Values in conflict: the rise and effects of anti-Islamic populism in Europe

Abstract

This paper explores how controversies about Islamic migration impact on European politics and foreign policy. New forms of ‘issue and identity politics’, centered on immigration and the compatibility of Islam with liberal democracy, and the rise of novel forms of populism – the phenomena of Pim Fortuyn and Geert Wilders are cases in point – illustrate a growing concern about values in European politics. These new populist parties share the view that Europe should not tolerate Islamic intolerance and they have become key coalition kingmakers in many of Europe's most affluent and progressive societies. Much of the IR literature - with its strict domestic / foreign dichotomy - underestimates the effects of domestic concerns about values on European foreign policy. For example, Europe’s ambiguous stance towards Turkish EU accession and its management of Middle Eastern policy are indicative of the growing inter-linkage between the domestic and foreign policy agendas and the encroachment of ‘issue and identity politics’. The paper finds that these new forms of political populism are not exceptional, singular, and temporary phenomena but socially accepted modes of political mobilization with serious implications for Europe’s ambitions to become a ‘normative power’ in international affairs.