Building a Strategy to Contest the Far Right

We know that what right-wing leaders do in one country today is part of a global strategy or, at minimum, political plays between globally connected actors shown by far-right leaders gathering in Madrid to “make Europe great again”. While Trump and Musk continue to dismantle liberal democratic institutions, people around the world are reeling from the consequences of elite decisions that are directly impacting safety and survival while eroding the foundations of democracy.

It is evident that our strategies–be they political, labour, movement or funding–are not working. Some of our mistakes seem obvious: the siloed approaches, the embedding of neoliberal individualism into the foundations of our movements, the prevalence of competition rather than collaboration, the hollowing out of a progressive base, infighting, unsustainable funding models and work that is overall far too anti-political. As Gramsci put it, we need pessimism of the intellect and optimism of the will: we need to be forensic in our analysis of the world as it is and build from there. As we ground in reality, who do we need to build power, alliances and strategies with, on a national and global level to confront the far right and build towards multi-racial democracies?

As we grapple with the global rise of the far right, we are collating resources on far-right authoritarianism to help make sense of this moment.

• This article offers a useful overview of concepts to navigate the global far right, including Cas Mudde’s distinction between the extreme far-right, who don’t believe in democracy and the radical far right, who believe in the essence of democracy but take a monist view that excludes minority rights, the rule of law or the separation of powers. Both fundamentally oppose liberal democracy, creating fertile ground and foundations for global alliances focused on elite power and control.

• Must-listen podcast episode with Jiore Craig on understanding how people consume information today and how the far-right taps into this, how and why the right are winning over men, especially young men, with podcasts (including a useful dissection of Jordan Peterson) and how out of touch and outdated the progressive digital playbook is. [Impolitic with John Heilemann]

• This essential piece by Nina Luo offers some much-needed historical context into the hollowing out of civil society and movements in the USA, and is widely applicable, that have left us with ineffective movement and political strategies. [The Nation]

• In this episode of Volts, Chris Hayes dives into how information and knowledge have been replaced by attention as the most valuable commodity and how the far right understands this, uses it to their advantage and the severity of the far-right now owning most social media infrastructure that directs our attention globally. It begs the question: How do we identify what we need people and politicians to pay attention to, and how do we make sure they are? [Volts]

• Academic research by Anja Neundorf et al. into the six key strategies used by authoritarian regimes to gain and maintain power shows that media indoctrination and repression of civil liberties are the most predictive of autocratic survival. These findings have big implications for “information autocracies” in the digital age. [Synopsis on Bluesky]

• Rooted in the 1990s, the far-right history of current Silicon Valley-based technology companies and their “technofascist” ideologies is crucial in understanding how today’s tech titans like Musk, Thiel and Zuckerberg are building on these foundations. [The Guardian]

• And finally, Slovakia’s current civic mobilisation highlights the power of grassroots activism and independent (crowd)funding as tools for safeguarding democracy and could serve as inspiration for other countries with repressive governments.