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- Convenors:
-
Antonia Jeflea
(University of Tübingen)
Rares Mihai Jeflea (University of Tübingen)
Adrian Stoicescu (University of Bucharest)
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- Formats:
- Panel
- Mode:
- Face-to-face
- Sessions:
- Thursday 25 July, -, -
Time zone: Europe/Madrid
Short Abstract:
This panel focuses on the answers the extremist speech constructs as fabricated solutions to the polycrisis world. To understand how these narratives are intertwined in different sociocultural spaces and their impact on societies, polycrisis can be used as a transdisciplinary theoretical framework.
Long Abstract:
In times marked by grievous emergencies, scientific knowledge is called upon to address the economic, social, and cultural crises our societies are facing. Analysing society through the ‘global polycrisis’ concept (Lawrence et al., 2022) could give us effective frameworks to understand the extent to which these crises interact with each other. For the anthropological toolkit, the polycrisis (Henig and Knight, 2023) is a novel theoretical lens that could generate a wide transdisciplinary discussion, especially in the contemporary political context.
In this uncertain ambience, ‘doing’ and ‘undoing’ identity becomes a crucial topic, and the rise of extremism in democratic societies is facilitated by the gradual degradation of humanity’s perspectives. How the ‘Other’ is demonized and how meaning, labelling and identity politics interfere with the cosmopolitan perception of the world (Nagata, 2001) poses a strenuous case for anthropology.
This panels seeks contributions which explore the answers the extremist speech envisages to offer as solutions to the polycrisis worlds in terms of creating the alterity sphere and providing alternative realities outside of the multiculturalist and pluralistic democratic societies.
Bringing to the foreground different sets of narratives from the extremist agenda and how these are intertwined throughout a variety of cultural spaces would lead to a better understanding of identity nowadays.
We welcome transdisciplinary papers with a focus on major European extremist movements providing an understanding of how the hate discourse prevails by being encompassed into fabricated solutions such as forms of national identity, de facto democracy, or stable economical situation for citizens.
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Thursday 25 July, 2024, -Camil Ungureanu (Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona) Ana Raluca Alecu (National University of Political Studies and Public Administration (SNSPA), Bucharest)
Paper short abstract:
This paper sheds light on the diversity of far-right environmental politics and hate discourses in Europe by contextually examining a semi-peripheral Eastern European variant – that of the Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR) and a Southern European one –that of Vox.
Paper long abstract:
This paper sheds light on the diversity of far-right environmental politics in Europe by contextually examining a semi-peripheral Eastern European variant – that of the Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR) and a Southern European one –that of Vox. Both extreme parties have leaders who style themselves as social activists (i.e. Santiago Abascal and George Simion), adhere to Christian values, and construct a national populist hate discourse against European and global elites, progressivists, feminists, and Islam. However, in practical terms, their environmental national-populism developed beginning with 2019 has significantly different policy-making and practical consequences: while Vox is greening capitalism, AUR strongly criticizes “predatory capitalism” and European imperialism and develops a mixture of environmentalism and nationalism. By drawing on our work (Alecu 2023; Ungureanu and Popartan 2023), we will inquire whether semi-peripheral positionality and religion (in AUR’s case, Orthodoxy; in Vox’s case, Catholicism) shape their differences within far-right environmental discourses. The paper demonstrates how their contrasting tropes about “national nature” and its enemies clash when brought together in Vox’s and AUR’s key environmental policies.
References
Ungureanu, Camil (2023) „The green, green grass of the nation. A new far-right ecology in Spain”, Political Geography
Alecu, Ana Raluca (2023) - The Christian Right in Europe: Movements, Networks, and Denominations, “Religious Actors and Their Political Agenda in Romania. From the Family Referendum to the Rise of the AUR”, Gionathan Lo Mascolo (ed.), Transcript Verlag
Jamie Saris (Maynooth University)
Paper short abstract:
On 23 November 2023, Dublin appeared in the international press because of several hours of severe rioting. This unrest was reported on as a nativist uprising against “mass immigration” by the Far Right, whose membership, it was claimed, came from the most socially excluded part of Irish society.
Paper long abstract:
On 23 November 2023, Dublin came to the attention of the international press because of several hours of rioting. Sadly (and largely incorrectly) this unrest were reported on the 24-hr news cycle, and almost continuously on X (formerly Twitter) as a sort of nativist uprising against “mass immigration”. The proximate cause of this unrest was a horrific attack on schoolchildren by a man, originally from Algeria, but a resident of Ireland for some two decades. This attack crystallised what had hitherto been considered by most mainstream pundits to be a marginal anti-migrant protest movement, whose poorly attended “rallies” outside of various asylum-seeker accommodations and/or service providers around the country for the last year or so had been very lightly policed by the Gards [Irish Police], despite the presence of known agitators from English Fascist/Nationalist circles at many of these events. This paper examines some of the aftermath of riot, especially those offered by various Irish pundits, Far-Right messaging on X, and more than two decades of on-and-off research in the kinds of neighbourhoods seen as the source of many of the rioters by the author. The paper is a reflection on how the ways that various kinds of marginality, structural and culture, and "hate" intersect in social life and online.
Rares Mihai Jeflea (University of Tübingen)
Paper short abstract:
The COVID-19 pandemic, the energetic crisis, and the volatile global economical context constitute the ideal framework for novel Romanian far-right movements to rise. This could be linked to the using of TikTok to disseminate the populist agenda.
Paper long abstract:
The COVID-19 pandemic brought to the fore numerous social problems and challenged social cohesion in most societies since it required people to cease a part of their social rights to fight the spreading of the virus. This moment was beneficial for the far-right movements, which gained momentum in Romania. After the pandemic ended, their agenda has incorporated a plethora of other topics, challenging the mainstream political environment. Recent polls show that approximately 25% of voters would choose one extremist party if elections were held today (HotNews, 2024). After the elections, many people pointed out that a decisive factor for their success was communication through social media, which started to constitute a new tool for sharing the populist agenda (Cervi et al, 2021). Although this is certainly accurate, the extent to which the digital sphere contributed to far-right's boom still needs to be analysed. This research aims to analyse the populist content from TikTok, focusing primarily on content created by Romanian political figures of the illiberal agenda, but will also include other personalities that are vectors for sharing similar ideologies. TikTok has already proved its efficacy in elections, helping Narendra Modi to win the general elections in India in 2019 (IANS, 2019), but could it be sufficient to place Romanian far-right movements in the political mainstream?
Alana Sá Leitão (University of Toronto)
Paper short abstract:
I will discuss how the raise of the extreme right in Brazil led to a focus on discourses on “crisis” in one of the most influential churches in the country’s public sphere, the UCKG, which became one of the main actors spreading the fear of a world on collapse and offering answers to ‘polycrisis’.
Paper long abstract:
For Henig and Knight (2023), the term polycrisis ‘thinks’ a landscape of knotted events, while anthropologists zoom in on specific intersections to see how these phenomena appear in ethnographic situations. Here, my intention is to discuss how the raise of the extreme right in Brazil impacted Christian churches, and specifically one of the most influential in the country’s public sphere: the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God (UCKG). This Church’s importance in Brazilian society is connected with its participation in politics and media, and over the years it has shifted from being allied to the left-wing Workers Party toward support of Bolsonarismo. While much has been written about the electoral support Evangelical and Pentecostal Churches have given to right-wing governments, my intention is not to discuss how this support enabled government wins, but rather to trace the effect of this support on the Church. Focusing on the changes I could observe in my fieldwork with the UCKG, I will discuss what they meant at an institutional level—changes in their news vehicles, slogans used to describe their candidates for Congress, positions regarding public policies - and how these adaptations were perceived by their followers. The UCKG do not give long explanations to these ‘reforms’, focusing instead on the crisis. This approach simultaneously feeds the vision of a society on the edge of collapse while legitimizing themselves as having the answers to the ‘polycrisis’.
Adrian Stoicescu (University of Bucharest)
Paper short abstract:
This papers proposes to look at the (mis)uses of folk culture in the extremist disourse through the leses of ‘knitted eventedness’ (Henig&Knight 2023), thus creating new affordances to the folk cultures as as instrument used in political agendas.
Paper long abstract:
It goes without saying that folk cultures create a sense of belonging to the group and, in times of risk, uncertainty and rapid change, they nestle comfort against a perceived sense of undoing forms of familiar being. Particularly, in a world of polycrisis seen as a ‘complex solidarity of problems’ (Morin, 1999:74) the need for familiarity in a shifting world may kindle reappraisals of folk cultures by revitalisation, valorisation of living heritage, or the creation of new practices stemming from initial forms by reorchestrated to server a particular purpose.
Against such backdrop, the populist discourse finds a fertile soil in the appeal to folk culture as a solution to a world that changes, but, most importantly, as an instrument to amass support against mainstream politics. However, such undertaking results in creating yet another layer of contrasting opinion, pitting members of the same rather homogenous group against each other.
This paper proposes to analyse various types of extremist discourse – ranging from that of political parties with an open right-wing agenda to non-affiliated or conjunctural voices – which resort to folk culture as a last bastion of resistance to present day challenges in connection with health (global pandemics and vaccines), family, East/West divide, access to natural resources etc. In doing so, the (mis)uses of folk culture will be looked at from the angle of ‘knitted eventedness’ (Henig&Knight 2023).
Weronika Kuta (University of Vienna)
Paper short abstract:
This paper analyses various strategies of using effects of policrysis as a tool for gaining public support by extreme far-right movement in Poland. In this context the key issue is internal diversity of the movement, corresponding to the multiplicity of needs of the individuals affected by crisis.
Paper long abstract:
Polycrisis, negatively influencing the future life perspectives of groups and individuals, results in the emergence and reinforcement of specific emotional responses. Financial insecurity, fear of losing social position, frustration, feelings of helplessness and powerlessness arising from socio-economic changes and disillusionment with politicians' decisions lead individuals to seek support through groups promising to re-establish “social order” and provide security. This situation creates new opportunities for nationalist movements and right-wing populists. Depending on the preferences of the social group they want to reach with their message, nationalists may use retrospectively oriented utopias based on a sense of nostalgia, agendas of active resistance with a metaphor of struggle and protection of own matters along with the reconstitution of agency, or the promise of social promotion and belonging to a strong collective striving to achieve shared goals.
In my presentation, I will analyse the strategies and tools that Polish nationalists use to adjust the types of narratives to the widest possible audience. Considering that this is an extremely internally heterogeneous group, I will try to answer the question of how, using appropriately shaped self-images, influencing individuals' definition of the current situation, multiple ways of managing emotions and politics of exclusion, the right-wing movement remains an attractive alternative in times of global crisis.
Campbell Thomson (UCL)
Paper short abstract:
This paper explores how “conspiracy-minded” freedom movement activists in the UK perceive of an unfolding “Great Reset” experientially, in the form of tangible impediments to daily life. It asks what activists consider the “Great Reset” to be, and the identity of those believed to be behind it.
Paper long abstract:
Reflecting on fieldwork conducted around the UK and via the social media platform Telegram, I consider how “conspiracy-minded” conceptions of an unfolding “Great Reset” motivate activism within the UK freedom movement. While initially emerging in opposition to COVID-19 lockdowns and vaccination measures in 2020, the freedom movement has since morphed into a sustained network of campaign groups, political parties and nascent “off-grid” communities. I argue that these groups share a sense that the “Great Reset” – supposedly, a secretive plot to abolish national democracies and establish a world government, instigated by a “global elite” – can be experienced affectively, in the form of tangible impediments to daily life. Within this paradigm, traffic zoning measures such as Low Emission Zones or “15-Minute City” schemes, as well as proposed “Central Bank Digital Currencies” become visceral forms of incarceration, administered via mass surveillance and geographic “lockdown”.
This paper aims to engage two questions, with reference to activist responses to traffic zoning measures. Firstly, how do freedom movement activists conceive of their key antagonists – the “globalists and technocrats” said to be driving and administering the “Great Reset” polycrisis – whether as fully-realised subjects (identifiable, “real people”), or as semi-anonymous arbiters of a hidden political project? Secondly, to what extent do activists consider the “Great Reset” to be a coherent political agenda? I suggest that the “Great Reset” might alternatively be described as a ‘blank banner’ (Ardener 2016) or ‘empty concept’ (Boyer 1986); an oppositional staging post from which populist alterities can be elaborated.
Antonia Jeflea (University of Tübingen)
Paper short abstract:
The return migration of Romanian immigrants is a sphere exploited by the far-right movement to create the demonised 'other'. These movements fabricate return migration as the ultimate solution in an idealised society 'protected' against the stereotypical Western culture.
Paper long abstract:
Caught in a floating sense of space (Marcu, 2020), with many unsuccessful tentatives of relocating permanently back home that turn into perpetual remigration paths, Romanian immigrants are a desirable target for extremist discourses. This paper aims to explore how political parties use polycrises to obtain political gains and votes for future elections.
Romania has large diasporic communities in Western Europe, encompassing transnational, short-term, long-term, or permanent migrants. Many of them leave their home country to fulfil a financial goal—often materialised as a permanent home in Romania—and plan to return afterwards.
Far right Romanian parties, along with orthodox organisations supporting their agenda, sketch the demonised ‘other’ (Nagata, 2001) in relation to Romanian immigrants from two perspectives, exploiting the impact polycrisis has on this group. On the one hand, they challenge the current governing political field, which supposedly does not provide any reasons for members of the Romanian diaspora to return in terms of education, health, social security, or financial benefits. On the other hand, the European Union, where many of these people live and work, is seen as the bigger, demonic organism that, in the context of health, energy, and financial crises, only benefits from the cheap work force provided by Romanian citizens without returning equal benefits for them.
In this context, these parties seek to capitalise on the lack of belonging sentiments in Romanian immigrants, fabricating return migration in an idealised society governed by them as the ultimate solution.
Jonatan Kurzwelly (Peace Research Institute Frankfurt)
Paper short abstract:
This paper will explore convergences between elements of violent extremism and phenomena based on similar axioms or mechanisms in ‘non-extremist’ contexts.
Paper long abstract:
Why are we not all extremists? All the ‘building blocks’, the causes identified as driving radicalisation towards violent extremism, are easily identifiable in the broader society. Literature attributes a plethora of factors to explain extremist militancy – from individual life circumstances, exposure, and psychological characteristics, to broader socio-structural factors. However, most, if not all, of these factors affect broader society amongst whom only a very small number of individuals are usually considered to be extremist. Similarly, a number of logical axioms that drive extremist ideologies are present in political structures, discourses and common social ways of thinking across Europe (at times also echoed by social scientists that give it legitimacy).
This paper will explore convergences between elements of violent extremism and phenomena based on similar axioms or mechanisms in ‘non-extremist’ contexts. Are the differences between the logic of radical violent extremism and our status-quo social discourses, differences of kinds or just extents? When thinking of ‘Preventing and Countering Violent Extremism’(PCVE), it can be useful to sometimes think more broadly and look more widely. Perhaps the growth of radical and extremist phenomena is made easy due to the rich soil on which it grows, and the work of ‘prevention’ ought to reach even the most ‘banal’ social forms that show similarities with extremism.
Georgios Karamanos (Metropolitan College)
Paper short abstract:
This paper incorporates the criminological frameworks of the sociology of denial and moral panics theory in order to critically analyse the processes under which extremism, political ideology and neo-Nazi identity are politically negotiated, and often legitimised, through media-driven narratives.
Paper long abstract:
This paper incorporates the criminological frameworks of the sociology of denial and moral panics theory in order to critically analyse the legitimising power of the media. The two frameworks will examine the processes under which extremism and political ideology is negotiated through media-driven narratives, as well as the manner under which media orchestrated over-reactions and under-reactions attempt to regulate societal response to extreme-right violence. These frameworks have almost never been applied together to the study of a phenomenon and their successful analysis can provide criminologists with valuable findings on the legitimising power of the media in regards to extreme-right violence. Furthermore, this essay will use the Greek neo-Nazi party and criminal organisation, Golden Dawn, and its depiction by the media as a case study. For this research, document and discourse analysis of 13 Greek newspaper articles were used. The findings concluded that statements of denial in regards to the neo-Nazi identity and criminal behaviour of the party were facilitated with exaggerated reports of the criminality of immigrants and refugees. Furthermore, the results of the research indicate that the media, indeed, have the power to legitimise criminal organisations, rationalize their ideologically motivated violence, and assign to them the false role of a folk ‘hero’. Lastly, this paper encourages further research on the concepts of denial and moral panics in regards to mass-media justifications and can serve as a starting point for the analysis of the interplay between the two theoretical frameworks.