There is a tendency to write about the radicalisation of the UK Right as if it emerged suddenly after the end of the Covid19 pandemic in 2022, when in reality fuelled by Brexit, infighting in the Conservative Party and Labour fecklessness under every leader it has been building for over 20 years.
The racist right has always been around, I remember when they railed against the Indians and Bangladeshi community that had been expelled by Idi Amin in 1969 and following years. The big difference now is 24hr news with its endless need to pump out content and they end up making the news.
These are the same people who would have been fighting west Indians in the 60s, asians in the 70s and 80s, who were hooligans fighting foreign football supporters in the 90s and on it goes. ONCE they done with asylum seekers they will go after black and brown britons born and raised here
Yes,in the old days it might have made the Six O'Clock news if it warranted, and may have been in the next day paper, but often only weeks later when people were charged etc. and the court case came up. Now its all the time everywhere and people treat 120 racist thugs as way much more that they are
Brexit stoked the belief among the UK Right that pursuing a maximalist agenda is a path to victory. The surrender of much of the UK political establishment to Brexit delusions encouraged the UK Far Right to move more quickly to seize control of the Conservatives and impose their agenda on Britain
Brexit maximalism is logical enough, in the sense that the UK was originally not an EU member (at the time EEC ). Some may not see the point here. Brexit was not 'radical' - in the sense that it merely restored a previously normal state of affairs.
Maximalism is itself a general characteristic of the right, and specifically of fascism. Some maximalism is performative, but reactionary maximalism is often rational, in the sense that what they want was indeed the status quo, in the past.
Hindsight's a wonderful thing, but there was I, all hopeful in the noughties, while me ole' Mum was scanning the papers & radio, trying to alert me to the rising tide of Bannon-inspired-right-wingery bubbling up in Europe. Sorry Mum: but I'm glad you're not here to see it. #WarningsFromHistory
Indeed. And if you go back a century you had the media and word of mouth at that time helping to raise the tide of fascism in Europe. Quite well documented by young travellers who wrote books later in the ‘30’s on what they saw. In fact, BBC’s Book at Bedtime on R4 is Sally Carson’s ‘Crooked Cross.’
The chronicles of poverty & disquiet have always been with us. The political & societal commitment to tackling them is mere background noise. Apart from 1945, the left-behind have always fallen-off the priority list, and the results are now manifest. "O I have ta'en too little care of this". K.Lear
Exactly. The rise of the far right in the UK has to be one of the most obvious, well-documented, and slow-moving political outcomes in recent history. It has been so widely studied, impossible to ignore, and unfolding in plain sight that it feels almost like climate change.
www.tetleystldr.com/tetleystldr-...
From UKIP’s Brexit through to Reform’s cut-and-paste of Identitarian ‘remigration now,’ I cannot think of a single typical far-right demand that successive UK governments haven’t reframed as "common sense" or "the will of the people", listened t,o and ultimately succumbed to.
The reason HAS to be that Britain believes itself naturally immune to the far right, in the same way it imagines continental countries are genetically predisposed to it? How many times have we been trolled about "the rise of the far right in Europe" as we watch the UKIP/Reform triumph.
I hope it's okay Anders but I have added you to ths starter pack. I notice you post a lot of interesting insights, about brexit & uk politics, from an European perspective. go.bsky.app/Pa8zPzr
Sure - thanks!
you're welcome. Alexander is already on the same starter pack. there's a myth that Europeans have "moved on" and don't talk about brexit anymore. I find the opposite to be true. the expectation is the UK, or GB, will re-join but it needs to fix itself first. the European perspective is useful.
I couldn't agree more. I visit england often and it is really odd with how the media & commentators regard trump or the protests against pro putin types, blocking EU membership in Georgia, Serbia, Bulgaria etc.
That is not unique to Britain. Germany is an exception, since for obvious reasons it cannot claim to be 'immune'.
The Great British far right isn't like nasty foreign far rights though. If theirs are all disgracefully reminiscent of Nazism, ours is more about winning the World Cup in '66 and reclaiming Churchill's honourable attitude towards India.
There are no hive-minds based on geog accident, or are you just talking abt the political establishment? Have memories of the NF & c in 1970s. Stop insulting entire pop.
I think the more basic lesson is *that there isn't that much difference* between the UK, Germany, France and US on this. On the face of it, that's mad - these are very different countries, with completely different political systems & demographies *and completely different economic trajectories*.
The obvious conclusion is that the Far Right is reacting to something more fundamental than the specific manner in which any given specific country operates. They are reacting against the very notion of open, diverse, inclusive societies i.e. against modernity itself.
> They are reacting Why assume they are *reacting*? This isn't just passive-aggressive internet-pissiness directed at you - there's a very broad tendency to view most every kind of politics (centre-left/right/liberal/socialist) as representing values x interests pursued by elite political actors...
... but the far/radical right as *reactors*. Look at this chart - they are as much a part of politics as any party - if you're looking for a period where they seem to be *reacting* rather than *acting* that would be post WWII (running/hanging from a lampost is definitely a *re*action).
If you really wanted to, you could say "when the centre-right and centre-left are weak, the far/radical/hard-right will surge" ... but that's an inference from a sample size of only 3 periods.
Sorry for the late reply. I say they are "reacting to modernity" because the entire discourse of the Far Right and that of their fascist predecessors from the previous century is reactive (cont.)
And yet the trends are the same, ergo (i) it's not about the specifics of any country's culture/economics/politics (ii) it's about stuff that's shared across these very different countries (including the fact that they aren't wholly independent - political entrepreneurs look to other states!)
So true Alexander, the likes of Fraser Nelson & Andrew Neill would deny any culpability, but their time at the Spectator was gateway to mainstreaming much of this. John Rentoul, was another with his trumpeting of Brexit & Robert Tombs ‘English exceptionalism’ dogma.
One of the interesting things about Brexit: it was haphazard, chaotic and self-destructive so we forget the deep prehistory of it. The Leave campaign worked with the grain of English/Tory members' opinions. They proved much better at politics than Remainers. policyscotland.gla.ac.uk/blog-sir-iva...
Without a doubt. The appoint of the hapless Straw was the moment I knew the vote would be lost.
Not just Brexit, but Trumpism/Orbanism/LePen (even if she didn't win) all showed these attitudes had serious currency.
At a certain point, all these RW organizations started attending each other's conferences, learning from each other, getting infected with the same virus (and probably Russian operatives also) and thinking the same way. Leaving aside ComIntern etc, the democratic left has not engaged in this.
Corbynism on the part of Labour was a huge mistake. Surrendered anything near the center.