Tag Archives: BNP

elections, historical, Party Politics, Reminiscences and Musings, Russia and Russian relations, society, Uncategorized

Tipping Points in Politics and Life

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We have all heard of the theatrical cliche of the actor who achieves “overnight success”, having in fact worked hard against all the odds for years. The same is often true of writers, painters and other artists. Not forgetting scientists. It was Edison who, on the failure of his (supposedly) 2,000th lightbulb experiment, is said to have said: “I have not failed. I have just discovered the 2,000th way not to invent the incandescent lightbulb.” At a later time, he of course succeeded. Many things follow the pattern: a long period of non-movement, then sudden success (or sudden failure of something, often after long stagnation).

One can call this a tipping-point, or characterize it by some other metaphor. The aircraft which suddenly fails by reason of metal fatigue, the ship which finally turns over after ice has built up on its external structure in Arctic waters, the huge empire which “suddenly” staggers and falls. On the other hand, there is that actor with his “overnight” success, that composer whose works suddenly find favour, the small political group which “suddenly” rises to prominence and power.

The Bolsheviks were a small group of societal rejects mostly living in internal or external exile, or in prison. Many were not even Russian. Jews predominated in their higher councils (despite forming only 10% of the entire membership), but there were also Georgians and others. In fact, the Bolshevik Party only had 8,400 members in 1905 and, though that increased to 46,100 by 1907, by 1910 the numbers had slipped back to about 5,000. Few would then have imagined either that the mighty Russian Empire would collapse or that the tiny faction of Bolsheviks could seize control of what was left. We know the rest: a failing war and an impoverished population, an initial attempt by others at “moderate” revolution and then a coup d’etat by one small group in one corner of a vast empire.

The lesson: a small and marginalized group, disciplined ideologically and practically, can both seize power and institute an entirely new form of society, once that tipping point or crisis point has been reached.

In post-WW1 Bavaria, Adolf Hitler became the 7th member of the German Workers’ Party [DAP], which may also have had an unknown number (estimates vary from mere dozens to as many as 15,000) of loose supporters in the beerhalls of 1919 Munich.

By 1923, this tiny and marginalized group was able to attempt the Beer Hall Putsch [aka Hitler-Ludendorff-Putsch], but it is important to note that, despite the support of Ludendorff and a few other notables, the actual number of putschists involved was small: the main march headed by Hitler was only 2,000-strong (immediately after the putsch failed, 3,000 students from the university also marched in support and to lay wreaths). Indeed, even had the putsch succeeded, Hitler would only have taken power in one city of one region within the German state as a whole.

The membership of the NSDAP grew steadily, reaching 108,000 by 1928. Electorally, however, the NSDAP was doing worse in 1928 (receiving only 2.6% of the national vote) than it had done in 1924, no doubt a reflection of the growing prosperity in the intervening years (i.e. since the infamous hyperinflation finished in 1924). Despite that poor showing, once the Great Depression started to affect Germany after 1929, the NSDAP was able to gain the trust of ever-more voters: the vote in 1932 was 37% and then 33% (in the two elections of that year), growing to 44% in 1933. Adolf Hitler then took full power, having been appointed Chancellor in 1932.

A different example: UKIP grew from a few people in a pub in 1991 to a peak in the 2012-2015 period, but has not the ideological discipline or revolutionary intent to “seize power” even by electoral means. It missed its chance and will probably not get any further. Still, its growth, in the UK context, is interesting. Its founder, Alan Sked, was a former Liberal candidate who stood as “Anti-Federalist” candidate for the seat of Bath in 1992 (i.e. after UKIP had been formed), receiving 117 votes [0.2%].

UKIP had virtually no members until the late 1990s, though by 2015 the membership had grown to nearly 50,000 (now 30,000). As for its vote share, that grew to nearly 13% by 2015, but the UK’s unfair “First Past The Post” [FPTP] electoral system meant no gains.

FPTP voting itself illustrates the “tipping point” idea, as happened in Scotland: the SNP had fairly good support for decades, but few MPs until the tipping point was reached. Now it has 50% support, but almost 100% of Westminster seats. Why was the tipping point reached? Cultural identity rising, living standards falling, entrenched Labour failing. The point was reached–and the Labour vote collapsed.

UKIP has the same problem. So long as it has only 10% or even 15% of votes, it cannot get more than one or two MPs. Were it to get to 25% support, the situation would tip and UKIP would have perhaps 100 MPs. Except that that will probably not happen…

In fact, the Bath constituency mentioned above is instructive: Alan Sked got only 117 votes (0.2%) in 1992; in 2015 the UKIP candidate received nearly 3,000 votes (over 6%), but was still only 5th (Sked came in 6th in 1992)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bath_(UK_Parliament_constituency)#Elections_in_the_2010s

The difference between UKIP’s situation and that of the Bolsheviks or NSDAP is that UKIP has no really firm ideological or organizational structure. Even if society came to a political tipping point, UKIP might well be unable to take advantage of that.

A new and properly-run social nationalist party could take most of the votes of UKIP as well as those which formerly went to the BNP and others. That however, could only ever be a foundation for electoral success. That success itself would depend on the rising star of the new party meeting the fading star of the old parties. It is a question of timing and of Fate. The tipping point for the whole society would be key.

Alt-Right, historical, Tommy Robinson, Uncategorized

On Marching and Demonstrating

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Should social nationalists march or demonstrate? My answer is the qualified, “only if the march or demonstration looks credible and maybe not even then”. What does that mean?

Some older people reading this will recall the National Front marches of the 1970s, with their aspiration to “a forest of Union Jacks”. Those marches were sometimes “credible” (meaning large enough not to be laughed at by hostile elements or the public generally) but had their drawbacks. All marchers were photographed (openly) by State security staff, as well as by the Press and/or Jewish Zionist snoopers. The police usually decided on the route in consultation with the organizers, as is usual now. The whole show was State-controlled. The resulting publicity was usually quite unfavourable, partly because the violence caused by anti-NF protesters tainted the NF marchers themselves, partly because of the unremittingly-hostile Press coverage, partly because many of the public could not see why such marches had to happen, disrupting superficially “peaceful” areas.

Unfavourable publicity from biased mainstream media, Jewish/Zionist provocation, public incomprehension. All of these were not new even in the 1970s. Mosley and the BUF faced similar problems in the 1930s. The uniformed marches remain controversial today, with even some who look kindly upon them blaming them for the relatively poor showing of the BUF in elections. The same is said of the famous rally at Olympia in 1934. After that, election results worsened and, importantly, the Daily Mail withdrew its support. BUF membership, which at one time had approached 50,000, dropped to 8,000 by 1935 (though at time of repression and involuntary disbandment in 1940, numbers had recovered to 20,000).

That was then and a different UK political milieu, but it can probably be said that Mosley and the BUF would have done better in terms of public perception without marches and, indeed, political uniforms (banned by the Public Order Act 1936).

The milieu today is one in which the Internet plays an important role. The mainstream media are losing ground in public visibility. The printed Press is dying: the Independent no longer publishes on paper, The Guardian begs its dwindling readership for donations. Where do public marches have a place?

It will be remembered that, a couple of years ago, a misguided young man started pushing on Twitter and elsewhere for marches against the Jewish influence in London, particularly North London and specifically in the (Orthodox Jew/Hasid) Stamford Hill area and also (later, in 2015) in the Golders Green neighbourhood. Some might say that that boat has well and truly sailed!

I opposed the idea on Twitter as soon as I became aware of it, not because I have any great liking for Jews of any kind, but for three main reasons:

  • firstly and most importantly, because such marches would probably be small, have to be protected by the ordinary police and make social nationalism look pathetic;
  • secondly, because the public would see such activity (especially through the msm lens) as an “unprovoked” attack on the Jews of those parts of London; and
  • thirdly, because it is the duty of social nationalists to put forward a vision of a better society, not to make futile gestures of a negative nature towards groups, even alien groups.

The result was all too predictable: the first event was abandoned (the organizer having been banned by the authorities from entering within the M25 area); the second “march” was moved, on the say-so of the police, to at least 7 miles from Golders Green. In the end, about 10 “marchers” held a static demonstration in a Central London street. The organizer (Joshua Bonehill) was absent, having been arrested. He was later convicted of “incitement” of “racial hatred” against Jews and is still in prison.

A sorry tale, though it seems that that young man has reconsidered his position while in prison and has come to the conclusion (according to his Wikipedia entry) that the thing to do is to try to build a political base in the rural area from which he originated (southern Somerset). Better.

Can marches etc ever be useful these days? I think that the answer, at least on a 99% basis, must be “no”. The trade unions have raised marches numbering 500,000 against UK “austerity” cuts, without effect. Going back further, the anti-Iraq War march of 2003 in London is said by some to have topped a million (others say 500,000), while in Rome, the figure was 3 million. Overall, the anti-Iraq War protests of 2003 are said to have been “the largest protest event in human history” [Wikipedia]. Result? No change of policy by government(s) at all.

My conclusion from the above is that public protests are a distraction from real political activity.

Alt-Right, Brexit, elections, ethnostate, Party Politics, society, The Great Replacement, Uncategorized

A Floor or a Ceiling?

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The Front National in France, other broadly social-national parties of the European mainland and (in England and Wales) UKIP are not “ceilings” (end results) but “floors” (starting points). Their function is to disrupt the political status quo and to awaken as far as they can the voting populations of the various European states. Naturally, that is not how they themselves see their role.

The case of UKIP is telling. UKIP came into a political milieu in Britain where (in the 1990s) there were only “three main parties” and a high majority of those who voted voted for them. Below the surface, though, there was growing but unfocussed discontent and alienation. Turnout in general elections, which peaked at 83.9% in 1950, fell (on the wider franchise after 1966) to a low of 59.4% by 2001, though it recovered slightly to 66.1% by 2015. An equally-telling fact is that the proportion of voters who voted and who voted for one of those “three main parties” fell steadily and is still falling. In broad terms, a third of eligible voters did not vote at the 2015 General Election; of those who did vote, about 75% voted for LibLabCon (UK-wide results), with another 12.6% voting for UKIP.

UKIP peaked in 2014, failed to break through in 2015 and is now declining fast in every way. Its 2016 by-election results have been poor, its donors are going and its membership falling. I addressed the UK political vacuum in an earlier blog post. However, UKIP has succeeded in a more major way than did the BNP and not only because UKIP scored 21 MEPs as against the BNP’s 2.

UKIP created an atmosphere across the country in which social nationalism might start to thrive, despite the fact that UKIP, as a party, is not really social-national.

UKIP, despite being now more or less washed-up, is a floor. On that floor a movement can be built. The Front National in France is not at all in decline (au contraire) but is also a basis for a movement, rather than the movement itself. The FN is, however, likely to become or coalesce with such a movement, whereas UKIP will just fade away even if it can score a few election victories in the 2016-2020 period. The importance of both parties, however, is that they have changed the atmosphere. Social nationalism is now not a fringe ideology. It stands ready, once the right vehicles arrive, to take command across Europe. In Britain (specifically England and Wales), there is a crying need for such a social national movement and I believe that it will emerge, will arise and will, eventually, seize power.