Far Right is no spent force

Concerns over immigration must be addressed if social cohesion is to be maintained

By Ted Cantle

Regardless of the defeat for Nick Griffin, leader of the British National Party, the general election did not produce the trouncing of the Far Right that was portrayed in the news media. In 2001 the BNP picked up just 47,000 votes; by 2005 this had grown to 192,000 and this year it was 563,000. Under a proportional representation system, the BNP would now have 12 seats in Parliament. Based on a new analysis by iCoCo of the voting patterns for far right groups, this appears to be part of a genuine trend of gathering support which threatens the stability of the UK.

There is no doubt that increased population and changes in the composition of some communities have put additional pressure on local services, and these do have to be understood and addressed. It is true they are often exaggerated by the Far Right - but some are very real and pressing and are most keenly felt in poorer areas who already feel that they are under the greatest pressure. In engaging with those arguments, there will no doubt be some expression of racist views, but these are in the minority and whilst people do have real concerns, they will respond to debates which acknowledge the problems and demonstrate a willingness to address them.

Promoting community cohesion, with its emphasis on building trust between disparate groups and minimising intolerance, will help to tackle Far Right extremism. However, we are no longer able to rely on the old approach to the Far Right of "ignore them: do not give them the oxygen of publicity‟. This has played into the hands of the BNP, who have been able to present themselves as the only party willing to discuss race and migration issues.

There is a need to engage with communities in different ways. In particular, it is dangerous to depend upon self-appointed community leaders who may simply be the community "gatekeeper‟ and who use their position to control communications to preserve their position of influence. We need to develop a new model of "gateway‟ community leaders who are willing and able to open their communities to wider and more varied influences and to empower them to do things for themselves.

In this regard, we need to avoid homogenising communities and assuming that people are of any one "type‟. We can learn from past experience for example, with the Preventing Violent Extremism (PVE), or Prevent agenda, which created a lot of hostility, confusion and mistrust amongst Muslims who resented being pathologised and associated with terrorism. There is a similar danger in relation to former government‟s Connecting Communities programme, which focuses on those predominantly white areas which are attracted to the Far Right. A one-dimensional approach should give way to a recognition that all communities are multi-faceted, diverse, constantly changing and adapting to internal and external forces and influences. Previous experience has shown that people are much more likely to engage with positive labels and images, rather than negative ones.

All public and private sector agencies need to work together, engage at all levels and develop consistent messages which resonate with the local community and respond to genuine grievances. At a neighbourhood level, there are lots of opportunities that already exist or that can easily be utilised - more open and shared spaces can be created, for people from different backgrounds, community facilities and places can get people together for work, leisure and socialising. There should be a specific focus on work with children and young people. The duty to promote community cohesion in all 23,000 schools is already having an impact, but it does need to be connected to the wider community. It also needs to involve parents and be carried over to youth centres and other local groups, to create more opportunities to develop their educational and employment skills. A greater emphasis should be put on work with young people around street gangs and gang culture, asking why gangs seem to play an increasingly important role in young people's lives.

The primary focus should be on insular communities, whatever their make-up and origins. It is too easy to condemn communities for being hostile to outsiders and unwelcoming to people not like themselves, but we have to provide the opportunities for them to engage with others and to enable them to become more open to change and difference. In long established communities, social capital and leadership has been slowly eroded. Working men's clubs, trade unions, local shops, clubs and societies have been under pressure and in some cases all but disappeared. These local institutions also provided an opportunity to air their views and discuss concerns about what is happening (or what they perceive to be happening) in their communities. In common with many other parts of society, there is some evidence that the "glue‟ of social networks which helped to bind local areas together has given way to an individualised community in which families provide their own entertainment and have little time for their neighbours.

In recent years, communities have become much more complex. In comparison to the position in the 1950's and 60's where Britain's diversity was in the form of a small number of migrant communities, we now have an era of "super diversity‟ with over 300 languages in London schools and as many as 65 in small market towns. But the identities of individuals are no longer fixed and are subject to many more diaspora and transnational influences. The evidence suggests that people who live in diverse communities are generally more comfortable with difference, as compared to those who live in communities which are more homogeneous or mono-cultural. White communities, in particular, feel that their collective identity is "under threat‟ and, in contrast to minority communities, tend to believe that they have no personal, recognisable identity.

There is a danger in regarding the BNP as a spent force. The party lost ground because of campaigns on the ground in places like Barking and Dagenham, but all the minority parties were squeezed by the media focus on the three main parties, especially around the televised debates. That may not be the case next time. We have to recognize that the Far Right do tap into real concerns, as the ‘bigoted woman’ incident showed, and we need more debate, not less, to answer these concerns. But we also need to recognize that whilst the BNP is part of the legitimate democratic framework, it does stir up tensions in local communities and is often accompanied by more extreme Far Right groups who peddle hatred. These tensions then have to be dealt with by public agencies and community groups who have to try to calm things down and offer reassurance – a costly exercise in both social and monetary terms.

28 July 2010

Ted Cantle. Executive Chair, iCoCo (Institute of Community Cohesion), Coventry University