Nowadays, and since the 1980s, far-right parties seem to gain more and more influence all over Europe. Each country has its own or even several: the British National Party and UK Independence Party in Britain, the National Front in France, the Golden Dawn in Greece, the Northern League in Italy or the Vlaams Belang in Belgium are examples amongst many others. This rise of such extreme right-wing parties is worrisome since they all praise for often highly controversial values and are considered by many as a threat for the democracy. Also, it is interesting to notes that the breakthrough of these parties has been important in among the states members of the European Union, and that furthermore they are all in favour of a return to a more conventional sovereignty. This would be achieved by ending the European Union and more broadly by restraining globalization. These aims may appear like a regress in view of all it has been accomplished over the last few years. In this way it would be interesting to answer to the following research question: what common characteristics do the supporters of far-right parties in Europe have? In order to offer an answer few theories will be introduced and analysed to determine the degree of their accuracy.
Theories
It is often said that the main characteristics of far-right parties and their supporters are xenophobia, nationalism and a politics of anti-immigration. This is the opinion of Catherine Fieschi who analysed the rise of the National Front in France, led first by Jean-Marie Le Pen and then by his daughter Marine Le Pen. According to her voting for their party means supporting anti-Europe, anti-immigration, anti-system and anti-Islam politics (2012, p. 11). But she points out that what led...
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The spread of democracy has been one of the largest and most widely heralded trends in government worldwide – its prevalence and impact has been the subject of much political discussion and debate. In many cases, however, fewer observers focus on the electoral system used by the democratic governments themselves, which are in many cases equally important to the ultimate shape of the government formed. In general, the First Past the Post (FPTP) electoral system that is used in Canadian Federal Elections has excluded and prevented third parties from having a large impact on the national stage post-WWII, forcing a bipartisan system of government. Central to this paper is an analysis on how third parties, in this case minor broad-based parties
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Since the Greek constitution does not allow the government to silence political parties, the only way the government can rein in the party is through criminal prosecution. Unfortunately, the Golden Dawn (GD) reflects a lager trend of European Populism Extremist Parties (PEPs) that have slowly gained influence in Europe since the 1990s. Significant literature covers these parties, and evidence has been gathered on how to be...
2. Roger Gibbins and Loleen Youngman Berdahl. “ The Institutional expression of Multiple Identities: The electoral Reform Debate” Braving the New World, Readings in Contemporary Politics. (2000): 176-186
The ultra-right parties have historically sustained outdated and fascist beliefs. Recently, however, the sudden rise to power of right-wing supporters - or "conservatives", as they prefer to be called – has been concerning me. The fact is that the loose and wide-ranging spread of these fundamentalist groups around the world is alarming. Therefore, I ask myself: why such an influential and threatening movement is taking place in the twenty-first century? Most importantly, are there viable solutions to this problem?
In fact, as tensions continue to rise in the Middle East, they have been further exacerbated. In just the past few years, France has been struck by numerous radical terrorist attacks from the Charlie Hebdo attack, to the Nice Bastille Day attacks, to the infamous Paris bombings that took place a year ago. While tensions have remained high since the 1970s when immigrants first came under scrutiny by the French upper classes, never before has such global attention been paid to France’s immigration and religious toleration policies. What is even more concerning is that the perpetrators of some of these attacks grew up in the banlieues of Paris. As La Haine predicted, since the institutional problems facing the French government continue to be ignored, the fall will be that much more
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Nationalism at its core is the support of a country. The goal of a country is to have some sort of resonance within the individuals that reside there that call themselves citizens. If the citizens don’t feel any connection with their country, they may move to find one that they feel closer too. Once found, they may support the country over others, defend it within conversations of politics or just find groups that have the same ideals they do about the country. This papers purpose is to illustrate the pros of nationalism as well as its cons.
...itism and attempting to appeal to ultra-nationalist sensibilities there is a definite racist element to their discourse. Such racism is evident in the National Front’s stance against immigration where they argue that Arab Islamic immigrants are unlikely to assimilate on the basis of the alien nature of their culture and in the idea that immigration should be banned and the rights of French citizens be made a national priority. Whilst attempts have been made to make this stance appear more moderate and in line with popular discourse in recent years, such as by aligning anti-immigration with cultural incompatibility these arguments simply attempt to mask the true nature of the National Front’s policies. Despite attempts to focus on other elements of party policy it is clear that underneath the rhetoric of Marine Le Pen the National Front is inherently a racist party.
The most important value of nationalism to democracy lies in the fact that it has the capacity to unite individual citizens into a single entity with shared beliefs. Democracy requires a definition of demos or who are included in the game and who are not (Nodia 6). Wherever the boundaries of the playing field are in dispute, democratic institutions (such as participation, representation, or cooperation) simply cannot function. Thus, for democracy to o...
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...derately nationalist platforms control over half of the popular vote. On the other hand, Islamic parties saw a sharp decline in public support from approximately 40percent in 2004 to less than one quarter this year.
In the past, the French government focused specifically on outlawing racism with the French Constitution and the Penal Code of 1994. Both of these documents are described by the United Nations as “a veritable battery of legislation against any racially discriminatory act or practice” (Criminalization of Racist Acts, 1999). These government measures seek to prevent the spread of racism by forbidding blatant displays of xenophobia. While these laws are a step in the right direction to preventing widespread racism, the government has also fallen short by claiming there are no minorities in France. In fact, France is the only nation on the Council of Europe that has refused to sign the “Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities” and according to the World Directory of Minorities, France has the worst record in terms of rights to minorities (“World Directory of Minorities”). By refusing to admit that there are minorities in France that need protection, the government has left many immigrant groups behind.
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