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White nationalism
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White nationalism is a political ideology which advocates a racial definition (or redefinition) of national identity for white people, in opposition to multiculturalism. The contemporary White Nationalist Movement in the United States is a reaction to the decline (based on US census projections) in white demographics, politics and culture. According to Samuel Francis, a key white nationalist writer, it is "a movement that rejects equality as an ideal and insists on an enduring core of human nature transmitted by heredity." Anti-racist organizations generally have argued that ideas such as white pride and white nationalism exist merely to provide a sanitized public face for white supremacy.
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Encyclopedia
White nationalism is a political ideology which advocates a racial definition (or redefinition) of national identity for white people, in opposition to multiculturalism. The contemporary White Nationalist Movement in the United States is a reaction to the decline (based on US census projections) in white demographics, politics and culture. According to Samuel Francis, a key white nationalist writer, it is "a movement that rejects equality as an ideal and insists on an enduring core of human nature transmitted by heredity." Anti-racist organizations generally have argued that ideas such as white pride and white nationalism exist merely to provide a sanitized public face for white supremacy. The goal of white nationalism is to appeal to a larger audience; most are nonviolent groups working for separatism.
White nationalists see themselves defending the legitimate civil rights of white people against society's racial double standards. Jared Taylor, another key writer in the movement, claims similar racial views were held by many mainstream American leaders before the 1950s. Opponents accuse them of hatred, racial bigotry and destructive identity politics.
According to Samuel P. Huntington, the modern movement is increasingly cultured, intellectual and academically trained. Rather than espouse violence, they use statistics and social science data to argue for a self-conscious white identity. They say a natural hierarchy should triumph over the "false promise of egalitarianism" and that the downfall of white dominance spells doom for representative government, the rule of law and freedom of speech.
White nationalists argue that every nationality feels a natural affection for its own kind. Thus they believe in a common identity, common interests, and common political action for white people. Many white nationalists see themselves as patriotic preservers of European history and culture. They say they stand for racial self-preservation and claim culture itself is a product of race. As a result, according to Huntington, they say the demographic shift in the US towards non-whites brings a new culture that is intellectually and morally inferior. With it comes affirmative action, immigrant ghettos and declining educational standards. By challenging established policy on immigration, civil rights and racial integration, they seek to build bridges with moderately conservative white citizens.
White separatism and supremacism are two smaller subgroups within white nationalism. The former seek a separate white nation-state, while the latter add ideas from social Darwinism and Nazism to their ideology. Some white nationalists deny they are in either category. Both schools of thought generally avoid the term "supremacy", saying it has negative connotations.
Development
White nationalism has a long tradition in English-speaking countries. According to one view, it is a product of the modern centralized state's emergence in the West, like all nationalisms. The term originated as a self-description by some groups, primarily in the United States, to describe their belief in a racially defined collective identity of white or Caucasian people. In the past, xenophobic ethnic policies may be seen as congruent to white nationalism.
In the 19th and early 20th century racial definitions of the American nation were common, resulting in race-specific immigration restrictions, such as the Chinese Exclusion Act. The 1915 film Birth of a Nation is an example of an allegorical invocation of white nationalism during this time.
The White Australia ideal was semi-official policy in Australia for many decades, while in South Africa, white nationalism was championed by the National Party starting in 1948, as the struggle over apartheid heated up. In recent years, the Internet has provided an expansion of audiences for white nationalism.
White nationalism in the US combines elements of American racial nationalism and race-based identity politics. Starting in the 1960s, it grew as the conservative movement developed in mainstream society. Samuel Huntington argues that it developed as a reaction to a perceived decline in the essence of American identity as European, Anglo-Protestant and English-speaking. Some American white nationalists, for example, say immigration should be restricted to selected people of European ancestry.
White power
"White power" is a white nationalist political slogan and a name for the associated ideology. It was coined by American Nazi Party leader George Lincoln Rockwell, who used the term in a debate with Stokely Carmichael of the Black Panther Party, after Carmichael issued a call for "Black Power". "White Power" became the name of the American Nazi Party's newspaper, and the title of a book by Rockwell. Many white nationalists, including white supremacists and certain neo-Nazis, have since used the phrase White Power to describe their political goal.
Definitions of whiteness
White nationalists define white people in a restricted way. In the United States, it implies European ancestry and self-identification with European culture.Despite their self-definition as European, many American white nationalists would not regard all descendants of European immigrants as white. White nationalists draw primarily on 19th-century racial taxonomy, which neither reached a consensus on racial categories nor is accepted by contemporary geneticists. Different variants of racial-origin theories, such as Nordicism and Germanism, define different groups as white, both excluding some southern and eastern Europeans because of perceived racial taint. Pan-Aryanism, originally a component of Nazi race theory, defines most Europeans as Aryans. Some white nationalists use the term Pan-Europeanism to include all European ethnic groups. Other white nationalists hope that population genetics will provide clear criteria for whiteness. Some have adopted a definition based on the Y-chromosome haplogroup R1b. This marker is prevalent in most Western European populations, possibly reflecting the re-expansion into Europe of a smaller human population in southern Europe, after the last ice age.
Criticism
Opponents to white nationalism charge that white nationalists are in fact white supremacists, Ku Klux Klan members or white power skinheads, and that white nationalists are not so much interested in their own heritage as they are in power over non-whites.
Kofi Buenor Hadjor argues that black nationalism is a response to white nationalism, while white nationalism is the expression of white supremacy. Some white nationalists respond to the accusation of white supremacism by saying that they are white separatists, and that separation precludes domination of one group by another. Some critics argue that while posturing as civil rights groups advocating the interests of their ethnic or racial group, white nationalists frequently draw on the nativist traditions of the American Ku Klux Klan and the British National Front.
Notable organisations
Notable individuals
Citations and notes
See also
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