Last days of a white world

The naturalisation of arguments about the existential threat posed to the West by “Islamisation” or by immigration in general, while not couched in the most explicit lexicon of white nationalism, have nevertheless gained traction in recent decades among large parts of the right but also many liberals and even leftists. Often framed in a narrative of decline and decadence, the objects of critique are the same: “multiculturalism” and “cultural relativism” have led European nation-states to lose their identity and the continent itself to lose its moral fibre and grounding in Enlightenment principles, while the corrosive force of immigration and “globalism”, particularly of confident and aggressive Muslims, pulls it down from within. In this essay, we explore the ways a similar anti-immigration discourse is produced in liberal, far-right and fascist narratives.