LevkaUnderstanding the far-right ideology spreading across the planet: ‘You should be more afraid of the sound of slippers than marching boots’
With Donald Trump at the helm, a diverse far-right movement made up of libertarians, paleoconservatives and neo-reactionaries seeks to change the world by reversing the values of the Enlightenment. Several recently published books have examined this phenomenon.
The rise of the global far-right can be seen as an epidemic. It doesn’t erupt suddenly: first, it’s a mild, almost imperceptible fever. Then, it spreads, mutates, becomes contagious. Finally, it settles in, like the climate. It ceases to be alarming, because it has become commonplace. 'We’re in the most developed phase of the epidemic,' says Franco Delle Donne, an Argentine researcher and author of *Epidemia ultra: Del fascismo europeo a Silicon Valley* (translated as Extremist Epidemic: *From European Fascism to Silicon Valley*), a book published in 2025, in which he argues that democratic forces made a grave error in underestimating the far-right outbreaks until they spread... and now, it’s too late.
(. . .)
The culture war being waged today by the new global far-right is a diverse and oftentimes contradictory force. It involves all kinds of elements, from paleoconservatives to anarcho-capitalists; from traditionalists to neo-Nazis; from Silicon Valley capital to the recesses of conspiracy theories. The movement is an archipelago imbued with resentment, provoked by the failure of neoliberalism, and the feeling that there’s no viable future. Members of this movement believe that it’s necessary to reset the world to a time before this decline, be it the 1950s or the pre-Enlightenment Ancien Régime. There’s a pervasive nostalgia for a golden age that never existed. 'Liberalism defeated monarchies, communism, fascism… but Trump is the expression of liberalism’s problems,' Delle Donne tells EL PAÍS.
After the storming of the Capitol and Trump’s second coming, ICE abuses could be seen as the latest step (so far) in the epidemic. 'ICE’s behavior could be described as fascist… although I know that we have to be careful with that word. But it seems to fit here, as some experts have already pointed out,' Delle Donne notes. He distinguishes between the radical right — which erodes democracy from within — and the extreme-right, of a revolutionary nature, which aims to abolish democracy outright. 'The ultimate goal for both is the same: a non-democratic regime,' the author opines. 'And we’re getting closer to that point. It’s already too late to prevent radicalization.'
Amid so much diversity, a common narrative emerges: '[There’s] the ongoing culture war, the need to construct a common enemy, as well as a staunch defense of traditional and patriarchal hierarchies,' says Antonella Marty, who’s also from Argentina. This political scientist navigated the currents of liberalism and libertarianism — their forums and think tanks — until she realized that a reactionary drift was occurring. She began to criticize this (and was considered by some to be a traitor).
In her 2025 book *La nueva derecha: Qué es, qué defiende y por qué representa una amenaza para nuestras democracias* (translated as *The New Right: What It Is, What It Defends and Why It Represents a Threat to Our Democracies*), she analyzes these currents, judging them to be based on fear, hatred and manipulation. Marty emphasizes how these reactionary movements promote misogyny as a fundamental tenet — for example, in the online manosphere, which lures 'angry young men' toward aggressive and hierarchical masculinities — or deepen their roots in evangelical communities.
'The new right uses religion as a political tool, as a device for moral control and social discipline. They thirst for theocracy.' In opposition to these strongmen, enemies are constructed to fuel the movement: those who are 'woke,' or migrants. 'The term ‘woke’ functions as a scapegoat. That’s how they label everything they don’t like,' the author points out. 'The new right is throwing a tantrum at the loss of its historical privileges.'"
Understanding the far-right ideology spreading across the planet: ‘You should be more afraid of the sound of slippers than marching boots’
With Donald Trump at the helm, a diverse far-right movement made up of libertarians, paleoconservatives and neo-reactionaries seeks to change the world by reversing the values of the Enlightenment. Several recently published books have examined this phenomenon