JEN_F_01 International Right-wing Populism in the Context of Global Environmental Crises (IRPC)
Objectives/ Research Questions
The challenges of climate change and environmental crises – particularly the controversial debates regarding the suitability of different climate and environmental measures along with their social and environmental consequences – have led to a new and highly relevant sociopolitical cleavage. In this context, right-wing populist and extreme-right actors, parties, and movements have assumed specific, yet also ambivalent and paradoxical, positions. What researchers must investigate is the extent to which this process is intensifying social polarization, increasing the gap between elites and the general population and contributing to the destabilization of democratic society. On issues related to climate and the environment, a striking position has emerged on the right marked by denial and rejection. “Green” environmental policies and their representatives serve as an adversary that is held responsible for the collapse of national economies and hitherto prosperous consumer societies. In countries such as Germany, in which right-wing populists have entered the opposition in parliament, such actors are ever more vehemently lamenting the allegedly disproportionate nature of climate and environmental policies promoted by “the establishment”, which are said to oppose the common sense of “simple citizens”, to worsen the fairness gap, and to increase social inequality. Moreover, there are indications that right-wing populists and extremists are increasingly attempting to make inroads into regional and local “not in my back yard” (NIMBY) protests against wind turbines and power transmission lines as well as to orchestrate campaigns against the government’s environmental and climate policies. In countries such as the United States and Brazil, right-wing government administrations are pursuing a pro-economy and social-populist agenda that is exacerbating climatic and environmental problems (conventional energy generation, deforestation of the tropical rainforest, fracking, etc.). In order to deflect global responsibility and as a reaction to the globalization of climate and environmental issues – including, for example, the anticipated related (redistribution) conflicts, aspects of forced migration, and so on – an aggressive framing of the issue based on culture, tradition, and identity politics has taken shape, one that draws on national foundation myths. These current developments related to discourse and mobilization strategies, as well as the policies pursued by right-wing populist and extremist actors in the context of the climate and environment, are an area that remains under-researched in the social sciences. Our research project makes use of international comparisons to generate empirical findings about the resultant impacts on social cohesion. In doing so, we aim to promote a differentiated social scientific understanding about current right-wing populist and extremist developments.
Emotionalization assumes a particularly relevant role in relation to the topics of the climate and environment. Overcoming what is considered to be “irrationality” is a key stylistic device used within right-wing populist mobilization; here, emotions such as defiance, fear, rage, hate, and jealousy are specifically fomented, whereas collective sentiments are created, influenced, and instrumentalized via processes of collective identity-building. Through this, social conflicts are provoked and intensified. These sorts of resentment and emotions in part target scientific facts and findings along with political decisions made on the basis of science (e.g. the energy revolution) as well as social movements increasingly advocating climate protection measures and the corresponding processes of social change (e.g. Fridays for Future). This trend is evident all across the world, including in right-wing populist government policies (such as those of Trump or Bolsonaro). At the same time, emotional appeals are also being utilized by climate activists and the opponents of right-wing populism.
This interdisciplinary research project is being carried out on the basis of international comparisons. We aim to investigate the political communications of right-wing populists and the radical right in Germany, Europe, and the United States (supply side: movements and parties) in the context of climate and environmental debates, as well as affective and attitudinal factors such as fear, anger, anxiety, disorientation (anomy), (dis)satisfaction, hope, and optimism (demand side: popular opinion and attitudes). We are particularly interested in investigating interactions between (1) the different ways in which distinct emotions are articulated in relation to environmental and social challenges associated with climate change and the “environmental revolution”, (2) the affinity or distancing assumed by the populace in regard to the positions and actions of right-wing populist and right radical actors (including in connection with NIMBY protests), and (3) social cohesion (e.g. through a consensus about values and social objectives). To investigate this, we will analyse data about attitudes as well as the content of communications on social media. Based on the results of our investigation, we will formulate recommendations for future practical measures to effectively counteract tendencies towards radicalization, the undermining of democracy, and political instability.
Thematic relation to social cohesion
According to Heitmeyer (1997), contemporary Western societies of the “Second Modernity” must be understood as conflictive instead of consensual, which begs the question as to the implications this has in terms of processes of cooperation and integration. This project – investigating the causes, manifestations, and effects of climate and environmental policies from the right – utilizes a specific case to investigate how conflicts along society’s lines of tension and division (cleavages) arise, express themselves, and intensify. Provided that broad scientific, political, economic, and civil societal consensus exists regarding the necessity of pursuing an environmental transformation, the attitudes, and practices of radical denial or fighting against this transformation must be interpreted as indicators of social disintegration in need of elucidation. Drawing from the RISC heuristics of presumed factors informing social cohesion, we will analyse the disintegrative potential of climate and environmental policies from the far right in view of the specific interactions among the following levels: (1) socioeconomic and political-cultural influences, (2) social relationships and practices, (3) affective dimensions, (4) myths, and (5) additional structural conditions.
In the normative sense of social cohesion, the radical and populist right challenges notions such as universalism, pluralism, diversity, and political relevancy and rationality, as well as freedom for research, media, and civil society – values that, in accordance with the liberal democratic basic order, possess normative claims to validity and are also meant to have a socially integrative effect. We assume that the radical populist right seeks to destroy the cohesion of pluralistic and democratic societies and replace them with authoritarian and ethnocentric (meaning nativist and exclusionary) orders (with a Volksgemeinschaft, or national community). In this context, a pointed and highly emotionalized confrontation with the issue of climate and the environment has also become highly relevant in recent times. Right-wing populist and radical right actors aim to influence the environmental and climate debate in their favour and, in doing so, instrumentalize and strengthen collective fears about losing status as well as constructions of nationalist identity based on culture and place.
Bude, Heinz 2014: Gesellschaft der Angst, Hamburg.
Forchtner, Bernhard (Hrsg.) 2020: The Far Right and the Environment. Politics, Discourse and Communication, Abingdon, New York.
Geden, Oliver 1996: Rechte Ökologie. Umweltschutz zwischen Emanzipation und Faschismus, Berlin.
Harth, Nicole S.; Kessler, Thomas; Leach, Colin Wayne 2008: Advantaged Group’s Emotional Reactions to Intergroup Inequality: The Dynamics of Pride, Guilt, and Sympathy, in: Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 34, 115-129.
Heitmeyer, Wilhelm (Hrsg.) 1997: Bundesrepublik Deutschland: Auf dem Weg von der Konsens- zur Konfliktgesellschaft, Frankfurt am Main.
Mishra, Pankaj 2017: Politik im Zeitalter des Zorns. Das dunkle Erbe der Aufklärung, in: Geiselberger, Heinrich (Hrsg.): Die große Regression. Eine internationale Debatte über die geistige Situation der Zeit, Frankfurt am Main, 175-195.
Nussbaum, Martha 2019: Königreich der Angst. Gedanken zur aktuellen politischen Krise, Darmstadt.
Quent, Matthias 2017: Rechtspopulismus und Radikalisierung: Wenn Wut zu Hass wird, in: Bürger und Staat 1, 55-62.
Quent, Matthias 2019: Deutschland Rechtsaußen. Wie die Rechten nach der Macht greifen und wie wir sie stoppen können, München.
Wahl-Jorgensen, Karin 2018: Emotions, Media and Politics (Contemporary Political Communication), Cambridge.
