What is on Trial in Oslo - the Actions of a Mass Murderer or His Ideology?

The ideology in question is that of right-wing extremism, a way of thinking usually typified by five characteristics: nationalism, racism, xenophobia, anti-democratic views and calls for a strong state.* In this case the perpetrator has shown in both written and verbal statements that his attitudes coincide with most of these criteria, and especially the aspects relating to what may be called «cultural racism», a strongly negative view of Islam seeing Muslims as «invaders» of Europe. The mass killer glorifies Norwegian and European historical traditions linked to Christianity. He claims to have defended these values by killing 77 people who were all somehow in his mind affiliated with the ruling political system in Norway, responsible for the country's openness to Muslim immigration. (Norway has 13% immigrant residents; the city of Oslo has 23%.)**

The case has triggered long debates both in Norway and in other countries, about right-wing extremism, political violence, freedom of expression, xenophobia, police surveillance, hand-gun control, bomb-making, etc. Media have focused to a great extent on the dangers of right-wing extremism. Still there is not much clarity about what is essential in the case, except the issue of the perpetrator's sanity and whether he can be held legally responsible for his actions. The court will decide on this in due time.

My question in all of this is: Could his actions make his particular attitudes (i.e., right-wing extremism) more dangerous – more attractive to other psychopaths like him - than previously thought? And are these attitudes more dangerous than other extremist views?

My view on both counts is, No. The European Left seems convinced that this mass murderer is only the tip of an iceberg of right-wing extremism. That's as faulty as thinking all terrorists are muslims. The danger lies in the demonstration of method and commitment to goal-oriented political mass-murder, a side-effect and possibly even a conscious purpose in which the killer has subsequently been greatly aided by the media. 


Extremist views of whatever nature, which advocate violence and attack democratic values, are all dangerous, and a democratic system has the right to defend itself against them with appropriate means. Extremist movements must all be countered and restrained, by democratic means if possible and by effective and continuous police action if necessary. There is no greater need to watch right-wing extremism than left-wing extremism or religious (including islamist) extremism or animal-rights extremism.

In other words, I disagree with the tendency in the debate about the Oslo/Utøya case to assign particular blame to right-wing extremism. I disagree especially with the tendency to see this as a simple extension of ordinary conservative and islam-critical views. Indeed,  I agree with the view recently put to me by a distinguished former colleague, that in contrast to what many people seem to think, conservatism (at least mainstream European conservatism) is not akin to and is not a more moderate form of right-wing extremism. Conservatism, especially in the tradition of Edmund Burke, is democratic, non-violent, anti-revolutionary and stands for cautious, incremental reform. Granted, there are other forms of conservatism that are authoritarian and reactionary, but they are rarely democratic. In any case, the proper focus of attention here is the violence, not the particular strain of thought.


In our time politically motivated violence increasingly overlaps with religious violence, to the extent that a distinction between the two is becoming meaningless. There is in my view nothing essential that separates this mass killer from the German and Italian left-wing terrorist killers of the 1970s and -80s or from the islamist mass killers (including suicide bombers) of today. It is not the particular type of extremism that is to blame, but the inhuman impulse to kill, and kill on a massive scale.


It is evidently the case that such an impulse to kill often has a theoretical or abstract motivation – political and/or religious – and this is why political surveillance of all kinds of extremism unfortunately is necessary. In my view, the attractiveness of the ideology is much less dangerous than the attractiveness of the methods, which all crackpots can use.

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* See, e.g.: Cas Mudde, «Right-Wing Extremism Analyzed», European Journal of Political Research 1995, 27, 203-224.
http://works.bepress.com/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1018&context=cas_mudde

** Immigrants: Residents who are foreign-born plus their children born in Norway. Only about half of these immigrants are non-European, however. Source: SSB Statistics Norway.