At some point in recent times, we’ve probably heard of the terms “Neoliberalism”, “Neoconservatism” and perhaps “Neofascism”. These are all a part of the rise of Neopolitics.
Neopolitics is a new movement in global politics. Hence the name of the movement- “Neo” meaning new, and “Politics”, well… meaning politics I guess!
What is Neopolitics?
Before we can delve into the rise of Neopolitics, we must first know what it is!
There is technically no single definition of Neopolitcs, due to the fact that it is split up into hundreds of subsections! Perhaps, there are even thousands of subsections!
However, there are four main subsections: neoliberalism, neoconservatism, neofascism and neocommunism.
Neoliberalism
Neoliberalism is the new, more ‘modern’ form of liberalism. Instead of being more left-leaning as I’d imagined… It was actually more right leaning as I had found!
I found myself actually agreeing with almost all of the neoliberal policies, except one! (Something I never thought I’d ever say!)
Their policies include:
- Corporate Deregulation
- Privatization
- Globalization
- Free Trade
- Reduction in government spending
- Austerity
- Increase in taxes (which is the one I disagree with!)
In fact, many traditional conservatives, including Ronald Reagan, Margret Thatcher and Augusto Pinochet are considered to be neoliberals by neoliberals! (Something that would undoubtedly annoy them!)
Neoconservativism
For many conservatives, neoconservatism is more on the left than neoliberalism is. For instance, where neoliberalism favors globalization, neoconservatism does not.
In fact, you can point out that neoconservative means “newly conservative” and therefore formerly liberal. As such, many of the policies have a slightly leftist leaning.
In fact, the neoconservative movement was founded by those who were worried and annoyed by more radical leftists. They weren’t communists, but they weren’t socialists either!
This was the the same for the UK as it was for the US! In the UK, they formed the Liberal Democrats (known as the Lib Dems) and in the US, they formed several smaller parties and then regained control of the Democrats… before losing it again!
Neocommunism
“What is neocommunism?” is an extremely difficult question to answer. For many, neocommunism is communism that goes to roots of one of the best conservative books ever written: The Communist Manifesto.
They tend to dislike authoritarianism that plagued many communist states throughout the 20th century. They also dislike China and Cuba mocking them as a failed attempt at communism that’s actually state owned capitalism.
They haven’t really got a general consensus on the USSR, only that it was too authoritarian. Assuming that then, other than the authoritarianism, neocommunists like the USSR.
However some will argue that neocommunism doesn’t exist, it’s merely a milder form of classical communism.
Neofascism
Neofascism is probably the most famous of the neopolitical movements. This is especially so for people who are acquainted with Antifa who are notable against neofascists!
Essentially, neofascism is a more extreme form of old style (classical) fascism. Although, many of the more extreme elements (such as antisemitism) has had their ‘roughest edges smoothed out’.
As such, their more racist ideologies are ever-present. They still fiercely oppose communism, democracy, socialism and parliamentarianism.
The US’s neofascist party is the National Alliance (as well as the American Fascist Party!) The UK’s neofascist party is the BNP (as well as the British Fascist Party!)
Where does neopolitics come from?
You may believe that because of the “neo” part of the name, it is relatively new. Perhaps 10 years old at most? 15 at a push?
No, the first form of neopolitics (which so happened to be neofascism!) took hold in 1942!
Although, this latter fact is highly disputed, with it merely being conceived then. Although, it would take until the 1960’s for the first lot of neopolitics to be enacted!
Here’s a rough timeline:
- 1942- Neofascism first created
- 1960- Neoconservatism created and enacted
- 1970- Neocommunism created
- 1980- Neoliberalism created and implemented
The Rise of Neopolitics
The rise of Neopolitics saw a major shift in our political atmosphere. It threatened every aspect of our lives arguably. Even the media has not been spared, with many shifting their political media bias to neoconservatism or neoliberalism.
The best example of this is the Wall Street Journal who went from free market, conservative capitalists to neoconservatives!
Whilst the first lot of neopolitics may have come about in 1942, it was not until 1980 that they started to be implemented. And it wasn’t until 2000 when it began to take off!
The rise of neopolitics is likely thanks to the same medium that you are reading Politic-Ed right now… the internet.
Before the internet, many of these ideologies were fringe groups of a few people. Your typical “bar stool politicians”. However, with the invention of the internet, and the websites that would fill it, these groups had a way to reach more people than their local pub.
As such, they have become massive movements.
And we can see that. The Democratic Party in the US has become more leftist in the past 15 years, the Labour Party also! The Republican and the Conservative Parties have both become more conservative too!
In many ways, neopolitics has put us back to the 1970’s in regards to politics.
Impacts of the Rise of Neopolitics
When you look at the Labour or the Democratic Party, they are more leftist than they’ve ever been. The Republican and Conservative Parties are also more conservative than they’ve ever been.
And this is what arguably caused the rise of neopolitics in the first place! It was because of the borderline political extremism that was present in both sides that people broke away. These people later going on to form their own neopolitical parties.
Just look at the history of the Lib Dems. They were created because more central-leaning members of the Labour Party were fed up of the far-left rhetoric of the Labour Party. As such they left and formed their own party.
I will make a prediction here. We are going to see a new neopolitical split within the next 10 to 15 years. Within the next 10 to 15 years, we will see people break away from both the conservative and liberal sides of the spectrum.
I believe that we will soon see a few more parties in our next Presidential Elections or General Election. They’ll be more prominent than middle of the road parties, but won’t be nearly on the scale of the main two!!
What do you think? Will there be a second rise of neopolitics? Tell me in the comments!
Featured image courtesy of Tim Pierce via Flickr