So much going on in the world but I wanted to share my new article in the summer issue of @PRAEyesRight on American ecofascism, its history and potential in the coming climate crisis. Quick thread on the article which you can read in full here: http://politicalresearch.org/2020/07/09/blood-and-vanishing-topsoil-american-ecofascism-past-present-and-coming-climate-crisis

First, thanks to @kathrynajoyce, @olivialw, and Koki Mendis at PRA for commissioning, editing, fact-checking, and promoting the article. Any remaining errors in the piece are mine.

My article covers similar ground as other reports attempting to ascertain the viability and scope of this subculture within the contemporary white power movement, as well briefly covering its historical roots in German political romanticism.

I define the “core” of ecofascism as “The devaluing of human life—particularly of populations seen as inferior—in order to protect the environment viewed as essential to White identity.”

Useful in writing this piece were a number of works by scholars Peter Staudenmaier and Janet Biehl, Betsy Hartmann, John Hultgren, Evangelos Protopapadakis, and @JedediahSPurdy. As well as examining the works of self-described ecofascists.

I also referenced/relied on the reporting of @zacharykamel, @bmakuch, @MackLamoureux, @nate_thayer as well as the work of @BlairTaylor360, @cassiepmiller, @shane_burley1 and @areidross and many others.

Core to my argument on the increasing viability of ecofascist ideas is the convergence of two projections: that of coming climate crisis and the shifting demographics in the U.S. (and Europe).

The U.S. is projected to reach majority-minority status in the same decade (2040s) that the IPCC projects that the planet will reach the 1.5 degree Celsius warming mark. (Though new research keeps accelerating the timeline of the climate crisis)

There is no more powerful conspiracy driving contemporary white power (and ethnonationalist) movements than that of the so-called “great replacement;” and there is no more powerful force that will reshape politics than the global climate crisis.

The Christchurch and El Paso shooters carried out the deadliest white power terrorist attacks since Anders Breivik in 2011. Their references to ecofascist concepts in their manifestoes is something new within the trend of increasing violence from the Far Right.

What I think are new contributions to the study of this topic include:

1. Breivik’s ecofascism. At the time, his writings on climate denial got coverage but overlooked was his discussion on the planet’s “carrying capacity.” His plagiarism of Ted Kaczynski is notable now in retrospect as “Uncle Ted” has been embraced by young ecofascists.

2. Recent efforts by anti-immigrant organizations to lobby President Trump to “make American green again” by expanding environmental law to encompass immigration policy.

3. Two killers from the 00s who passed through ecofascist spaces.
4. The popularization of Pentti Linkola by an American ecofascist and recent efforts to translate documentaries on the late sage of ecofascism by members of a white nationalist podcast network.

5. What I've termed "green accelerationism" and the rise of Mike Ma, author of Harassment Architecture, a book shared alongside killer’s manifestos and other racist tracts. Ma has built a faithful following on Instagram and is perhaps the major figure in American ecofascism today

Pictured: Ma’s book listed and shared on Far Right Telegram. Fans posing w his book in tactical weapons gear. Group of young men holding Revolution War-era “An Appeal To Heaven” flag appropriated by Ma.

Final note in the article is given over to @danieldenvir’s warning at the end of his recent book on nativism that rising nationalism “poses a greater threat to addressing global warming than climate denialism.”

The rise of ethnonationalist movements and groups—inflamed by xenophobia, expressed through violence, and increasingly claiming the mantle of environmentalism—cannot be separated from the challenge of the climate crisis itself. They are—all of them—the same fight.