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Some key points from my @guardian article on the populist Right's reaction to the #coronavirus crisis.
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Populist Right has built its strength on hard-headedness and arrogant self-confidence. Yet, at the moment it seems confounded and downbeat. This emergency does not seem to fit the national-populist playbook 1/
Uncharacteristically zigzagging strategy from the likes of Trump, Salvini, Johnson. First deny the #coronavirus crisis, then admit it, then minimise it again, finally prepare the public for massive death toll. They don't seem in control. 2/
Trump is clearly worried about the electoral consequences of a massive #coronavirus death toll and a recession that could see unemployment of over 20%. He is lucky to have such a weak opponent as @JoeBiden. Otherwise he'd be in deep trouble 3/
In Italy Salvini suffering in opinion polls and unable to wear robes of responsible statesman #coronavirus emergency calls for. He earned moniker of "unpatriotic" for unabashed criticism of government. Plus he supported private health. In France Marine Le Pen looks muted. 4/
As for Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, he is desperately clinging to narrative of normality (" #coronavirus just a flu"). But he is looking increasingly deranged and becoming isolated even in his own camp. Macho denial not working when majority knows this is very serious 5/
The difficulties experienced by national populists in #coronavirus crisis are unsurprising given they are no friends of the issues at the heart of this crisis: health, welfare and science 6/
National-populists are known for stoking people’s fears. But fears now prevalent not of the kind these leaders are best positioned to exploit. Due to the urgency of health and economic worries, migration – populist right’s main enemy – has fallen in the list of priorities. 7/
#coronavirus crisis calls for a sea change in economic policy that is at odds with the ideological premises of national populism, which combines chauvinism on the cultural front and ultra-neoliberal policies on the economic front 8/
Populist right strongly opposed welfare measures that are necessary to avoid social catastrophe. Having repeatedly branded these policies as “dangerous” and “anti-patriotic”, these politicians find themselves in the embarrassing situation of having to espouse them 9/
Another skeleton in the closet: national-populists’ disparagement of science. #coronavirus emergency confronts us with a threat best understood and measured through the lens of science. This is embarrassing for the likes of Trump given their anti-science tirades 10/
If #coronavirus economic crisis results in a new wave of migration like that of 2015, scenario could drastically change. National-populists will try to use crisis to validate their narrative of cosmopolitan globalisation as dangerous vector of all sorts of ills. 11/
It would be misguided for the left to believe this crisis will work out in its favour. The #conavirus health crisis will be followed by a deep economic crisis. populist right has already demonstrated its ability to find social scapegoats for economic ills. 12/
Authoritarian measures implemented on Monday by Viktor Orbán in Hungary, with the suspension of parliament and government by decree, may be the shape of things to come, with populist Right reacting to #coronavirus crisis by becoming overtly anti-democratic. 13/
Another strategic adjustment: exacerbation of anti-Chinese rhetoric. Trump made no apologies for calling #COVID19 “the Chinese virus”, while Steve Bannon argued that #coronavirus is a “Chinese Communist Party virus” 14/
What may be in store is thus something much worse than the populist Right of the 2010s: extreme Right using the whole arsenal of the red scare and authoritarianism to intimidate opponents and defend its economic interests from demands for meaningful redistribution. 15/
*ENDS*
