Tag: british nationalism

Matthew Goodwin: friend or foe of British Nationalism?

Will Wright
Matthew Goodwin
Matthew Goodwin (image from Creative Commons)

Matthew Goodwin is not a British Nationalist. He is Professor of Politics at Kent University. He is well in with the likes of Penguin/Pelican Books and the BBC.

He is a respectable figure and he wants to stay that way. Occasionally, he is one of four guests on the BBC2 lunchtime programme, Politics Live, where I learned of his latest book, Values, Voice and Virtue – The New British Politics.

The hostess there is Jo Coburn, an active member of the Ealing Liberal Synagogue. She is married to Mark Flanagan, former head of strategic communications for both the Labour government and the following Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition government. Coburn’s guests frequently include another Jew of some variety.

I do not know whether Coburn personally chooses her guests, or whether that is done for her from either above or below. But we can tell the kind of company that Matthew Goodwin keeps.

Matthew Goodwin – treading carefully?

As an academic, Goodwin has to demonstrate a certain amount of objectivity, although a host of Marxist sociology lecturers etc seem to get by quite nicely without doing that. Just as the BBC is obliged by its charter to be politically impartial. Martin Webster and Philip Gegan have shot down that myth, on the Anglo-Celtic website. Anglo-Celtic is campaigning to abolish the BBC.

Matthew Goodwin has co-authored a number of books where British Nationalism is either implied to be, or openly stated to be, “fascist” or “far right”. But Nationalism seems to be a major interest of Goodwin’s. I do not know what first attracted him to his subject.

But as he developed his interest, he also developed an understanding, and an empathy with some modern nationalist ideological positions. He might have developed a sympathy with moderate nationalist positions. But, as he is based at a politically correct university, he dares not say so openly, if in fact that is the case. Many have been driven out of universities for not taking the right line.

In 2018, Goodwin co-wrote with Roger Eatwell, National Populism – The Revolt Against Liberal Democracy. They concentrated on ‘national’ populism, rather than populism in general. In that book they wrote:

“One point that has recurred throughout is that people who support national populism are not merely protesting: they are choosing to endorse views that appeal to them. So we need to look more closely at the promises being made by these politicians and examine whether, contrary to the popular claim that it is a new form of fascism, national populism strives towards a new form of democracy in which the interests and voices of ordinary people feature far more prominently.”

I enjoyed that book and even wrote a letter to the Hull Daily Mail about it – see the published text below.

Matthew Goodwin’s new book

The back cover of Values, Voice and Virtue states:

“What has caused the recent seismic changes in British politics, including Brexit and a series of populist revolts against the elite? Why did so many people want to overturn the status quo? Where have the Left gone wrong? And what deeper trends are driving these changes?

“British politics is coming apart. A country once known for its stability has recently experienced a series of shocking upheavals. Matthew Goodwin, acclaimed political scientist and co-author of National Populism, shows that the reason is not economic hardship, personalities or dark money. It is a far wider political realignment that will be with us for years to come. An increasingly liberalised, globalized ruling class has lost touch with millions, who found their values ignored, their voices unheard and their virtue denied. Now, this new alliance of voters is set to determine Britain’s fate.”

In chapters one and two, Goodwin discusses the new political elite and how it accomplished a revolution. He writes in chapter two:

“It opened the economy to a new and very disruptive model of hyper-globalization. It opened the country’s borders to a new and unprecedented era of mass immigration. And it opened up and hollowed out its national democracy, handing much greater power, influence and control to supranational institutions.”

Nowhere in the book is there any mention of the Jewish role in all of this. Some time ago, I wrote to Matthew Goodwin and asked him if he was aware of the books by Kevin MacDonald. I did not receive either a reply or an acknowledgement of my letter.

But I am reminded of Ruling the Void – The Hollowing of Western Democracy, by the Irish academic, Peter Mair, and Coming Apart, Charles Murray’s commentary on United States society. Edward Dutton has things to say about some of this in his co-authored book, The Past is a Future Country.

The truly brilliant Kevin MacDonald has much to say in his fourth book, Individualism and the Western Liberal Tradition, in the last two chapters, eight and nine. This includes comments on another book, by Joseph Henrich, The Weirdest People in the World, a book describing how Westerners (read White people) do not look after their own, like other peoples in the Third World do, and the way this situation developed.

I think that there is hope for some Establishment academics. Remember, even Kevin MacDonald started out as a leftist, and later became a Reagan-supporting conservative. Only later did he become a racial nationalist.

All of these books, including the two mentioned of Goodwin’s books, are worth reading. Because British Nationalists should be well-read and well-informed.

There is some evidence that Establishment academics, in Britain and America, and elsewhere, are aware of the political situation, and are currently cautiously commenting on it. Of course, most of them will not mention the Jews. MacDonald is the honourable exception.

A revolutionary situation developing

Some intelligent people know that there is a potentially revolutionary situation developing. The Establishment is trying hard to crush all Nationalist thinking. I have little doubt that people like Charles Murray in the United States, and Matthew Goodwin in the UK, would furiously deny having any sympathy with racial nationalism (at this stage, probably honestly). But they are noticing things that we know about.

All political revolutions start off as an Idea, and then develop slowly at first. Later, when they have gained momentum and more public support, there are always some among the old Establishment who come over to the new regime. Some of those people are braver than others. Some want to see which way the political winds are blowing before they will jump ship. Some are cynical and self-serving, but want to be well in with the new rulers – and they can be used by the new regime.

But I almost think that it is a pre-condition of the success of all revolutions that they win some  sympathisers among the old order that they want to replace. Are we seeing the first tentative signs of that with people like Goodwin and Murray?

If we do not make significant progress, such types will turn their professional interest elsewhere and play down their previous comments.

But a revolutionary situation demands a revolution. Goodwin’s book has five chapters. The first two are, The Rise of the New Elite, and Revolution, by which he means Cultural Marxism’s revolution. He does not call it that, but chooses “Hyper Liberalism” instead. In this he echoes the Tory writer, Nick Timothy, in his book, Remaking One Nation – The Future of Conservatism. Timothy refers to “Ultra Liberalism”.

Chapters three, four and five are about how the political elite are out of touch with the public. He devotes these chapters to the “Values, Voice and Virtue” of his title to the book. But interestingly, the conclusion to the book is called “Counter Revolution”.

Is he advocating that, or warning against it? Read the book and form your own opinion! I hope to comment again on this book, in a future post.

=================

Published in the Hull Daily Mail, on Friday November 30, 2018, as:

Local politicians could learn a lot from this book

Recently, I read ‘National Populism, the Revolt Against Liberal Democracy’ by Roger Eatwell and Matthew Goodwin. Although this book is by a couple of academics, it is an easy read and a good buy at £9.99 from Pelican books. Published on 25th October, 2018 it is right up to date and in my opinion, a must read for anyone who is interested in contemporary politics.

But more than that, I think some of our local politicians could benefit from reading it. Colin Inglis and David Nolan might find it useful in understanding why they were on the losing side in the EU referendum. But they are not the only ones.

Stephen Brady, who thought that immigration had been good for Hull, might see things from a different perspective once he has read this book. Regular Mail contributor, Michael Somerton, might realise that not everyone thinks in purely economic terms. Middle class feminists might gain insight into why America rejected Hilary Clinton and embraced Donald Trump.

Most of all I hope lots of Mail readers rush out to buy this book. The writers devote a chapter to each of the four ‘D’s:

  • The distrust of the political class.
  • The threatened destruction of nation states and indigenous populations by super-states and mass immigration.
  • The relative deprivation of ordinary people compared to the global, jet-setting super-class.
  • The de-alignment of the old political parties with their traditional voters.

Trump, Brexit and the rise of continental nationalist movements – the new force is populist nationalism.

The writers explain that this is different to fascism. This nationalism threatens the future of ‘centre-right’ parties and ‘centre-left’ parties.

According to the authors, the right’s only answer is to steal nationalist policies. The left hasn’t found an answer and faces terminal decline. The left cannot please both politically correct, middle class liberals and immigrants on the one hand – and their traditional working-class supporters on the other.

Much of Labour’s new recruits are in London, rather than that party’s traditional northern heartlands.

This is a very timely message, let’s see it in a few Christmas stockings!

This entire post (apart from the image of Professor Goodwin) is copyright (c) 2023 Will Wright. Extracts or the entire post may be re-posted provided acknowledgement is given to the author and a link supplied back to this post.

 

Genuine British Nationalism vs Phoney Patriotism

When the establishment parties put on a display of "patriotism", remember that it is only a display, and not the real thing. As Will Wright explains...

I love genuine British Nationalism. I always hated Communism. I always assumed that Communists would rather see the Red Flag flying over London than our Union Flag. Communism was internationalist.

In the Seventies, when I became politically active, Britain was plagued by a phenomenon that some people called “The New Left”. These people were Trotskyists – followers of the Jewish Communist Leon Trotsky. These Trotskyists seemed even more vile than the more established Communist Party of Great Britain.

Trotskyists had infiltrated the Labour Party and the trade unions. They were prominent in violent demonstrations and violent picketing during strikes. As you would expect, they were to the forefront of violent attacks on British Nationalism. Sometimes left-wing demonstrations involved the burning of a Union Jack. This was symbolic of their hatred of our country.

Neil Kinnock expelled the Militant Tendency from the Labour Party. Tony Blair supposedly turned the Labour Party into a left-leaning liberal party that could work with big business. Even then there were several former Communist Party members prominent in Blair’s cabinets, not least Peter Mandelson and Jack Straw.

Labour is not patriotic

Blair wanted to pretend that ‘New Labour’ was patriotic. He substituted the English red rose for the red flag. Labour’s annual conferences dropped the singing of the song called The Red Flag. I believe that they even had the Union Flag prominent in the hall.

After Blair, there was a reaction to his hijacking of the Labour Party. The party’s members twice elected Jeremy Corbyn as leader – and by large majorities. Neil Kinnock, still very much a man of the Left despite his public row with Militant, said that “We have got our party back!”

Labour’s new leader, Keir Starmer, is playing the patriotic card even more than Blair did. For the first time ever, the National Anthem was sung at a Labour Party Conference.

British Nationalism – Do not confuse symbols with policies and ideology

Anyone can wave a Union Jack or sing the National Anthem. But we should not confuse patriotic symbols with a real meaningful patriotic ideology and genuine British Nationalism. Labour is still the party that elected Corbyn twice. The attempt to rebrand Labour as a patriotic party, before a general election is a none-too-obvious con trick.

Labour wants open door immigration. What is patriotic about that? Starmer would like to see Britain back in the EU. What is patriotic about that?

Former BBC political editor, Andrew Marr, wrote a book, The Making of Modern Britain. The Union Flag is prominent on the cover. Marr makes it clear that he regards himself as a British patriot. Yet at university he was known as ‘Red Andy’. He admits that racial discrimination is a natural reaction. Yet he would like to see very harsh laws to outlaw any expression of racialism. That is not my idea of patriotism! Even if Marr regards himself as patriotic, he must be recognised as someone who is, in reality, very anti-patriotic. Marr serves as an example of patriotic talk and flag waving being very different to real patriotism.

Genuine British Nationalism vs Tory Phoney Patriotism

We must recognise the often-wide gap between patriotic ideas and the cynical use by politicians of patriotic symbols. This behaviour is deceitful and actually very anti-patriotic. If Labour is learning to be deceitful about patriotism, then the Tory Party are masters of many decades’ practise.

The Conservative Party is both socially and economically liberal. It is the servant of global monopoly capitalism. It is ridiculously pro-Zionist. About eighty percent of Tory MPs belong to the Conservative Friends of Israel. Why?

The Conservatives have always been a pro-EU party from the very beginning of the ‘European Project’. The majority of the Parliamentary Conservative Party campaigned for Remain during the 2016 EU membership referendum. That is not patriotism.

That party has always pretended that it will “do something” about immigration. But it will never make race a condition of British citizenship. It will never implement a programme of repatriation for all racial foreigners. That was true even in the days of Enoch Powell and the Monday Club.

The Tory Party today is packed with one-worlders who support global capitalism. It is top-heavy with racial foreigners in top government jobs. It is financed and controlled by Jewish interests. Today the Tories will not even control immigration – let alone stop it, let alone repatriate even illegal immigrants! There are many Tory MPs who openly support immigration to “grow the economy”!

Yet flag waving remains widespread among the Tory rank-and-file.  Are they and Tory voters stupid? Many Tory members voted for non-White candidates to be leader of their party.

Many people are desperately convinced that even a bad Conservative Party is still better than the Labour Party. But in what way? Patriotic talk and patriotic symbols will not save our country. We need patriotic policies underpinned by a comprehensive nationalist ideology.

A False Choice

There are still plenty of people in British politics and the media in Britain who are openly anti-patriotic. These people are the ideological enemies of genuine British Nationalism – and we should hate them. They hate us. But their only virtue is that they are at least honest. They have shown their colours and we can recognise them as the enemy.

The Conservative Party deserves to die. They have lived the lie that they are patriotic for far too long. This lie becomes less and less credible with the passing of years. The Tory Party is a colossal fraud on the voters of the United Kingdom.

Now we have another fraudulent party pretending to be patriotic – the Labour Party. Most of the membership recently twice elected Corbyn as leader. How long Labour can keep the pretence up is anyone’s guess. But my guess is that the pretence will be cynically dropped not long after Labour is elected to power.

The real alternative to corrupt, anti-patriotic politics in Britain should be genuine British Nationalism in the form of a revivalist British Nationalist movement. The question is: who can build it, and lead it to victory?

Is British Nationalism really “right wing”?

Will Wright

Out-dated terminology

I don’t really like the word “right-wing” being used to describe British Nationalism position, or any White Racial Nationalism. Even more so, I dislike the expression “the far-right” Why? Let me tell you.

I accept that “left” and “right” are so deeply ingrained in our language and thought, that it is hard not to use those terms, and I certainly know that I do use them myself. But I wish that we could obliterate them.

I want to see the Nationalist movement as new, different, vibrant, dynamic and ultimately successful. I see it as at odds with the Establishment world, which I see as tired, old, degenerate, corrupt – and suicidal. I see Nationalism as a radical and revolutionary creed. I want to see the Nationalist movement smash (metaphorically) the old political world into a million pieces, that can never be put back together again. We must build a new, stronger, better Britain, that will endure.

The old world had built-in weaknesses – one of which was the class system.
But the words “right-wing” and “left-wing” belong to that old corrupt world. They belong to an era of class warfare, whereas Nationalism is, and must be, a classless movement.

In the old world, the left, and particularly the extreme left, saw themselves as representing by far the biggest social class – the working class. They believed, and some still do believe, that they had a built-in advantage, that would one day translate into permanent political power.

In this left-wing view of the world, the political right is an old-fashioned minority that is losing ground. The far left sees what it insists on calling “fascism” as a fight back by the old ruling class. A sort of counter revolution. The left claim that British Nationalism is a part of the old ruling class that represents a minority that is doomed to failure.

I reject that picture, created by our ideological enemies, totally. But if we use old world terminology, created by our enemies, then we are accepting the enemy view of the world.

British Nationalism and Realism

While I like the imagery of smashing the old political world into a million pieces, I am old enough to realise that this is not, in practical terms, how revolutions happen. There is always some degree of compromise with the old regime, as I have explained in previous posts.

The dynamic mass movement that I would like to see emerge, will always have some common ground with other ideologies. Sometimes that will be left-wing ideologies, and at other times and places, right-wing ideologies. Before we come to power, we will need political allies, in other camps, because history teaches us that any new movement that succeeds will always have allies already in place in the old regime – the hated Establishment!

When we find allies in Conservative circles, we should recognise that these people are allies, rather than a part of our movement. Sometimes these people are temporary allies, to enable us to come to power, or win an objective, like leaving the EU. But people do change their political thinking and allegiances. Some Conservatives, and others, might one day become proper, ideological British Nationalists.

But in the meantime, British Nationalism does not benefit from being grouped with old-fashioned Conservatives, or labelled “right-wing” or “far-right”. We want to win over all indigenous classes, to create a classless mass movement, and eventually a classless society. We are part-way towards a classless society, so being branded as “the far-right” does us practical harm.

In this regard, I do not agree with either AK Chesterton, or John Tyndall, embracing the enemy label “extremist”. Being an “extremist” clearly implies that you are out on a limb – in an over-the-top minority position. We want to become the majority. We need to become the majority political ideology if our race and nation are to survive.

It seems to me that Tyndall and Chesterton were being self-indulgent, and that it was a gut reaction in defiance of our enemies, when they described themselves as extremists. I once cringed when I read the ludicrous Eddy Morrison write “We are the Ultras”.

In the same way that everyone ought to think well of themselves, no one should want to be, or even be thought of by others as, an extremist. British Nationalists should believe that ours is the correct political ideology and work to convert others, so that ours becomes the majority political view. Labelling yourself as an extremist is doing the enemy’s work.

British Nationalism must smash the left’s notional link with the working class

Antonio Gramsci wanted to see the Marxists take over the West’s universities. His allies in the Frankfurt School achieved that. The left broadly won over the educated middle classes, in a way that the older Marxists had never won over the working class – either as revolutionaries, or voters.

But because the educated go on to govern us, the left scored a more lasting victory than either a violent revolution, or a leftist victory at a general election. But those with a higher education will never be the biggest class in society.
While leftist ideas have won a victory through the backdoor, which enables left-wing ideas to be translated into government policies, the left no longer represents the biggest class. This thought is unsettling for some on the left. So much so, that they refuse to accept it. Some lefties don’t like the idea that they are now the elite, and very much out-of-step with traditional working class ideas.

Because voting habits are ingrained over generations with many British voters, left-wing Labour MPs continue to win seats in working class constituencies. But they do not truly speak for their constituents on issues such as race and immigration, the EU, defence, and law and order.

British Nationalists need to find a way to smash Labour, and any left-wing successor party, as an electoral force. Then those people who are highly educated, but brainwashed with Cultural Marxism, will stand out as an unpopular minority. It needs to be rammed home to working class voters that Labour is no longer their party.

Margaret Thatcher is credited with standing up to the old Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact allies. She claimed the credit for the decline of Soviet Communism. Because her laissez-faire economic policies wrecked heavy manufacturing industry at home, and her raft of trade union laws hampered those communists who had taken over some of them, she claimed a victory over British Communism.

But what she didn’t do is root out the well-embedded Cultural Marxists in our universities. That must be done as a priority, to prevent future generations being infected with an ideology that amounts to racial suicide.

If Cultural Marxist ideas are killed off in our universities, and Labour is now widely exposed as a politically-correct, educated middle class, London-centric party, then Labour might eventually die.

But let us concentrate on which political ideas politicians and political parties actually stand for, rather than lazily labelling people as “right-wing” or “left-wing”. Because using old world terminology doesn’t advance racial nationalism.

Does British Racial Nationalism Have Any Friends in the Establishment?

In the months since the historic Brexit vote on June 23rd 2016 there have been a surprisingly high number of establishment figures that have come out as being in favour of our withdrawal from the so-called "European Union". People such as Lord Lawson, Andrew Neill, Michael Caine and John Cleese, as well as many Tory and Labour MPs. In this thought-provoking post, Will Wright discusses whether this is a trend that is likely to grow as the British public gradually wakes up to the nightmare they are being sleep-walked into and start to do something about it.

Do we have friends in high places?

Does British nationalism have any friends in our county’s establishment? This might seem a strange question to ask. Some nationalists might have taken it for granted that everyone in the establishment and the political class is beyond redemption. Does it matter?

When a country has a revolution, or a fundamental change of government, many people recognise that one ruling group of people has been replaced by another. But, that’s not the full story. The country itself is still much the same. The civil service, the police and the military are mostly the same people as before.

Some senior people in those institutions find it fairly easy to go from supporting the old regime to supporting the new one. Some journalists, unless they are very ideologically committed, might carry on much as before. Revolutionary regimes tend to purge those they regard as ideological enemies, just as the previous order would purge those it considered dangerous revolutionaries – but most of the people in the country are the same people in the same roles.

Governments change when a new party wins an election, or in some countries, when there is a violent revolution. But something happens before that point. Something that is subtler. Some people who are very much part of the establishment, politicians, judges, senior civil servants and policemen and military leaders, gradually change their allegiances from the old order to the new.

It is this change before a revolution happens that enables it to happen. All new regimes had supporters in the old order. This seems to have been true of the French Revolution, the Bolshevik Revolution and the Nazi takeover in Germany.

There might be some in the British establishment who have always been patriotic and broadly in agreement with us. Such people might have been browbeaten into silence, at the moment, waiting for a patriotic mass movement to emerge. After all, shouldn’t we expect the military to be nationalistic? Shouldn’t we expect judges and policemen to believe in law and order? Shouldn’t we expect some common ground with journalists and politicians ‘on the right’?

When a movement is very certain about what it wants to achieve and very active and determined about achieving it, then something magical happens. The movement becomes very charismatic. The magnetic pull of the movement becomes ever greater and more and more people are attracted. Of course, people in establishment circles are not immune from this. Some of them prepare to make peace with a new regime and get ready to serve it.

So, does British racial nationalism have any supporters in the establishment? At the moment this is not at all clear. The conditions are not right to bring about open support – there is no charismatic mass movement. Anyone who declared any kind of support for nationalism would be purged.

During the nineteen-seventies, the National Front was numerically small compared to the established parties and those of the far-left. But, through a spirit of activism, lead by National Activities Organiser, Martin Webster, it was becoming charismatic. Some members of established parties defected to the NF. Many policemen, especially London policemen, supported the NF. So, too did prison warders and many London postal workers.

John Tyndall boasted, in Spearhead magazine, that the establishment would be frightened if it knew of the strength of support among those groups. Tyndall was probably too quick to mention this. The establishment did notice – and took steps to reverse the trend. The military, the police and the prison service all now ban nationalists from joining. In all the big public service trade unions, the far-left are in charge. They join the management in driving out nationalists.

All big public organisations have ‘Equality and Diversity’ courses for their employees. The unions state, “no platform for fascists and racists”.

So, is all lost? No.

Nationalists need to have a very clear vision of the future that we are going to achieve – long-term and well as short-term. There seems to be something mystical about thinking very long-term. Once a body of people has a vision they must be very active in pursuit of that goal. Then the charisma and magnetic pull takes over. People are attracted to conviction politicians – they can tell when someone is authentic. Once a mass movement is born, then the conditions are in place for friends in high places to declare themselves.

Most people pay lip-service to ‘Equality and Diversity’ but privately regard it as a form of brainwashing. The unions are in terminal decline. Not many people join or support them anymore. The old political parties have become alienated from voters – and alienated from their own rank-and-file members.

Banning nationalists from certain professions will be counterproductive in the long run. This practice might even be challenged in the courts if someone declared themselves to be a nationalist and then was refused a job. The establishment’s equality and diversity legislation can be used against it.

We need someone with vision to build the mass movement.