Confronting Right Wing Extremism and Terrorism in the USA

George Michael

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2003
• ISBN:
  9781134377619
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This book examines the response to right-wing extremism in the US from both the government and non-governmental organisations. It provides a detailed portrait of the contemporary extreme right in the US including interviews with several of the movement's leading figures from groups such as the Ku Klux Klan, Militias, American Renaissance and the White Aryan Resistance. The author also explains how the activities of these racist groups have been curbed due to the campaigning efforts of anti-racist and anti-fascist watchdogs who have helped to shape and influence government policy.

1
Introduction

By most accounts, right-wing extremism appeared to make a comeback in the United States during the 1990s. Although, this did not manifest itself in electoral success due in large part to the nature of the American electoral system, the far right seemed to gain ground as a social movement. What is more, recent trends in technology, such as the internet, have enabled the far right to reach out to a potentially larger audience than it has in the past. Finally, some high profile confrontations with law enforcement authorities and horrific acts of political violence—most notably the 1995 bombing of Murrah federal building in Oklahoma City—have seared the issue of right-wing terrorism into the public’s mind.

Previously, America was seen as relatively safe from a serious domestic terrorist threat. However, some high-profile terrorist incidents have done much to alter this image. And over the past few years there has been a flurry of new anti-terrorist laws and measures enacted.¹ The Clinton administration placed a high priority on counter-terrorism.

The pattern of domestic terrorism is in a state of flux. Left-wing terrorism is in retreat and Puerto Rican separatist terrorism, though still sporadic, appears to be attenuating perhaps due to the recent referendum in which Puerto Ricans decided by a large majority to reject independence and remain a part of the United States. However, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) of the US Department of Justice, has identified new actors that threaten to fill the void. First, are the so-called single-issue terrorists such as the eco-terrorists and extremist anti-abortion groups. Second, are the international terrorists who can take advantage of America’s porous borders and liberal immigration laws and conduct activities inside American territory. Finally, there are domestic right-wing terrorists who have captured much attention after the bombing of the Murrah federal building in Oklahoma City. Although small in numbers, right-wing terrorists are among the most active of all terrorist categories in the United States.² Moreover, the American far right is widely dispersed with adherents in all major regions of the country as Table 1.1 illustrates.³ Finally, according to a 1996 Center for Democratic Renewal estimate there are roughly 25,000 “hard core” members and another 150,000 to 175,000 active sympathizers who buy literature, make contributions, and attend periodic meetings.⁴

Compared to most of the other Western democracies, the situation as regards political extremism is unique in the United States. For instance, in the Federal Republic of Germany, there is an agency called the Office of the Protection of the Constitution, which can recommend to judiciary the dissolution of extremist groups that it deems a threat to Germany’s constitutional democracy.⁵ Likewise, the British government has invoked the 1965 Race Relations Act to justify raids on homes and offices of right-wing extremists including the National Front and the British National Party And even in Israel, where the far right enjoys significant grassroots support, the government outlawed the late Meir Kahane’s Kach movement because of its extremist platform.⁶ Other democracies would appear to have much more legal latitude in responding to political extremism and violence.

Table 1.1 Regional breakdown of far-right groups in the United States for 1999

By contrast, the United States has a strong civil liberties tradition. While it is axiomatic to say that terrorism is usually perpetrated by extremists, the vast majority of extremists are not terrorists. This presents somewhat of a conundrum in that because of First Amendment protections, the government does not officially have the authority to disband groups just because they espouse unpopular ideas. From a comparative legal perspective the US government appears to be more constrained in responding to political extremism. However, what is often ignored is that private non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have interjected themselves into this area of public policy and have done much to fill the void. Compared to other Western nations, the federal government’s response to right-wing terrorism and extremism is unique insofar as it engenders much greater participation from NGOs. Moreover, these NGOs have persuaded the government to take a strong position vis-à-vis the far right. In essence, the response to right-wing extremism in America is a joint effort by both the government and private watchdog groups.

Thus the US response to right-wing terrorism and extremism is qualitatively different than the response to other variants of terrorism and political extremism insofar as it engenders much greater participation from NGOs. NGOs are much less likely to be involved in the response to other forms of political extremism and violence. Although historically some NGOs have been involved in countering other forms of political extremism, the number involved has been much fewer, and the scope of that involvement has been much more limited. To bring this issue into sharper focus, this study includes some comparative analysis between the responses to right-wing extremism and other variants of political extremism. NGOs have been instrumental in shaping the government’s response to right-wing extremism in a number of ways including, inter alia, collaboration with law enforcement agencies and sponsoring legislation, which is primarily aimed at neutralizing the far right. Moreover, some of these NGOs often take it upon themselves to respond to the far right in more direct ways without the assistance of the state. Examples range from civil suits to physical confrontations in the streets. By and large the government responds to other variants of political extremism relatively independently, unencumbered by the influence of private interest groups. Thus the response to right-wing extremism is unique.

What is the effect of NGOs on the formation of the US government’s response to right-wing terrorism and extremism? Why have private groups been able to exert so much influence on this public policy agenda? Like many other areas of American public policy, NGOs have a significant influence on public policy and this area is one more, but unexplored, example. This study explores the US government and NGOs’ responses in this area by examining public policies and other measures, which take aim largely at the far right. This study is grounded in NGO and interest group theory, and to put in its proper context, examines not only the NGOs and the government agencies involved, but also the far right, including its major groups, figures, ideologies and patterns of terrorism.

Before going any further a clarification of terms is in order. Specifically, what is meant by the term “far right”? Many observers and scholars have belabored this issue and there is no general consensus. What’s more, in the context of American politics the term is even more difficult to define owing to the vast geographic size, large population, and heterogeneity of the country. There are several different permutations, not only in the more respectable mainstream American right wing but within the far right as well.

One should not confuse the far right as an extrapolation of the conservative right wing. The contemporary conservative right wing for the most part espouses principles such as limited government, fiscal restraint, and support for business and free enterprise. The far right by contrast often has a quasi-socialist populist element along with a suspicion of big business and global capitalism. In general, economic issues do not loom large in the far right’s agenda; cultural issues figure more prominently. Indeed, the far right is a different entity.

That said, most observers seem to be able to instinctively recognize the phenomenon of right-wing extremism. As the esteemed historian Walter Laqueur once remarked, it resembles pornography “in that it is difficult– perhaps impossible to define—in an operational, legally valid way, but those with experience know it when they see it.”⁷

Examining right wing and reactionary movements in American history, Chip Berlet and Matthew N.Lyons use the term “right-wing populist” to designate those movements that have sought to mobilize against “liberation movements, social reform, or revolution.” In their view, right-wing populist movements in America have historically reflected the interests of two types of social groups: (a) middle-level groups in the social hierarchy (usually White) that have a stake in the traditional arrangement of social privilege, but resent the power that upper-class elites hold over them; and (b) “outsider” factions of the elites that occasionally use forms of anti-elitism to further their own interests and bid for power. Furthermore, Berlet and Lyons coined the term “producerism” to denote a doctrine that “champions the so-called producers in society against both ‘unproductive’ elites and subordinate groups defined as lazy or immoral.” They argue that this cognitive model leads to scapegoating, “conspiracism,” and apocalypticism—elements that have traditionally figured prominently in right-wing extremism. They cite various examples of such movements, including the Jacksonian populism of the early nineteenth century, which represented an alliance between lower-class Whites and certain factions of elites and the Reconstruction Era Ku Klux Klan, which represented an alliance between Southern lower-and middle-class Whites and wealthy Southern planters who sought to regain the power and privileges they had lost as a result of the Civil War.⁸ Berlet and Lyon’s thesis offers interesting insights into the nature and style of populist movements, but still does not really constitute a definition of the core characteristics that compose right-wing extremism. As noted by observers, populism is primarily a style of political organizing rather than a separate political ideology Indeed, styles of populism can be harnessed by various political ideologies all across the political spectrum.

Although somewhat vague, Roger Griffin, borrowing from the terminology of biology, succinctly captured the essence of one variant of right-wing extremism—fascism—by defining it as an ideology, which has at its core an ultra-nationalist palingenetic myth (i.e. process of death and rebirth). This definition has a great deal of merit insofar as many variants of fascism and right-wing extremism espouse the creation of a “new order” built upon the ruins of a perceived decadent and decrepit “old order.”⁹ Thus he sees a strong revolutionary element in right-wing extremism, which certainly would adequately describe much of the contemporary American far right. Other important characteristics that observers have cited as principal to the fascist variant of right-wing extremism are exaltations of “the people” or nation and some form of anti-elitism.¹⁰

Griffin’s definition however, fails to adequately describe some of the other variants of the American far right, such as the Christian Patriot movement, which does not really view itself as revolutionary, but rather as preserver of the true heritage and principles of the American republic. Such a movement would more aptly be labeled “preservatist”¹¹ than revolutionary. Perhaps one could argue that the Christian Patriot movement should therefore not be included in the designation of the far right and should be examined separately. This has been Jeffrey Kaplan’s approach, as he has focused exclusively on the racialist segment of the far right in his excellent studies of this topic. For Kaplan, the primacy of race, religiosity, and a revolutionary ethos are what characterizes the “racist radical right.”¹²

However, in the history of the American far right, there has been a considerable degree of overlap, migration, cross-fertilization of ideas, and cross-membership between the Patriot and racialist segments. Moreover, the response by the government and watchdog community has usually targeted both segments contemporaneously. Measures they employ, such as anti-paramilitary training statutes and intelligence sharing, are often employed against both segments of the far right.

In surveying the twenty-six different definitions of right-wing extremism in the literature, Cas Mudde found no fewer than fifty-eight features that are mentioned at least once. Of those features, only five are mentioned in one form or another by at least half of the authors: nationalism, racism, xenophobia, antidemocracy and the strong state.¹³ Mudde focused on five extreme right parties in Europe (the Republikaner Party and the Deutsche Volksunion in Germany, the Vlams Blok in Belgium, and the Centrumdemocraten and Centrumparti ‘86 in the Netherlands) and found evidence to suggest the existence of an extreme right “party family” with a shared core ideology. This core is built around the nucleus of nationalism, in particular internal homogenization, i.e. that the state should endeavor to create a monocultural society. Other core features include xenophobia, welfare chauvinism—the belief that the state should only serve the economic interests of its “own people,”—and law and order.¹⁴ Arguably, these characteristics would apply to many segments of the American far right as well. However, Mudde’s focus is primarily on the European far right. What is more,

However, Mudde’s focus is primarily on the European far right. What is more, he focused on programmatic political parties that regularly contest elections in Europe In America by contrast, rarely do even a few far-right organizations run candidates for political office. At the present time, the American far right resembles more a loose social movement than a collection of like-minded political parties or organizations. There are, moreover, some subtle differences between the American and European variants of right-wing extremism, most notably the esteem in which the state is held; whereas the former tends to be anti-statist, the latter is more likely to view the state as an organic outgrowth of the nation. The term “nationalism” also is much more ambiguous in the American context. Whereas in Europe it often coincides with ethnicity, in America, which contains no majority ethnic group as such, it can be viewed as perhaps a more chauvinistic style of patriotism.

This therefore presents a definitional problem for researchers and scholars. With the preceding discussion, I have tried to make clear that is very difficult to rigidly define the term “far right.” Thus I have endeavored to develop a list of characteristics which, although it does not rigidly define the far right, I believe adequately describes and captures the essence of the far right:

Particularism Unlike other political ideologies and orientations, the far right usually takes a more parochial outlook, as it is more concerned with a smaller locus of identity such as the nation, republic, race or ethnic group. It tends not to have ambitions to proselytize the whole world to its belief system. This is in contrast to other ideologies such as liberal democracy, communism, and some variants of socialism, which are seen as suitable, indeed desirable, for export, and the whole world is encouraged to adopt them as its model.

Low regard for democracy Although far-right political organizations and individuals by and large tend to play by the democratic rules of the game, they seem to be less enthusiastic for democracy than mainstream political orientations. For example, even members of the ultra-patriotic militia movement like to point out that technically the American political system was designed as a republic and not a democracy.

Anti-statism Right-wing extremism often evinces a severe disaffection with the government or at least the scope of government. Although certain segments of the racialist right—most notably those which draw inspiration from National Socialism— may in principle approve of the idea of a strong state, they regard the current US government as hopelessly under the control of outsiders who use their power in such away that is inimical to the national community.

A conspiracy view of history Denizens of the far right have a tendency to look beneath the surface of American politics and find elite cabals at work subverting society.

A racial or ethnic component which includes usually at leas...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Tables
• Series editors’ preface
• Acknowledgements
• 1 Introduction
• 2 Who are the watchdogs?
• 3 Overview of the contemporary American far right
• 4 The far right and terrorism
• 5 The US government’s response to right-wing extremism
• 6 The watchdogs’ response to the far right
• 7 Conclusion
• Notes
• Bibliography