Disaster Nationalism: The Downfall of Liberal Civilization

"a cogent and deeply disturbing exploration of today’s political and ideological landscape and the daunting challenges of transforming it."

In his new and immensely valuable book, Richard Seymour analyzes the phenomenon of a new form of far-right ideology and politics he calls “disaster nationalism.”

The book’s title derives from Naomi Klein’s The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism (2007), which argued that neoliberal economic policies exploit natural disasters, wars, and other crises to promote deregulation and privatization. (Seymour cites Klein a few times but not The Shock Doctrine.)

From Northern Ireland, Seymour is one of today’s most original and widely read leftist intellectuals, a Marxist whose books and articles combine analytic rigor and deep erudition. He is also an elegant prose stylist, if sometimes abstract and too fond of obscure terminology.

Seymour characterizes disaster nationalism as “the apocalyptic nationalism that has swept several far-right leaders to power.” It is a global phenomenon manifested in Modi’s India, Orban’s Hungary, Duterte’s Philippines, Netanyahu’s Israel, and the United States under Trump. It is not the same as “historical fascism,” but like it, disaster nationalism offers a “balm . . . which restores the traditional consolations of family, race, religion and nationhood.”  

Disaster nationalism exploits “the profound unhappiness accumulated in the era of peak liberalism.” It has “radicalized existing “sadism, authoritarianism and paranoia.” If, as Seymour maintains, it is not yet fascism, “there hasn’t been a better time to be a fascist since 1945.” Disaster nationalism provides the environment “in which inchoate fascist forces can thrive.” 

“We are,” he warns, “in the early days of a new fascism.”

Seymour argues that while class issues figure prominently in disaster nationalism, “it’s not the economy, stupid.” He points to British pro-Brexit voters who voted to leave the European Union despite knowing that Brexit would hurt them economically. They were motivated by something other than concern for their economic well-being.

But the results of the 2024 U.S. elections challenge Seymour’s claim, as poll after poll showed that economic concerns motivated pro-Trump votes more than any other issue. Still, Seymour’s larger point holds: that people will act against their material interests in the name of a cause they deem more important.

Class comes into it because neoliberalism, a “comprehensive social transformation” based on the “sovereignty of markets” and hostility to equality, is not only a form of free market capitalism but also of class rule. It is “a backlash against mass democracy and the incursion of the welfare state and human rights on property rights.” Countries that have imposed neoliberal policies, like Chile under Pinochet or India under Modi, have been “intensely relaxed about the use of despotism.”

Neoliberalism promotes inequality and the concentration of enormous wealth in fewer and fewer hands. It leads to a hollowing out of the social safety net and social atomization, replacing solidarity with the “law of universal competition.” As Margaret Thatcher said, “There is no such thing as society,” just individuals and families pursuing their own interests.

Seymour’s analysis of the global rise of the far right draws on a wide range of thinkers, including Marx, Engels, Freud, Hannah Arendt, historian of fascism Michael Mann, Polish-German Marxist Rosa Luxemburg, and “social contagion” theorist Damon Centola.

Seymour also employs psychoanalytic theory to analyze the psychological elements of disaster nationalism. The far right thrives not on rational discourse but on irrationality, including conspiracy theories that offer simplistic, false, and often ludicrous explanations of complex problems. Seymour quotes Marx’s observation that passion is the “essential force” of human beings and that inciting and manipulating passion is essential to the far right’s appeal.

And one of the passions it incites is resentment, a pervasive sense of unfairness. Far-right ideology directs this resentment away from its causes in the neoliberal economic order to conspiracy theories, to scapegoating of minorities, to violent and apocalyptic scenarios of revenge.

Those inclined to buy conspiracy theories—“lone wolf” killers, Q-Anon followers, Proud Boys, for example—often have a sense of persecution—sinister and unaccountable forces are out to get them—and resent what they perceive as a loss of privilege and social standing. The far right offers its followers imaginary crises (white men being “replaced” by racial, ethnic, and social minorities) while denying real crises caused by neoliberal capitalism, like climate change.

Obsessions with threats supposedly posed by feminism, LGBT rights, and so-called gender theory are another common thread in disaster nationalism. Sexual and gender difference are seen as undermining nations, their social cohesion, and their very existence.

Extreme violence against sexual and gender minorities is a hallmark of disaster nationalism, whether led by the state or by civil society groups that act with the state’s support. Seymour notes that when far-right grassroots groups are joined by the state, disaster nationalism becomes particularly dangerous.

In analyzing Donald Trump’s first administration, with its assault on legality by the former president and the mob he summoned to Washington in January 2021, Seymour cites Democratic representative Adam Shiff’s comment that “the system held, but barely.” If this was the case, “the need for system change could not be more obvious.” But the Biden administration “existed precisely to avert system change.”

Are there antidotes to disaster nationalism? Seymour writes that although “bread and butter” politics are necessary, a leftism that focuses on material well-being is insufficient to “defeat and marginalize the far right.” It must offer a broader vision to counter the appeal of disaster nationalism. And the left and labor movements must “let go of the resignation that has characterized both” in recent decades.

Seymour sees some encouraging signs in “a resurgence of the radical left in electoral terms, the resurfacing of class after all these years, and militancy in the labour movement.” These trends, he says, are “significant cracks in a cold and oppressive consensus.” Disaster nationalists “need not be the only ones to benefit from the crisis of liberalism.” 

In his concluding chapter, Seymour cites Marx on understanding and changing the material conditions “in which ideas and intentions are formed.” That approach can help us understand the role of passion as a historical force that animates the far right but can also energize the left.

Seymour also references Rosa Luxemburg’s famous maxim that humanity faces a choice between “socialism and barbarism.” The latter has always existed and persists today in often horrific forms, such as the state and state-sanctioned violence against Muslims in India and Palestinians in Gaza.

Disaster Nationalism offers little in the way of prescription, no agenda for a resurgent left, but the diagnostician isn’t obliged to provide the cure. What Richard Seymour has provided is a cogent and deeply disturbing exploration of today’s political and ideological landscape and the daunting challenges of transforming it.