Right-wing nationalist populism poses direct attacks on social tolerance, human rights discourse, political debates, the survival of the welfare state and its universal services, impacting on the roles of social work. This book demonstrates how right-wing nationalist populism can and must be countered. Using case studies from around the world, this book shows how a revitalised radical social work where community organisation, building alliances, trade union commitment and social action can be used as political forces to speak up against discrimination and hate in accordance with human rights, social justice, and social work values. The rise of national populism signals that now is the time for social work to forge and reforge such networks and create links with civil society and challenge right-wing populist policies wherever they manifest themselves. It will be of interest to all social work students, practitioners and academics, particularly those working on critical and radical social work, green social work, anti-oppressive practice and community development.

Social work as a democratically constituted profession committed to human rights is currently facing cross-border encroachments and attacks by right-wing populist movements and governments. With the Bundestag elections in September 2017, the question of the extent to which right-wing populist forces succeed in influencing the discourse with xenophobic and nationalist arguments arises in Germany, too. The authors examine how social work can respond effectively to nationalism, exclusion, de-solidarization and a basic skepticism about science and position itself against this background. The book explores different conditions in Germany, France, Poland, Russia and the US.

Using international perspectives and case studies, this book discusses the relationships between community development and populism in the context of today’s widespread crisis of democracy. It investigates the development, meanings and manifestations of contemporary forms of populism and explores the synergies and contradictions between the values and practices of populism and community development. Contributors examine the ways that the ascendancy of right-wing populist politics is influencing the landscapes within which community development is located and they offer new insights on how the field can understand and respond to the challenges of populism.

Social work as a democratically constituted profession committed to human rights is currently facing cross-border encroachments and attacks by right-wing populist movements and governments. This book examines how social work can respond effectively to nationalism, exclusion, and skepticism about science and reposition itself.

While research in right-wing populism has recently been blossoming, a systematic study of the intersection of right-wing populism and gender is still missing, even though gender issues are ubiquitous in discourses of the radical right ranging from »ethnosexism« against immigrants, to »anti-genderism.« This volume shows that the intersectionality of gender, race and class is constitutional for radical right discourse. From different European perspectives, the contributions investigate the ways in which gender is used as a meta-language, strategic tool and »affective bridge« for ordering and hierarchizing political objectives in the discourse of the diverse actors of the »right-wing complex.«

Elections are the means by which democratic nations determine their leaders, and communication in the context of elections has the potential to shape people's beliefs, attitudes, and actions. Thus, electoral persuasion is one of the most important political processes in any nation that regularly holds elections. Moreover, electoral persuasion encompasses not only what happens in an election but also what happens before and after, involving candidates, parties, interest groups, the media, and the voters themselves. This volume surveys the vast political science literature on this subject, emphasizing contemporary research and topics and encouraging cross-fertilization among research strands. A global roster of authors provides a broad examination of electoral persuasion, with international perspectives complementing deep coverage of U.S. politics. Major areas of coverage include: general models of political persuasion; persuasion by parties, candidates, and outside groups; media influence; interpersonal influence; electoral persuasion across contexts; and empirical methodologies for understanding electoral persuasion.

During the last 15-20 years a new party family of radical right-wing populism (RRP) has emerged in Western Europe, consisting of parties such as the French Front National and the Austrian Freedom's Party, among many others. Contrary to the situation in the other Scandinavian countries, such parties have been largely unsuccessful in Sweden. Although Sweden saw the emergence of the populist party New Democracy - which partly can be classified as a RRP party - in the early 1990s, it collapsed in 1994, and no party has so far been successful enough to take its place. Most of the literature on populism and right-wing extremism deals with successful cases; this book takes the opposite direction and asks how one can explain the failure of Swedish radical right-wing populism.