that some of these individuals might have controversial or divergent political affiliations matters less than whether they are able to work with the flow of things to get the business of the university done. </p>
<h2>Purpose of education</h2>
<p>But it shouldn’t just be about individuals. </p>
<p>We need to look at the core purpose of our post-secondary sector. Should universities be big businesses? Should market share and donors drive educational decisions? I don’t think so. </p>
<p>Those of us who advocate for fundamental structural change want more than increased individual diversity at the top: We know that only a fundamental restructuring will make a difference. Such a restructuring would reframe how university decisions are made and transfer power more directly to elected, rather than appointed, governors. </p>
<p>Universities should be at the forefront of a socially just democratic society, and to do this we have to change real structures of control and power. We have a choice to make — continue to celebrate rituals of rebellion or engage in acts of transformative change.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/142450/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Charles R Menzies receives funding from regional, national, and international social sciences funding agencies. </span></em></p>Bringing change to universities needs to focus on systems, not people. Although online shaming is effective at removing people from their positions, it doesn’t change systems.Charles R Menzies, Professor, Department of Anthropology, University of British ColumbiaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1424152020-07-17T11:09:28Z2020-07-17T11:09:28ZHas the coronavirus proved a crisis too far for Europe’s far-right outsiders?<p>In recent years, far-right political parties in Europe have capitalised on crises to build their support bases. Many have made it to positions of power as a result of these efforts. The financial crisis of 2008, the refugee crisis that began in 2014 and the ongoing debate around climate change have all provided opportunities to harness growing uncertainty and resentment for political purposes.</p>
<p>However, early signs suggest these groups have not had the same success during the coronavirus crisis. For now at least, incumbent European governments seem to be in control.</p>
<p>On the internet, far-right communities have played a role in circulating
<a href="https://journals.uic.edu/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/10633">conspiracy theories</a> about COVID-19’s origins during the pandemic. They have helped spread the idea that the virus was created in a laboratory rather than coming from nature – and even that it was released intentionally – despite <a href="https://theconversation.com/heres-how-scientists-know-the-coronavirus-came-from-bats-and-wasnt-made-in-a-lab-141850">overwhelming evidence</a> to the contrary. They have <a href="https://theconversation.com/leicester-lockdown-blame-on-minority-communities-needs-to-be-challenged-142418">blamed minorities</a> for the spread of the disease and adopted a <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/nigel-farage-china-pay-must-covid-19-1501478">racist rhetoric</a> that blames China for the pandemic.</p>
<p>In turn, many far-right political parties have picked up the themes and brought them into <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/05/12/trans-atlantic-conspiracy-coronavirus-251325">mainstream discourse</a>.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-are-there-so-many-coronavirus-conspiracy-theories-listen-to-part-six-of-our-expert-guide-136664">Why are there so many coronavirus conspiracy theories? Listen to part six of our expert guide</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
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<p>Given the massive surge of conspiracy theories that have circulated online in the past few months, there has been concern that another surge in anti-establishment xenophobic politics is on the cards for Europe. The <a href="https://institute.global/policy/covid-19-and-global-far-right">worry has been</a> that the far right will make gains again as a result. But, so far, it seems this crisis has not actually been particularly “profitable” for these groups. In fact, they seem to be floundering.</p>
<h2>In retreat</h2>
<p>In Germany, the far-right AfD <a href="https://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/article207181643/Umfrage-zu-Corona-Krise-Angela-Merkel-mit-der-besten-Bewertung.html">openly embraced</a> conspiracy theories. Its members claimed Angela Merkel’s lockdown measures were unnecessary. </p>
<p>This initially gained traction among a public trying to adapt to a strange new way of life. But the AfD were quickly seen to have <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/04/14/coronavirus-has-paralyzed-europes-far-right/">painted themselves into a corner</a> when it became clear that Germany’s lockdown was producing the desired effect and infections were dropping.</p>
<p>The AfD has lost a significant amount of support during the pandemic, sliding from around 15% approval in <a href="https://www.politico.eu/europe-poll-of-polls/germany/">pre-coronavirus polls</a> to something more like 9% now. This is a blow to German ultranationalists.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, in Italy, Matteo Salvini, leader of the League party, has found it very hard to <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/countering-radical-right/after-covid-19-will-matteo-salvini-lead-europes-radical-right/">hold the attention</a> of the national media – which is a new experience for him. The League’s messaging has been confusing. In late February, the party initially called for the partially locked down region of Lombardy to be re-opened but then later demanded a full lockdown. The news website Politico’s analysis of opinion polling in Italy shows that the League’s popularity is <a href="https://www.politico.eu/europe-poll-of-polls/italy/">down 11%</a> from last summer.</p>
<p>The National Rally in France has also seen better days. Party leader Marine Le Pen asserted that <a href="https://www.valeursactuelles.com/clubvaleurs/politique/interview-marine-le-pen-le-gouvernement-est-le-plus-gros-pourvoyeur-de-fake-news-depuis-le-debut-de-cette-crise-117518">it makes sense to ask</a> if COVID-19 was made in a lab. <a href="https://www.lefigaro.fr/politique/coronavirus-marine-le-pen-trouve-legitime-de-se-demander-si-le-virus-ne-s-est-pas-echappe-d-un-laboratoire-20200330">A recent poll</a> found that 40% of National Rally voters believe that the virus was intentionally designed in a laboratory. Support for Le Pen’s party appears to have <a href="https://www.politico.eu/europe-poll-of-polls/france/">flatlined</a> during the pandemic.</p>
<p>In Greece, the leader of a new far-right group called Greek Solution is <a href="https://www.ekathimerini.com/250508/article/ekathimerini/news/probe-ordered-into-misleading-ad-on-party-leaders-tv-station">under investigation</a> by the Supreme Court for producing TV commercials advertising balms that “effectively protect people from coronavirus”. Vox in Spain has also failed to advance in polls, while mainstream parties in the country have enjoyed a significant boost.</p>
<h2>Incumbents hold support</h2>
<p>In spite of the far right’s continuous attempts to cause further instability during the pandemic, most European countries have rallied around their governments. Even mainstream opposition parties have struggled to make an impact.</p>
<p>Germans have been supportive of <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/opinion-germans-rally-behind-merkel-amid-coronavirus-crisis/a-53014974">Merkel’s evidence based approach</a> , while both France’s Emmanuel Macron and Italy’s Giuseppe Conte have seen their approval ratings <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/04/17/835988054/several-european-leaders-see-a-popularity-boost-during-coronavirus-pandemic">climb</a>.</p>
<p>Greece’s <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/28/world/europe/coronavirus-greece-europe.html">success</a> at controlling the virus so far has not gone unnoticed either. It’s hard for opposition parties of any kind to gain traction when the current government has managed to keep total infections to fewer than 4,000 by taking swift action to restrict movement.</p>
<p>The predicament facing Europe’s far-right and nationalist parties represents a very interesting break with the past. In the last decade, most crises in the continent played out with a familiar winner. There was significant disunity between European leaders when it came to managing the financial crash and the refugee crisis. This fractured the European Union and opened a space for the far right.</p>
<p>Drawing on old notions of identity and boosted by online conspiracy theories, far-right actors once again openly doubted European policies and attempted to take advantage of the crisis. But compared to the more scientific and realist approaches of most European governments, their response looks insufficient.</p>
<p>The far right has been the significant loser of the pandemic. Not only have these groups lost credibility, but their nationalist agenda looks highly irrelevant in the era of COVID-19. Amid lockdowns and closed borders, the issue of immigration has lost its significance in 2020 and the failure to come up with viable solutions to the biggest issue of the day has hurt the popularity of far-right actors.</p>
<p>However, now the focus has shifted towards the need to return to “normality” things might change. Impatience is growing among populations that have been living in lockdown for months. </p>
<p>A recession looms – and it looks set to dwarf the last. That presents opportunities to governments and fringe groups alike – opportunities that the far right will be actively looking into, to further weaken liberal democracies.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/142415/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Georgios Samaras does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Incumbent governments are enjoying renewed popularity during the pandemic, while far-right challengers get bogged down in conspiracy theories.Georgios Samaras, PhD Candidate, Department of European and International Studies, King's College LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1422682020-07-13T20:04:21Z2020-07-13T20:04:21ZParler: what you need to know about the ‘free speech’ Twitter alternative<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/346812/original/file-20200710-6739-nv7bx1.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=11%2C11%2C2402%2C1115&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Amid claims of social media platforms stifling free speech, a new challenger called Parler is <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnscottlewinski/2020/07/04/social-media-platform-parler-becomes-hot-political-topic-between-conservaties-progressives/#4a38b95c20ea">drawing</a> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/jun/28/the-uk-social-media-platform-where-neo-nazis-can-view-terror-atrocities">attention</a> for its anti-censorship stance. </p>
<p>Last week, Harper’s Magazine <a href="https://harpers.org/a-letter-on-justice-and-open-debate/">published</a> an open letter signed by 150 academics, writers and activists concerning perceived threats to the future of free speech.</p>
<p>The letter, signed by Noam Chomsky, Francis Fukuyama, Gloria Steinem and J.K. Rowling, among others, reads:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The free exchange of information and ideas, the lifeblood of a liberal society, is daily becoming more constricted.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Debates surroundings free speech and censorship have taken centre stage in recent months. In May, Twitter <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-52843986">started adding</a> fact-check labels to tweets from Donald Trump. </p>
<p>More recently, Reddit <a href="https://theconversation.com/reddit-removes-millions-of-pro-trump-posts-but-advertisers-not-values-rule-the-day-141703">permanently removed</a> its largest community of Trump supporters. </p>
<p>In this climate, Parler <a href="https://home.parler.com/about/">presents itself</a> as a “non-biased, free speech driven” alternative to Twitter. Here’s what you should know about the US-based startup.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/is-cancel-culture-silencing-open-debate-there-are-risks-to-shutting-down-opinions-we-disagree-with-142377">Is cancel culture silencing open debate? There are risks to shutting down opinions we disagree with</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>What is Parler?</h2>
<p>Parler reports more than <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/27/parler-ceo-wants-liberal-to-join-the-pro-trump-crowd-on-the-app.html">1.5 million users</a> and is <a href="https://news.yahoo.com/social-media-tumult-startup-parler-draws-conservatives-041427679.html">growing in popularity</a>, especially as Twitter and other social media giants crackdown on <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/Business/twitters-fact-checking-labels/story?id=70903715">misinformation</a> and <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-socialmedia/u-s-social-media-firms-say-they-are-removing-violent-content-faster-idUSKBN1W329I">violent content</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/346777/original/file-20200710-22-102xppk.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/346777/original/file-20200710-22-102xppk.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=331&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346777/original/file-20200710-22-102xppk.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=331&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346777/original/file-20200710-22-102xppk.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=331&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346777/original/file-20200710-22-102xppk.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346777/original/file-20200710-22-102xppk.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346777/original/file-20200710-22-102xppk.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Parler appears similar to Twitter in its appearance and functions.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">screenshot</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Parler is very similar to <a href="https://twitter.com/">Twitter</a> in appearance and function, albeit clunkier. Like Twitter, Parler users can follow others and engage with public figures, news sources and other users. </p>
<p>Public posts are called “parleys” rather than “tweets” and can contain up to 1,000 characters.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/346780/original/file-20200710-87076-1w6201f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/346780/original/file-20200710-87076-1w6201f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/346780/original/file-20200710-87076-1w6201f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=137&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346780/original/file-20200710-87076-1w6201f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=137&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346780/original/file-20200710-87076-1w6201f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=137&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346780/original/file-20200710-87076-1w6201f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=172&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346780/original/file-20200710-87076-1w6201f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=172&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346780/original/file-20200710-87076-1w6201f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=172&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Users can comment, ‘echo’ or ‘vote’ on parleys.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">screenshot</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Users can search for hashtags, make comments, “echo” posts (similar to a retweet) and “vote” (similar to a like) on posts. There’s also a direct private messaging feature, just like Twitter. </p>
<p>Given this likeness, what actually is unique about Parler?</p>
<h2>Fringe views welcome?</h2>
<p>Parler’s main selling point is its claim it <a href="https://www.kusi.com/parler-ceo-john-matze-wants-the-growing-social-media-platform-to-embrace-free-speech/">embraces freedom of speech and has minimal moderation</a>. “If you can say it on the street of New York, you can say it on Parler”, founder John Matze <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/27/parler-ceo-wants-liberal-to-join-the-pro-trump-crowd-on-the-app.html">explains</a>. </p>
<p>This branding effort capitalises on allegations competitors such as Twitter and Facebook <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/06/25/ted-cruz-joins-parler-339811">unfairly censor content</a> and <a href="https://apnews.com/5e761263c5324fe3b450b2cbb53d15c8">discriminate against</a> right-wing political speech.</p>
<p>While other platforms often employ <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/Business/twitters-fact-checking-labels/story?id=70903715">fact checkers, or third-party editorial boards</a>, Parler <a href="https://legal.parler.com/documents/guidelines.pdf">claims to moderate</a> content based on American Federal Communications Commission guidelines and Supreme Court rulings.</p>
<p>So if someone shared demonstrably false information on Parler, Matze said it would be up to other users to fact-check them “<a href="https://www.foxnews.com/tech/social-media-alt-parler-censorship">organically</a>”.</p>
<p>And although Parler is still dwarfed by Twitter (330 million users) and Facebook (2.6 billion users) the platform’s anti-censorship stance continues to attract users turned off by the regulations of larger social media platforms. </p>
<p>When Twitter recently hid tweets from Trump for “<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/23/twitter-labeled-another-trump-tweet-for-violating-its-policies.html">glorifying violence</a>”, this <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-campaign-weighs-alternatives-to-big-social-platforms-11593003602?mod=searchresults&page=1&pos=1">partly prompted</a> the Trump campaign to consider moving to a platform such as Parler.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/346770/original/file-20200710-54-2r5i38.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/346770/original/file-20200710-54-2r5i38.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/346770/original/file-20200710-54-2r5i38.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=372&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346770/original/file-20200710-54-2r5i38.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=372&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346770/original/file-20200710-54-2r5i38.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=372&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346770/original/file-20200710-54-2r5i38.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=468&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346770/original/file-20200710-54-2r5i38.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=468&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346770/original/file-20200710-54-2r5i38.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=468&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Far-right American political activist and conspiracy theorist Lara Loomer is among Parler’s most popular users.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">screenshot</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Matze also claims Parler <a href="https://www.kusi.com/parler-ceo-john-matze-wants-the-growing-social-media-platform-to-embrace-free-speech/">protects users’ privacy</a> by not tracking or sharing their data. </p>
<h2>Is Parler really a free speech haven?</h2>
<p>Companies such as Twitter and Facebook have denied they are <a href="https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/may/27/trump-we-will-regulate-or-close-down-social-media-/">silencing conservative voices</a>, pointing to blanket policies against hate speech and content inciting violence. </p>
<p>Parler’s “free speech” has resulted in various American Republicans, including Senator Ted Cruz, promoting the platform.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1276200378296664066"}"></div></p>
<p>Many conservative influencers such as <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/parler-katie-hopkins-and-laurence-fox-flee-to-twitters-anything-goes-rival-9kkm2d58m">Katie Hopkins</a>, <a href="https://www.cnet.com/news/right-wing-activist-laura-loomer-handcuffs-herself-to-twitters-nyc-office/#ftag=MSF491fea7">Lara Loomer</a> and <a href="https://www.cnet.com/news/infowars-alex-jones-test-the-limits-of-free-speech-on-twitter-facebook-youtube-apple/">Alex Jones</a> have sought refuge on Parler after <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-06-20/katie-hopkins-permanently-suspended-from-twitter-for-27abuse-a/12376352">being banned</a> from other platforms. </p>
<p>Although it brands itself as a bipartisan safe space, Parler is mostly used by <a href="https://www.foxbusiness.com/technology/parler-user-numbers-john-matze">right-wing media, politicians and commentators</a>. </p>
<p>Moreover, a closer look at its <a href="https://legal.parler.com/documents/useragreement.pdf">user agreement</a> suggests it moderates content the same way as any platform, <a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/parler-free-speech-alternative-twitter-user-agreement_n_5ef660fdc5b6acab28419a5d">maybe even more</a>.</p>
<p>The company states: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Parler may remove any content and terminate your access to the Services at any time and for any reason or no reason.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Parler’s <a href="https://legal.parler.com/documents/guidelines.pdf">community guidelines</a> prohibit a range of content including spam, terrorism, unsolicited ads, defamation, blackmail, bribery and criminal behaviour. </p>
<p>Although there are no explicit rules against hate speech, there are policies against “fighting words” and “threats of harm”. This includes “a threat of or advocating for violation against an individual or group”.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/346767/original/file-20200710-38-1qirjp5.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/346767/original/file-20200710-38-1qirjp5.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/346767/original/file-20200710-38-1qirjp5.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346767/original/file-20200710-38-1qirjp5.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346767/original/file-20200710-38-1qirjp5.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346767/original/file-20200710-38-1qirjp5.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346767/original/file-20200710-38-1qirjp5.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346767/original/file-20200710-38-1qirjp5.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Parler CEO John Matze clarified the platform’s rules after banning users, presumably for breaking one or more of the listed rules.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>There are rules against content that is obscene, sexual or “lacks serious literary, artistic, political and scientific value”. For example, visuals of genitalia, female nipples, or faecal matter are barred from Parler. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, <a href="https://help.twitter.com/en/rules-and-policies/media-policy">Twitter</a> allows “consensually produced adult content” if its marked as “sensitive”. It also has no policy against the visual display of excrement.</p>
<p>As a private company, Parler can remove whatever content it wants. Some users have already been <a href="https://screenrant.com/parler-free-speech-censorship-users-banned/">banned</a> for breaking rules.</p>
<p>What’s more, in spite of claims it does not share user data, Parler’s <a href="https://legal.parler.com/documents/privacypolicy.pdf">privacy policy</a> states data collected can be used for advertising and marketing.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-twitter-and-the-way-of-the-hashtag-141693">Friday essay: Twitter and the way of the hashtag</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>No marks of establishment</h2>
<p>Given its limited user base, Parler has yet to become the “<a href="https://www.foxnews.com/tech/social-media-alt-parler-censorship">open town square</a>” it aspires to be. </p>
<p>The platform is in its infancy and its user base is much less representative than larger social media platforms.</p>
<p>Despite Matze saying <a href="https://www.foxbusiness.com/technology/parler-user-numbers-john-matze">“left-leaning” users</a> tied to the Black Lives Matter movement were joining Parler to challenge conservatives, Parler lacks the diverse audience needed for any real debate. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/346765/original/file-20200710-50-i3ygby.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/346765/original/file-20200710-50-i3ygby.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/346765/original/file-20200710-50-i3ygby.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=759&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346765/original/file-20200710-50-i3ygby.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=759&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346765/original/file-20200710-50-i3ygby.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=759&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346765/original/file-20200710-50-i3ygby.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=954&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346765/original/file-20200710-50-i3ygby.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=954&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/346765/original/file-20200710-50-i3ygby.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=954&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Upon joining the platform, Parler suggests following several politically conservative users.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">screenshot</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Matze also said he doesn’t want Parler to be an “<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/27/parler-ceo-wants-liberal-to-join-the-pro-trump-crowd-on-the-app.html">echo chamber</a>” for conservative voices. In fact, he is offering a US$20,000 “<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/27/parler-ceo-wants-liberal-to-join-the-pro-trump-crowd-on-the-app.html">progressive bounty</a>” for an openly liberal pundit with 50,000 followers on Twitter or Facebook to join. </p>
<p>Clearly, the platform has a long way to go before it bursts its conservative bubble.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/dont-just-blame-echo-chambers-conspiracy-theorists-actively-seek-out-their-online-communities-127119">Don't (just) blame echo chambers. Conspiracy theorists actively seek out their online communities</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/142268/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Audrey Courty does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Here’s what you need to know about the largely right-wing social media platform creeping into headlines.Audrey Courty, PhD candidate, School of Humanities, Languages and Social Science, Griffith UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1346612020-06-22T01:15:03Z2020-06-22T01:15:03ZPauline Hanson built a political career on white victimhood and brought far-right rhetoric to the mainstream<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/340484/original/file-20200609-165389-d0sojm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Mick Tsikas/AAP</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>The Conversation is running a series of explainers on key figures in Australian political history, looking at the way they changed the nature of debate, its impact then, and its relevance to politics today. You can also read the rest of our pieces <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/key-figures-in-australian-political-history-86822">here</a>.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>Pauline Hanson and her party have only achieved modest electoral successes. Yet, she is undoubtedly Australia’s most successful populist politician and has had a profound impact on the way the country talks about issues like multiculturalism and immigration.</p>
<p>Hanson’s entire political career can be seen as a denial and rejection of the realities of <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/1341787.pdf">whiteness</a> in Australia – that is, the unearned <a href="https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/the-white-possessive">benefits and privileges</a> afforded to white people in settler-colonial countries. </p>
<p>Hanson has benefited from – and helped to shape – the normalisation of racism and xenophobia in Australia. She has pushed the boundaries of what can be “acceptably said” in public discourse and has had a disproportionate influence on the national debate. </p>
<p>In doing so, she has also created the political space for other far-right figures like <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5pxE4RXpjc">Fraser Anning</a> to emerge and become more a part of the political mainstream. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/340486/original/file-20200609-165389-ivl4b3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/340486/original/file-20200609-165389-ivl4b3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=394&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340486/original/file-20200609-165389-ivl4b3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=394&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340486/original/file-20200609-165389-ivl4b3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=394&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340486/original/file-20200609-165389-ivl4b3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=495&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340486/original/file-20200609-165389-ivl4b3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=495&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340486/original/file-20200609-165389-ivl4b3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=495&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Hanson’s political fortunes have come and gone, but she’s remained a fixture in the public consciousness.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Dean Lewins/AAP</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The birth of One Nation</h2>
<p>Hanson first emerged on the political landscape in 1996 when <a href="https://australianpolitics.com/1998/03/01/background-information-on-pauline-hanson.html">she was disendorsed</a> as the Liberal Party candidate for Oxley following racist comments she made about Indigenous people in a letter to the Queensland Times.</p>
<p>She contested the election anyway, running as an independent on a self-described nationalist, populist and protectionist platform, and won the seat with a large swing against the Labor incumbent. </p>
<p>In her <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/pauline-hansons-1996-maiden-speech-to-parliament-full-transcript-20160915-grgjv3.html">maiden speech</a> to the House of Representatives, Hanson claimed to speak on behalf of “mainstream Australians” and promised a “common sense” approach to politics.</p>
<p>Most controversially, Hanson warned Australia was “in danger of being swamped by Asians”, called for the abolition of multiculturalism and railed against Indigenous rights, so-called “political correctness” and “reverse-racism”.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/hkV1PkPj7ZA?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>The times suited Hanson. After 13 years of Labor government, John Howard and the Liberal Party looked to exploit a sense of resentment and grievance on the issues of multiculturalism and immigration, which arguably opened up the space for Hanson and helped to legitimise her views. </p>
<p>Indeed, in a 1996 speech delivered to the Queensland Liberal Party, Howard <a href="https://pmtranscripts.pmc.gov.au/release/transcript-10114">celebrated</a> the idea people felt able to speak a little more freely and could do so </p>
<blockquote>
<p>without living in fear of being branded as a bigot or racist. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Hanson’s One Nation party <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-07-10/timeline-rise-of-pauline-hanson-one-nation/7583230?nw=0">was formed the following year</a> and performed well at the 1998 Queensland state election, <a href="https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/Publications_Archive/CIB/cib9899/99CIB02">winning 11 seats</a>.</p>
<h2>Hanson’s downfall and political resurrection</h2>
<p>One Nation’s initial success, however, was short-lived. Hanson <a href="https://www.theage.com.au/national/the-rise-and-fall-of-pauline-hanson-20030821-gdw80v.html">failed to win</a> the newly redistributed seat of Blair at the 1998 federal election. Her party then began to suffer from <a href="https://www.penguin.com.au/books/please-explain-the-rise-fall-and-rise-again-of-pauline-hanson-9780143784678">internal divisions, poor leadership and Hanson’s personal and financial scandals</a>. </p>
<p>She was subsequently <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/aug/20/australia.thefarright">convicted</a> of electoral fraud in 2003. (It was later overturned on appeal.)</p>
<p>After a number of <a href="https://www.theage.com.au/politics/federal/hansons-senate-bid-im-the-redhead-voters-can-trust-20130603-2nl21.html">failed federal and state campaigns</a> (including under the rebranded <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20071014012637/http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,22450691-1248,00.html">Pauline’s United Australia Party</a>), Hanson finally succeeded in being elected to the Senate in 2016, along with three other One Nation candidates. </p>
<p>This represented a high point for the party at the federal level and gave it considerable influence over government policy. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/henry-parkes-had-a-vision-of-a-new-australian-nation-in-1901-it-became-a-reality-131453">Henry Parkes had a vision of a new Australian nation. In 1901, it became a reality</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Hanson’s populist, nativist beliefs</h2>
<p>Hanson can best be described as a <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/populist-radical-right-parties-in-europe/244D86C50E6D1DC44C86C4D1D313F16D">populist radical right politician</a>, alongside such figures as Donald Trump, Nigel Farage, Marine Le Pen and Viktor Orbán.</p>
<p>For populist figures, politics are seen as a struggle between everyday, ordinary people and a <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/government-and-opposition/article/populist-zeitgeist/2CD34F8B25C4FFF4F322316833DB94B7">corrupt, illegitimate and out-of-touch elite</a>.</p>
<p>But more importantly, the populist radical right also uses the language of “us-versus-them” and portrays immigrants and refugees as existential threats to the safety, security and “culture” of a particular society.</p>
<p>In Hanson’s view, non-natives must either assimilate and embrace “Australian culture and values” or <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-09-15/pauline-hanson-maiden-speech-2016/7847136">“go back to where they came from”</a>.</p>
<p>Hanson has consistently drawn on a sense of grievance and victimhood – in particular, white victimhood. She has espoused a belief in the existence of so-called “reverse-racism” or “anti-white” racism since the outset of her political career.</p>
<p>Hanson has even gone so far as to <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/artless-and-angry-pauline-hanson-demonstrates-lack-of-fitness-for-crucial-role-20190920-p52tes.html">claim</a> the </p>
<blockquote>
<p>most downtrodden person in this country is the white Anglo-Saxon male.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>The mainstreaming of the far-right</h2>
<p>Hanson’s resurgence in 2016 occurred in a very different political climate than her first stint in parliament in the late 1990s. </p>
<p>Political scientist Cas Mudde refers to the 21st century as the “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/global/commentisfree/2019/nov/12/nativism-is-driving-the-far-right-surge-in-europe-and-it-is-here-to-stay">fourth wave of the far-right</a>”. It is a time when far-right ideas are becoming increasingly tolerated, debated and normalised in the mainstream and the <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0957926519889109">boundaries of what can be said are shifting</a>.</p>
<p>Emboldened by years of <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01419870.2017.1312008">normalised Islamophobia</a> in Australia and the electoral successes of far-right parties globally, Hanson’s <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-09-15/pauline-hanson-maiden-speech-2016/7847136">maiden Senate speech</a> warned Australia was now</p>
<blockquote>
<p>in danger of being swamped by Muslims, who bear a culture and ideology that is incompatible with our own. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>She called for a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/aug/17/pauline-hanson-wears-burqa-in-australian-senate-while-calling-for-ban">“Trump style” immigration ban</a>, <a href="https://www.sbs.com.au/language/english/pauline-hanson-plans-to-ban-the-burqa-and-call-royal-commission-into-islam">a Royal Commission into Islam</a> and the “<a href="https://www.onenation.org.au/pauline-hanson-moves-to-ban-burqa-voted-down-by-out-of-touch-politicians/">banning of the burqa</a>”.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"898333651418492929"}"></div></p>
<p>Hanson’s resurgence has clearly cemented Muslims as the new “<a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/22041451.2020.1729970">dangerous other</a>”, though her racist attitudes towards First Nations people and Asian immigrants have also remained a constant.</p>
<p>Her claims of “anti-white racism” have also gained traction in the mainstream. For example, when Hanson put forth a Senate motion declaring <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/oct/15/ok-to-be-white-australian-government-senators-condemn-anti-white-racism">“it’s OK to be white”</a> in 2018, a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/oct/16/government-blames-administrative-error-for-its-support-for-its-ok-to-be-white-vote">surprising number of Coalition members voted for it</a> and later defended it on Twitter. </p>
<p>It was only later, after a vocal outcry, that the Coalition backed down and claimed the votes were made in error.</p>
<p>The media have played a key role in the mainstreaming of Hanson and One Nation by consistently giving them a platform to voice far-right ideas. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/krEPTyYO6l8?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<h2>Hanson’s legacy and impact on society</h2>
<p>There are a couple of ways to think about Hanson’s legacy and impact on society. </p>
<p>The first is to gauge her direct influence on government policy through her role as a parliamentarian. There’s no doubt she has wielded considerable influence as one of a number of senators to hold the balance of power in recent years. </p>
<p>Yet, despite some success in influencing legislation and her recent appointment as deputy chair of the <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-09-18/rosie-batty-family-law-inquiry-pauline-hanson-bias/11523914">family law inquiry</a>, Hanson has been largely unsuccessful in seeing her <a href="https://www.onenation.org.au/policies/">signature policies</a> realised.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-julia-gillard-forever-changed-australian-politics-especially-for-women-138528">How Julia Gillard forever changed Australian politics - especially for women</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>And while acknowledging Hanson’s role in mainstreaming far-right ideas, it’s important to note these ideas have existed before her maiden speeches and will exist well beyond her time in politics.</p>
<p>Exclusively focusing on Hanson’s individual acts ignores the <a href="https://theconversation.com/explainer-what-is-systemic-racism-and-institutional-racism-131152">systemic nature</a> of racism and the role of the mainstream political class in reproducing and upholding these racist structures.</p>
<p>When assessing Hanson’s legacy, it may be comforting to view her as an aberration and reflection of a bygone era, but she remains very much a product of the Australian settler-colonial story.</p>
<p>It’s perhaps more accurate to think of Hanson as a symptom of racism and xenophobia in Australia, rather than its cause.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/134661/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kurt Sengul does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Hanson has been largely unsuccessful in seeing her signature policies realised. But she has helped normalise xenophobia and racism and thus had a disproportionate influence on the national debate.Kurt Sengul, Doctoral Researcher, University of NewcastleLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1389872020-05-26T11:11:59Z2020-05-26T11:11:59ZHow to understand Obamagate – Donald Trump’s latest conspiracy theory<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/337574/original/file-20200526-106836-1q8o3x7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://twitter.com/JoanneWT09/status/1259614457015103490">Andrew Cline / Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Obamagate is the latest conspiracy theory to be pushed by US president, Donald Trump. It started on the morning of May 10, when Trump <a href="https://twitter.com/JoanneWT09/status/1259614457015103490">retweeted</a> the word “OBAMAGATE!” By the next day, the Obamagate hashtag <a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/obamagate-trends-on-twitter-following-trumps-latest-claims-of-deep-state-ploy-to-undo-him">had accrued over two million tweets</a> and another four million by the end of the week. Trump has repeatedly reused the slogan on his Twitter feed since and it has been promoted by right-wing influencers including <a href="https://twitter.com/glennbeck/status/1261049756589195267">Glenn Beck</a>, <a href="https://twitter.com/seanhannity/status/1260011852660002816">Sean Hannity</a> and many others.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1259614457015103490"}"></div></p>
<p>You are not alone if you’re confused by what Obamagate actually is or why Trump is tweeting about it. When a reporter from the Washington Post asked the president to explain it in a press briefing, <a href="https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4876088/user-clip-trump-obamagate">he replied</a>: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Obamagate! It’s been going on for a long time. It’s been going on since before I even got elected … Some terrible things happened, and it should never be allowed to happen in our country again … and I wish you’d write honestly about it but unfortunately you choose not to do so.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>When asked for specifics, Trump added: “The crime is very obvious to everybody, all you have to do is read the newspapers, except yours.” </p>
<p>Obamagate is a half-baked conspiracy theory, which is why Trump’s explanation seems cryptic and incoherent. Accusing the Obama administration of a vague cover-up, relating to the investigation into collusion with Russia that has dogged Trump’s presidency, it conjures up the spectre of a vast conspiracy without providing much explanation. Its very vagueness, however, is part of what makes it attractive to those among Trump’s fan base who see themselves as <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-conspiracy-theories-spread-online-its-not-just-down-to-algorithms-133891">researchers in search of the truth</a>.</p>
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<h2>QAnon links</h2>
<p>Obamagate is strongly linked to the QAnon conspiracy theory – on Twitter, these hashtags are frequently used alongside each other. <a href="https://theconversation.com/qanon-conspiracy-theories-about-the-coronavirus-pandemic-are-a-public-health-threat-135515">QAnon</a> is a well-established deep state conspiracy theory centred around a shadowy figure “Q” with supposed insider government knowledge. Q posts anonymously (hence QAnon) in far-right online forums, stoking up the idea that a deep state cabal of global elites is responsible for all the evil in the world. Followers see Trump as the world’s only hope in bringing down this cabal and claim that Q requested Trump to post <a href="https://8kun.top/qresearch/res/9109729.html#9110010">the first #Obamagate tweet</a>. </p>
<p>With its origins on fringe messageboard websites such 4chan, the QAnon conspiracy theory has <a href="http://salhagen.nl/dmi19/normiefication">gone increasingly mainstream</a> in recent years. Indeed, it has become so popular that it currently appears to be taking the shape of a new religious movement among its acolytes, some of whom <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-church-of-qanon-will-conspiracy-theories-form-the-basis-of-a-new-religious-movement-137859">now even convene worship groups</a>.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/337575/original/file-20200526-106862-1bgyxle.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/337575/original/file-20200526-106862-1bgyxle.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/337575/original/file-20200526-106862-1bgyxle.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/337575/original/file-20200526-106862-1bgyxle.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/337575/original/file-20200526-106862-1bgyxle.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/337575/original/file-20200526-106862-1bgyxle.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/337575/original/file-20200526-106862-1bgyxle.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">QAnon followers back Donald Trump.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/phoenix-october-19-2018-trump-supporters-1207940566">Eric Rosenwald / Shutterstock</a></span>
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<p>Like a lot of conspiracy theories, QAnon serves a political purpose. It emerged at the time of the official investigation into alleged Russian collusion in the Trump presidential campaign, led by former special counsel Robert Mueller. Similarly, Obamagate has a clear political agenda. It accuses the Obama administration of masterminding the Russia investigation to tarnish Trump’s presidency from the outset. More importantly, it diverts attention away from the current coronavirus crisis, suggesting that Trump is the victim of a far-reaching plot to undermine his authority.</p>
<h2>Propaganda play</h2>
<p>Obamagate is an example of what has been called “conspiracy without theory” by the political scientists <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691188836/a-lot-of-people-are-saying">Nancy Rosenblum and Russell Muirhead</a>. It makes knowing gestures towards the idea of a conspiracy theory without developing or committing to an actual full-blown explanation. This is a rhetorical technique that Trump has long used to great effect, both as a <a href="https://books.google.nl/books/about/Dog_Whistle_Politics.html?id=cZe1AQAAQBAJ&redir_esc=y">dog-whistle</a> appeal to <a href="https://books.google.nl/books/about/The_Reactionary_Mind.html?id=fpc4DwAAQBAJ&redir_esc=y">American conservatives</a> and an attempt to deflect attention from his many blunders. In this case, it’s his administration’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/fast-acting-countries-cut-their-coronavirus-death-rates-while-us-delays-cost-thousands-of-lives-139018">mismanagement of the coronavirus crisis</a>. </p>
<p>As the scholar Jason Stanley <a href="https://books.google.nl/books?redir_esc=y&hl=nl&id=NARIDwAAQBAJ&q=provide+simple+explanations+for+otherwise+irrational+emotions%2C+such+as+resentment+or+xenophobic+fear+in+the+face+of+perceived+threats#v=snippet&q=provide%20simple%20explanations%20for%20otherwise%20irrational%20emotions%2C%20such%20as%20resentment%20or%20xenophobic%20fear%20in%20the%20face%20of%20perceived%20threats&f=false">has pointed out</a>, this form of political speech offers “simple explanations for otherwise irrational emotions, such as resentment or xenophobic fear in the face of perceived threats”. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-dangerous-are-conspiracy-theories-listen-to-part-five-of-our-expert-guide-136070">How dangerous are conspiracy theories? Listen to part five of our expert guide</a>
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<p>Obamagate is a classic case of propaganda in that it is intended to create an aura of innuendo in order to reframe the narrative. It is an attempt to deflect attention away from the Trump administration’s disastrous handling of the coronavirus pandemic by making Trump out to be the victim. In a similar manner to how Pizzagate <a href="http://journal.media-culture.org.au/index.php/mcjournal/article/view/1422">tarnished Hillary Clinton’s electoral prospects in 2016</a>, Obamagate is part of Trump’s campaign strategy to defeat the democratic nominee Joe Biden in the upcoming presidential election. </p>
<p>The difference from Pizzagate, however, is that this time Trump has abandoned the pretence of keeping the conspiracy theory at arm’s length. Desperate to reset the narrative, he has thrown in his lot with some of the most extreme and fringe elements of his base. In the past, Trump’s fans on 4chan often referred to him as <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=God+Emperor+Trump&safe=off&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjvnNi89MbpAhXR-qQKHaJmA0QQ_AUoAXoECGMQAw&biw=1337&bih=749">God Emperor Trump</a>. After Obamagate, it would now seem that the proverbial emperor has no clothes. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/301912/original/file-20191115-66957-gxdqkd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/301912/original/file-20191115-66957-gxdqkd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/301912/original/file-20191115-66957-gxdqkd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/301912/original/file-20191115-66957-gxdqkd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/301912/original/file-20191115-66957-gxdqkd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=176&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/301912/original/file-20191115-66957-gxdqkd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=176&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/301912/original/file-20191115-66957-gxdqkd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=176&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em>Get the latest news and analysis, direct from the experts in your inbox, every day. Join hundreds of thousands who trust experts by <strong><a href="http://theconversation.com/newsletter?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=TCNewsletter&utm_content=newsletterA">subscribing to our newsletter</a></strong>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/138987/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The author received funding from the ODYCCEUS Horizon 2020 project, grant agreement number 732942.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Peter Knight does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Obamagate is strongly linked to the QAnon conspiracy theory – on Twitter these hashtags are frequently used alongside each other.Marc Tuters, Department of Media & Culture, Faculty of Humanities, University of AmsterdamPeter Knight, Professor of American Studies, University of ManchesterLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1330502020-03-10T18:01:15Z2020-03-10T18:01:15ZFar-right extremists still threaten New Zealand, a year on from the Christchurch attacks<p>In the hours after the Christchurch mosque attacks on March 15 last year, <a href="https://theconversation.com/christchurch-mosque-shootings-must-end-new-zealands-innocence-about-right-wing-terrorism-113655">I wrote</a> that I hoped New Zealand would finally stop believing it was immune to far-right extremist violence. A year on, I’m not sure enough has changed.</p>
<p>I’ve researched far-right extremism for decades – and I would argue it remains a high-level threat in New Zealand, not just <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/sep/19/fastest-growing-uk-terrorist-threat-is-from-far-right-say-police">overseas</a>. </p>
<p>My assessment is that there are about 60 to 70 groups and somewhere between 150 and 300 core right-wing activists in New Zealand. </p>
<p>This sounds modest alongside the estimated 12,000 to 13,000 <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/21/world/europe/germany-shooting-terrorism.html">violent far-right activists in Germany</a>. But proportionate to population size, the numbers are similar for both countries. And it only takes one activist to act out his extremism.</p>
<p>In the past year, there has certainly been greater investment by New Zealand’s security agencies in monitoring extremist groups and activists. There has been more media coverage. The government moved quickly to ban assault weapons and further <a href="https://www.parliament.nz/en/get-involved/topics/all-current-topics/bill-proposes-further-tightening-of-gun-controls/">controls on the use and possession of arms are underway</a>. Other initiatives, including a <a href="https://christchurchattack.royalcommission.nz/">royal commission of inquiry</a>, are pending. </p>
<p>But I also feel there is a tendency to see the Christchurch attacks, which killed 51 people, as a one-off or an aberration – rather than something we still need to guard against. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/christchurch-mosque-shootings-must-end-new-zealands-innocence-about-right-wing-terrorism-113655">Christchurch mosque shootings must end New Zealand's innocence about right-wing terrorism</a>
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<h2>New Zealand’s home-grown extremists</h2>
<p>New Zealanders should now be more aware than a year ago of the presence of local right-wing extremists. There has been plenty to remind them.</p>
<p>In June last year, Philip Arps, who has been involved in white supremacist activities in Christchurch for some time, was sentenced to 21 months in jail for sharing video of the Christchurch shootings. I am puzzled by the limited public awareness that the imagery on the side of his van – a <a href="https://www.adl.org/education/references/hate-symbols/1488">reference to 14/88</a> and Nazi signage – was a clear indicator of his extremist views. </p>
<p>Arps was <a href="https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2020/01/white-supremacist-philip-arps-released-from-prison-banned-from-contact-with-muslims.html">released early in January this year</a> under strict conditions, including a GPS monitor that alerts authorities if he goes near a mosque. </p>
<p>Even though the white nationalist group Dominion Movement folded after the mosque attacks, one of its leaders, a soldier in the New Zealand defence force, was arrested in December last year for “<a href="https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/119627639/whats-public-and-whats-secret-in-the-case-of-the-soldier-arrested-for-breaching-national-security?m=m">accessing a computer for a dishonest purpose</a>” and disclosing information that “<a href="https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/118942709/soldier-with-farright-links-accused-of-disclosing-military-information">prejudiced the security and defence of New Zealand</a>”. He had been active since 2011 on the neo-Nazi site Stormfront and attended a free speech rally in Wellington in 2018 along with another extreme-right activist.</p>
<p>He also appears to be a member of Wargus Christi, a group formed in September last year by a self-described neo-Nazi, Daniel Waring. It is a “martial-monastic” group of body builders who are homophobic, anti-Semitic and Islamaphobic.</p>
<p>Another group new to New Zealand’s extreme right is <a href="https://www.newsroom.co.nz/2020/03/09/1072195/action-zealandia-member-planned-terror-cell">Action Zealandia</a>. Their slogan is “building a community for European New Zealanders”. Apart from their online presence, their main public activity is placing stickers in public spaces highlighting their ultra-nationalism.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-overhauling-nzs-gun-and-terrorism-laws-alone-cant-stop-terrorist-attacks-113706">Why overhauling NZ's gun and terrorism laws alone can't stop terrorist attacks</a>
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<h2>Confronting NZ’s place in a global web of hate</h2>
<p>Information from agencies such as the <a href="https://www.splcenter.org/">Southern Poverty Law Center</a> or the <a href="https://www.adl.org/">Anti-Defamation League</a> in the US shows a significant <a href="https://www.adl.org/blog/white-supremacists-double-down-on-propaganda-in-2019">increase in extremist activity</a> since 2016. </p>
<p>What has been most concerning is that the rise in online hate speech has real-world implications. <a href="https://phys.org/news/2019-10-online-speech-crimes-minorities.html">Research</a> shows an increase in online hate speech will be accompanied by hate crimes in a region or locality. Internet outages reduce both.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/a-year-from-the-christchurch-terror-attacks-nz-intelligence-records-a-surge-in-reports-131895">A year from the Christchurch terror attacks, NZ intelligence records a surge in reports</a>
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<p>In the aftermath of the Christchurch attacks, it was good to see <a href="https://www.beehive.govt.nz/release/new-zealand-bans-military-style-semi-automatics-and-assault-rifles">rapid action on limiting automatic weapons</a>. And the <a href="https://www.christchurchcall.com/">Christchurch Call</a> – Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-christchurch-call-is-just-a-start-now-we-need-to-push-for-systemic-change-117259">initiative</a> to stop people using social media to promote terrorism – certainly helped put pressure on online platforms such as Facebook to monitor and remove objectionable material.</p>
<p>But we could move to ban right-wing organisations and put restrictions on individuals who <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/feb/24/uk-ban-neo-nazi-sonnenkrieg-division-terrorist-group">breach agreed thresholds of speech and action</a>. We still do not have clear guidelines for what constitutes hate speech, apart from <a href="http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1993/0082/latest/DLM304643.html">s61 of the Human Rights Act</a> and the <a href="http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/2015/0063/latest/whole.html">Harmful Digital Communications Act</a>.</p>
<p>I do worry that we don’t have sufficient resources and skills locally to adequately monitor what is happening, even if agencies have been working together more closely internationally.</p>
<p>It would be good to know more from the agencies that have oversight. The New Zealand Security and Intelligence Service (<a href="https://www.nzsis.govt.nz/">NZSIS</a>) refers to the threat value, but often in relation to international threats. </p>
<p>More openness about their concerns and the extent of local groups and activists would help: for instance, something like <a href="https://tellmamauk.org/">Tell MAMA</a> in the UK or the reports other security agencies provide. </p>
<p>It was refreshing to see the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (<a href="https://www.asio.gov.au/">ASIO</a>) provide its <a href="https://www.asio.gov.au/director-generals-annual-threat-assessment.html">annual threat assessment</a> in February this year. It assessed the terrorist threat in Australia as probable but the possibility of a right-wing extremist attack as low in terms of capability.</p>
<p>But it acknowledged that advances in technology are “outstripping our technical capabilities”, which must be a concern everywhere.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/asio-chiefs-assessment-shows-the-need-to-do-more-and-better-to-prevent-terrorism-132447">ASIO chief's assessment shows the need to do more, and better, to prevent terrorism</a>
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<p>One thing is certain. The Christchurch mosque attacks have become part of the lexicon whenever white supremacist terrorism is discussed. The events on March 15 have become something of a guide – and, unfortunately, an inspiration to other right-wing terrorists. </p>
<p>It is challenging that many of these extremists, the alleged Christchurch gunman included, are self-radicalised, ideologically motivated, and with a small or no digital footprint. Often there is no prior warning of an attack. </p>
<p>One year on from the attacks, my report card for New Zealand is that we’ve made progress on greater awareness and action. But we still need to do more, including on keeping the public better informed that the problem hasn’t gone away. Just ask those <a href="https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/403884/new-register-for-islamophobic-and-racist-incidents-created">who continue to be targeted</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/133050/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Spoonley does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>My assessment is that there are about 150 to 300 core right-wing activists in New Zealand. This might sound modest – but proportionate to population, it’s similar to extremist numbers in Germany.Paul Spoonley, Distinguished Professor, College of Humanities and Social Sciences, Massey UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.