Comparative Politics



B12(a) - Xenophobia, Displacement, Race, and Class

Date: Jun 13 | Time: 12:00pm to 01:30pm | Location: 680 Sherbrooke St. West 355

Chair/Président/Présidente : Marat Akopian (Sheperd University)

Discussant/Commentateur/Commentatrice : Marat Akopian (Sheperd University)

The Xenophobic Wave: Ideology and Social Movement Theory in White Power Terrorism: Alon Burstein (University of California, Irvine)
Abstract: The rise in xenophobic terror attacks across the democratic world since Anders Behring Breivik committed a politically motivated massacre on the island of Utoya in July 2011 constitutes a vital development in the ongoing waves of terrorism (Auger 2020). We make the case in this paper that this new wave is best understood as a loose transnational social movement rooted in the ideology of white power. This conclusion is reached through close analysis of the key texts of perpetrators of these attacks through the methodological paradigm of social movement theory, unpacking core ideological continuities as well as noting relevant points of divergence. Social movement theory offers a rigorous analytical framework that facilitates the plasticity necessary to accommodate the way both actors resembling self-activated lone wolves and members of semi-organized hierarchical and disciplined collectives constitute a wave of terror. Given the social movement methodological paradigm utilized in this research, the ideological core of the movement is of particular interest. Our research locates ideological commonalities across a diffuse cross-section of cases that offer diversity across geographical, temporal and (ostensibly) motivational dimensions. We root the ongoing wave of terror specifically in the white power social movement, furthering the case that this is meaningfully distinct from white supremacy and white nationalism despite obvious points of historical and ideological overlap. The white power movement is a cohesive but not necessarily coherent suite of ideas that most notably fuse around 1) an often pessimistic or ambivalent (rather than triumphalist) disposition toward the fate of the white race 2) belief in the imminence of racial extinction and 3) commitment to a transnational borderless white nation. Ultimately, we argue that an ideologically engaged understanding of this particular social movement is the framework through which the interconnected nature of the contemporary wave of xenophobic terrorism is revealed.


Destroy Them Gradually: Displacement As Atrocity: Andrew Basso (Wilfrid Laurier University)
Abstract: All the most widely acknowledged twentieth-century atrocities incorporated displacement as a key element of the processes of destruction. Perpetrators of mass atrocities have used displacement to transfer victims to killing sites or extermination camps, transfer victims to sites of forced labour and attrition, ethnically homogenize regions by displacing victims out of their homes and lands, and destroy populations. This paper focusses on the last problem: why perpetrators of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes use forced displacement as a process to destroy populations in whole or in part. This paper outlines the main conceptual and theoretical core of Displacement Atrocity (DA) crimes, situates this destructive practice in international law, and provides forward-looking analyses on the structural possibilities for climate violence based on insights from comparative historical analyses of previous instances of DA crimes. As a method of atrocity perpetration, DA crimes refer to the unique fusion of forced displacement and systematic deprivation of vital daily needs (food, water, clothing, shelter, and medical care) to create potent killing systems. Annihilatory forced displacement has for too long remained a hidden destructive process even though DA crimes have been perpetrated on every major inhabited continent across space and time, posing a ubiquitous problem for prevention and punishment regimes. This paper begins to illuminate these types of violent processes and brings some measure of justice for crimes of the past through discourse about what was done, why, and how to understand pathways to specific forms of political violence.


Descriptive Representation of Class and its Influence on Party Policies: Evidence from Canada and the United Kingdom: Thomas Rafie (Université de Montréal)
Abstract: Extensive research has demonstrated that descriptive representation matters. Groups often share common interests and elected officials that are part of these groups can wield their power to advance their group's interests. While most representation studies are about women and ethnic minorities, fewer have inquired into the descriptive representation of economic groups. This paper tries to remediate this by asking two questions: how has descriptive representation of class changed, and how are these changes in representation connected to party policy? First, I use former occupation of Canadian MPs to analyze trends in the representation of class since the Second World War. Second, I combine these trends with data from the Comparative Manifesto Project (CMP) to establish a link between the proportion of working-class MPs and party policy. Descriptive results show that in Canada, the working class used to have some amount of representation among MPs, but that this representation has largely faded. Furthermore, regression results show that these changes have affected Canadian parties by making them adopt more right-wing policies. Implications from these results add to the debate on the importance of the representation of economic groups. Additionally, further work will add data from the United Kingdom, which will allow for comparison between systems and discussion of mechanisms that explain similarities or differences in the results.


A unified theory of secession, unification, and sorting: local and national cases from Canada and the United States: Lawrence Anderson (University of Wisconsin-Whitewater)
Abstract: Secession, unification, and sorting fit together naturally: all are responses to some perception of suboptimality in the policy-making environment; all are instances of moving the boundaries of a polity or moving people into or out of a polity. In secession, the size of the government territory is made smaller; in unification, the size of the polity is made larger; in sorting, the population in one polity is made larger and the population of another is made smaller. In all instances, the rationale behind the choice might be the same: escaping lock-in, evading discriminatory redistribution, achieving greater economies of scale, etc. This paper explores secession, unification, and sorting as functionally equivalent, different means of the same goal: policy optimization. Most of the existing literature on secession and unification explores these policies in the national context, where new state boundaries are drawn and old state boundaries are revised. With respect to sorting, much of the analysis is at the local or regional level. Why do groups seek to secede or unify? Why do individuals seek to move from one polity to another? What prompts the desire for change? What happens to the new political units created and the old political units left behind? Secession, unification, and sorting at the local and national levels are similar enough in form, context, origin, and impact to those instances taking place at the local level to allow for fruitful comparison and deeper understanding. This paper will explore cases of secession, unification, and sorting in the US and Canada.