Red Pill Politics: Demystifying Today’s Far Right

This perceptive study by political scientist Ost (The Defeat of Solidarity) traces ways in which the fascist movements of yesteryear differ from today’s populist “red pill” politics. Comparing today’s movements with those of Hitler and Mussolini, Ost shows how contemporary far-right parties—he looks most closely at India, Poland, and the U.S.—are leaning as much into populist rhetoric as exclusionary rhetoric, are winning at the polls, and are less often resorting to violence. Additionally, they’re more likely to draw on socialism as a political tool. In short, the “red pill” right is an agile shape-shifter that is hard to for critics to pin down, partly because it has learned to tiptoe up to the edge of authoritarianism without crossing the line, and partly because it’s drawing more heavily on the left-wing, populist tools within the fascist toolbox. Ost suggests that today’s far right should be viewed as a sort of reformed fascism, an idea embraced by far-right figures themselves; he cites one supporter of Poland’s far-right Law and Justice party who griped that “Hitler gave fascism a bad name.” The author astutely concludes that, rather than falling into the trap of opposing populism, the left must strive to outpace the right on “radicalism, economic populism, and political toughness” if it wants to win. It’s a robust and energizing dissection of a protean foe. (May)