The Great Backlash

Nationalism, populism, isolationism and xenophobia are emerging and gaining traction even in the world’s most advanced countries in response to the 2008 global recession. Economist Nouriel Roubini, writing for Project Syndicate, reviews global political trends and draws parallels with those in Europe just before the Second World War. He points to the rise of nationalist governments in Asia and chaos and conflict in the Middle East. Populist parties are most influential in hard times: Slow recovery and growing inequality offer “ideal terrain” for their expansion; an easy target for blame is the foreigner. To that end, the parties solidify support and spread messages that are anti-immigration, anti-globalization, anti-trade, anti-intellectual in attempts to deflect any culpability from the local governance. So many challenges are global in scale, yet the extremists see no need for global institutions like the United Nations or the World Trade Organization. Roubini warns that similar frustrations and fears led to angry and dangerous authoritarian governments in Italy, Germany and elsewhere in the mid-20th century. – YaleGlobal