Racism & Fascism - new material (58)
01 October 2007
Election Special. European Race Bulletin no 60 (Summer) 2007, pp 40. This issue assesses the impact of recent presidential elections in France and the general election (November 2006) and provincial elections (March 2007) in the Netherlands. It also contains summaries of events in other European countries. Available from the Institute of Race Relations, 2-6 Leeke Street, London WC1X 9HS, email: info@irr.org.uk
Report on Racism and Xenophobiaa in the Member States of the EU. European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) 2007, TK-AK-07-002-EN-C, pp 172. This annual report records an increase in racist violence in eight (Britain, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Poland and Slovakia) of the 11 European Union member states that supplied data covering the last six years. The rate was down in Austria, the Czech Republic and Sweden. However, the full picture could not be ascertained due to the lack of national data with a number of countries publishing no information for 2005-2006. Available at: http://fra.europa.eu/fra/material/pub/racism/report_racism_0807_en.pdf
Modell Wurzen, Arthur Leone. Jungle World 30.8.07, p 3. Useful background German-language article on the far-right scene in the East German region of northern Saxony, where there was a racist pogrom against eight Indian migrants in the small town of Mügeln in late August 2007 which received much international media attention. The standard official response to such daily attacks in Germany is a denial of their racist nature. This article does away with myth of unorganised criminal youth committing the attacks and highlights far-right organisation in the area surrounding Mügeln, located only a few km away from the stronghold of the National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD) in the town of Wurzen. There is a general racist consensus that has developed since German "reunification" in the early 1990s that allows for attacks, not only against black people but also activists, to carry on without the comprehensive prosecution of perpetrators or civic outrage. The only counter-forces to the far-right threat in the eastern German regions are anti-fascist networks. This article details the work of anti-fascist and other networks in the region and – despite the continued existence of far-right activities and racist violence - the changes that they have brought about. Available at http://www.jungle-world.com/seiten/2007/35/10504.php
Europe's Heart of Darkness: plan to expel immigrants is symbol of new extremism, Paul Vallely. Independent 7.9.07. Article on the rise of the "new extremism" in Switzerland, in the form of the Swiss People's Party (Schweizerische Volkspartei, SVP) which has the largest number of seats in parliament and is a member of the coalition government. It will be contesting October's general election using propaganda that, according to the United Nations, is a "sinister symbol of the rise of the new racism and xenophobia at the heart of one of the world's oldest democracies"
This is not a 1938 encore, Ian Buruma. The Guardian 26.6.07. Buruma discusses the oxymoronic notion of "Islamofascism", a keyword favoured by neoconservatives "sympathetic to the idea of using American armed force to further the cause of human rights and democracy". He argues that "Revolutionary Islamism is undoubtedly dangerous and bloody. Yet analogies with the Third Reich, though highly effective as a way of denouncing people whose views one disagrees with, are usually false. No Islamist armies are about to march into Europe...and [Iranian president] Ahmadinejad, his rhetoric not withstanding, does not have a fraction of Hitler's power." He sees this rhetoric as deriving from a neoconservative philosophy "in which a belief in revolution from above was commonplace" and describes armchair support for the US-led crusade as "the blind cheering on of a sometimes foolish power embarked on unnecessary wars that cost more lives than they were intended to save."
A Pyrrhic<