Introduction
This introductory chapter discusses the emergence of the extremist commercial market and how it has coincided with one of the most significant waves of far right popularity in Europe in recent memory. The past several years have witnessed a steady increase in far right wing politics and social movements across Europe. Such protests and violent episodes exist in a context in which far right, nationalist, xenophobic, anti-Semitic, Islamophobic, and racist rhetoric and discourse has risen across Europe. These developments pose significant challenges for countries that have spent decades rebuilding democratic societies in the post-World War II era and have firmly committed to policies and practices that protect pluralistic communities. Academics and policy makers have struggled to understand the diverse causes and dynamics that have made the far right so appealing for so many people—that appear, in other words, to have made the extreme more mainstream.