Fear in global politics?
campaigns as a whole, they are often more brazen and have a variety of these five moral foundations to choose from. That is true of the infamous Bush campaign featuring (black) murderer Willie Horton’s mug shot and (the eventually unsuccessful) democratic candidate Michael Dukakis allowing him a weekend pass out of prison where he went on to murder and rape several people; it is also true of Trump’s ‘ Make America Great Again ’ slogan, which directly and firmly appealed to both the ‘ Loyalty/Betrayal, and Sanctity/Degradation ’ to such an extent that people were compelled to wear items of clothing with this slogan upon it. The crucial aspect here is that whilst all would agree that theWillie Hortonmurder is an atrocity, the Republicansmanaged to convey it in the 1988 campaign as something that was caused directly by the Democratic leniency, thereby using the foundations of ‘ Sanctity/Degradation ’ and ‘ Authority/Subversion ’ and associating the innate fear caused by the violation of these foundations, with poor Democratic policy [weekend passes]. Moreover, Trump appeals to a similar set of foundations, causing fear that liberals simply don’t and arguably can’t understand with his campaign slogan. His continual anti-immigration and self-proclaimed nationalist speeches allude with varying degrees of subtlety that the high levels of immigration are degrading the US and in order to reclaim sanctity, or ‘ make America great again ’ , he must address this. The fear this threat of degradation creates amongst Americans is just a singular example of why he has been accused of ‘ fearmongering ’ , but also arguably the basis for his passionate support. The same idea of anti- immigration ‘ fearmongering ’ is now commonplace globally and features in Hungarian, Orbán-funded anti- immigration advertisements, some of which were actually borrowed from Nigel Farage’s UKIP adverts from 2016. Along with this, Orbán told state radio that if Hungary were to become an ‘ immigrant country ’ it would bring ‘ terror ’, again clearly appealing to several of Haidt’s moral foundations, including the same ‘ Sanctity/Degradation ’ foundation that Trump and the 1988 Republicans chose to appeal to. The threat of ‘ terror ’ causes enough fear to illicit an inward, conservative response in many globally, and the fact that this response has been so marked and dramatic shows the unprecedented extent that fear is now shaping a large proportion of global politics. Whilst it can be clearly argued that ‘ fear ’ plays a role in shaping global politics on the ‘right’, it is also possible to argue that it plays an equally paramount role on the ‘left’. The desire to protect a utopi an democracy of civil liberties that arguably never existed in the first place, as well as cherish hard-earned rights for the population arguably create paralysing and divisive fear and societal tension, only widening the gap between people. This is possibly dividing society in a similar way to those on the right. Martha Nussbaum, a professor of philosophy at the University of Chicago states in her book ‘ The Monarchy of Fear: APhilosopher Looks at Our Political Crisis ’ that many on the left see significant episodes in recent political history – such as Trump’s election or the Brexit referen dum (both of which can be said to have been heavily influenced by fear) – as the start of the ‘ collapse of many democratic freedoms, such as speech, movement, association or press ’ , or even democracy itself. Many on the traditional left would argue that ca mpaigns like Trump’s or Brexit (spearheaded in part by Farage) are ‘ undemocratic ’ , as they seem to go against many values that we, in an age of ‘western’ identity politics, of individual rights and representation, have come to associate with democracy. Many, however, including Nussbaum, see these claims as false; some would even go as far as to say that popular support for impeachment of an elected president, or a second referendum after a legitimate yet divisive first one in itself is ‘undemocratic’, and possibly equally, if not more so than the ‘ fearmongering ’ acts that are driving these concerns in the first place. Labelling a large proportion of any given electorate as simply ‘ racists ’ or ‘ uneducated ’ , as has been the case in both the UK and the US, is always dangerous and sets an unhealthy precedent. Ironically, Trump, who many view as having run an essentially ‘racist’
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