Imperialistic nostalgia in populism
Hey team, sorry I’ve been quiet on the blog front, had a
heavy week. Got a couple bits that might be relevant.
This article explores the way in which the populism that
engulfed the Brexit campaign, wasn’t exclusive to Britain or Europe, but in fact
present across the globe. It recognises the nostalgia harnessed by populist
groups as a key means by which they are able to achieve their political goals.
“Some 63% of British citizens think life was better and
easier in the past. The Brexit hardliners exploited this emotional nostalgia
for their own political interests. History is purged of its dark chapters,
stripped of its complexity, simplified and sanitised. Facts do not matter.
Historical accuracy is sacrificed for the sheer lure of rhetoric.”
I found this extract especially poignant as it seems to expose
in a succinct but eloquent manner the dishonesty that underpinned much of the
Leave campaign. It also contains parallels with much of the discussion we have
had over the last few weeks about how we, firstly, define nostalgia but also how
we see that reflected in the political sphere.
The second piece makes a direct link between imperialistic
nostalgia and the ideological mechanisms at work behind Brexit, theorising that
“Brexit is intricately connected to Britain’s unaddressed and unredressed imperial
past”.
It draws attention to a characteristic of nostalgia that we
have continued to identify throughout our exploration of this topic. The way in
which nostalgia often tells us a story of the past that conveniently frames the
narrative in a way that is more appealing than perhaps was actually true of reality
was, as this article explains, integral to the momentum created by the Leave campaign
in the 2016 EU referendum.
Not to be forgotten whilst visiting this specific example of
populist politics is the relentless nature of nostalgic propaganda and rhetoric
employed by the Leave campaign. The slogan “taking back control” and the calls
of people “wanting our sovereignty back” were central to the successes of the
Leave campaign. But why these words prompted such an emotional response from so
many people is key to recognise if we are to gain a wider understanding of the
intricacies of populism across the political world.
Part of the reason these words resonated with people so
heavily is directly linked to a politics of nostalgia and the impressions many already had towards the past. In short,
a narrative existed prior to the referendum in many communities that suggested
things were generally better, for various reasons, before entry into the EEC in
the 70s. All the Leave campaign did was tap into this nostalgia and profess to
represent a solution, or access to a time machine.
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