178 CHAPTER 8
Right populism The ideological complexion of right-wing populism is reflected in a fusion between key features of generic populism – such as anti-elitism, monism and moralism – and the socially conservative belief that, being composed of a fragile network of relationships, society urgently needs to be bolstered or upheld. This fusion has been founded either on the basis of nationalism or on the basis of authoritarianism (see p. 66). Right- wing populism therefore comprises two principal forms – national populism and authoritarian populism – although most right-wing populists are sympathetic towards both nationalism and authoritarianism, albeit usually to different degrees. National populism The central feature of national populism is that it defines the people in ethnic terms, meaning that the people is equivalent to the nation. National populists thus prioritize the culture and interests of the nation over all other considerations. They promise to give a voice to a national community that has been neglected, even held in contempt, by distant and corrupt elites (Eatwell and Goodwin, 2018). Such a conception of the people typically also has a historical and a territorial dimension. Paul Taggart (2000) conveyed this by arguing that populism always draws on the notion of an implicit or explicit ‘ heartland ’, a version of the past that celebrates a hypothetical, uncomplicated and non-political territory of the imagination. From this ‘place’, the people draw both their values and their sense of themselves as unified, diligent and ordinary. The heartland therefore encapsulates an image of past national greatness which national populists commit themselves to restoring.
Authoritarian populism: A form of populism that fuses robust anti-elitism, the practice of government ‘from above’ and strict adherence to conventional moral norms. Heartland: An ill-defined Assimilation: The process through which immigrant communities lose their cultural distinctiveness by adjusting to the values, allegiances and lifestyles of the majority group. Repatriation: The act or process of returning property or a person – voluntarily or forcibly – to their country of origin. Nativism: A political stance that (supposedly) reflects the needs and interests of native (or majority ethnic) inhabitants against those of immigrants. earlier time in which a ‘virtuous and unified population’ resided.
National populism has been rising steadily since the late 1990s, gaining impetus from the emergence of a faster-moving, more open society (see ‘open/closed’ divide, p. 15), and giving rise to burgeoning cultural wars (see p. 179) between social liberals and social conservatives. It has become by far the most prevalent form of populism across the globe, being particularly strong in Europe and the USA. In 2016 and 2017, 18.4 per cent of Europeans voted for national-populist parties, an increase of 7 per cent compared with 2000. In states including Hungary, Poland, Serbia, Slovakia, Italy and Austria, national-populist parties have succeeded in winning, or sharing, government power. This surge in national populism has been linked to two key – and often overlapping – policy positions. First, and most crucially, national populists oppose immigration, a stance that was boosted in Europe by the refugee crisis that peaked in 2015 (see p. 179), and in the USA by the election of President Trump in 2016. Opposition to immigration has been expressed, variously, in bans, or at least the imposition of robust controls, on migrants, pressure on minority ethnic communities to assimilate into the culture of the ‘host’ society, and, most radically, forcible repatriation . Anti-immigration populism typically has a strong ‘ nativist ’ character and is underpinned by the wider belief that ethnic diversity is irreconcilable with national cohesion and social stability. Immigration and multiculturalism (see Chapter 11) are thus portrayed as twin enemies of the people. (For a more detailed account of the conservative nationalism on which such thinking is based, see Chapter 7.)
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