Affect And The Rise Of Right Wing Populism

This book analyzes the affective modes of right-wing populism and discusses the pedagogical implications for renewing democratic education.

The last two decades have seen the emergence of new radical right-wing populist parties in Western democracies. The electoral breakthrough of the French Front National in 1984 was the starting point for the rise of parties combining anti-establishment populism and anti-immigrant politics based on ethno-nationalist ideology, and today radical right-wing populist parties are well represented in national politics in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Italy, Norway, Switzerland, and the Netherlands in Western Europe, as well as in Australia, Canada, and New Zealand. By bringing together some of the foremost experts within this area of research, this book gives a comprehensive image of different aspects of radical right-wing populism: its causes, ideology, and impact.

Immigration has become one of the central issues dominating the agenda of political parties, and has also played a crucial role in the rise of right-wing populism in Western Europe. This book explores the role of conservative parties in immigration policy change. The following questions are addressed: What explains the introduction of restrictive immigration policies across a number of European states? Why do conservative parties choose to toughen their immigration policy stances? How can we explain the variation in the factors that affect conservative parties’ immigration policy-making logics? What mechanisms account for the dynamics of immigration policy change or policy deadlock? Based on interviews with political elites and policy makers in the UK, Switzerland and France, the book explains why governmental conservative parties in these countries revised their immigration policy stances and steered immigration policy in a more restrictive direction between 2002 and 2015.

While research in right-wing populism has recently been blossoming, a systematic study of the intersection of right-wing populism and gender is still missing, even though gender issues are ubiquitous in discourses of the radical right ranging from »ethnosexism« against immigrants, to »anti-genderism.« This volume shows that the intersectionality of gender, race and class is constitutional for radical right discourse. From different European perspectives, the contributions investigate the ways in which gender is used as a meta-language, strategic tool and »affective bridge« for ordering and hierarchizing political objectives in the discourse of the diverse actors of the »right-wing complex.«

Studies the new West European parties of the radical populist right, arguing that, in distancing themselves from the reactionary politics of the traditional extremist right, these parties have become a significant challenge to the established structure and politics of West European democracy today.

This volume offers a comparative survey of Far Right parties across Europe, examining in particular their changing political rhetoric. The contributors look at the development of two distinct forms of party development and discourse: The Haiderization and The Berlusconization model.

Right-wing populist movements and related political parties are gaining ground in many EU member states. This unique, interdisciplinary book provides an overall picture of the dynamics and development of these parties across Europe and beyond. Combining theory with in-depth case studies, it offers a comparative analysis of the policies and rhetoric of existing and emerging parties including the British BNP, the Hungarian Jobbik and the Danish Folkeparti. The case studies qualitatively and quantitatively analyse right-wing populist groups in the following countries: Austria, Germany, Britain, France, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Italy, Netherlands, Hungary, Belgium, Ukraine, Estonia, and Latvia, with one essay exclusively focused on the US. This timely and socially relevant collection will be essential reading for scholars, students and practitioners wanting to understand the recent rise of populist right wing parties at local, countrywide and regional levels in Europe, and beyond. This timely and socially relevant collection will be essential reading for scholars, students and practitioners wanting to understand the recent rise of populist right wing parties at local, countrywide and regional levels in Europe, and beyond.

This book explores the question of why and under which conditions right-wing populist parties receive electoral support. The author argues that neither economic variables, nor national culture or history are what account for their successes. Instead, he illustrates that the electoral success of populist parties in Western Europe, such as the French Front National or the Alternative for Germany, is best understood as the unintended consequence of misleading political messaging on the part of established political actors. A two-level theory explains why moderate politicians have changed their approaches to political messaging, potentially benefiting the nationalist, anti-elitist and anti-immigration rhetoric of their populist contenders. Lastly, the book’s theoretical assumptions are empirically validated by case studies on the immigration societies of Germany, the Netherlands and Sweden.