The Nationalists in Europe

I just read that LePen is not voting for any Candidate in the French Presidential Election. Marine LePen the leader of the National Front in France, and the candidate who stood third in the First Round of the French Presidential Vote has decided not to cast a vote for either the Right Wing Candidate Sarkozy or the Left Wing Candidate Hollande. She has been the most interesting candidate to watch as she has realised the version of Nationalist Parties which would succeed in Modern Europe are the authoritarian, but not extreme authoritarian, versions of SNP and  Plaid Cymru. Only this would be palatable to the modern European Voter as Extremes are considered distasteful in that part of the world. Whether she can make the voters forget the history of the NF is a different matter altogether. In that sense parties such as the English Democrats or UKIP do much better in matters of public perception as they don’t carry the historical extremist baggage. If you read about the history of economics by the likes of people like Niall Ferguson etc you realise that Nationalist Parties with Socialist philosophies are the ones to generally do better during a recession. Europe, thanks to the Germans in the 1930′s, has already experienced the fruits of extreme Nationalism. Thus extreme Nationalists will always be abhorred there however moderate nationalist parties do have a chance to fill the gap between the liberal left-wing parties and authoritative right-wing parties. The concern I have about these nationalist parties is not their xenophobic views but their views on Globalisation. The issue which concerns me is that there is a chance that due to their increasing influence there maybe a partial rollback of positive political attitudes towards Globalisation in Europe. As such it would be very interesting to see if pro globalisation parties across the political spectrum can create policies which may calm the fears of the natural voters of these nationalist parties.

Anders Behring Breivik and his Testimony

For the past three days i have been diligently looking at the coverage of Breivek’s trial by looking at the live updates from The Guardian, a British Newspaper. Generally i don’t like following the Guardian for such important issues but they have got it spot on by being completely factual. Ill be honest, his testimony has given me goosebumps.

In the past, I have spoken with a white British National Party Voter and i have spoken with a Muslim from Bradford, who does not support intermingling of communities and races unless its for work purposes. The gentleman supporting the BNP was primarily a protest voter who felt that Muslims were allowed to live a separate life and as such did not attempt to integrate and thus did not like them (He was more of a Islamaphobe than a out and out racist). The Muslim gentleman was British Born but was not comfortable speaking in English. He believed that the UK was a much better place twenty years back for some reason !!! However when i spoke with either of them i never felt anger,sorrow etc. I just took their views as just a couple of opinions. They were civil,polite and did not scare me. Both of them seemed to be having stable family lives and were just worried about earning a good living and living a happy family life. This shows i am particularly capable of accepting diverse political opinions and thoughts .

So what scares me about Breivik ?

Its his views combined with the action he took and the “out of box” thinking to achieve his purposes. He might have committed a perfect political crime by murdering so many people as this may probably lead to a Europe reaching a crossroad with loads of opinions being thrown at it and any decision the countries of Europe take would probably change the way Europe functions as we know it. Here is my reasoning -

1. His Views – He believes that many immigrants, primarily Muslims, are refusing to integrate with the values of their adopted homeland. In fact quite a few of non-Muslims, who themselves are immigrants , also believe the same thing. He believes that this has been caused by Multiculturalism and the lack of backbone shown by established political parties across the spectrum. He feels he had been disenfranchised as there was no political outlet for his frustrations. He feels that no political party recognised or understood his views. He believes that the media has had a role to play as it has helped to stifle debate on issues such as multiculturalism and mass immigration. He feels frustrated at the change he is seeing in his society and the feels powerless at trying to control it. Have i heard these views before ? Yes a lot of people have these views. ( I don’t necessarily agree or disagree with this viewpoint.)

2. His Objectives – He states that he wanted to be a martyr towards his cause of militant nationalism. He felt if he carried out such an act European Countries would want to  reduce the possibility of fissures in society by further driving the concept of multiculturalism. This he felt would make a lot of nationalists, both from the left and the right, more militant in a few years time as the political consensus in the short to medium would not represent them. This he felt would drive more people towards his cause.

3. His Actions – His actions were simple. Bomb blasts outside buildings of authority and once he survived he wanted to attack a gathering of journalists but decided that would not be possible due to various reasons. He targeted a Labour Youth Party meeting as the Left leaning parties have been the biggest supporters of the concept of multiculturalism.

So why am i worried about the future ?

In mature,established countries there is a tendency to act as one during a crisis which impacts society. For eg: every politician jumped on GW Bush’s Plan of Action after 9/11. This time all the choices seem be between the devil and the deep sea. Lets take an example of all parties adopting the concept of multiculturalism a lot more. As more parties shift towards this concept and adopt it with more rigour it will lead to more on the extreme right losing hope and tempting some of these individuals to follow in the footsteps of Breivik. If the political parties decide to move away from this doctrine there is a chance of creating left wing terrorists as well as group of AQ influenced solitary Muslim terrorists as these elements could easily refuse to accept the changes.

In conclusion is there anyway that you can avoid potential bloodbaths and periods of upheaval in Europe ? Yes there is. What is needed is an honest,tough, open,politically incorrect debate on the way Western European Countries want their society to develop. Do i think it is possible ? I am not too confident. I don’t think the Western European Establishment as well as the media is capable of having such a debate which would involve all communities from the segregationists amongst the immigrant population to the Neo Nazis.