[News] The Dangerously Appealing Style of the Far Right

[Anti-Imperialist News]

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*The Dangerously Appealing Style of the Far Right: The Forty-Eighth 
Newsletter (2023)*


Emilio Pettoruti (Argentina), Arlequín (‘Harlequin’), 1928.

Emilio Pettoruti (Argentina), /Arlequín /(‘Harlequin’), 1928.

Dear friends,

Greetings from the desk of Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research 
<https://thetricontinental.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=6a79324d3b4acfde1e7e546c6&id=1558e332c2&e=d206d0a40d>.

Before he won Argentina’s presidential election on 19 November, Javier 
Milei circulated a video 
<https://thetricontinental.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=6a79324d3b4acfde1e7e546c6&id=3feb645cad&e=d206d0a40d> 
of himself in front of a series of white boards. Pasted on one board 
were the names of various state institutions, such as the ministries of 
health, education, women and gender diversities, public works, and 
culture, all recognised as typical elements of any modern state project. 
Walking along the board, Milei ripped off the names of these and other 
ministries while crying /afuera!/ (‘out!’) and declaring that if elected 
president, he would abolish them. Milei vowed not only to shrink the 
state but to ‘blow up 
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the system, often appearing at campaign events with a chainsaw in hand.

The reaction to Milei’s viral video and other such stunts was as 
polarised as the Argentinian electorate. Half of the population thought 
that Milei’s agenda was madness, the sign of a far right out of touch 
with reality and rationality. The other half thought that Milei 
displayed precisely the kind of boldness required to transform a country 
mired in poverty and skyrocketing inflation. Milei did not just win the 
election; he won it handily, defeating the outgoing government’s finance 
minister, Sergio Massa, whose stale, centrist promises of stability did 
not sit well with a population that has lived with instability for decades.

Milei’s proposals to solve the downward spiral of the Argentinian 
economy are not unique, nor are they practical. Dollarisating the 
economy, privatisating state functions, and suppressing workers’ 
organisations are pillars of the neoliberal austerity agenda that has 
plagued the world for the past several decades. To debate Milei on this 
or that policy misses the point behind the ascendancy of the far right 
across the world. It is not /what/ they say they will do to solve the 
world’s actual problems that matters so much as /how/ they say it. In 
other words, for politicians like Milei (or Brazil’s former President 
Jair Bolsonaro, India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and former US 
President Donald Trump), it is not their policy proposals that are 
attractive, but their style – the style of the far right. People like 
Milei promise to take the country’s institutions by the throat and make 
them cough up solutions. Their boldness sends a frisson through society, 
a jolt that masquerades as a plan for the future.

Fátima Pecci Carou (Argentina), Evita Ninja, 2020.

Fátima Pecci Carou (Argentina), /Evita Ninja/, 2020.

There was a time when the general mood of the international middle class 
centred on guaranteeing convenience: they hated the inconvenience of 
being stuck in traffic jams and queues, of being unable to get their 
children into the school of their choice, and of being unable to buy – 
even if by credit – the consumption goods that made them feel culturally 
superior to each other and to the working class. If the middle class was 
not inconvenienced, then that class – which shapes the electorate of 
most liberal democracies – would be content with promises of stability. 
But when the entire system convulses with inconveniences of one kind or 
another – such as inflation, the rate 
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of which was 142.7% in Argentina at the start of the elections in 
October – then the assurance of stability holds little weight. The 
political forces of the centre, such as of Milei’s opponent, are trapped 
in a habit of speaking about stability while their country burns. They 
promise little more than incremental destruction. In this context, 
timidity is not always attractive to the middle class, let alone to 
workers and peasants, who require a bold vision rather than a fixation 
on mild cost-of-living increases alongside taxation holidays for big 
businesses.

This timidity is not merely about the character of the political force 
that seizes the moment. If that were the case, then merely shouting 
louder should win the centre-left and left votes. Rather, it reflects 
the increasing timidity of the centre-left and its political platform, 
deflated by the immense stresses and strains that have damaged society 
at the neurological level. The precariousness of employment, the state’s 
retreat from providing care for its people, the privatisation of 
leisure, the individualisation of education, and other strains have, 
together, produced overwhelming social problems (not to mention the 
impact of the climate catastrophe and brutal wars). The political 
horizon of large sections of the centre-left has been reduced to merely 
managing this decaying civilisation (as our latest dossier, /What Can We 
Expect from the New Progressive Wave in Latin America?/ 
<https://thetricontinental.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=6a79324d3b4acfde1e7e546c6&id=055a21aa5c&e=d206d0a40d>, 
points out). The persistent failure of governments to solve the problems 
of society has made politics itself foreign to large sections of the public.

Two generations of people have been raised in the world of austerity, 
sold falsehoods by technocratic experts who promise to improve their 
social condition through neoliberal economic growth. Why should they 
believe any expert who now cautions against the economic cannibalism 
promoted by the far right? Besides, the erosion of education systems and 
the reduction of the mass media into a gladiatorial contest have meant 
that there are few avenues for serious public discussion about the 
troubles facing our societies and the solutions needed to address them. 
Anything can be promised, anything can be implemented, and even when 
neoliberal agendas create catastrophic outcomes – as with Modi’s 
demonetisation 
<https://thetricontinental.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=6a79324d3b4acfde1e7e546c6&id=e24fa8cb96&e=d206d0a40d> 
scheme in India – they are touted as successes and their leaders are 
celebrated.

Neoliberalism has increased not only the precariousness of the global 
majority, but also sentiments of anti-intellectualism (the death of the 
expert and expertise) and anti-democratisation (the death of serious, 
democratic public education and discussion). In this context, Milei’s 
triumph is less about him than it is a product of a broader social 
process, one that is not exclusive to Argentina but holds true around 
the world.

Raquel Forner (Argentina), Mujeres del Mundo (‘Women of the World’), 1938.

Raquel Forner (Argentina), /Mujeres del Mundo /(‘Women of the World’), 1938.

Pillars of neoliberalism such as the privatisation and commodification 
of state functions created the social conditions for the rise of twin 
problems: corruption and crime. The deregulation of private enterprise 
and the privatisation of state functions have deepened the nexus between 
the political class and the capitalist class. Granting state contracts 
to private enterprises and cutting back on regulations, for instance, 
has provided immense avenues for bribes, kickbacks, and transfer 
payments 
<https://thetricontinental.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=6a79324d3b4acfde1e7e546c6&id=22e4c038f8&e=d206d0a40d> 
to proliferate. Simultaneously, the increased precarity of life and the 
evisceration of social welfare increased the volume of petty crime, 
including through the drug trade (as demonstrated by a Tricontinental 
research project 
<https://thetricontinental.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=6a79324d3b4acfde1e7e546c6&id=5e1143aab4&e=d206d0a40d> 
on the war on drugs and imperialism’s addictions, which will bear fruit 
soon).

The far right has fixated on these problems not in an effort to address 
the roots of the problem, but to achieve two results:

 1. By attacking the corruption of state officials but not of capitalist
    enterprises, the far right has been able to further delegitimise the
    state’s role as a guarantor of social rights.
 2. Using the general social malaise around petty crime, the far right
    has used every instrument of the state – which they otherwise decry
    – to attack the communities of the poor, garrison them under the
    guise of crime prevention, and rob them of any self-representation.
    This attack is extended against anyone who gives voice to the
    working class and the poor, from journalists to human rights
    defenders, from left politicians to local leaders.

The far right’s misleading representation and weaponisation of 
corruption and crime has placed the left at a deep disadvantage. On 
these issues, the far right has an intimate relationship with old social 
democracy and traditional liberalism, who generally accept the content 
of the far-right agenda, objecting only to their brash approach. This 
leaves the left with few political allies when it comes to these core 
battles, forcing it to defend the state form despite the corruption that 
has become endemic to it through neoliberal policy. Meanwhile, the left 
must continue to defend working-class communities from state repression, 
despite the real problems of crime and insecurity that confront the 
working class due to the collapse of employment and social welfare. The 
dominant debate is framed around the surface-level realities of 
corruption and crime and is not permitted to probe deeper into the 
neoliberal roots of these problems.

Diana Dowek (Argentina), Las madres (‘The Mothers’), 1983.

Diana Dowek (Argentina), /Las madres/ (‘The Mothers’), 1983.

When the election results came in from Argentina, I asked our colleagues 
in Buenos Aires and La Plata to send me some songs that capture the 
current mood. Meanwhile, I buried myself in Argentinian poetry of loss 
and defeat, mostly the work of Juana Bignozzi (1937–2015). However, this 
was not the mood they wanted to put forward in this newsletter. They 
wanted something robust, something that reflects the boldness with which 
the left must respond to our current moment. This mood is captured by 
the rapper Trueno (b. 2002) and the singer Víctor Heredia (b. 1947), 
crossing generations and genres to produce the moving song /Tierra 
Zanta/ (‘Sacred Earth’) and an equally moving video 
<https://thetricontinental.us11.list-manage.com/track/click?u=6a79324d3b4acfde1e7e546c6&id=c74ad54c25&e=d206d0a40d>. 
And so, from Argentina:

I came into the world to defend my land.
I am the peaceful saviour in this war.
I will die fighting, firm as a Venezuelan.
I am Atacama, Guaraní, Coya, Barí, and Tucáno.
If they want to throw the country at me, we’ll lift it up.

We Indians built empires with our hands.
Do you hate the future? I come with my brothers and sisters
from different parents, but we don’t stay apart.
I am the fire of the Caribbean and a Peruvian warrior.
I thank Brazil for the air that we breathe.

Sometimes I lose, sometimes I win.
But it is not in vain to die for the land that I love.
And if outsiders ask what my name is,
my name is ‘Latin’ and my surname is ‘America’.

Warmly,

Vijay

Website <www.eltricontinental.org>

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