December 20, 2016

The legitimation of the radical right wing

editor:	Maria João Morais

As the debate rages about immigration control and national identity across Europe, a recently published study by Ipsos Mori has shown that people in Europe overestimate the Muslim population living in their countries.

France is the state with the largest gap between the real and the perceived Muslim population: whilst 7.5% of the residents are Islam followers, French people believe it is 31%. The British treble in their estimations: only 5% of people living in the UK are Muslims, but on average they think it is 15%.

In part a consequence of endless and often sensationalist press coverage, such a distortion in the perception of immigration levels can help understanding the growth in immigration control demands within European countries. At the same time, this misconception is a result of the racist and islamophobic rhetoric that far right wing parties have been spreading across the continent with increasing success.

Connecting all Muslim people with radical fundamentalism, these parties have been instigating fear and hate towards a whole community. In times of economic crisis, they efficiently blamed the weakest link for the lack of employment, ending up demonising all immigrants.

Extremist right wing movements have already won elections (US) and referendums (UK), but they keep threatening to extend their power across Europe, where crucial elections are coming up next year. The risk is not only that these parties are increasingly considered as reliable government alternatives. When their opponents assume some of their radical positions —conservative French candidate François Fillon has accepted Marine Le Pen’s position of controlling immigration and Islam — they are also winning the ideological battle.