The far-right is typically understood through a Western lens, broadly reduced to white supremacist movements rooted in European Fascism and American racial politics. While often overlooked, the global far-right movements have emerged in diverse cultural and historical contexts. These movements are never monolithic, and undeniably share an ideological structure that transcends geography.
Central to this analysis is the need to move beyond rigid categorizations of far-right movements as “radical” or “extreme” or beyond the insular understanding of these movements as isolated national phenomena. While these categories are analytically useful, they no longer capture — and, in fact, often obscure — the complex realities of contemporary far-right mobilization. Globally, far-right movements are now evolving into ecosystems with dense networks of political actors, grassroots movements, digital platforms and influencers as well as cultural and religious organizations that increasingly operate in tandem.
The global far-right should not be understood as a monolith or a hydra-like organization. It is more similar to a constellation of movements, parties, influencers and actors who, while often shaped by local histories and national ambitions, share a recognizable ideological core of exclusionary nativism and an authoritarian moral order, as well as a rhetoric of anti-elitist populism. These ecosystems adapt contentious repertoires of collective action and disinformation campaigns. What unites them is not a global vision of uniformity, but rather a shared civilizational vision of hegemonic cultural dominance within their respective national silos and a shared ambition to establish this by reshaping the moral, cultural and political fabric of their societies through illiberal means.
These ecosystems do not merely seek political power. They are diverse actors with varied ambitions, but they are united towards pursuing a collective change project aimed at reshaping not just institutions, but also norms, values and practices at the societal level. The Italian philosopher and activist Antonio Gramsci coined the term common sense as a blend of beliefs, values, prejudices, and ideologies that, while rooted in dominant power structures, often appear natural and self-evident in the public sphere. The global far-right negotiates itself within this terrain, advancing its agenda through three ideological pillars: nativism, authoritarianism, and populism.
Nativism as a Core Ideology
Nativism operates as the ideological spine of global far-right movements. Fundamentally, it refers to the belief that a nation should be exclusively inhabited and ruled by a homogenous, ‘native’ group, defined not by modern notions of citizenship and law, but through markers like religion, race, blood, culture or civilizational belonging. It is hence a deeply exclusivist idea that often portrays those ‘outside’ this imagined native nation — immigrants and minorities, for example, as well as designated traitors like cosmopolitan elites — not merely as ‘outsiders’ but as existential threats to the survival of the nation.
Beyond its exclusionary structure, nativism is also imbued with a redemptive vision deeply rooted in a grand narrative of civilizational victimhood that positions its in-group as having once enjoyed a glorious golden age of cultural and civilizational supremacy and prosperity. The decline of the so-called golden age is attributed to the perceived invasion of outsider “enemies” and the corruption of elites who favoured these enemies. Movements like the Golden Dawn in Greece and Nippon Kaigi in Japan draw on mythologized histories of classical Hellenism and Imperial Japan respectively, to frame contemporary regimes and the present as a state of civilizational humiliation and decay. Both movements seek to foster and mobilize resentment against perceived external infiltration and internal betrayal, and in doing so, cast themselves as the vanguard for national and cultural reawakening. This shared grand narrative is powered by the logic of redemption, the goal of which is to reject outsiders, reclaim the nation and restore it to its past glory and usher in a new golden age.
The exclusivist and redemptive logic of nativist ideology is perhaps most visible in the Great Replacement theory, a conspiracy theory dating back to the 19th century that was revived and popularized for contemporary movements by Renaud Camus in his 2011 book Le Grand Remplacement. The conspiracy revolves around the central idea that, in cahoots with corrupt liberal and globalist elites, non-white ethnic groups were demographically and culturally replacing white European populations through mass migration and accelerated birth rates, a narrative fueled by a drop in the birth rate of white Europeans.
This theory has become a rallying cry for white nationalist movements and has inspired extremists towards acts of mass violence, including the Christchurch massacre in New Zealand in 2019. Beyond extremist violence, the theory has also been institutionalized and mainstreamed by political movements across Europe and the United States.
In France, Marine Le Pen’s Reassemblement National and grassroots organizations like Génération Identitaire have effectively invoked this theory and stoked fear of civilizational replacement while avoiding overt racism through dog whistles that call for an urgent need to preserve national identity, culture and civilizational values in the face of dangerous mass migration.
The nativist ideology is not confined to the West. In India, it forms the ideological core of the Hindu nationalist movement, dominated by the Sangh Parivar, a network of affiliated organizations led by the world’s largest volunteer organization, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). This includes the ruling party, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which has come to shape and dominate politics, public life and cultural discourse. The movement defines India as a Hindu Rashtra (Hindu nation) which belongs solely to Hindus who are defined as those whose Pitrubhumi (Fatherland) and punyabhumi (holyland) are located within the territorial boundaries of India. This automatically casts Muslims and Christians as permanent outsiders, regardless of citizenship.
Like other far-right ideologies, Hindu nationalism draws on a narrative of historical grievances stemming from the loss of a golden civilizational age at the hands of foreign invaders. The movement calls for a national reawakening through cultural homogenization and the marginalization and exclusion of minority groups designated as civilizational threats to the Hindu nation. This has manifested in the proliferation of conspiracy theory-based campaigns throughout India, alleged forms of “Jihad,” including love jihad, land jihad and population jihad. These harmful narratives are built around a civilizational replacement logic similar to the Great Replacement. Love Jihad, for example, alleges a deliberate attempt by Muslim men to seduce, marry and impregnate Hindu women to weaken and eventually replace the Hindu majority and turn India into a Muslim country.
Fundamentally, nativism weaponizes cultural heterogeneity into a means for civilizational warfare by recasting minorities not as citizens with fundamental protected rights, but as infiltrators and ‘sleeper cells,’ agents for the long-term cultural genocide of the rightful native people. It employs this effective framing to mobilize emotions of loss and betrayal and demands urgent redemptive retaliation. This is the ideological core that powers the global far-right’s collective change project.
Authoritarianism as Enforcement
Authoritarianism in the context of far-right ideology, according to Dutch political scientist Cas Mudde, draws from social psychology and should be understood not simply as a means of expanding executive power or strengthening the state. Instead, it is embedded in a deeper social logic that prizes and promotes hierarchy, conformity, discipline and moral regulation in society. Authoritarianism should thus be understood as an instrument aimed at preserving nativist cultural norms and restoring the promised cultural utopia of a culturally pure, morally upright and hierarchically ordered society.
Authoritarianism is not a top-down political project but instead a cultural, collective change project that seeks to designate social hierarchies as well as marginalize and punish groups and behaviour that is deemed as a threat to the nation. This project thus seeks to appeal to broad sections of society who crave order and clarity in eras defined by vast change and perceived cultural decline. It drives cultural anxieties and moral panics about immigration, multiculturalism, gender norms, secularism and other agents of change.
Authoritarianism as an instrument of the contemporary far-right functions not just through institutions and laws, but also through mobilizations in everyday life, employed in tandem that aim to police social behaviour. It flourishes when cultural insecurity and anxiety can be weaponized to justify illiberal governance through the display of strong popular support.
This interplay between social mobilization and authoritarian governance is evident in modern-day Hungary under Prime Minister Viktor Orban, where the centralization of power, the weakening of checks and balances, as well as the control of the media has been justified at the altar of an exclusionary majoritarian cultural nationalism. This is supported by a dense network of grassroots movements, such as the Civil Unity Forum (CÖF). These movements mobilize support in society for authoritarian measures under the guise of protecting Hungarian values. This echoes a deeper cultural strategy of reshaping national identity around Christian conservative values, traditional gender norms, and deeply anti-immigrant narratives. In support of this, educational curriculums have been rewritten, minority rights have been curtailed and liberal civil society groups have been suppressed and labelled as foreign agents in Hungary.
Authoritarianism is the infrastructure that enables nativist redemption, and should be understood as the second key pillar of far-right movements. It is the repressive, and indeed productive means through which a society can be fashioned by disciplining dissent and enforcing cultural norms.
Populism as Legitimization
Historian Jan-Werner Müller describes populism as a moralistic imagination of politics that claims to represent the authentic will of the people against a corrupt elite and other ‘enemies,’ while rejecting their legitimacy. Mudde complements this understanding by describing populism as a ‘thin ideology’ that lacks a fully developed set of ideas and must therefore bind itself to more substantive ideologies to become actionable.
Populism can thus be understood as a moralizing political logic that proclaims a singular virtuous people as the sole authentic source of authority and political legitimacy, while portraying “elites” as a corrupting and traitorous influence on the body politic. In far-right ecosystems, this logic justifies exclusionary rhetoric and mobilizes support while positioning liberal institutions, minority protections, pluralism and multiculturalism alike as threats to the legitimate will of the pure and authentic ‘people.’
Far-right populism effectively weaves two antagonisms together. By positioning elites as corrupt and traitors to the authentic nation, it links them to minorities, migrants and other marginalized, targeted groups, portraying them as conspiratorial collaborators or protected beneficiaries. The resulting framework is a simple and seductive one that accuses elites of betraying the ‘people’ and the nation by empowering outsiders and enemies.
This strategy accomplishes two key aims. First, by positioning minorities and existing power structures as collusive elements, it forms a potent coalition of grievance with a tempting target. Secondly, by ‘raging against the machine it positions far-right movements as perennially counter-hegemonic forces, even when they have captured political office and power.
The presidency of Donald Trump and the “Make America Great Again” (MAGA) movement that has heralded him to power twice effectively demonstrates the power of far-right populism as a mode of both mobilization and legitimization. The movement and his campaign portrayed Trump, a billionaire, as the lone voice of ‘real Americans’ against a corrupt, globalist elite.
The movement has also effectively framed marginalized and minority communities like migrants and Muslims as causes for national decline, empowered and protected by the corrupt, global elite. This has effectively created a siege mentality that has mobilized and radicalized citizens, legitimizing both acts of collective violence like the attempted coup of January 6, 2021 as well as policies that curtail basic freedoms and rights.
The populist rhetoric is also reinforced by a massive grassroots infrastructure and media ecosystem that create waves of disinformation campaigns in echo chambers that now have come to resemble silos. Influencers like Alex Jones, Charlie Kirk and Laura Loomer play prominent roles in this ecosystem, actively amplifying conspiracy theories and extremist narratives that popularize and reinforce the movement’s worldview. This reinforced siege mentality transforms political identity into a cultural identity premised on a civilizational war where the ends justify the means. Populism is the rhetorical and strategic glue that binds the far-right’s ideological change project together by effectively casting the coalitions of “we” and “them” and justifying authoritarian measures as necessary course correction, transforming exclusion into empowerment.
Conclusion
In contemporary times, far-right movements are best understood not just as isolated national phenomena but as increasingly interconnected ecosystems united by a shared ideological project. Nativism, authoritarianism and populism function as core pillars in the collective effort to reshape norms, values, identities and institutions through the illiberal politics of exclusion. Far-right ecosystems exert influence not only by infiltrating formal political structures but also by embedding their narratives into everyday sensibilities. By leveraging disinformation networks, and weaponizing cultural grievance, they blur the boundaries between political discourse and everyday life and frame illiberal contentious performances and policies as a necessary response to societal decline. These are thus not just political movements, but rather civilizational collective change projects aimed at fundamentally altering society’s common sense on a global scale. Further examination is needed to assess how far-right ecosystems embed themselves and their vision across societies, radicalizing the public sphere, engineering democratic decay and reshaping the global political imagination.