The Volokh Conspiracy
Mostly law professors | Sometimes contrarian | Often libertarian | Always independent
My New UnPopulist Article on How Nationalism is Driving the Growth of anti-Semitism on the Right
Nationalism has a longstanding historical connection to anti-Semitism, and the link between the two in the US today should not be surprising.
Today, the UnPopulist published my article "Nationalism Is Driving the Neo Right's Virulent Antisemitic Turn." It builds on my earlier Volokh Conspiracy post on the same topic, and also on 2024 National Affairs article "The Case Against Nationalism" (coauthored with Alex Nowrasteh). Originally, Alex and I were also going to coauthor this new article. But, after seeing my draft, Alex said he had little to add to it, though he very much agrees with the thesis. I am nonetheless grateful to Alex for his help in thinking through this topic, and for insights derived from his extensive expertise on it. Here is an excerpt from today's article:
American conservatism has been rocked by the rise of "Groyper" antisemitism within its ranks, roiling both official Republican Party organizations and some of the right's most influential intellectual organs….. Even now, the debate over this issue has largely overlooked the source of antisemitism's rise in conservative circles: the political right's increasing turn towards nationalism.
Nationalism doesn't just historically correlate with bigotry—it consistently drives antisemitism and other racial and ethnic prejudices. Indeed, nationalism intensifies preexisting antisemitic impulses. To the degree that today's conservatives decide to embrace—or even just make peace with—nationalism and dispense with the universalist liberal principles of the American Founding, they will find it difficult to impossible to stem the spread of antisemitism in their midst….
In October, Politico published an explosive report disclosing a selection of vile antisemitic and pro-Nazi messages from leaked group chats written by leaders of Young Republican chapters and various state GOP politicians and staffers. Later that month, Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts mired his organization in the controversy when he publicly defended prominent far-right podcaster Tucker Carlson—a longtime promoter of antisemitic ideas and conspiracy theories—after Carlson conducted a fawning interview promoting Nick Fuentes, an even more notorious antisemitic influencer who openly defends the Nazis….
The recent resurgence of right-wing antisemitism is rooted in the conservative movement's turn towards nationalism. It is no accident that it emerged at the same time as the political right—led by Trump—has increasingly defined American identity not in terms of universal liberal values but in terms of ethnic and racial identity. Many in the movement privilege native-born white Christians over other groups—and often even privilege "heritage Americans," defined as those (primarily whites) who can trace their ancestry in the U.S. over many generations all the way back to the Civil War or earlier.
Nationalist political movements—defined here as those that hold that the main purpose of government is to advance the interests of the nation's dominant ethnic group—have a long history of antisemitism and other bigotry….
A movement that exalts the interests of the ethnic and cultural majority and believes that these interests are the true foundation of the nation is inherently prone to viewing ethnic and religious minorities with suspicion and hostility. That may be especially true of minority groups with a large diaspora in many countries, a history that is perversely used against them as a reason to doubt their allegiance to the nations they live in.
These prejudices are exacerbated by Jews' disproportionate success in the commercial and intellectual worlds. Nationalists tend to believe such disproportionately successful minorities are encroaching on the rightful domain of the majority group. Such suspicion is heightened by the zero-sum worldview shared by most nationalists, under which one ethnic or racial group can only gain at the expense of others. Thus, if Jews are disproportionately successful, it must be at the expense of the ethnic majority.
Resentments are heightened by nationalists' historic predilection for conspiracy theories. If the ethnic majority has been denied its supposedly rightful position of dominance, nationalists readily assume that the cause must be some nefarious plot.
Later in the article, I explain how the best antidote to nationalism is embracing the universalist principles of the American Founding:
In his resignation statement from the Heritage board, Robert George urged Heritage to be guided by the principles of the Declaration of Independence, especially the idea "that each and every member of the human family, irrespective of race, ethnicity, religion, or anything else; … is 'created equal' and 'endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights.'" George is right. Unlike nationalist movements focused on ethnic particularism, the American Founding was based on universal liberal principles…..
In his General Orders to the Continental Army, issued on the occasion of the end of the Revolutionary War in 1783, George Washington stated that one of the reasons the United States was founded was to create "an Asylum for the poor and oppressed of all nations and religions." Other leading Founding Fathers—including James Madison and Thomas Jefferson—expressed similar sentiments.
Washington sounded a similar theme in his famous 1790 letter to the congregation of the Rhode Island Touro Synagogue, in which he avowed that the United States has "an enlarged and liberal policy," under which "All possess alike liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship," and that the U.S. government "gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance." America, he emphasized, went beyond "mere toleration" of Jews to granting them full equality. It could do so because American identity was based on universal liberal principles, not ethnic or religious particularism.
As noted in the article, there is also troubling anti-Semitism on the far left (which I previously wrote about here). That in no way justifies the right-wing nationalist variety (and vice versa).
