The latest French regional elections have been another episode in the everlasting rise of the National Front. Political  anthropologists such as Marc Abélès have already underlined that one of the effects of capitalist globalisation upon contemporary society is a double process of fragmentation: vertically, i.e. between classes, and horizontally, between communities, cultures and identities. Its outcome is a nightmare for left-wing parties and organisations. Class solidarities and active democratic citizenship register a declining tendency.

The rise of neo-fascism and/or mass nationalist parties within the European political landscape shouldn’t be seen as a dangerous relapse into the dark hours of the 20th century. They’re profoundly “modern” in so far as they’re grounded in the workings and dynamics of today’s world.

The neoliberal counter-revolution of the last thirty years has pushed commodity relations to the fore and made all other social relations seem “archaic” in public discourse. But the massive social destruction of these years – Schumpeter’s so-called “creative destruction” – has also transformed the cultural and political landscape through the search for alternatives, and, when these have failed, the search for meaning. Religious, national, ethnic identities have therefore arisen in the last thirty years as the last “residues” for peoples searching to belong to something greater than their inner-family and friends circle.

Commodification and neo-fascist/nationalist movements feed upon each other. Social-revolutionary and democratic movements must face the fact that nationalist hysteria is here to stay.

This lesson is also a guiding path for resistance and alternatives when one considers why the Left remains so weak. Consider for instance how many among leftist sympathizers fund political parties, unions, papers, webzines, campaigns and so on. How being a “militant” within an organization is often seen as something good but to be left to others… In France and in the other developed capitalist countries, politics have been reduced to a “choice” made during elections among competing tickets, once every four or five years. What we need is to deepen our politics and to actualize the seemingly “archaic” virtues of democratic debate, civil disobedience and class struggle. This is already under way within the social and political movements of the Left but it needs to draw upon the mass of the sympathizers to reinforce the weight of the Left.

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