We live in dangerous times. Far-right parties are in government in seven European countries. In the USA, the White House plans to shut down the Department of Education and is lining up climate deniers to run its environmental policies with a manifesto pledge to ‘drill, baby, drill’. Let’s not even think about Trump’s purported plans to annex the Panama Canal, Greenland and Canada.
In the UK, a party aligned with the hard right’s ideology won one in seven of all votes cast in last year’s General Election – an election that was swiftly followed by the most widespread outburst of racist rioting in more than 100 years. The world’s richest man uses his social media platform to call for the UK’s recently elected prime minister to be jailed as he rehashes wholly discredited fake news, allegations and smears.
Those who aspire to transform our society into one which is fundamentally fairer and more caring have traditionally believed, in the words of Martin Luther King, that ‘we shall overcome because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice’.
It may well be that this is a naive view of the world. After all, the Weimar Republic was defeated and superseded by the horrors of the Third Reich. But certainly not since the end of the Second World War have the fundamentals of democracy – free speech, the right to protest, the civil rights of minorities and the rule of law – been under such sustained assault. Not just by the street gangs of the far right, but also by ‘honourable members’ in the Palace of Westminster – people who aspire to run our country.
It would be all too easy to focus on the individual failings of these ‘new right’ advocates or to myth-bust the lies that they spread, but recent, and indeed older history, teaches us that such approaches are of very limited value.
When democracy is functioning well, then, to succeed, politicians need to demonstrate they are trustworthy, transparent and truthful. However, our democracy is not functioning well. We live in a country where 4.5 million children live below the poverty line, housing is unaffordable, our health service is failing and our school system is, in some cases literally, collapsing. In such circumstances, to be an outsider, however dishonest, untrustworthy and shameless, is an electoral asset. Many people, frightened for their future, would prefer a disruptive outsider, someone who refuses to ‘play the game’, over more of the same.
The electoral surge towards what are traditionally seen as hard-right ideas is a consequence of structural changes in the economy and society that have isolated individuals, reduced people’s hopes for the future, seen wealth redistributed from the poor to the already rich, and most importantly, provided no alternative narrative to free-market neoliberalism. The resulting resentment is exploited by the hard right, but the central problem is not Trump, Musk, Le Pen, Orbán, Meloni, Farage, etc. They are just symptoms of the problem. The problem is that millions of people have come to believe that their best hope for a better future lies with these disrupters or people like them.
Advocates for democracy have failed to ask themselves why these toxic disrupters are gaining support from otherwise decent ordinary people.
The answer is very simple.
- The quality of life, and the hope of a better future, have been diminishing in working-class communities for the last 40 years.
- No one is offering a credible alternative to ‘the market must rule’ ideology of neoliberalism.
- Changes in lifestyle and the economy have weakened traditional community networks; the tenants’ association, the union branch, the high-street shop, the faith network, and of course ‘the local’ that previously contributed to a ‘sense of us’: all these have largely disappeared.
It is the third of these that is the most devastating because, as the old adage goes, ‘if you don’t stand for something, you will fall for anything’.
People often ask why social media is so poisonous, but sociologists and psychologists know the answer. If someone tells us something hopeful, but we don’t have an existing relationship of trust with them, then we are unlikely to feel better. However, if someone tells us something frightening or disturbing, then, if we don’t know them, or even if we do know them and don’t trust them, we are likely to be influenced, becoming more fearful or disturbed. Perhaps it is related to the ‘fight or flight’ instinct, but if there is a warning of danger, we do not evaluate its credibility before we have an emotional response to it. Another old saying is that ‘a lie will travel around the world, before the truth has got its boots on’ and that was true long before social media.
Hateful lies are simply far more powerful on social media than hopeful truths.
Fortunately, all is not lost. It is relatively easy to defeat the lies and the hatred if we rebuild the sense of community that has been lost.
All of the issues that the hard right exploits are really ‘our’ issues: unaffordable housing, child poverty, a failing health service, the cost-of-living crisis, inadequate care for the elderly, insecure and low-paid jobs. If we organise around these issues, as radical advocates of democracy, demanding that those in power do more to address the issues in our communities, we can win small but significant changes. Such a mindset has three benefits:
- It shows that the issues causing resentment in our communities can be addressed through the active engagement of citizens in the political process.
- It can rebuild hope that further change can be achieved.
- It can help people to recognise that if they want to win they have to work with those of their neighbours whom they have previously viewed as ‘the other’.
It is this process of working for a common objective across what are artificial divides that can inoculate our people from the narratives of division and in the process create a new and potentially transformative ‘story of us’.
Let’s do this!
Take part in a changemakers forum and find information on upcoming events: https://www.ellabakerorganising.org.uk/changemakers
Jane Holgate is Professor of Work and Employment Relations at the University of Leeds and a Trustee of the Ella Baker School of Organising. She has been a longtime trade unionist, serving in elected positions and as a community activist. John Page serves on the committee of the Ella Baker School of Organising. He has worked as a union organiser and in organising or campaigning roles at the Jo Cox Foundation, the Equality Trust, HOPE Not Hate and the Runnymede Trust.
Changemakers by Jane Holgate and John Page is published by Policy Press and available on Bristol University Press for £14.99.
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