A brief introduction to the “red-brown” movement.
Rexhino Abazaj
The previous issue of Libero featured an interview of the Italian philosopher Diego Fusaro, which led me to wonder why a left-wing magazine would give a platform to such a character.
PhD in Philosophy of History, Fusaro is a researcher in Milan. He publishes books with the most prestigious publishers and makes regular TV appearances. He is a great speaker, but his talents fail to hide his politics.
Feltrinelli, a historical publishing houses of the Italian left, entrusted a monograph of Antonio Gramsci to Fusaro. But it seems no-one is paying attention to the fact that Fusaro’s Gramsci is anti-scientific and nationalist, and a direct subsidiary of the right-wing Gramscianism theorized in the 1970s by Alain de Benoist.
Twisting the writings of Marxist theorists seems to be Fusaro’s favourite pastime. In one of his articles, Fusaro has tried to enlist Lenin in the anti-European campaign in defense of the the bourgeois nation state. You don’t need to be a Marxist-Leninist to know that Lenin was not in favour of a bourgeois nation state. Fusaro remains vague when he speaks about nation and nation state – he uses ambiguous formulas mostly borrowed from Gramsci. As Gramsci said in his Prison Notebooks, our prospects should certainly be internationalist, but the starting point must be the national.
Fusaro’s job has brought him to lead a lecture about Marx at the headquarter of CasaPound – a neo-fascist organization that has opened several right-wing “social centers” in Italy. Last but not least, Fusaro is a pupil of the philosopher Costanzo Preve, a scholar of Marx who theorized about overcoming the right-left dichotomy, and promoted the creation of a “red-brown”, or “Eurasian” as some call it, common front against capitalism. Fusaro recently wrote on Twitter: “It’s time to make an Italian national front to save the country from the European dictatorship!”
Fascists seeking entry into the left
The sympathy that some sectors of the extreme right have often offered left-wing movements is something to keep an eye on – it can result in dangerous outcomes for people active in certain areas.
As early as in the 1920’s, the National Bolsheviks began to develop in Germany. This movement focused on left-wing issues with nationalist indications – it’s philosophy is comparable to Jean-Marie Le Pen’s description of himself during the French presidential election in 2002 as “socially left, economically right and a French nationalist”.
At the start of the 2000s, the heirs of these National Bolsheviks started to seek contact with the anti-imperialist and internationalist left. Often, militant leftists didn’t take distance from them because of a lack of knowledge and understanding. We are yet to see the result of the infiltration of nationalists in the left, though in Italy, the internationalist movement has begun to break as a result. Bigger conflicts are also emerging in the aftermath of the Crimean War between anarchist and Marxist groups and nationalist left groups, such as the Borotba party, in Russia and Ukraine
An organisation called “Millenium” has been identified as red-brown by Italian anti-fascists after it tried to collaborate with writer Claudio Mutti. Mutti’s biggest influence is Aleksandr Dugin, a far-right Russian thinker who founded the National Bolshevik Front and the Eurasia Party. These parties aim to unite all Russian speaking countries to create a counterbalance to the Atlantic states. Dugin is also considered a promoter of Putin’s initiative for the annexation of Crimea to the Russian Federation.
Dugin’s thinking has been influenced by Jean-François Thiriart, who developed anti-American and anti-Soviet ideas centered on the notion of Europe as the cradle of civilization. Eventually, he began to view the USSR as a nationalist bulwark, with Stalin at its fore, and turned sympathetic to China. He formulated the notion of ”Eurasia” – a political and cultural entity capable of setting back the US, which now perceived as practically the only enemy together with its appendix, Israel.
“Left fascists” gaining political ground
On of the notable developments in the red-brown movement has seen a minority component of “left fascism” infecting the entire span of the extra-parliamentary right-wing. In Italy, we can find traces of red-browns in the parties such as Fiamma Tricolore and Forza Nuova, as well as organisations like the neo-fascist CasaPound and others.
CasaPound and Forza Nuova have subscribed to the Third Position (or Third Way) – a nationalist and fascist ideology that presents these groups as being ”beyond left and right”, opposed to both capitalism and communism. Forza Nuova’s leader Roberto Fiore is one of the first developers of this ideology. It’s also important to note that Forza Nuova militants were sent to Donbass to fight for Novorossiya in the Russo-Ukrainian conflict.
Red-brown front abandons class in favour of the nation
The red-browns are camouflaged well, hiding their identity behind symbols and policy slogans that appear left-wing on the surface. But one core point characterizes the whole red-brown movement – every phenomenon of collective life is interpreted as an episode in international politics. Social development is determined through the continuous dialectic between culturally homogeneous national blocks and macro-regional opposition, the two of which are in perpetual conflict with each other in order to either achieve cultural hegemony, or to survive.
The combination of Europe and Asia (”Eurasia”) is seen as an entity that will be able to defeat US imperialism. The current European Union is not perceived to be sufficient to this end. In order to oppose US imperialism, forging any alliance with states and forces that are pursuing the same goal is acceptable – weather they are Islamic fundamentalists, nationalist Slavs, and socialist countries like Cuba or Venezuela.
Capitalism is abhorred, and it’s embodiments, banks and large investment funds, are usually perceived to be in the hands of Jews. Class conflict, however, is considered a thing of the past. In the red-brown view, power relations have become ”geopolitical” – Russia, China and Vietnam (countries that promote neo-capitalism), as well as Iran and others, are seen as opponents of the global system. ”Nations”, ”ethnics” or ”peoples” have come to replace class.
The “communitarian” ideology is not considered racist – each community should maintain its cultural identity. The mass exodus of people towards richer countries is not seen as a consequence to poverty, but an American plan to control Europe – and the future Eurasia. With the support of international finance and the bodies that control it, the US seeks to stifle our culture.
Notes
http://www.leftwing.it/2015/03/20/novita-in-libreria-un-gramsci-lepenista/
https://twitter.com/diegofusaro/status/499094669473882112
http://www.carmillaonline.com/2010/07/21/i-rosso-bruni-vesti-nuove-per/
https://books.google.fi/books?id=V9nRCQAAQBAJ&hl=fi&source=gbs_navlinks_s
http://www.infoaut.org/index.php/blog/antifascismoanuove-destre/item/12039-i-rossobruni-di-millenivm-e-la-spedizione-nel-donbass
http://www.inventati.org/cortocircuito/2015/03/26/il-cuore-dei-neofascisti-batte-per-la-russia/
