How the Alt Right builds on earlier far right upsurges: teleSUR article

I have an opinion piece on teleSUR about “How the Alt Right Builds on Earlier Far-Right Upsurges.”  A lot of my work over the past couple of years has been based on a distinction between the far right and the system-loyal right. The teleSUR article summarizes this analytic point:

"The alt-right's attitude toward Trump highlights an important dividing line within the U.S. right — the divide between those who accept the legitimacy of the existing political system, and those who don't. I reserve the term 'far right' for forces that (1) regard human inequality as natural or inevitable and (2) reject the established political order on principle. The 'system-loyal right,' by contrast, includes those forces that want to make change through incremental measures. An analogy on the left is the difference between social democrats and communists, reformists and revolutionaries.

"One of the biggest ways that far rightists make an impact is through collaboration and interchange with system-loyal rightists, such as alt-rightists helping to put Trump in the White House and using his campaign to increase their own visibility. Yet the two part company on whether to accept the U.S. political system or abandon it and sooner or later that is likely to lead to conflict."

The article presents the Alt Right's rise in the context of the Nazi-Klan upsurge of the 1980s and the Patriot movement's rise in the 1990s:

"Unlike the Nazi-Klan movement of the 1980s or the Patriot movement of the 1990s, the alt-right mostly exists online. This means it is unlikely to take up armed struggle or organize militias, but it has powerful tools to continue its 'metapolitical' strategy, to shift the parameters of political discourse as a first stage before transforming institutions. And unlike the previous two far-right upsurges, which were met by federal government crackdowns, the alt-right now faces a presidential administration that it helped to put in power."

Read More

Against the Grain interview: The Origins and Politics of the Alt-Right

The Pacifica Radio program Against the Grain recently broadcast an interview with me about the Alt Right. Here's their description:

"Until the last year or two, most people had never heard of the alt-right. But the lead up to the election of Donald Trump has highlighted its noxious influence, including in the corridors of power. Is the term the 'alt-right' just a fig leaf for neo-Nazism? Or is the alternative right a new formation of reactionary politics, steeped in white supremacy and misogyny? Scholar Matthew Lyons talks about the intellectual origins of the alternative right, and the relationship between the alt-right and Trump’s key advisor Steve Bannon. He also weighs in on whether the Trump administration is fascist."

The interview, which was conducted by Against the Grain co-producer Sasha Lilley and aired on February 6, is available for download or for listening online.

Read More