It's the German state of Brandenburg's elections this weekend, and as we are in the middle of this thrilling lurch to the right - where people elect Far Right governments in Europe that have not been seen since the 1940s - it's a good moment to stop and think. What's driving this?
But first, as a lot of media are skipping this point, and we have space here, we should first ask the radical questions of "what is the Far Right?", as that has a direct relationship with why I write criticism these days. Many people think they know what the Far Right is, but if they do, then few actually seem to be remembering why they are so dangerous. So I'll dedicate this first section to an ambitious brief overview.
The Far Right
"The Far Right" describes political movements which attempt to genereate societies of authority, control, and hierarchy. They do this though both active and passive promotion of violence, oppression, and exclusion, often through a mix of economic violence, military and institutional violence, and social coercion, using and exaggerating existing structures. Often these have heavily ideological components that inform their power structure, commonly:
- racial or ethnic supremacy (power structure favouring ethnicities, often white supremacy but not only),
- patriarchy (or power structure favouring an idea of "man", often expressed in misogyny or violence against women and other genders),
- xenophobia (power structure designed to exclude otherness),
- religious supremacy (power structure that deploys religious institutions as tools to create submission),
- nationalism (construction of an idea of state that produces submission and excludes other ideas),
- "the family" (power structure designed for a particular image of family, especially one that favours child production),
- ableism (power structure designed to favour an idea of the body or mind as a 'normal' one),
- classism (here the Far Right can be a confusing mix, depending on what is convenient and to whether they are addressing workers or elites), and
- sexual discrimination (power structure designed to favour a specific version of sexuality, commonly heterosexuality as this is most convenient for child production).
(Centre-right or "small c conservatism", which I view as the dominant political force globally from 1991 until now, shares many of these ideas, but uses less direct means to achieve them, and focuses more on the "free market" as a tool).
All of these are normalising factors that create a version of the self that one should aspire to "fit in" to. If you don't fit into it, you are unable to share in the rewards of that structure, and may indeed - under extreme right-wing governments - find yourself accidentally sharing in its punishments. Because no-one actually fits the ideal of the Far Right, their objective is to create an 'aspiring to an ideal', and submission of the subject, who is never quite able to meet that ideal image. Their principle tool is a psychological one: shame, which is a deeply-rooted cause of human behaviour (not-coincidentally the primary tool of pick-up artists and abusers). When this shaming is seen on a wide scale, it creates systems of thinking and patterns of behaviour that define and reproduce that system of violence autonomously within societies, without the need for direct intervention from a state. Because high levels of state intervention are impractical (need too many resources), this "hands-off" approach is often the control mechanism favoured by Far Right governments, although some do make massive state interventions.
"Because no-one actually fits the ideal of the Far Right, their objective is to create an 'aspiring to an ideal', and submission of the subject, who is never quite able to meet that ideal image."
What I have just given is a really brief overview of the Far Right. I would describe this as not particularly controversial, and actually certain figures of the Far Right speak openly about using these tools to manipulate people: Donald Trump, who is a presidential candidate for re-election in the US this year (and a proto-far-right figure in the sense that he does not seem to understand the consequences of the tools he uses, only that they offer power), sometimes speaks directly about it, sometimes accidentally. The "Project 2025" document details these objectives and how it will be achieved. But they are often left unspoken, because of fear.
Criticism as resistance
As well as being a checklist for the Far Right, the bullet-points above are also a scattergun of concepts from different critical thinkers, from Hannah Arendt to Michel Foucault, who engage in identifying and theorising about these forces, which often exist in the deep ambiguity of politics. There are great differences between even these two: Foucault was more focused on the theorising the disciplinary natures of societies and how these are almost-invisibly expressed in power structures, whereas Arendt is more interested in the ethical questions of how individuals come to commit atrocity, and their relationship to systems in terms of their independence and autonomy for decision-making. However, they are tied together by their occupation with these central questions of violence and its expression in political systems, describing and responding to them. More recently, Achille Mbembe expands on Foucault to speak from a specific Blackness standpoint, taking Foucault's concepts of Biopolitics and applying them to historical instances of control and exploitation of the Black body, especially in slavery. Sylvia Federici is occupied with the historical concept of Witchcraft and its use as a convenient tool to punish women, and the context around this phenomenon. Judith Butler often approaches systems of power from the perspective of gender, regarding gender oppression as one of the first (and therefore defining) types of violence a human encounters.
"we do not have to simply submit to it. When we reject manipulation and aggression, things can be whatever we want them to be."
These writers are all pretty different people, but they are all great critics. What they are all articulating is how systems of violence function in a political sense, a practice which begins in earnest with the Frankfurt School in the 1930s. They examine these instruments I listed above, and develop proposals for how those devices function, so that a reader might be able to identify them, and not be simply swept along with participating in the coming carnage. (Keen readers of Theaterstück will notice these concepts keep re-appearing in my own writing: that's because for me art is endlessly intertwined with its political context, and these writers are the best tools I have to articulate that context). The concept here is that together we have some control over our circumstances: we do not have to simply submit to it. When we reject manipulation and aggression, things can be whatever we want them to be. That is the victory, if we can get there.
Side note: In the interests of journalistic balance, I will note that, yes, there are Far-Right writers. But reading them extensively gives me headaches: they make no logical sense, are heavily manipulative, and their writing reads like propaganda - it does not have any self-reflection, it's based on manipulated information to describe a fantasy context, and it is normally designed to give the reader no option except to either submit to its perspective, or be provoked into confusion about their own standpoint ('engulfment'). They are also good at disguising themselves as critical writers, using long words etc., without doing any actual critical reflection, deep analysis, or proposing solutions. These writers do exist, but I do not name these writers here because I don't promote them as popularising their concepts makes them stronger, and I also do not recommend reading them for health reasons. Discover writers and thinkers who set you free, not the ones who trap you.
The Far Right - then and now
The most-known historical example of the Far Right is the confusingly-title "National Socialism" of Germany, represented by the rise of the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei in the 1930s, better known by its abbreviation "Nazi". Socialism is often closely connected to the left, yet in the case of Nazism, the word was appropriated to describe a party that had a massive expansionist, imperialist, and genocidal totalitarian platform, with little to do with any type of sharing of resources, protection of workers, or prioritising of social harmony that are closely connected with Socialism (at least in its ideal form). Nazism was not a socialist idea, and had no socialist platform. It is a right-wing authoritarian regime.
While it existed, the Nazi Party generated a lot of groundwork for later manifestations of the Far Right such as the AfD in Germany, and many of these concepts can be found in today's Far Right, to the point where you sometimes have to squint to see the difference. Georgia Meloni, Robert Fico, Viktor Orbán, Marien Le Pen, Matteo Salvini, and Vladimir Putin are all dedicated to a shame-producing politics that isolates the individual and encourages them to turn off their critical viewing in order to receive the social and economic benefits that are distributed through mechanisms of the public and private spheres. This, in turn, creates a corridor of power which can be used to get them re-elected, through influencing the voters directly, or the voting systems of that context. This creates no-win situations for individuals who, having made initial strategic choices, soon find their options eroding with their freedoms, and may find themselves conducting acts of which they previously did not know they were capable.
"Although we have countless examples of writers, theorists, and artists labelling these ideas as extremely dangerous to everyone, they are nevertheless ideas that have been - and it seems soon will again be - elected."
The period of the Nuremberg trials was a time for deep reflection on how systems and structures of power are developed where people are led to ignore obvious signs around them and knowingly commit atrocious acts, and Arendt dwells on this extensively in her 1961 book Eichmann in Jerusalem. So we find ourselves in a position today, where people increasingly swarm to individual acts of self-preservation while neglecting common interest, which will eventually lead to them sacrificing more and more of their principles. (This process is best articulated in one of my favourite plays from Friedrich Dürrenmatt, Der besuch der Alten Dame, in English The Visit, in which the home town of the protagonist slowly turns against them following the arrival of a manipulative force. It is also described well in among my favourite and worst films, Dogville, which carefully articulates the social horror of this tragic process).
Although some of the critics I brought into the same paragraph above may seem like old news, many of the observations are startlingly contemporary... and in fact can be heard in today's media and politicians. Orbán, who Trump recently cited as a tough, smart person, has been removing the country's court jurisdictions for a long time now - among the Nazi Party's first moves when seizing power (and something indirectly proposed in Project 2025). Meloni's startling rise to power was built on relentlessly pulling the heart-strings of Italians on the level of the 'normal' family. Marine Le Pen has successfully weaponised a context of global geopolitical collapse to focus on migration, as did Matteo Salvini before her. Vladimir Putin, who is friends with all except Meloni, follows a 25-year consolidation of power, and is now making final moves towards an endgame that involves lifting the curtain on a wider strategy of subjugation, that involves sustained murder and terror of Ukrainian civilians as a first step.
So the Far Right is a way to describe movements that are inherently about control through violence, which can be physical or psychological, and a lot of these concepts are re-appearing today. Although we have countless examples of writers, theorists, and artists labelling these ideas as extremely dangerous to everyone, they are nevertheless ideas that have been - and it seems soon will again be - elected. The way that we have historically addressed this is by the development of critical ways of viewing the world. But at the moment, this seems difficult.
So what has happened? What are the differences between these historical examples and today? Why elect something that has been endlessly and thoroughly denounced, and shown to create wide-scale horror?
The "Softening" Intervention of Digital Capitalism
Although I would not describe Big Tech as inherently far-anything, there have been several developments in the history of Silicon Valley which have pushed it into a synergistic alliance with the Far Right. This doesn't just occur because a large majority of its controlling structure are white 'tech bros', but that part doesn't help. Tech cultures repeat many of the historical pinnacles of the Far Right: Racial bias tends to be embedded into code of various programming, patriarchy and misogyny is the crux of every second meme, the image of culture presented is aspirational, non-inclusive, and other-fearing, christian values are subtlely promoted and reinforced through the interactions the platforms allow, nationalism proliferates through a supposedly positive celebration of national identities, having children is normalised while loneliness is quietly punished and exploited, ableism is promoted through restricting access and rendering disability invisible, class is represented in a confusing mix of wealth-hating and wealth-envy, while heterosexuality is doggedly reinforced as the only possible sexual alternative. Of course, there are exceptions to this, but largely Silicon Valley has stuck with the Far-Right script since about the mid-2000s, offering the occasional deviation as evidence to the contrary while enjoying the benefits of turbo-capitalism including gentrification, exploitative wages and horrific conditions for manufacturing, concentration of resources, and political influence.
"it's ok to take evil actions, as long as one remains oneself "not evil". Is there a better way to summarise our contemporary ethics today?"
Although certain hackers are against this, and some work is still being done to try to preserve or re-capture the possibilities of the early internet, that's basically the trend. But to me, as a critic, cultural artefacts are not where Big Tech actually does the most damage - this happens on an aesthetic level. It is a "softening" or "smoothening out" of representation that is both incredibly popular and very dangerous. There are various trends that have led in this direction: for example, the tendency to avoid work, digital nomadism as an aspirational lifestyle, collapse of traditional media, the rise of influencers, gaming, unsupported sex work, tax evasion, cuts to welfare and support institutions including arts. The removal of protective mechanisms and their replacement with hollow "solutions" has led to the easy delivery of Far Right material, especially through social media, which has become largely normalised. This is especially clear on Instagram, where the Far Right and its various agents have learned to tell stories that people want to hear, seeing reality as a flexible, drivable concept. Large questions of public debate are reduced to easily-consumed mistruths, which resemble propaganda and which heavily manipulate people, based on the writings of earlier Far Right figures and white supremacists such as those from the AfD, National Rally, Lega Nord, and others. They normally do so under the guise of "protection" and "victimisation", ironically the same logic used by the current russian president to justify the 2022 full-scale invasion.
Big Tech is culpable in delivering their messages and developing the platforms that do so, including lack of forum moderation and a hands-off approach to content management. The lack of responsibility shown mirrors nicely the atmosphere around the common misconception of Google's early slogan, "Don't be evil".
Google adopted "Don't be evil" as its corporate slogan in 2004. This statement is interesting to examine critically: on one hand, it points fortuitously to the hellhole that digital cultures would become, which lead the company into a situation of almost biblical temptation. On the other hand, the phrase was commonly misstated as "do no evil". The difference is interesting here. The phrase as it was intended refers to a state of being, whereas its misinterpretation refers to actions. So one way to think about this is: it's ok to take evil actions, as long as one remains oneself "not evil". Is there a better way to summarise our contemporary ethics today?
I first used this short critical reflection on some reflections on the role of digital culture in a conference in Brussels in 2017. In today's situation of deferred responsibility, where there is trade in making your problems the problems of other people while taking on as little responsibility as you can, the difference is stark. That situation of not "being evil" has led us to forget the banal principles on which evil is based, and will lead the first election of a Far-Right candidate in Brandenburg since 1945.
Criticism: Why so Unpopular?
Previously I equated some of my favourite writers with criticism. This may seem a little strange, as they are writing theory, and not, for example, theatre criticism, as I do on this platform. However, I find the differences here can be pretty slim: reading a specific work and writing about this is not dissimilar to reading a context. The question of reading a theatre work is often a process of orientation and identification: how is a work sitting in its context? What aesthetics is it producing, how is that interacting with the expectations of an audience? What effects does this have?
Contrary to popular opinion, where criticism is associated with something subjective and emotional, for me, writing criticism about a theatre work is neither of these things. My emotional reaction plays a tiny role in how I write. When I write, I write 'without subjectivity': what that means for me is, I talk about what the work is, not what I think it is. This means I often write things I disagree, but understand that, because of the context and what the artists is doing, it "is" that way. So, sometimes I celebrate works I don't actually "like", because I identify them as important for the context. Often I qualify my own writing with disclaimers or contrary positions, including different ways of seeing the same thing. All of this is what I see as being the best critic I can be. It is not inauthentic, it is acknowledging my role. It is a lot of work. But it is absolutely necessary. This does not mean that I don't have emotions and I don't have a subjective view. Instead, these things are inherent, and don't need to be discussed (unless the work makes an exclusively personal connection with me) . What needs to be discussed is the work itself: how to reflect on it, and what it might mean inside the situation. The authority of my writing comes from my ability to effectively articulate these things (which technically anyone can learn, with some time and resources).
"Against the softening of the image of the Far Right, criticism makes things concrete."
There is a specific and distinct relationship between this process and the Far Right, which articulates in emotional and subjective terms, attempting to divide and manipulate. This has been accelerated by digital cultures. Against the softening of the image of the Far Right, criticism makes things concrete. Where the Far Right delivers a fantasy of power, criticism delivers grounded material argument. Where the Far Right delivers super-personas, criticism dismantles them and looks at the human in-context. Criticism's moderating effect has a lot to do with its capacity for categorisation, definition, and somewhat formal and boring structuralising of things which otherwise float around in an abstract way. This is not just a masculine-coded process of scientific classification: it is also putting words on things which otherwise can't be described or explained. While this can rob art of its mystical power, in certain circumstances that's a really good thing, as artist can get so wrapped up in their own scent that they lose the capacity to see what it is they have created.
Whatever you think about my writing, you have to acknowledge that I've been doing it for 10 years now, often in pretty difficult personal circumstances, that I've seen and written about lot of work, and that I have learned about theatre and how to write about it along the way. I'm not invoking experience as authority here, I'm inviting reflection on some of these trends, and speculating that just because I am against them does not make me automatically bad at what I do - that I am somehow defective, and that I should feel a sense of shame about my critical writing because I refuse to use the word "I". Far from it. I can't force people to see what's going on, but I can make invitations and offer alternatives through viewing, reading, and writing about theatre well.
The way we look at the world is the metaphor through which we see and perceive it. This is the major political battle, and the stage is my place to contest it. That is what the development of Theaterstück is all about.
Screenshot of a webpage asking if I can use the Google logo.
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