Is the West Experiencing a Right-Wing Drift?

... something you will never hear from the UK media despite all their tut-tutting about Johnny Foreigner and their far right tendencies.

I guess the prospect of this coalition collapsing within two years is as high as it gets at least? Even if the oppo cannot unite in the meantime (much more difficult it seems as bloody usual).

As long as you are pro-EU.

🇪🇺 reaction to yesterday's 🇮🇹 election, which has paved the way for #Italy's first far-right leader since Mussolini:

We are likely to see something similar to 2018 when the populist 5 Stars won - an initial effort to appeal to #Meloni's pro-EU instincts and not to isolate her. pic.twitter.com/NPoQfxJMCI

— Dave Keating (@DaveKeating) September 26, 2022

im american so obv my internal calibration for right-wingedness is tuned to US frequencies, but what besides anti-immigration unites the various right wing parties of the EU and the UK? to what extent do they attack the welfare state, promote privatization and conservative theology, etc?

Well, they pretty much all hate teh gays.

all these parties are remarkably similar imo. you could just copy and paste their speeches (and translate them, of course). it’s pretty much anti-immigration, anti-globalization (i.e. we should make our own stuff!) usually very anti-muslim, and occasionally there’s a whiff of antisemitism for extra credit. “make (x) great again.”

If you want to look at the layers Meloni is keen on gutting reproductive rights, and an emphasis on 'normal' families.

This is pure Guardian.

Happy to be back in @guardian with my take on #ItalianElections 🇮🇹

In short: no reason to panic, as conditions are unfavorable. More important story is two decades of mainstreaming far-right actors and ideas.https://t.co/30G8WGrPle

— Cas Mudde (@CasMudde) September 26, 2022

yeah you’re right xy. i suspect there is a certain brand of catholic conservatism at work in some of these countries that meshes fairly seamlessly with america’s evangelical right.

I met someone from Pakistan at a conference. I think he was based in Portugal and had traveled through Sweden or the reverse with respect to the countries involved. I think the Scandinavian countries, as well as the Baltic states and Finland, have tried to be inclusive. There is a balance between assimilation and numbers and social cohesion that creates tests on many levels.

The current Swedish elections have put that idea to the test.

(yes, of course)

(I guess I was impressed that he was at the conference. I think he was first author on a paper that won the best paper award. How did he get there? What supported him in that journey? etc.)

So the American right is going predictably gaga over Meloni — why not, she's more photogenic than Orban — and is very incensed at any use of the word fascist to describe her. All while also being faux-naif about what she means by "financial speculators."

The European right also seems to be exactly like the contemporary American right in selling reactionary populism (re: anti-globalization/make stuff here) while being 100% wedded to trickle-down/tax cuts for the rich ASAP.

to what extent do they attack the welfare state, promote privatization and conservative theology, etc?

i think one of the key differences between the european far-right and the american far-right is at least some of the europeans are somewhat pro-welfare, especially in comparison to the establishment centre-right parties, as long as it's not for immigrants

"So the American right"

And Hilary Clinton.

can't believe they made mussolini a woman in the reboot. this woke nonsense has ruined yet another franchise

— Ida🏳️‍⚧️🥔 (@Ida_Clemens) September 26, 2022

The "she's not a fascist, chill" idiocy amongst mainstream right wing types for Meloni seems to me to be a lot stronger than it was for Bolsonaro, Orban, Erdogan - any theories?

Bolsanaro has never tried to hide how much he loved the old military junta whereas Meloni has played down the associations with Mussolini.

Also the ppl saying chill are silly and shouldn't be bothered with.

Maybe because she isn't that different from most of the current Tory Party? Apart from the Catholic bit, of course.

A lot of people are either not experienced with the kind of dogwhistling about family etc or it reads differently coming from a woman due to structural sexism. I think that’s a big part of it, that she is physically small, relatively young and leans hard on that unpolished not-a-politician thing, and also that she knows how to code a lot of her words so that they pass if you don’t want to look too closely = less threatening. She doesn’t look like what people think a fascist looks like.

That makes a lot of sense gyac. But then you could say the same about Le Pen? I guess her family credentials make things more obvious.

I also wonder whether it's a "too close to home" situation, where leaders in South America, Eastern Europe, the Middle East can be safely categorized as fascists (while still making arguments as to why this is all somehow Fault Of The Left) but a Western European fascist has to be spun as something else.

Also the ppl saying chill are silly and shouldn't be bothered with.

I am not "bothering with them" in terms of taking their opinions seriously, but finding out why centrist stooges take the positions they take can reveal things about the political powers they align with.

Le Pen gets a lot of soft soaping too! She’s been on Newsnight. But yes, family connection and she’s older and doesn’t play vulnerable girlboss.

Aesthetics are a huge part of it for fascists. You’d read people making fun of Nick Griffin’s looks as though that was the thing that mattered.

Farage has got a fair bit of soft soaping over the years, and very rarely does the girlboss thing

Farage is from the same background as the ruling class, it’s no mystery.

also Farage is not really viewed as Not A Fascist anywhere save the UK, while with Meloni I've seen the same sort of opinions coming from voices in the UK, US, France, Portugal.

Latin America, Eastern Europe etc. is just much further away, yes. Most of the ppl wondering as to whether Meloni is a fascist will know of Mussolini. Don't think people have an equivalent for Turkey or Brazil at their fingertips.

Isn't the centrist position one of distance and a hedging one's bets? They'll publish an opinion that will say Meloni is a fascist, or that Meloni is nothing to be afraid of. As long as both are considered. Because there is no immediate danger maybe it's ok to have this kind of debate as it won't knock on their door tomorrow. But if it does they aren't on the wrong side, or so they think.

they would be saying the same thing about le pen if she won power in france

both the national rally & the brothers of italy have pretty direct fascist lineages that their leadership is keen to downplay for the very obvious reasons, but that makes the accusations hit harder & their backers much more defensive about it.

i think orban was offset by having more explicit fascists around in jobbik & being an established political figure who wasn't as explicit about his trajectory until he was already in a position to seriously consolidate power, erdogan's relations with the west have been very rocky, his consolidation of power has been much more gradual, and the western right still often views him with suspicion so they're not anywhere near as inclined to be defensive there, and bolsonaro is much more direct about who he is (though he still denies the far-right label).

farage has also never been very close to directly holding power (so less need for foreign centrists to both-sides him) despite the gigantic influence he's had & he doesn't have the same sort of direct fascist ties as meloni and le pen so there's not the same sort of defensiveness by default.

Among U.S. conservatives I have seen some discomfort with her going after "financial speculators," but only because it sounds Marxist to them. It's basically the anime meme of the guy with the butterfly, pointing to a swastika and saying "Is this socialism?"

(((off topic and uninformed response that is perhaps buying into stereotypes but Italy seems like a good example of an economy that could be revived with management and investment in craftsmanship that is world renowned -- why can't things work better smaller with more intelligent and less wasteful connections between them?)))

The Italian economy is a lot stronger than the UK one fwiw.

Is that right? I think it depends on the sector.

If you broke it down by region both the UK and Italy have vast areas of poverty and very high youth unemployment. Countries broken by deindustrialization and offshoring, and cheaper goods made in the East.

I doubt craftsmanship is the answer either. How many jobs would it deliver?

Yeah my gut feeling is craftsmanship only comes into play when you're catering to semi-luxury products and that's too much of a niche to build an economy around.

(I think spending and value would have to be reconfigured for craftsmanship to matter and to be affordable and to ensure everyone who wanted to and was able to could work.)

I don't know, Italy is always treated as a basket case by the UK media as if this country is so much better. But then they run down everywhere in Europe that isn't Germany or in Northern Europe.

... now we're the basket case!

But then they run down everywhere in Europe that isn't Germany or in Northern Europe.

This is the dynamic of the European media in general (incl self flagellation in Southern countries and superiority complex in the Northern ones).

Modi has also very successfully resisted being called a fascist

In this country, for sure.

I thought Italy already was renowned for exports of high quality food products, fashion, design, luxury cars. Cheap stuff or more quotidian stuff has been offshored but Italian luxury goods are status symbols the world over.

This looks like a good thread on Italian industry

It's hard to explain to a foreign audience what is happening in Italy with Meloni, and how this is possible. But it is easier to understand once you consider this: Italy is the Western country that has suffered the most severe and prolonged economic decline over the last decades.

— Paolo Gerbaudo (@paologerbaudo) September 27, 2022

"Things are in decline, so let's go with the people who led us into outright ruin."

This was an interesting thread about Italian Bengalis

After the UK, Italy has the largest Bengali community in Europe. Seeing the result of the elections makes me worried for what could happen to them. I know many migrated to the UK and this is most visible via the Italian-Bengali cafes dotted around East London.

— Fatima Rajina (@DrFRajina) September 27, 2022

Eater London bait there in the last sentence.

The next European Parliament Elections, Caius Julius Caesar Mussolini (I'm not making it up, it's his name)

Will likely become a MEP pic.twitter.com/C3RcpzRG57

— Italian🇮🇹🇻🇦 (@Italian347) September 27, 2022

British newspaper columnists in unison: If Meloni is such a fascist why do I agree with her about everything? pic.twitter.com/SAOxNaNGbF

— Simon Whitten (@Simon_Whitten) September 29, 2022

She's such a shameful piece of shit

I've been listening lately to the Know Your Enemy podcast, which I find really interesting. And right after listening to an episode from last November about the second National Conservatism Conference, I read this from the (terrible! awful!) Federalist today: https://thefederalist.com/2022/10/20/we-need-to-stop-calling-ourselves-conservatives/

It basically confirms a lot of things the podcast talked about, that these NatCons are really psyching themselves up for what they foresee as an all-or-nothing real culture war, in which they envision using the power of the state to enforce their versions of Christian morality and stamp out any vestiges of liberalism. Which seems both scary and ludicrous to me, because ... I don't think that will work. But they can obviously do a lot of damage along the way, and already are.

Some snippets from that Federalist piece if you can't bear to give them a click:

So what kind of politics should conservatives today, as inheritors of a failed movement, adopt? For starters, they should stop thinking of themselves as conservatives (much less as Republicans) and start thinking of themselves as radicals, restorationists, and counterrevolutionaries. Indeed, that is what they are, whether they embrace those labels or not.

... The left will only stop when conservatives stop them, which means conservatives will have to discard outdated and irrelevant notions about “small government.” The government will have to become, in the hands of conservatives, an instrument of renewal in American life — and in some cases, a blunt instrument indeed.

To stop Big Tech, for example, will require using antitrust powers to break up the largest Silicon Valley firms. To stop universities from spreading poisonous ideologies will require state legislatures to starve them of public funds. To stop the disintegration of the family might require reversing the travesty of no-fault divorce, combined with generous subsidies for families with small children. Conservatives need not shy away from making these arguments because they betray some cherished libertarian fantasy about free markets and small government. It is time to clear our minds of cant.

In other contexts, wielding government power will mean a dramatic expansion of the criminal code. It will not be enough, for example, to reach an accommodation with the abortion regime, to agree on “reasonable limits” on when unborn human life can be snuffed out with impunity. As Abraham Lincoln once said of slavery, we must become all one thing or all the other. The Dobbs decision was in a sense the end of the beginning of the pro-life cause. Now comes the real fight, in state houses across the country, to outlaw completely the barbaric practice of killing the unborn.

... On the transgender question, conservatives will have to repudiate utterly the cowardly position of people like David French, in whose malformed worldview Drag Queen Story Hour at a taxpayer-funded library is a “blessing of liberty.” Conservatives need to get comfortable saying in reply to people like French that Drag Queen Story Hour should be outlawed; that parents who take their kids to drag shows should be arrested and charged with child abuse; that doctors who perform so-called “gender-affirming” interventions should be thrown in prison and have their medical licenses revoked; and that teachers who expose their students to sexually explicit material should not just be fired but be criminally prosecuted.