Rafael Behr warns against relying on the cautionary lessons of the 1930s to address the current rise of far-right and nationalist politics (Left, right, Harris, Trump: all prisoners of political nostalgia in an era few understand, 5 November). Yet it is only by looking at the past that we can avoid repeating its mistakes. Yes, the 1930s shouldn’t be used as a stick to beat current-day nationalist supporters as deplorables. But it is more than helpful to study the source of their appeal in the 1920s and 1930s, and what was successful in countering them then.
On the source, the Weimar Republic’s lack of margin to deliver substantial economic benefits to voters because of war debts and the 1929 financial crash (an early version of “there is no alternative”) combined with the enabling of the Nazis by big businesses and mainstream conservatives to protect them against rising support for the far left. Today, we can see the same mistakes being repeated all over the western world but, as we digest the US election result, what about the tech bros supporting Donald Trump or the willingness of mainstream Republicans to enable him?
On countering their appeal, the only successful electoral strategy in the 1930s was Léon Blum’s popular front of far-left and centre-left parties in France. The lessons to counter the far right are many but, as an example, it points to why Spain and Portugal have been the most successful European polities at countering the far right. They also suggest that if Keir Starmer’s government doesn’t deliver tangible economic results, and continues to isolate the far left, we can expect a major political breakthrough by Reform at the next UK election.
Patrick Costello
Brussels, Belgium
• Rafael Behr is quite right to note the problem of using “analogue” modes for contemporary digital politics. But two areas in his piece needed more attention. The first is the idea that “self-reinforcing information silos” dominate digital platforms – a nod to Eli Pariser’s “filter bubbles”. This, ironically, appeals precisely to the vision of modern liberal democracy that Behr is warning us against – ie extreme views arise because they aren’t properly challenged. Attractive as the filter bubble model is, research has shown that the realities are far more complicated and less siloed than we may want them to be.
The second area is the somewhat natural conclusion of Behr’s argument that isn’t quite made: the state of politics is due to the insufficiency of modern liberal democracy to respond, or relate, to the evolution of capitalism into its current contradictory and self-devouring form far more than the digital platforms on which politics takes place.
Prof Tom Grimwood
Lancaster
• Rafael Behr makes many astute observations, but is surely wrong on one fundamental issue – that the growth of digital over analogue political communication, beset as it is by echo chambers, trolling, misinformation and manipulation, is a matter of politics and economics, not technology. It is a consequence of the failed regulation of the tech giants that command these systems. Exacerbated by unprecedented inequality, the deep resentments and anger that result in such abominations as Donald Trump’s victory are not a reflection of a digital shift alone.
Peter Golding
Newcastle upon Tyne
• Mr Behr tries out some pretty big and intriguing ideas in a very small space. Perhaps he would have been better off waiting 24 hours and then he could have written – I told you so. It strikes me that the disaster in Spain is a microcosm and reality check on the state of politics, whether you see it as a revival of rightwing tropes or not.
In Valencia, the political model, “it is what we say it is”, came up against a reality that was totally predictable. Result, a complete catastrophe and needless loss of life. This model is being run across the world – in Putin’s Russia, in Italy and now, it seems, on a mega scale in the US. Surely it is a truism that the only defence against this deranged magical thinking is the parliamentary democratic process. Vladimir Putin has eviscerated it, Donald Trump has engineered his triumph by gerrymandering it in full sight. Philosophy and acres of journalistic soul-searching will not defend us or reverse this.
Neil Blackshaw
Alnwick, Northumberland
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