The Setting

Abstract

A historical review of the array of political and social movements in numerous countries indicates that the extreme right is not a recent phenomenon. The left–right political spectrum originated in revolutionary France’s Assembly, in which the right stood for the ancien régime and the left for radical change. At that time, the right, made up of the privileged classes, defended the overthrown monarchy, the Catholic Church, and the feudal economy. The left, constituting the working classes, stood for equal and universal voting rights, a free economy, and an end to the old religious and cultural privileges. Since then, the concepts have changed significantly. Presently the right in various countries does not constitute a monolithic bloc but may have subgroups ranging from moderate conservative to radical to extreme. In most cases, the extremist right has opposed socialist and communist movements on the left that emerged during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.