Why the Real Right Should Care about Ethnonationalism
Weaving together a fabric for Rightist action
Among neoreactionary circles, as well as other allied groups in the Real Right, it is common to focus on the functionality of power mechanisms as they pertain both to government and to sociopolitical adjuncts such as the media, NGOs, and corporations and other economic entities. Typically this functionality is interpreted largely or solely through the lenses of certain macrohistorical events and trends. Even I tend to fall into this current when I write about cliodynamics, secular cycles, and demographic-structural theory. As such, the focus tends to be institutional and power-political in its approach.
However, we need to understand that history does not exist in a vacuum. If we neglect to consider the characteristics of the “human material” involved in these historical events and trends, then we will miss much of the explanatory power that can be applied to these phenomena. Certainly, there is room for an element of Carlyle’s “Great Man” theory. But even further, we should understand that there must be an understanding and acceptance of the reality of the differences between different people groups, both genetically (i.e. human biodiversity) and culturally and that these differences will have significant, disparate impacts on macrosocial behaviours and civilisational success.
One of the fundamental goals of both NRx and the broader Right in general is (or at least should be) the establishment of socially stable order. To fully encompass this goal, however, it is necessary to take into account some sociological and ethnographic factors which aren’t always reflected in the formalistic analyses undertaken by neoreactionaries. One of the primary areas of interest should be that of ethnicity, ethnonationalism, and how these impinge on social order. Which they do - comprehending how a societal “one size fits all” approach to disparate people groups only serves to create chaos and disorder is a necessary element to help us begin rolling back many of the ideological and policymaking mistakes that currently characterise the governments of most governments in the West.
So at this point, some definitions are in order. “Ethnicity” is a term which primarily refers to commonalities shared within quasi-discrete human groupings that serve to define the “in-group” as well as determine “out-groups.” Ethnicity centres about “ethnic markers” - language, religion, morals, traditions, customs, patterns of life, etc. - and is often delineated through the use of “worldview” symbols. Now phenotype can be included within this set of markers but is not a primary determinant of it and is largely not what defines an ethnie. At the same time, ethnies do generally tend to share a common genetic heritage, though during periods of constructive ethnogenesis (i.e. new ethnies forming through the conjoining of elements from others), components from similar parent ethnies may amalgamate to create a new ethnie. As an example, the generalised White American experience in the USA prior to the 1920s-era moratorium on immigration shows that frontier, colonial types of societies can be prone to this, as culturally similar (relative to the rest of the world) immigrant groups from Europe were gradually acculturated to Heritage American norms.
At its most basic meaning, ethnonationalism therefore involves the organisation of people groups along these ethnic lines and the subsequent attempt to harmonise ethnic and political boundaries. In this sense, the question of which came first - the nation (ethnos) or the state - while falling to the former, is also somewhat irrelevant since the two work together in synergistic feedback loops. It’s essentially just a sociopolitical expression of the principle of “a place for everyone and everyone in his place.”
However, per the definitions given above, ethnonationalism rightly understood involves a very different concept from the “white nationalism” such as was espoused by Richard Spencer before he went all cattywampus. Though members of the same ethnie will tend to share similar phenotypic expressions (which are not limited to skin colour), and these phenotypic distinctions can serve as in/out-group markers (especially across metaethnic fault lines), “race” as a modernistic biological concept is not really what’s being discussed. Indeed, ethnicity is not only a better, but is also a more exclusive and delineative, means of defining group solidarity.
The reason all of this is important for NRx and the rest of the Right hearkens back to the stated goal of social stability and order within a society. You can deride it as “tribalism” all you like, but the fact remains that shared ethnicity has been one of the single most powerful organising principles in all of human history. It is something that has been hardwired into our collective psyche since the beginnings of human civilisation thousands of years ago. Indeed, it is something which God Himself has ordained for us. It is through the concept of ethnicity that “collective solidarity” (asabiyyah in agrarian societies as used by Turchin) is primarily expressed – people will much more readily identify with and be willing to sacrifice of their own good for other people who share their customs, psychology, etc. than they will for artificial groupings like corporations, fraternal organisations, etc.
Hence, if the Right wishes to encourage true social stability, then we must work towards the establishment of rational ethnonationalist structures which will facilitate, rather than hinder, collective solidarity. This necessarily means a rejection of civic nationalism and the so-called “multicultural” state (keeping in mind that empires with an aristoclade are a different matter structurally and do not necessarily fall under this analysis).
The power of collective solidarity (CS) can be seen in the modern Western experience. CS is something that waxes and wanes within different ethnies over time. It increases when the core aristocratic element within an ethnie exhibits shared goals and ideology (which usually takes place during the growth phases of a polity’s secular cycle), which it then leads the co-ethnic commons to act upon. Usually this is a result of shared struggle, low ratio of population density to available resources, etc. Conversely, CS seems to decline when the ethnie’s aristocratic core is degenerate, divided through intraelite competition, or no longer sees itself as sharing its destiny with the co-ethnic commons (as ours does now).
The rise of the West coincided with a high level of CS in western societies – each nation saw a unity of purpose between the aristocratic and common elements, which was true even given the generally greater tendency towards individualism found among northwestern European populations (but which also existed among other Europeans as well). The decline of the West has coincided with the decline in CS, as there is an increasing ideological gap between our ethnic elites and the rest, combined with the presence of alloethnic elites (South Asians, Jews, East Asians, etc.) which have suborned and won to themselves the loyalty of our ethnic elites. This occurred not because of any inherent “evilness” on the part of these groups, but because they tend to exhibit much more in-group cohesion (i.e. much higher CS), which allows them to outcompete native Western elites who grew complacent and already saw waning CS in their nations. Groups with high social cohesion will always be able to outstrip those without it.
The decline in western collective solidarity has accelerated because of the encouragement of multiculturalism and other trust-destroying phenomena by foreign ethnic elites in the West. These have encouraged the importation of millions of often hostile metaethnies into our countries. As we all ought to know, diversity plus proximity equals war. The more you adulterate the boundaries between people groups and create “ethnic liminal spaces,” the more chaos and strife you eventually create. So restoring these boundaries needs to be the starting point for any rational restoration of western societies.
But we have to do more than just “kick them furners out.” If we wish to begin reversing our ongoing social disorder, we must necessarily support other efforts and methods for increasing CS among western populations by working to increase heritage ethnic identification among our peoples. This is done by encouraging the expression and “re-elitifying” of traditional ethnic markers within Western societies – our languages, Christianity, traditional mores, etc. Trying to introduce (or reintroduce) “new” ethnic markers is only going to be counterproductive.
Doing this obviously must be coupled with methods for obtaining and maintaining formal structural and institutional power. Since neoreaction has been primarily interested in this area anywise, the two concepts can and must work in tandem. After all, merely obtaining formal power doesn’t mean anything if you don’t subsequently use it to get done what you want to get done. In our case, that means coupling our American/Anglo/European ethnonationalisms with various forms of “Christian nationalism,” which ultimately just represents the traditional expressions of our cultural forms as they had existed for centuries. In this way, various threads of Right worldview can be brought together to work synergistically.
It seems America faces a choice between either disintegration into self-selected ethnonations, or the neo-imperial Russian model. The latter's nascent aristocracy is unlikely to be purely European (Hapakenazis being the strongest contenders).
To give you an example of what you are up against go here: https://csmfht.substack.com/p/the-dark-side-of-classics
What we see with this man-hating New Zealand woman is an attempt to demoralize white men by mocking their gods and heroes. At the same time this classics teacher extolls the architectural accomplishments of the Romans on a class trip to Italy. She has adopted a strategy of subversion and parasitism because she was unable to compete against white men fair and square. Thus, she needs quotas, constant undermining of European culture and identify, and censorship against sexism, racism, etc.
Her goal is to turn white men into a kind of helot class. She wants the infrastructure and civic virtue that white men provide but with her and the blacks she wants to import in charge. It really shows how different women are from men. The spiritual and psychic power men should be seeking and affirming means nothing to her.
And the problem is, most men today aren’t capable of looking for spiritual identity either. They are materialists who are angry they lost power and with it their culture and identity. Once again this woman proves that identity is everything and it’s primarily racial and sexual