View source for Ethnopluralism

{{short description|Political concept}}
'''Ethnopluralism''' or '''ethno-pluralism''', also known as '''ethno-differentialism''',<ref>{{Cite book|title=Fascism: Post-war fascisms|last1=Griffin|first1=Roger|last2=Feldman|first2=Matthew|year=2004|publisher=Taylor & Francis|isbn=9780415290203|pages=84}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VbLSBAAAQBAJ&pg=PT64|title=The Post-War Anglo-American Far Right: A Special Relationship of Hate|last1=Jackson|first1=P.|last2=Shekhovtsov|first2=A.|year=2014|publisher=Springer|isbn=9781137396211}}</ref> is a political concept which relies on preserving and mutually respecting separate and bordered ethno-cultural regions.{{sfn|Bar-On|2001}} Among the key components are the "right to difference" (French: ''droit à la difference'') and a strong support for [[cultural diversity]] at a worldwide rather than at a national level. According to its promoters, significant foreign cultural elements in a given region ought to be [[cultural assimilation|culturally assimilated]] to seek [[cultural homogenization]] in this territory, in order to let different cultures thrive in their respective geographical areas.{{sfn|Spektorowska|2003}}{{sfn|Deland|Minkenberg|Mays|2014|p=58}}{{sfn|Rueda|2021}} 

Proponents describe ethnopluralism as a "world in which many worlds can fit" and as an alternative to [[multiculturalism]] and [[globalization]]. They claim that it strives to keep the world's different cultures alive by embracing their uniqueness and avoiding a one-world doctrine in which different regions can be increasingly seen as culturally similar or identical.{{sfn|Deland|Minkenberg|Mays|2014|p=58}} Critics have called the project a form of "global [[apartheid]]" and "[[separate but equal]]" doctrine,{{sfn|Deland|Minkenberg|Mays|2014|p=58}}{{sfn|Rueda|2021}} and many specialists have described the idea as a strategic attempt to legitimise racial supremacist views in public opinion by imitating egalitarian, anti-totalitarian, antiracist, or environmental discourses of the [[Progressivism|progressive movement]].{{sfn|Taguieff|2001|p=109}}{{sfn|Taylor|2019}}{{sfn|Rueda|2021}} Scholars have also highlighted close ideological similarities with ideas promoted by French [[Neo-fascism|neo-fascist]] activists in the 1950–1960s.{{sfn|Taguieff|1981}}{{sfn|François|2013}}{{sfn|Rueda|2021}}

The concept, formulated in its modern form by French political theorist and [[Nouvelle Droite]] founding member [[Alain de Benoist]],{{sfn|Rueda|2021}} is closely associated with the [[European New Right]] and the [[Identitarian movement]].{{sfn|Bar-On|2001}}{{sfn|McCulloch|2006}}

{{Nationalism sidebar}}

== Origin ==
According to [[Ethnography|ethnographer]] [[Benjamin R. Teitelbaum]], the term "ethnopluralism" ({{lang-de|Ethnopluralismus}}) was first coined by German sociologist [[Henning Eichberg]] in a 1973 essay that was written in opposition to both Western and European [[eurocentrism]].<ref>{{Cite thesis|title='Come Hear our Merry Song': Shifts in the Sound of Swedish Radical Nationalism|publisher=Brown University|year=2013|first=Benjamin R.|last=Teitelbaum|degree=PhD|doi=10.7301/Z0CZ35H2}}</ref>

The concept of ethno-differentialism ({{lang-fr|ethno-différencialisme}}) was promoted from the 1970s onward by [[GRECE]], an [[Ethnic nationalism|ethno-nationalist]] think tank led by [[Nouvelle Droite]] thinker [[Alain de Benoist]], but it was foreshadowed by ideas expressed in the 1950s by French [[Neo-fascism|neo-fascist]] activist [[René Binet (neo-Fascist)|René Binet]].{{sfn|Taguieff|1981}}{{sfn|François|2013}}{{sfn|Lebourg|2020}} "Biological realism", a concept coined by Binet in 1950, advocated the establishment of individual and racial inequalities founded upon scientific observations.{{sfn|François|2013}}{{sfn|Rueda|2021}} He argued that "interbreeding capitalism" (''capitalisme métisseur'') aimed at creating a "uniform barbary" (''barbarie uniforme''), and that only "a true socialism" could "achieve race liberation" through the "absolute segregation at both global and national level."<ref>[[René Binet (neo-Fascist)|René Binet]], ''Théorie du Racisme'', s.e., Paris, 1950, pp. 16-35</ref>

In the 1960s, the [[Pan-European nationalism|euro-nationalist]] magazine ''[[Europe-Action]]'', in which Alain de Benoist then worked as a journalist, drew influence from the so-called "Message of Uppsala",{{sfn|François|2013}} a text likely written in 1958 by French far-right activists related to the [[New European Order]], a neo-fascist movement led by Binet. It carried out subtle semantic shifts between "differentialism" and "inequality" which are deemed influential on European far-right movements at large.{{sfn|Taguieff|1985}}

==Concept==

The concept, which has been part of the ideological foundation of [[European New Right]], emphasizes the separation of varying ethno-cultural groups, as opposed to cultural [[Social integration|integration]] and intra-state [[multiculturalism]].{{sfn|McCulloch|2006}} Ethnopluralism tends to rely on [[cultural assimilation]] of foreign cultural norms in order to preserve the inherent forms and resemblances of a given ethno-culture, which has a right to claim cultural dominance over a defined territory.{{sfn|Deland|Minkenberg|Mays|2014|p=58}} It has been proposed by [[Nouvelle Droite]] thinkers, and embraced by European New Right activists at large, as a mean to facilitate the continuity of distinct ethno-cultural societies as politically autonomous entities.{{sfn|Bar-On|2001}}{{sfn|Camus|Lebourg|2017|pp=123–124}} De Benoist claims that indigenous cultures in Europe are being threatened by the liberal worldview promoted by the United States, and that [[pan-European nationalism]] founded on the idea of ethnopluralism would stop this process.{{sfn|Spektorowska|2003}} In 2002, he described the "progressive disappearance of diversity from the world", including biodiversity of animals, cultures and peoples, as the "greatest" world danger.{{sfn|Bar-On|2011}}

These views on culture, ethnicity and race have become popular among European [[far right|far-right]] groups from the 1970s onward and, more recently, in [[alt-right]] circles in North America.{{sfn|Taylor|2019}} It has also been covered in some [[New Left]] sources like ''[[Telos (journal)|Telos]]''.{{sfn|Bar-On|2001}}{{sfn|Spektorowska|2003}}

=== Plasticity ===
The difficulty of defining clearly the concept lies in the fact that its proponents can oscillate between a genetic and a cultural definition of the notion of "difference". [[Alain de Benoist]] had for instance supported an ethno-biological perspective in the 1960s,<ref>[[Alain de Benoist]]: "What makes a population move towards greater quality is that valuable men, the elites, can in turn procreate and transmit, according to the laws of heredity, their exceptional abilities and gifts." (''Avec ou sans Dieu ?'', 1970, p. 88)</ref><ref>[[Alain de Benoist]]: "Race is the only real unit encompassing individual variations. The objective study of history shows that only the European race (white race, caucasian) has continued to progress since its appearance on the rising path of the evolution of the living, unlike races stagnant in their development, therefore in virtual regression [...] The European race does not have absolute superiority. It is only the most capable of progressing in the direction of evolution [...] Racial factors being statistically hereditary, each race has its own psychology. All psychology generates value." (''Qu'est-ce que le nationalisme?'', 1966, pp. 8-9)</ref> endorsing [[apartheid|South African apartheid]] during the same decade.{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=121}} He has however gradually adopted a more dual approach in his writings. Inspired by [[Martin Buber]]'s [[philosophy of dialogue]] and ''[[I and Thou|Ich und Du]]'' concept, de Benoist defined "identity" as a "dialogical" phenomenon in ''We and the Others'' ("Nous et les autres", 2006). According to him, one's identity is made of two components: the "objective part" that comes from one's background (ethnicity, religion, family, nationality), and the "subjective part", freely chosen by the individual. Identity is therefore a process in constant evolution, rather than an immutable notion.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Key Thinkers of the Radical Right: Behind the New Threat to Liberal Democracy|last=Sedgwick|first=Mark|year=2019|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=9780190877613|pages=75–76}}</ref> In 1992, he consequently dismissed the [[National Rally (France)|Front National]] use of ethnopluralism, on the grounds that it portrayed "difference as an absolute, whereas, by definition, it exists only relationally."<ref>{{harvnb|Camus|Lebourg|2017|p=124}}; see also Sharon Waxman, [http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1993-12-13/features/9312130011_1_intellectuals-debate-anti-immigrant "Europe's Left And Right Are Too Divided To Even Talk About It"], Chicago Tribune, 13 December 1993.</ref> While [[Guillaume Faye]] argued in 1979 that immigration, rather than immigrants, should be combated in order to preserve cultural and biological "identities" on both sides of the [[Mediterranean Sea]],{{sfn|Camus|Lebourg|2017|p=124}} he later preached "total ethnic war" between "original" Europeans and Muslims in his 2000 book ''The Colonization of Europe'', which earned him a criminal conviction.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Bar-On|first=Tamir|year=2014|title=A Response to Alain de Benoist|journal=Journal for the Study of Radicalism|volume=8|issue=2|pages=141|doi=10.14321/jstudradi.8.2.0123|issn=1930-1189|s2cid=143809038}}</ref>

If ethnopluralists use the concept of "cultural differentialism" to assert a "right to difference" and propose [[regionalism (politics)|regional policies]] of ethnic and racial [[separatism]], there is no agreement among them upon the definition of group membership, nor where these hypothetical borders would lie. Some of them advocate limiting Europe to "true Europeans" (that is people of European descent), while others propose much smaller divisions, similar to an ethnically-based [[communitarianism]].{{sfn|Spektorowska|2003}} For instance, de Benoist has proposed ethnic and social territories should be as small as possible, such that Muslims would be allowed some territories subordinated to [[sharia]] within the European continent.{{sfn|Deland|Minkenberg|Mays|2014|p=58}}

== Critics ==
Ethnopluralism has been criticised by philosopher [[Pierre-André Taguieff]] as a strategic attempt to disguise racial supremacist ideas behind an anti-totalitarian and egalitarian discourse.{{sfn|Taguieff|2001|p=109}} Scholar Daniel Rueda locates the emergence of ethnopluralism as part of a "cultural turn in racism", that is, "the passage from biological and [[Scientific racism|pseudoscientific racism]] to alterophobic discourses based on culture and ethnicity among European far-right intellectuals."{{sfn|Rueda|2021}} In the words of political scientist Blair Taylor, "many contemporary far-right groups have traded in the language of overt white supremacy for ethnopluralism, a vision wherein distinct groups live separately but allegedly equal, free to pursue their ethnic interests. Ethnopluralism is often embedded in the discourse of diversity, capitalizing on the progressive antiracist and environmental associations".{{sfn|Taylor|2019}}

Left-wing historian [[Rasmus Fleischer]] has speculated that Jews and Roma are implicitly absent from the ethnopluralist world map because, in the vision of "multi-fascists", both minorities should be "eliminated in order to make room for a peaceful utopia."{{sfn|Deland|Minkenberg|Mays|2014|p=58}}

==See also==
*[[Archeofuturism]]
*[[Ethnonationalism]]
*[[Cultural assimilation]]
*[[Separatism]]
*[[Ethnocracy]]
*[[Europe of 100 Flags]]
*[[GRECE]]
*[[Integralism]]
*[[Separate but equal]]

==References==
{{Reflist|30em}}

==Bibliography==
{{refbegin}}
*{{Cite journal|last=Bar-On|first=Tamir|year=2001|title=The Ambiguities of the Nouvelle Droite, 1968–1999|journal=The European Legacy|volume=6|issue=3|pages=333–351|doi=10.1080/10848770120051349|s2cid=144359964|via=Taylor & Francis}}
* {{Cite book|last=Bar-On|first=Tamir|chapter=Intellectual Right - Wing Extremism – Alain de Benoist's Mazeway Resynthesis since 2000|date=2011|title=The Extreme Right in Europe|pages=333–358|editor-last=Backes|editor-first=Uwe|edition=1|publisher=Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht|doi=10.13109/9783666369223.333|isbn=978-3-525-36922-7|editor2-last=Moreau|editor2-first=Patrick}}
*{{Cite book|title=Far-Right Politics in Europe|last1=Camus|first1=Jean-Yves|last2=Lebourg|first2=Nicolas|year=2017|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=9780674971530}}
*{{cite book|last1=Deland|first1=Mats|title=In the Tracks of Breivik: Far Right Networks in Northern and Eastern Europe|last2=Minkenberg|first2=Michael|last3=Mays|first3=Christin|year=2014|publisher=LIT Verlag Münster|isbn=9783643905420}}
*{{Cite web|title=Dominique Venner et le renouvellement du racisme|url=https://tempspresents.com/2013/05/23/dominique-venner-renouvellement-racisme-stephane-francois-nicolas-lebourg/|last=François|first=Stéphane|author-link=Stéphane François|date=23 May 2013|website=Fragments sur les Temps Présents}}
*{{Cite web|last=Lebourg|first=Nicolas|author-link=Nicolas Lebourg|date=2 November 2020|title=René Binet, the French Father of White Nationalism|url=https://www.illiberalism.org/rene-binet-the-french-father-of-white-nationalism|website=Illiberalism.org}}
*{{Cite journal|last=McCulloch|first=Tom|year=2006|title=The Nouvelle Droite in the 1980s and 1990s: Ideology and Entryism, the Relationship with the Front National|journal=French Politics|volume=4|issue=2|pages=158–178|doi=10.1057/palgrave.fp.8200099|s2cid=144813395|issn=1476-3419}}
*{{Cite journal |last=Rueda |first=Daniel |date=2021 |title=Alain de Benoist, ethnopluralism and the cultural turn in racism |url= |journal=Patterns of Prejudice |volume=55 |issue=3 |pages=213–235 |doi=10.1080/0031322X.2021.1920722 |s2cid=244558523 |s2cid-access=free |issn=0031-322X|doi-access=free }}
*{{Cite book|title=The Extreme Right in France: From Pétain to Le Pen|last=Shields|first=James|year=2007|publisher=Routledge|isbn=9781134861118}}
*{{cite journal|last=Spektorowska|first=Alberto|year=2003|title=The New Right: ethno-regionalism, ethno-pluralism and the emergence of a neo-fascist 'Third Way'|journal=Journal of Political Ideologies|volume=8|pages=111–130|doi=10.1080/13569310306084|s2cid=143042182}}
*{{Cite journal|title=L'Héritage nazi. Des Nouvelles Droites européennes à la littérature niant le génocide|url=https://phdn.org/negation/taguieff-heritage-nazi-1981.html|last=Taguieff|first=Pierre-André|author-link=Pierre-André Taguieff|year=1981|journal=Les Nouveaux Cahiers|issue=64}}
*{{Cite journal|last=Taguieff|first=Pierre-André|author-link=Pierre-André Taguieff|year=1985|title=Le néo-racisme différentialiste. Sur l'ambiguïté d'une évidence commune et ses effets pervers|journal=Langage & Société|volume=34|issue=1|pages=69–98|doi=10.3406/lsoc.1985.2039 |doi-access=free }}
*{{Cite book |last=Taguieff |first=Pierre-André |title=The Force of Prejudice: On Racism and Its Doubles |publisher=University of Minnesota Press |year=2001 |isbn=978-0-8166-2373-0}}
*{{Cite book|last=Taylor|first=Blair|title=The Far Right and the Environment|year=2019|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-1-351-10404-3|chapter=Alt-Right Ecology: Ecofascism and far-right environmentalism in the United States|doi=10.4324/9781351104043-16|s2cid=213586588}}
{{refend}}

{{European New Right}}{{Nationalism}}{{Ethnicity}}{{Ethnic nationalism}}{{Separatist movements per continent}}

[[Category:Ethnicity]]
[[Category:Identitarian movement]]
[[Category:Identity politics]]
[[Category:Multiculturalism]]
[[Category:Political theories]]
[[Category:Race (human categorization)]]
[[Category:Social theories]]
[[Category:Sociology of culture]]
[[Category:Ethnic nationalism]]
[[Category:Nationalism]]