The Perils of Vanguardism

2017 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
pp. 947-968 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joshua C Gordon
Keyword(s):  
Causal Explanation ◽  
Unemployment Benefit ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Social Democrats ◽  
Asylum Policy ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Rich ◽  
The Right ◽  
Unexpected Outcome

AbstractOver the past 25 years, Sweden has gone from having one of the most generous unemployment benefit systems among the rich democracies to one of the least. This article advances a multi-causal explanation for this unexpected outcome. It shows how the benefit system became a target of successive right-wing governments due to its role in fostering social democratic hegemony. Employer groups, radicalized by the turbulent 1970s more profoundly than elsewhere, sought to undermine the system, and their abandonment of corporatism in the early 1990s limited unions’ capacity to restrain right-wing governments in retrenchment initiatives. Two further developments help to explain the surprising political resilience of the cuts: the emergence of a private (supplementary) insurance regime and a realignment of working-class voters from the Social Democrats to parties of the right, especially the nativist Sweden Democrats, in the context of a liberal refugee/asylum policy.

Nazistowski mord na Żydach w prasie polskich komunistów (1942–1944).

2006 ◽  
pp. 54-75
Author(s):  
Klaus Peter Friedrich
Keyword(s):  
Shared Responsibility ◽  
The Political ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Social Democrats ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Government ◽  
Post War ◽  
Polish Government ◽  
The Right ◽  
Political Right

Facing the decisive struggle between Nazism and Soviet communism for dominance in Europe, in 1942/43 Polish communists sojourning in the USSR espoused anti-German concepts of the political right. Their aim was an ethnic Polish ‘national communism’. Meanwhile, the Polish Workers’ Party in the occupied country advocated a maximum intensification of civilian resistance and partisan struggle. In this context, commentaries on the Nazi judeocide were an important element in their endeavors to influence the prevailing mood in the country: The underground communist press often pointed to the fate of the murdered Jews as a warning in order to make it clear to the Polish population where a deficient lack of resistance could lead. However, an agreed, unconditional Polish and Jewish armed resistance did not come about. At the same time, the communist press constantly expanded its demagogic confrontation with Polish “reactionaries” and accused them of shared responsibility for the Nazi murder of the Jews, while the Polish government (in London) was attacked for its failure. This antagonism was intensified in the fierce dispute between the Polish and Soviet governments after the rift which followed revelations about the Katyn massacre. Now the communist propaganda image of the enemy came to the fore in respect to the government and its representatives in occupied Poland. It viewed the government-in-exile as being allied with the “reactionaries,” indifferent to the murder of the Jews, and thus acting ultimately on behalf of Nazi German policy. The communists denounced the real and supposed antisemitism of their adversaries more and more bluntly. In view of their political isolation, they coupled them together, in an undifferentiated manner, extending from the right-wing radical ONR to the social democrats and the other parties represented in the underground parliament loyal to the London based Polish government. Thereby communist propaganda tried to discredit their opponents and to justify the need for a new start in a post-war Poland whose fate should be shaped by the revolutionary left. They were thus paving the way for the ultimate communist takeover

The Center Wages Kulturpolitik: Conflict in the Marx-Keudell Cabinet of 1927

1969 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 139-158 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ellen L. Evans
Keyword(s):  
Democratic Party ◽  
Social Democratic Party ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
Social Democrats ◽  
People's Party ◽  
Center Party ◽  
Electoral Support ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Right

In descriptions of the political structure of the Weimar Republic, the German Center Party is usually grouped as a party of the “middle,” together with the German Democratic Party and German People's Party, between the left-wing Social Democrats and the right-wing German Nationalists. In the years after 1928, the Center showed an increasing disinclination to work in coalition with the Social Democratic Party and finally, under the leadership of Dr. Ludwig Kaas, the last chairman of the Center Party, broke completely with the Socialists. During the same years Heinrich Brüning, Chancellor of Germany from 1930 to 1932, made persistent, though futile, attempts to find an acceptable coalition partner for the Center on the Right, hoping, among other possibilities, to encourage a secession movement from the Nationalist Party in 1930. Because of the rapid dwindling of electoral support for the other parties of the middle, very little attention has been paid to the Center's relationship with them. It is the purpose of this article to show that the mutual antipathies between these parties and the Center were as great or greater than its antipathy toward Social Democracy on certain matters which were vital to the Center's existence. By 1928, in fact, coalition with the parties of the middle had become as unsatisfactory to the leaders of the Center as coalition with the party of the Left. The turning-point in this development was the breakup of the Marx-Keudell right-wing cabinet of 1927. The failure of that government to attain the party's goals in the realm of Kulturpolitik, i.e., religion and education, confirmed the Center's disillusionment with the workings of the parliamentary system itself.

scholarly journals How and Why Fascism and Nazism Became the “Right”

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Allen Gindler
Keyword(s):  
Political Science ◽  
National Socialism ◽  
Historical Background ◽  
The Political ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Social Democrats ◽  
The Social ◽  
Working People ◽  
Political Spectrum ◽  
The Right

The Left has been represented by various currents that have historically been very aggressive toward each other because they used different tactics and strategies to achieve socialism. Like many intellectuals, revolutionary leftists did not get along with each other very often. Since the inception of Marxism, which is the doctrine of communism—an extreme and distinctive flavor of socialism—the far Left has portrayed adherents of less revolutionary ideologies as enemies of the working people. The followers of evolutionary socialism—the Social Democrats—were accused by the communists of betraying the proletariat. Non-Marxist currents of socialism, such as Fascism and National Socialism, were excluded from the socialist camp and put on the right wing by Marxist-Leninist propaganda. Stalinist political science became a benchmark that set markers to distinguish between the genuine Left and the Right. This article shows the origin and historical background of the artificial shift of Fascism and National Socialism to the right side of the political spectrum.

scholarly journals ELECTION OF THE NEW PRIME MINISTER OF SWEDEN

2021 ◽  
Vol 24 (6) ◽  
pp. 132-138
Author(s):  
Natalia Plevako ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Prime Minister ◽  
Chief Executive ◽  
Political Crisis ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Social Democrats ◽  
Political Processes ◽  
The Social ◽  
Political Forces ◽  
Global Events ◽  
The Right

The article examines the situation in Sweden around the election of a new Prime minister of the country. Describing it as a political crisis, the author points to the causes that gave rise to it, the course of the crisis itself and the interim results. The reasons are seen in the self-destruction of the former two-block party-political mechanism, which turned out to be unable to find adequate answers to new challenges, the appearance of which is predetermined by both internal political processes and global events and phenomena. The restructuring of this mechanism proceeds in complex contradictory forms, which was shown by the election of the chief executive. The weakening of the old traditional rivals in the struggle for power, which also affects their internal unity, is accompanied by the activation of forces on the extreme flanks, especially the right part of it, where nationalists are strengthening from year to year. The election of a new leader of the SAP as the new prime minister with the changed, and probably not for the last time, configuration of political forces has become a fragile compromise, for which the Social Democrats will have to pay dearly – they will have to fulfill the budget of the right-wing parties. There was a temporary reconnaissance before the new battles, the main of which will be the election of a new composition of the Riksdag in 2022.

scholarly journals Resentment

AmeriQuests ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Marc Angenot
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Max Scheler ◽  
The Past ◽  
Rational Debate ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Will ◽  
The Right

Resentment has been and continues to be a component of numerous ideologies of our century, forming as much a part of the right wing (nationalism, antisemitism) as the left, as it finds its way into various expressions drawn from both socialism and feminism. Resentment relies on basic fallacies: That any superiority that is acquired in the empirical world, in the world such as we know it, is in itself and without any further discussion, a sign of moral "baseness." That the values attached to it by the dominant ones are contemptible in themselves, that is to say as values - and not merely those uneven (tangible and symbolic) benefits that the dominant ones draw from such values. And that any subordinate or inferior situation grants one the status of a victim, that any failure to take advantage in this world can be metamorphosed and justified through grievances directed at the dominant and the privileged groups - thereby permitting a total denial of responsibility. Such an attitude involves an axiological reversal, an Umsturz der Werte, which Nietzsche and Max Scheler already described in divergent ways. It is sometimes difficult to immediately distinguish within different militant ideologies and fallacies of resentment on one hand and on the other the will for justice and emancipation behind which such fallacies hide or with which they are intertwined. This essay describes the idealtype of what I have called the thought of resentment which expresses itself through a specific rhetoric of argumentation (or rather a sophistics) and through a pathos of rancour and grievance. It seems that at the end of this century in industrialized societies - societies disintegrating into suspicious lobbies, obsessed by claims of their "identity," twisting the concept of Rights to suit the bickering market of "rights to difference," societies composed of groups or "tribes" fostering endless litigations based on insurmountable disagreements and a vindictive re-invention of the past - resentment is once again becoming an all-consuming attitude. This trend may be explained by the collapse of Socialism and the utopias of Progress among other determinants. This essay studies and illustrates briefly the axiology and the rhetoric of resentment. It retraces its relationship with the relativism that prevails today in philosophy and the social sciences. It sheds light on some of the mechanics of discussion which have allowed resentment to organize itself into an impregnable sophistics resisting compromise and pluralism. Such sophistics grant resentment the self-justified advantage of indefinitely putting rational debate at bay.

Main Forms of Propagandistic Activities of the Right-Wing Parties (1904–1914)

2020 ◽  
Vol 102 ◽  
pp. 656-676
Author(s):  
Igor V. Omeliyanchuk
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Periodical Press ◽  
Political Movement ◽  
The People ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Right ◽  
In The Beginning ◽  
The 19Th Century

The article examines the main forms and methods of agitation and propagandistic activities of monarchic parties in Russia in the beginning of the 20th century. Among them the author singles out such ones as periodical press, publication of books, brochures and flyers, organization of manifestations, religious processions, public prayers and funeral services, sending deputations to the monarch, organization of public lectures and readings for the people, as well as various philanthropic events. Using various forms of propagandistic activities the monarchists aspired to embrace all social groups and classes of the population in order to organize all-class and all-estate political movement in support of the autocracy. While they gained certain success in promoting their ideology, the Rights, nevertheless, lost to their adversaries from the radical opposition camp, as the monarchists constrained by their conservative ideology, could not promise immediate social and political changes to the population, and that fact was excessively used by their opponents. Moreover, the ideological paradigm of the Right camp expressed in the “Orthodoxy, Autocracy, Nationality” formula no longer agreed with the social and economic realities of Russia due to modernization processes that were underway in the country from the middle of the 19th century.

The Specter of the Past: Reconstructing Conservative Historical Memory in South Korea

2021 ◽  
Vol 49 (3) ◽  
pp. 337-362
Author(s):  
Myungji Yang
Keyword(s):  
South Korea ◽  
Historical Memory ◽  
Political Legitimacy ◽  
New Right ◽  
Historical Narratives ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Far Right ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Republic ◽  
The Right

Through the case of the New Right movement in South Korea in the early 2000s, this article explores how history has become a battleground on which the Right tried to regain its political legitimacy in the postauthoritarian context. Analyzing disputes over historiography in recent decades, this article argues that conservative intellectuals—academics, journalists, and writers—play a pivotal role in constructing conservative historical narratives and building an identity for right-wing movements. By contesting what they viewed as “distorted” leftist views and promoting national pride, New Right intellectuals positioned themselves as the guardians of “liberal democracy” in the Republic of Korea. Existing studies of the Far Right pay little attention to intellectual circles and their engagement in civil society. By examining how right-wing intellectuals appropriated the past and shaped triumphalist national imagery, this study aims to better understand the dynamics of ideational contestation and knowledge production in Far Right activism.

Czech Social Democracy and its “cohabitation” with the Communist Party: The story of a neglected affair

2008 ◽  
Vol 41 (3) ◽  
pp. 317-338 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lubomír Kopeček ◽  
Pavel Pšeja
Keyword(s):  
Communist Party ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Social Democratic Party ◽  
Pragmatic Approach ◽  
Social Democrats ◽  
Unsuccessful Attempt ◽  
Social Democratic ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Right ◽  
The Relationship

This article attempts to analyze developments within the Czech Left after 1989. Primarily, the authors focus on two questions: (1) How did the Czech Social Democratic Party (ČSSD) achieve its dominance of the Left? (2)What is the relationship between the Social Democrats and the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia (KSČM)? We conclude that the unsuccessful attempt to move the KSČM towards a moderate leftist identity opened up a space in which the Social Democrats could thrive, at the same time gradually assuming a pragmatic approach towards the Communists. Moreover, the ability of Miloš Zeman, the leader of the Social Democrats, to build a clear non-Communist Left alternative to the hegemony of the Right during the 1990s was also very important.

Acting Out

2012 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 205-223 ◽  
Author(s):  
Beth Holmgren
Keyword(s):  
Role Modeling ◽  
Acting Out ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Value System ◽  
City Life ◽  
Immoral Behavior ◽  
The Social ◽  
Big City ◽  
Harsh Criticism ◽  
The Right

In the turbulent context of interwar Polish politics, a period bookended by the right-wing nationalists’ repression of an ethnically heterogeneous state, several popular high-quality cabarets persisted in Warsaw even as they provoked and defied the nationalists’ harsh criticism. In their best, most influential incarnation, Qui pro Quo (1919–1932) and its successors, these literary cabarets violated the right’s value system through their shows’ insistent metropolitan focus, their stars’ role-modeling of immoral behavior and parodic impersonation, and their companies’ explicitly Jewish–Gentile collaboration. In the community of the cabaret, which was even more bohemian and déclassé than that of the legitimate theater, the social and ethnic antagonisms of everyday Warsaw society mattered relatively little. Writers and players bonded with each other, above all, in furious pursuit of fun, fortune, celebrity, artistic kudos, and putting on a hit show. This analysis details how the contents and stars of Qui pro Quo challenged right-wing values. Its shows advertised the capital as a sumptuous metropolis as well as a home to an eccentric array of plebeian and underworld types, including variations on the cwaniak warszawski enacted by comedian Adolf Dymsza. Its chief female stars—Zula Pogorzelska, Mira Zimińska, and Hanna Ordonówna—incarnated big-city glamour and sexual emancipation. Its recurring Jewish characters—Józef Urstein’s Pikuś and Kazimierz Krukowski’s Lopek—functioned as modern-day Warsaw’s everymen, beleaguered and bedazzled as they assimilated to city life. Qui pro Quo’s popular defense against an exclusionary nationalism showcased collaborative artistry and diverse, charismatic stars.

scholarly journals Designing the social estate of odnodvortsy of the western provinces in 1831

2017 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 135-140
Author(s):  
Constantin Vadimovich Troianowski
Keyword(s):  
19Th Century ◽  
Legal Status ◽  
Social Hierarchy ◽  
Social Category ◽  
The Past ◽  
Imperial Russia ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Right ◽  
The 19Th Century

This article investigates the process of designing of the new social estate in imperial Russia - odnodvortsy of the western provinces. This social category was designed specifically for those petty szlachta who did not possess documents to prove their noble ancestry and status. The author analyses deliberations on the subject that took place in the Committee for the Western Provinces. The author focuses on the argument between senior imperial officials and the Grodno governor Mikhail Muraviev on the issue of registering petty szlachta in fiscal rolls. Muraviev argued against setting up a special fiscal-administrative category for petty szlachta suggesting that its members should join the already existing unprivileged categories of peasants and burgers. Because this proposal ran against the established fiscal practices, the Committee opted for creating a distinct social estate for petty szlachta. The existing social estate paradigm in Russia pre-assigned the location of the new soslovie in the imperial social hierarchy. Western odnodvortsy were to be included into a broad legal status category of the free inhabitants. Despite similarity of the name, the new estate was not modeled on the odnodvortsy of the Russian provinces because they retained from the past certain privileges (e.g. the right to possess serfs) that did not correspond to the 19th century attributes of unprivileged social estates.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document