Trump is trying to build a far-right international

Until recently, the spectre of an international far-right alliance of populist parties in democracies around the world has been just that: any appearance of cooperation was a form of self-promotion, rather than an expression of true solidarity.

- Jan-Werner Mueller

Few far-right figures have made any sacrifices for one another or seriously interfered in other countries’ internal affairs to prop up allies. And efforts to unite the far right in the European Parliament have fallen dismally short.

But that may be changing. US President Donald Trump's threat to impose punitive tariffs on Brazil, with the explicit goal of protecting its far-right former president, Jair Bolsonaro, from a “witch hunt”, marks a significant shift in tactics. What's more, Mr Trump's meddling in other democracies in the name of “free speech” serves powerful interests in the United States: tech companies that do not want to be regulated by foreign governments.

The international far right is often said to be a contradiction in terms. After all, every far-right leader is a nationalist, which would seem to preclude, by definition, an international alliance. But this view shows little philosophical sophistication or, for that matter, historical awareness.

In nineteenth-century Europe, liberals like Giuseppe Mazzini helped one another in their various struggles for freedom and independence from imperial powers. At the time, no one complained that there was a deep contradiction embedded in a liberal international alliance devoted to national self-determination.