I think you misunderstood what I said. We judge the BNP on its social values, not economic values, hence its a right-wing org because its social values are extreme right-wing.

Thatcher was possibly more socially liberal than previous Tory govts, but her main thrust was a right-wing neo-liberal economic policy. That was what defined the Thatcher govt, and of course her right-wing foreign polic hawk stances. Which is why she’s right wing

Thatcher’s principle policies where economic values not social values. Was she left wing?

Campaigning is all well and good, but a good campaign has realistic and identifiable objectives, both practically and politically.

I’d have said to campaign against fascism is to campaign against anti-democrats (which is, by definition, not the same thing as supporting democracy) and only possible by assuming anti-democratic techniques of repression.

Instead, how about supporting continued engagement and participation in the political processes of the day? Does one support building party membership and voting entitlements, or reactive demonstrations of guilt-abdication and emotion?

(1) they dislike the BNP, but don’t believe them to be “fascist” in any serious sense

(2) the BNP has such little electoral traction (unlike equivalent parties in Europe)

(3) whenever they manage to get someone elected to something they implode thanks to their own idiocy

Samizdata and other libertarians are up for lumping the BNP in with left, on the grounds that their economic policies are somewhat socialistic and their attitudes are more collectivistic than individualistic. In other words, not without some justification.

Others use conflate being ‘right-wing’ with being racist and having other BNP-type attitudes, rather than believing in maximal individual liberty (or, as Nick puts it, minimising state interference). Some even frame the campaign against the BNP as being a matter of left vs right, rather than freedom-lovers versus fascists.

Lib Dems, Libertarians, Labour centrists and Tories should feel as encouraged to join campaigns against fascism as lefties are, and at the moment I don’t feel as if this is the case. Osler’s post (while far from being the worst example) is part of this problem. Face it, Dave, Marxists are a miniscule minority. Framing it as a battle between the ‘Marxist left’ and the BNP is not constructive.

I do

In fact, I am often in agreement with left anarchists on the majority of things (particularly on reducing corporate power). And while my own priorities aren’t green (I’m a proud urban dweller), there is nothing inherently illiberal about choosing to establish and protect eco-systems with your own resources. I believe Clint Eastwood is both a Republican and environmental activist.

I think it is important to understand that they don’t care about being called left or right, just so long as they are talked about and made acceptable in the process.

In fact they would be happy to conjoin what more outdated commentators call ‘left’ and ‘right’ on their terms – to their narrow personal benefit, as opposed to the benefit of wider society.

The rise of extremist parties are the precise result of the failure of government and the inability of governmental structure to adequately reflect the real needs and concerns of the wider population – the extremists don’t represent solutions, they represent the frustrations.

From my experience I have to say that the analysis in this article is flawed – reactionary votes require spark-points to flame and fuel their furious discontent, so any political party which chases or cultivates this oppositional form of constituency is guilty of undermining the democratic process.

The left has only a narrative of struggle, not one of rule – there are no yardsticks to say whether social justice has gone forwards or backwards since 1997, or rather, there are a plethora of yardsticks all of which measure a small part of the picture. More particularly, the left never has had any idea of whether any given “left” government has done the best it could in the circumstances it faced, or has “sold out”.

We are all, at heart, oppositionists. We are happier denouncing injustice, or corruption, than we are administering a system. We legitimise demands through the numbers game, except when we don’t – paying reparations for slavery to the Afro-Caribbean community is apparently a dotty idea whether 0.99% or 99% of Afro-Caribbeans support it.

And above all we suppose that people actually want social justice and greater equality. There’s no evidence that these “moral goods” have ever stirred anyone other than a few intellectuals. For most of the left, since before Marx’s day – for the masses, that is – these have just been flags of convenience for the more basic, more real human demand for power and privilege.

And so we have nothing to say to, for example, a Muslim who says she opposes terrorism because it’s unnecessary – the demographics will deliver Sharia (or some cutesy Westernised version thereof) in two or three generations anyway.

And we no longer know what to think about the State. Even if we could persuade people to want the “moral goods” we know they ought to want, we are utterly clueless as to whether national government can deliver them. We have no theory whatever to deal with the tensions between popular mandates and international institutions – how can Europe-wide elections be meaningful when there are no Europe-wide media, for example?

The BNP have the wrong answers. Unlike us, they do, however, have answers.

Oh c’mon please, spare us that rubbish of trying to argue the BNP is a leftist party. I know you guys want to disassociate the party of any mention of the word ‘right’ but this argument is getting rather boring.

The BNP is right-wing not left-wing because its principle policies are social values, not economic values. Its pernicious because of its ultra-conservative and racist social attitudes. Frankly its economic policies, socialist in nature they may be, are irrelevant. We don’t make a big deal about the BNP for that reason. Otherwise you might as well argue that anarchists and many environmentalists are right-wing because they want to cut down state intereference as much as possible.

Just because the Samizdata lot have said it doesn’t make this piece of silly thinking any more right. And that article specifically about the Green Party has so many holes its not even worth engaging with.

The solution to getting rid of the BNP is to educate people of the value of the rule of and equality before the law and private property rights.

The problem is that so long as liberal society is presented as an oppressive struggle, the truly disadvantaged will tend to be more convinced that it is a race struggle rather than what other far left parties propose, a class struggle.