Decay and rebirth : Conceptions of history in Norwegian right-wing extremism

Abstract

This thesis investigates the conceptions of history that underpin fascist and right-wing extremist ideologies – in the present, but also in the past. Based on primarily Norwegian case studies, the thesis looks at how various extreme right ideologies have diagnosed the present and linked this diagnosis together with a vision of the past and an anticipation of the future. The thesis utilises qualitative methods on various types of textual material and analyses Norwegian far right discourses on time and history in different historical and sociological contexts: the attempt at creating a fascist mass movement in and around Nasjonal Samling in the 1930s and 1940s; the attempts at reformulating and ‘modernizing’ Nazism from the 1970s and forwards; and, finally, newer currents of Islamophobic rightwing extremism and lone-actor terrorism that have surfaced in the last couple of decades. Consisting of five articles, the thesis argues not only that the fascist or right-wing extremist conceptions of history are Manichean, marked by pitting a ‘good’ and ‘healthy’ in-group against an ‘evil’ and ‘corrupted’ out-group, it also argues that it is possible to identify a structurally similar ‘regime of historicity’ underpinning different right-wing extremist currents and ideologies. This regime of historicity revolves around a nurturing of idealised and nostalgic myths about the past, a diagnosis of the present as decadent, and dreams about reversing the alleged uprooting in modern societies by fostering a revolutionary and purified new order. Believing that the people are facing an existential threat of worldhistorical proportions, they see this rejuvenation as a prerequisite to secure the future of the people.