The Politics of Fear and the Rise of Far-Right Extremism in Europe

Journal: Re-public
Deadline for submitting full papers: Nov. 15, 2011

The upcoming special issue of Re-public, entitled "The politics of fear and the rise of far-right extremism in Europe" is seeking submissions. The influence of the far-right is surging cross Europe in multiple forms. Mainstream far right political parties have recently participated in government coalitions. Right wing extremism is becoming explosive, ranging from violent attacks against migrants and ethnic minorities to the recent mass killings in Norway. Far right political parties and groups are increasingly setting the political agenda on the European management of migration flows. Although the rise of far right movements in Europe has received widespread attention and has triggered a variety of responses from liberal, social democratic and left political forces, these seem to have been relatively ineffective.

One of the main analytical and activist deficiencies of the struggles against the far-right in Europe is that they have failed to fully tackle its janus-like constitution. The far right in Europe has managed to blend racist (based on the notion of the hierarchy of biological races) with neo-racist (focusing on the insurmountability of cultural differences) beliefs, to frame the question of migration as one of the principal threats to European democracies, and it has managed to place itself both as a legitimate actor in the democratic public sphere and concurrently as one of its main critics.

Submissions should address some of the following themes:

All submissions should be around 1.500 words in length.

Please send your contributions in electronic format to the following e-mail: editors@re-public.gr

Deadline for submissions is Nov. 15, 2011

Re-public
e-mail: editors@re-public.gr