• Radical, Far and Populist Right

  • In the last European elections in three countries (Great Britain, Denmark and France) radical right-wing nationalist parties became the strongest forces. The number of MEPs belonging to these parties has grown considerably and they are spread all over the right political spectrum. The term “Radical Right” seems to be too vague as it applies to a spectrum including open neo-Nazis and right-wing parties having adapted their appearance to suit mainstream media.

    Can right-wing parties with a nationalist and populist agenda come into power even in the big states of the EU? Of which character is the challenge they are posing to the Left?

  • Analysis

  • Could Marine Le Pen’s Dominance of the French Far Right Be Under Threat?

  • 15 Nov 21
  • After her setback in the regional elections, Marine Le Pen now finds herself rattled by the unexpected rise of far-right media polemicist Éric Zemmour. Between its desire to represent a break with the status quo on the one hand, and its aspirations to electability on the other, her National Rally party is going through an identity crisis.
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  • Statement of the Party of the European Left

  • We Condemn the Attack on the CGIL Headquarters

  • 11 Oct 21
  • During the demonstrations that took place on 9 October in Rome against the Covid-19 health pass, the national headquarters of the Italian General Confederation of Labour (Confederazione Generale Italiana del Lavoro, CGIL) were attacked by right-wing forces. The President of the Party of the European...
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  • Analysis

  • The Populist Radical Right as a New Class Vote?

  • By Nathan Gaborit | 21 Apr 21
  • The concept of class voting is shaken by neo-liberalism. Therefore, the quasi-natural link between social structure and voting is in question. Voting for radical right-wing parties is often considered as based on affects (e.g. anger). But these characteristics seem to be incomplete for grasping the determinants of this electoral behaviour.
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  • Article Series

  • The Extreme Right in the Baltic States: Introduction

  • By Małgorzata Kulbaczewska-Figat | 27 May 20
  • The positions of far-right forces in the Baltics show the differences between these countries. Looking at them as one whole turns out to be a simplification, making it difficult to understand the internal specifics of each nation. Read our article series on the different approaches, successes and failures of far-right forces in these countries.
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  • Analysis

  • Israel’s Radical Right Populism

  • By Dani Filc | 07 Apr 20
  • Since its 'conversion' to radical-right populism, Netanyahu's Likud has remained in power for a decade, and following the third round of elections within one year as the dominant force in Israeli politics. Now it looks as if Likud will remain in power until the next election. How did they manage to become hegemonic?
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  • Conference Report

  • ¡No Pasaran!

  • By Patrícia Martins | 29 Mar 19
  • In March, over four hundred people gathered in central London for the ¡NO PASARAN! conference - to confront the rise of the far right and plan for cooperation and coordinated action to meet the threats we face.
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  • Speech at the ¡No Pasaran! Conference

  • The Reactionary Rebellion

  • By Walter Baier | 18 Mar 19
  • The experiences in Hungary, Poland, Austria and elsewhere make clear the antidemocratic character of these right-wing extremist parties, which, once in government, infiltrate the state apparatus in order to take precautions against their being deprived of power again. Is it possible to speak, in a scientific sense, of a fascist danger in Europe?
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  • France

  • The Metamorphosis of the Front National

  • By Antoine de Cabanes | 23 Oct 17
  • This article was written in January 2017 and initially published in the February 2017 issue of the Journal Sozialismus. In December 2016, the Austrian presidential election finally came out with the rejection of far-right presidential candidate Norbert Hofer. However the defeat of the Freiheitliche...
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  • Analysis of Trump’s Victory

  • The Dilemma between Post-Democracy and Pre-Fascism

  • By Walter Baier | 09 Nov 16
  • Donald Trump, a relentless right-wing populist, outed as a sexist defender of rape culture, becoming the 45th president of the US proves that the rise of right radicalism is not confined to a number of states and regions and is not a foremost European issue but rather is the expression of a global crisis of politics.
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  • About the Radical Right

  • Reactionary Rebellion

  • By Walter Baier | 19 Jan 16
  • When, in an unanticipated turn of events, Jörg Haider took over the leadership of the FPÖ (Freedom Party of Austria) in 1986 (at the time the party was part of a coalition government alongside the SPÖ (Socialist Party of Austria)), the party barely won 5 percent of the vote.
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  • The Far Right in Europe

  • By Walter Baier | 27 Feb 15
  • We have launched a thematical Focus on “Radical, Far and Populist Right” on our website: Can right-wing parties with a nationalist and populist agenda come into power even in the big states of the EU? Of which character is the challenge they are posing to the Left?
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  • Based on an Alter Summit Seminar on the Far Right

  • Theses on the Struggle against Right-Wing Extremism in Europe

  • 22 Apr 14
  • To learn better to understand the realities in the different European countries regarding the Right in its various forms and also to study systematically the political issues involved, the Alter Summit network hold this European seminar “Strategies for the Struggle Against the Far Right and Neo-Fascism in Europe” in Budapest on 3 April 2014.
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  • The Greek Nazi Party “Golden Dawn”

  • By Sia Anagnostopoulou | 19 Dec 12
  • The fact that a Nazi party – namely “Golden Dawn” – made it to the Greek Parliament is part of the broader phenomenon of the rise of far-Right in Europe; it reveals nonetheless some special dimensions of the political and financial crisis in Greece.
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  • Peril from the Right

  • By Walter Baier | 02 May 12
  • Introduction1 Many serious observers hold that the crisis in Europe has not come to an end. With the restructuring of the Greek national debt and the enlargement of the European Stability Mechanism, only time was bought, yet the fundamental problems of over-accumulation2 and the imbalances of the...
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  • Right-Wing Populism in Europe

  • By Walter Baier | 20 Oct 11
  • In many discussions the increase of extreme right-wing and right-wing populist parties in a growing number of European countries is regarded as if it were only a matter of parallel individual national phenomena. But there is also a European dimension that is unfortunately rarely considered, one that...
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  • The Hungarian Disaster

  • By Gáspár Miklós Tamás | 10 May 11
  • I hate writing this article. Since I oppose the alarming authoritarian developments in my country and am pleading for the restoration of civil liberties, I might appear to be what I definitely am not: someone who thinks that the 21st-century European variant of liberal democracy is a political order...
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  • The Rise of Right-wing Populism in Finland: The True Finns

  • By Carl Mars | 10 May 11
  • Right-wing populist anti-immigration parties, such as the National Front in France, the Freedom Party of Austria, the Progress Party in Norway and the Danish People’s Party have done well in many European countries over the last couple of decades. So far Finland has been seen as an exception in...
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  • New Aspects of the Radical Right

  • By Jean-Yves Camus | 10 May 11
  • Until the beginning of the 21st century, political science generally defined the “far right” differently from the conservative and the liberal right on several fundamental points, even though definitions varied depending on the author. Adhesion of the traditional right to an all-inclusive concept of...
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  • Author Pictogram

  • Authors