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Fillon, Erdo?an, Trump and the Rise of the Far Right: Is the Left in a Shambles?

Yonela Diko is currently the Spokesperson of the African National Congress (ANC) in the Western Cape. Prior to assuming his role in the ANC, he worked in various companies in the private sector. Between 2007-2009 he worked for one of the Leading Retirement Fund Companies, NBC Holdings as an Employee Benefits Consultant. After that he joined the Corporate Strategy and Industrial Development (CSID), an Economic Research Unit housed under the School of Economics at Wits University. He did his BCom degree at the University of Cape Town majoring in Economics.

If Brexit was earth-shattering, Trump’s victory over Hillary Clinton punched a hole in the universe. A social conservative has emerged as the surprise frontrunner in a race to choose France’s centre-right presidential candidate. The critical question now becomes, is it possible to have a people's agenda?

The world has over the last century predominantly been characterised by an ever growing cosmopolitanism. In great cities such as Istanbul and Alexandria, communities with very distinct identities were rubbing shoulders and interacting every day. So in Alexandria for example, throughout the 19th to the early 20th Century, communities of Greeks, Syrians, Italians, French, British, Armenians, Turks and Arabs co-existed and intermingled, and they were considered Egyptians. Christians, Muslims and Jews intermingled. They had a multiplicity of newspapers and produced novels, plays and films in multiple languages. The mosaic of diverse cultures was overlain by social networks that criss-crossed many political movements and political parties.

The ideas of racially pure, ethnically unique or homogeneous religious societies had almost been rejected by the overwhelming majority of humanity. Those who promoted that by genocide and ethnic cleansing were few and far between. It was almost a forgone conclusion that it is self-evident that diverse communities enrich the mosaic of a multicultural society. Most recently, the “melting pot” that is the United States has always stood as a beacon of diversity of the ethnic and religious mix of the citizens.

Then entered the earth-shattering Brexit that could not have been imagined even 10 years ago. The main reason for Brexit is the rise of nationalism across the world. This is called a rise of nationalism by those who have been ignoring the long-lasting separatism that has never left the world, despite a deep desire to always punt Alexander or Athens or the United States as microcosms of the whole, in a world that has never really changed much, in that the majority of people stick to their kind. The immigration crisis in Europe was a trigger. EU opponents saw immigration as a national issue, as it affected the internal life of the country.

Former French prime minister François Fillon, a social conservative, has emerged as the surprise frontrunner in a race to choose France’s centre-right presidential candidate in next year’s elections, after former president Nicolas Sarkozy was defeated in the first round of voting. Fillon’s victory over Alain Juppé in particular, another former prime minister, sent shivers around France because Juppe was hounded for his embrace of multiculturalism, his defence of the European Union and his notion that France should embrace a “happy identity” for all. One would have thought these are mainstream thoughts that should win on any given day.

In Germany, Angela Merkel is facing her most challenging re-election yet, purely because of her humanitarian stance, her strong belief in our sense of community, our openness and our willingness to help people in need. Merkel faced a barrage of criticism over her immigration policy and allowing Syrians to come in their hundreds of thousands into Germany. Ironically, German migrants have hit out at Merkel for her open-door immigration policy and the influx of new migrants, saying it has wrecked their standard of living. Some migrants who have lived in Germany for too long have been heard saying, “Today’s refugees get social housing, welfare payments. And this, and that, and this. Why? It’s not like it used to be.”

Then there is President Erdo?an, in a so-called post-coup crackdown in Turkey, where the stateless Kurdish people, its leaders in what is clearly an ethnic cleansing of government and country, are being jailed and hounded and their immunities suspended. Although Kurds have the third largest political party in Turkey, the Kurds themselves remain outsiders in Turkey, viewed as a stateless people who are not patriotic enough or really part of Turkey.

Ethnic cleansing has been happening in Cambodia, Bosnia and in half of the African continent.

This is clearly not new. We have witnessed disasters in the Balkans and Rwanda, the dissolution of the state in Yugoslavia and Sudan… even in the democratic societies of Europe. Belgium has been at a crossroads for too long, while Czechoslovakia underwent a peaceful separation between the Czechs and Slovaks.

If Brexit was earth-shattering, Trump’s victory over Hillary Clinton punched a hole in the universe. The US November elections were a small peek into the mind of the Endangered White Male. There is a sense that the power has slipped out of their hands, that their way of doing things is no longer how things are done. This monster, the “Feminazi”, the thing that, as Trump says, “bleeds through her eyes or wherever she bleeds”, has conquered us — and now, after having had to endure eight years of a black man telling us what to do, we’re supposed to just sit back and take eight years of a woman bossing us around? After that it’ll be eight years of the gays in the White House! Then the transgenders! You can see where this is going. By then animals will have been granted human rights and a fuckin’ hamster is going to be running the country. This has to stop!

In South Africa, the divide is convoluted by many aspects but its features remain the same – separatism and being comfortable with one’s own. Now, 22 years after the death of apartheid, there are signs that racism is mounting a comeback – if it ever went away. In Cape Town, there are widespread reports that some restaurants and landlords discriminate against blacks, refusing to let them book tables or rent houses.

For their part, some whites see themselves as the victims of racial discrimination, because of South Africa’s policies of affirmative action and black economic empowerment. Some claim they are victims of a “white genocide” because of the large number of murders of white farmers – although studies have found that the murders are mostly motivated by robbery, rather than racial hatred.

The critical question now becomes, is it possible to have a people’s agenda; to say in a practical way that there are things that make up the people’s interest to which all can adhere, regardless of racial or partisan interests? Or are the very concepts of human interest and universal consensus nothing more than the dream of fools, an illusion best left to the idle who have nothing to do but build sandcastles?

What remains true is that the world needs more inclusive, ecumenical, and diverse groups of people who respect each other, agree to disagree, and work together to create positive social change – despite fundamental disagreements on other issues.

Equally, we need to learn from the lessons of history. Extreme inequality, let’s remember, has always given rise to both populism and nativism and racism that have historically driven against immigrants and people of colour.

The struggle to overcome inequality must always continue in earnest. DM

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