The Rise of Far-Right Movements in Eastern Europe
In Europe, especially in Eastern Europe, there is an uprising of far-right movements. This isn’t the first time we have seen this. The formation of these movements in Eastern Europe started in the mid-1980s toward the fall of communism. In 1990, radical right parties emerged as an electoral force. After the fall of communism, we saw parties such as Poland’s LPR, Hungary’s MIEP, Romania’s PRM, and Slovakia’s SNS gain some acknowledgment. In today’s political landscape, far-right-wing parties hold about 10-20% of the seats.
We see two main trends in far-right-wing parties. First is ethno-nationalist xenophobia, where countries are scared of losing their “ethnicity,” which includes their heritage, language, faith, etc. Second is the anti-political establishment sentiment they try to spread. (Think Trump, Brexit, France.)
We are now seeing this spread to Eastern Europe, mostly due to social isolation and social capital. These two reasons are why people are most likely to support far-right-wing parties and why they are growing so quickly.
Rydgren’s Analysis of Far-Right Movements
Rydgren, in his article, comes up with three reasons that foster extreme right-wing movements:
- The diminished role of family, local community, professional organizations, and traditional civil society organizations leaves people distant and detached from the social order.
- There is a decline of a pluralist society and an increase of a populist society.
- In an effort to counter social isolation, people replace the absence of such with different social networks, such as these far-right-wing parties.
In his article, Rydgren talks about how the mass society theory posits that if a society starts feeling a loss of community, it leads to an increasing desire to seek “new ideologies.” Meaning, ideologies that satisfy their desire for community, which is pretty much what they know best. This has then created the far-right movement in countries.
Case Studies: Hungary and Slovakia
Two big examples are Hungary and Slovakia.
The far right party in hungary is know as Jobbick their motto is “a future for a better Hungary.” There focuses include a very nationalist stance, putting Hungary and the people of hungary first. They are Anti-immigration, populist and economic protectionist party. Hungary’s third largest party. Views are to increase government spending on ethnic Hungarians living abroad and to criminalize homosexuality. In Slovakia their party is People’s Party-Our Slovakia – anti-Roma, anti-American, and has called NATO a “criminal organization”. Leader spoke favorably of an individual responsible for sending tens of thousands to concentration camps during WWII. Both far right parties started to gain influence by gaining small percentages of seats in the parliament. Hungary won 205 of the vote in parliamentary elections in 2014 and are the 3rd largest party in hungary, Jobbick started out with 2% in 2006 and has now reached 20%. In Slovakia, the party won 8% of the seats serving 14 out of 150 sears in parliament. As we can see the parties are growing and are growing rapidly. The second argument rydren brings up is that he believes leads to extreme right wing movemnets is the decline of the pluralist society. This gap between the people and the elite is growing. While pluralist society is declining populism is increasing. Populism talks about that people should have powere based on the general will and that they are the superior group. Populism declines the idea of a “liberal democracy” which means receiving checks and balacnes by the government and the ensureance that all rights are protected no matter who you are. Populism wants “pure democracy” and what the general will wants. These parties are understanding this and creating a platform of being a party for the people. The immiragtion crisis in Europe has been a big contributer to this as there has been a lot of anti-immigration sentiment throughout all of Europe. The right-wing parties are on a nationalist platform. Both far-right parties of Slovakia and Hungary are rejecting refugees. We see this through the pressure to promote islamphobia and any one that is not like them in the country. According to BBC Hungary has the highest refugees in proportion to its population. This is causing for uproars in Europe as Hungary is not feeling safe and wants isolation which brings the extreme nationlist perspective by the far-right parties. Even Prime Minsiter Orban says that Muslim asylum seekers are unwelcome in Hungary and argues that he is defending European Christianity against a Muslim influx according to a hoel reading. In Slovakia the Slovak PM said Muslims cannot be incorporated into Europe. In order to counter this social isolation, these countries have created the far-right party movements and they are gaining a lot of momentum because of it. We see this first through the parties encouragement of ethnic reductionism/simplification. The blame is being put on the different ethmic groups for all diminishes of social issies. An example of this is, acroding to Varga, in hungary jobick is trying to mobilize anti-roma sentiment nd presents itself as a party with interest in economic issues of poverty and inequality triggered by capitalism. They are doing this through a ethno-nationalis perspective and trying to blame all ethnic groups for their problems promoting their nationalists views to try and get ethnic groups out. In hungary roma makes up 5% of the population which is half a million of the 10 million population. Hungary and Slovakia do have their differences as well though, Hungary more far along – anti-semitic rhetoric, seeking to eliminate the central euro universitySlovakia is trying to work with the EU to solve the influx of refugees… Hungary wants to build a wall Hungary has a stronger anti-immigrant community, Slovakia has a stronger emphasis on domestic issues (failing healthcare system, education system, etc…). With this being said about Slovakia, according to the Hlavek reading,
Smer party would do better in districts with high-unemployment and low education. This is showing the disconnect with the eleites and the people and causing the frustration. Immigration is hard for post-comm countries because: Communist era legacy,Previous ethnic issues, Religious issues, Not wealth or poor countries,Previous far right movements