/ world today news/ The results of the last elections in Argentina and the Netherlands record the dramatic success of the right-wing populist, one might even say, ultra-right forces. What are the reasons for this? And how far can we say that these are not isolated coincidental cases, but the manifestation of a new trend? This is the opinion of Oleg Barabanov, program director of the Valdai International Discussion Club.
In his inauguration speech, the new president of Argentina, Javier Miley, drew attention to the connection between history and the future. He pathetically proclaimed the dawn of a new era in the life of Argentine society. And he directly compared his election to the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Miley also remembered the “golden era”, when in the second half of the 19th century Argentina had rulers close to him in spirit. And then came the hundred years of humiliation and shame that followed.
All of Argentina’s problems, he said, were due to this deviation from right-wing libertarianism. He promised that everything would be okay in the end. But not suddenly. Because the previous rulers brought the country’s economy to the brink.
In her speech, Miley long poured out numbers about financial disaster and collapse. And he also persistently pursued the idea that the only prescription to correct the situation was shock therapy in its most severe form. That is exactly what he intends to accomplish without delay. Therefore, at the beginning it will be difficult and even very difficult, get ready, dear citizens of Argentina. But then happiness will definitely come.
Residents of countries that have already experienced right-wing liberal shock therapy in recent history (including us in Russia, with our memory of the shock therapy of Gaidar and Chubais in the 1990s) will only smile bitterly.
The hardships during Miley’s prescribed shock therapy are sure to be monstrous, but whether deliverance will come is uncertain. History, despite Miley’s speech, does not know many cases of successful shock therapy.
And there are enough counterexamples when such steps lead to social disaster. And whatever the outcome, shock therapy always results in severe psychological trauma for an entire generation. Now the Argentinians will have to re-enter these waters. Let’s pray for them and wish them perseverance and luck.
When the pendulum of electoral preferences swings sharply towards non-systemic parties, then almost always one of the main reasons for this is public fatigue with the old elites, who, while in power for decades, engaged in hypocritical aggrandizement and often sank into corruption, which is already politically correct called “revolving doors” between the state and business.
This institutionalized lobbying is essentially no different from corruption, but for some reason it is called something else and therefore is not prosecuted in any way by the law.
In this case, people are ready to vote for any other candidate, however populist and unachievable his program may seem in reality. With a new face, people associate their last hopes for correcting the situation in conditions where the people do not trust the old elites.
By the way, this “last choice” in favor of a non-systemic candidate does not always appeal to far-right forces. Here, everything depends on the specifics of the balance of power in a given state.
Recently, we have seen not only the successes of the right, but also, for example, the resounding victory of the leftist candidate Bernardo Arevalo in the presidential elections in Guatemala.
However, now they are trying in every possible way to prevent him from coming to power through various legal tricks. The role of lawyers as enemies of democracy here, in our opinion, becomes quite obvious.
A few years ago, in a completely different geopolitical era, in the time of early Trump and Syriza, the Valdai International Discussion Club already published two special reports on this topic. Then we called them “Global Right Rebellion” and “Global Left Rebellion” against the neoliberal mainstream.
Even then, we concluded that this refusal to support the old elites in favor of both right-wing and left-wing non-systemic politicians is happening in parallel in the world. And the key for the voters is precisely the protest against the old system, and who they will choose in return – right or left – depends only on the specifics of the moment.
A long time had passed since those times in the mid-2010s, and it seemed that the wave of unsystematic “rebellions” of the population had already been overcome and assimilated by the old elites. But now we see that the situation of growing protest is returning. And therefore again requires expert attention.
The results of the previous wave of electoral success of non-systemic parties were mixed. Often, especially with non-systemic leftists, after winning an election, they quickly forget their previous promises and become an organic part of the global mainstream. The examples of the same “Syriza” in Greece or Matteo Renzi in Italy are very indicative here.
To put it in Marxist language, we are dealing here with a typical, unfortunately, manifestation of opportunism and compromise. This opportunism has always been rampant on the left, ever since the “Alexander Millerand incident” over a hundred years ago. It has not disappeared anywhere, as we can see, even today.
But such a compromise is also characteristic of the right. The most significant recent example here is Giorgia Meloni in Italy. There were all kinds of labels that stuck to her during the election campaign. And they did not scare the Italian voters.
Even the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, got involved in this, who very transparently hinted to the Italians about the responsibility and consequences if they choose the wrong choice. Meloni eventually, despite this whole campaign of harassment and intimidation, won the election. But what happened next?
She suddenly found herself simply “holier than the Pope” and as organically joined the transnational mainstream as her opponent Matteo Renzi had a decade earlier.
Another tool for the influence of the old woman on the winning non-systemic candidate is the open sabotage of his decisions by the state apparatus. This worked quite well in the case of Donald Trump.
In his memoirs, Trump’s former national security adviser, John Bolton, unhesitatingly and extremely cynically describes the mechanism of this internal sabotage.
The old elites are scary too, of course. That with us, dear voters, your life may not be very good. But everything is already familiar to you, there is an understanding of the situation, the power of momentum and stability. But if others come instead of us, who knows who, from the street, it will be even worse. So don’t destroy what you have yourself, vote for us again.
Another possible reaction: when a non-systemic political force gets a relative but not an absolute majority in the elections and cannot form a government on its own, then the old mainstream political parties, which had previously been at odds with each other for decades, immediately come together in a coalition, to to stay in power.
Coalitions of this kind are well known between the CDU and the Social Democrats in Germany to block the Alternative for Germany, or coalitions of the mainstream left and right in Italy to prevent the Five Star Movement from coming to power in its early, revolutionary era.
It is clear that no ideology matters here and a single principle prevails – to maintain power by all means.
The next example of the influence of the old elites on an unsystematic winner is the “junior ally”. Dilma Rousseff and Michel Temer in Brazil are very important examples of this kind. When that junior ally betrays you and backs off at the first opportunity. And everything is back to normal.
In our opinion, this accumulated protest charge can work in favor of non-systemic forces not only in Argentina and the Netherlands, but also in other upcoming elections. In this regard, it will be particularly interesting to follow the elections for the European Parliament and the presidential elections in the USA.
Translation: SM
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