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Empire of Resentment: Populism's Toxic Embrace of Nationalism
From a leading scholar on conservatism, the extraordinary chronicle of how the transformation of the American far right made the Trump presidency possible—and what it portends for the future
Since Trump’s victory and the UK’s Brexit vote, much of the commentary on the populist epidemic has focused on the emergence of populism. But, Lawrence Rosenthal argues, what is happening globally is not the emergence but the transformation of right-wing populism.
Rosenthal, the founder of UC Berkeley’s Center for Right-Wing Studies, suggests right-wing populism is a protean force whose prime mover is the resentment felt toward perceived cultural elites, and whose abiding feature is its ideological flexibility, which now takes the form of xenophobic nationalism. In 2016, American right-wing populists migrated from the free marketeering Tea Party to Donald Trump’s “hard hat,” anti-immigrant, America-First nationalism. This was the most important single factor in Trump’s electoral victory and it has been at work across the globe. In Italy, for example, the Northern League reinvented itself in 2018 as an all-Italy party, switching its fury from southerners to immigrants, and came to power.
Rosenthal paints a vivid sociological, political, and psychological picture of the transnational quality of this movement, which is now in power in at least a dozen countries, creating a de facto Nationalist International. In America and abroad, the current mobilization of right-wing populism has given life to long marginalized threats like white supremacy. The future of democratic politics in the United States and abroad depends on whether the liberal and left parties have the political capacity to mobilize with a progressive agenda of their own.
Since Trump’s victory and the UK’s Brexit vote, much of the commentary on the populist epidemic has focused on the emergence of populism. But, Lawrence Rosenthal argues, what is happening globally is not the emergence but the transformation of right-wing populism.
Rosenthal, the founder of UC Berkeley’s Center for Right-Wing Studies, suggests right-wing populism is a protean force whose prime mover is the resentment felt toward perceived cultural elites, and whose abiding feature is its ideological flexibility, which now takes the form of xenophobic nationalism. In 2016, American right-wing populists migrated from the free marketeering Tea Party to Donald Trump’s “hard hat,” anti-immigrant, America-First nationalism. This was the most important single factor in Trump’s electoral victory and it has been at work across the globe. In Italy, for example, the Northern League reinvented itself in 2018 as an all-Italy party, switching its fury from southerners to immigrants, and came to power.
Rosenthal paints a vivid sociological, political, and psychological picture of the transnational quality of this movement, which is now in power in at least a dozen countries, creating a de facto Nationalist International. In America and abroad, the current mobilization of right-wing populism has given life to long marginalized threats like white supremacy. The future of democratic politics in the United States and abroad depends on whether the liberal and left parties have the political capacity to mobilize with a progressive agenda of their own.
272 pages, Hardcover
Published September 8, 2020
About the author
Lawrence Rosenthal
5 books7 followersNote: There are more than one Lawrence Rosenthal on GR's database.
This is the “catch-all” profile.
Lawrence S. Rosenthal (cardiologist) = Lawrence^^Rosenthal
Lawrence Rosenthal (CPA) = Lawrence^^^Rosenthal
This is the “catch-all” profile.
Lawrence S. Rosenthal (cardiologist) = Lawrence^^Rosenthal
Lawrence Rosenthal (CPA) = Lawrence^^^Rosenthal
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
January 22, 2022
"Empire of Resentment: Populism’s Toxic Embrace of Nationalism" offers an unapologetic account of how Donald Trump recognized and exploited right-wing discontent to bring together white Evangelicals, free-market fundamentalists, and white nationalists: forming a coalition that is vehemently loyal to his administration. This movement is not confined to the U.S.: it is spreading across other Western democracies, such as Italy and the U.K. “Economic populist” and “othering nationalist” movements that scapegoat minoritized groups are devolving to fascism, giving rise to despots who willfully erode trust in democratic institutions, such as the mass media and the electoral system.
Author Lawrence Rosenthal, chair of the Berkeley Center for Right-Wing Studies, focuses much of his analysis on the rise of disillusionment and distrust of government in the U.S., from the fiscal conservatism of the Tea Party Republicans to street terrorism among militia-inspired white nationalist groups. His take on the “alt-lite” was illuminating, as it takes apart the motivations of a nihilistic subculture of men – mostly white and fearful of feminism – who found a haven for their discontent in alt-right constituencies. This is an important book for all Americans to read, as it reveals the disturbing rise of white identity populism that is provoking racist and xenophobic violence against citizens and society.
Rosenthal’s analysis doesn’t attempt to inspire sympathy for the disillusioned. Perhaps with more awareness about us/them dynamics of white nationalism, we can recognize these trends in our own communities and mobilize efforts to halt the further infectious spread of distrust and resentment.
This review was originally published in San Francisco Book Review.
Author Lawrence Rosenthal, chair of the Berkeley Center for Right-Wing Studies, focuses much of his analysis on the rise of disillusionment and distrust of government in the U.S., from the fiscal conservatism of the Tea Party Republicans to street terrorism among militia-inspired white nationalist groups. His take on the “alt-lite” was illuminating, as it takes apart the motivations of a nihilistic subculture of men – mostly white and fearful of feminism – who found a haven for their discontent in alt-right constituencies. This is an important book for all Americans to read, as it reveals the disturbing rise of white identity populism that is provoking racist and xenophobic violence against citizens and society.
Rosenthal’s analysis doesn’t attempt to inspire sympathy for the disillusioned. Perhaps with more awareness about us/them dynamics of white nationalism, we can recognize these trends in our own communities and mobilize efforts to halt the further infectious spread of distrust and resentment.
This review was originally published in San Francisco Book Review.
September 13, 2020
Explains how Donald Trump won in 2016. Also explains how nationalism is rising in the U. S. and across Europe in regards to the white population.
I found the interesting but, at times, above my experience/knowledge level. I need Populism and Nationalism 101 and this was a college class. It got easier to understand as I got further in the book. Read the notes in the back as you read the book. His documentation is excellent as are the books and articles listed in the notes for further reading. I expect I'll be reading some of them as I seek to expand my knowledge.
I found the interesting but, at times, above my experience/knowledge level. I need Populism and Nationalism 101 and this was a college class. It got easier to understand as I got further in the book. Read the notes in the back as you read the book. His documentation is excellent as are the books and articles listed in the notes for further reading. I expect I'll be reading some of them as I seek to expand my knowledge.
September 16, 2020
Here’s America’s leading scholar of Right-Wing politics with an up-to-the-minute analysis of the contending forces that have seized hold of the Republican Party.
Because, as UC Berkeley’s Lawrence Rosenthal explains in Empire of Resentment, conservatism comes in many flavors, of which the following are the most prominent:
** Neoliberalism advocates letting free-market capitalism loose on the world with few, if any, restraints.
** Paleoconservatism glories in American nationalism and Christian ethics, pushing for restrictions on immigration and multiculturalism.
** Right-Wing populism (which Rosenthal terms right populism) combines populist rhetoric and anti-elitist sentiments. “Emotion—more than ideology or dogma—is the motor force of populism.”
This leading scholar of Right-Wing politics goes to the heart of the matter
And here’s the gist of Rosenthal’s argument, as laid out on the book’s second page: “Donald Trump won the 2016 election by convincing America’s right-wing populists to migrate ideologically—from the Tea Party’s free-market fundamentalism to Trump’s anti-immigrant, America-First nationalism.” He managed to do so by co-opting the Christian Right as well. And how did Trump pull this off, when on all sides it was agreed that he came to the campaign in 2015 wholly unprepared to be President?
“What the mainstream media missed in the analysis of the day,” Rosenthal writes, “was how Trump’s immersion in right-wing media had loaded him up with a stockpile of Tea Party speak, complete with its resentments, conspiracy ideas, passions, and convictions.”
Trump’s broad coalition of disparate forces
Yet Donald Trump’s success rested on far more than “the working class. He brought in the fringe of American politics as well. They came in two forms.” Neither group was a comfortable fit with its more prominent bedfellows in the new coalition, but Trump mashed them together all the same:
** White nationalists. “The white supremacist right that had had no role in national politics (though some in regional politics) since the 1920s. These were the members and sympathizers of the Ku Klux Klan and neo-Nazi and similar white power groups . . .”
** Nihilistic gamers. “An alienated and largely nihilistic population, chiefly of young men, who inhabited an online subculture that had largely developed out of online gaming. The border between these young men and the alt-right was blurry . . .”
“The looked-down-upon now look down”
Apparently, Donald Trump’s seemingly clueless references to how brilliant he is are no accident. As conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer (1950-2018) wrote in 2002, “Conservatives think liberals are stupid” because we—yes, I am of the Left—indulge in “compassionate condescension.” Hence, when the President refers to “Donald Trump’s very, very large brain” and characterizes himself as “not smart, but genius. . . and a very stable genius at that!” he is merely confirming his followers in the belief that their leaders—and, by extension, they themselves—are smarter than the rest of us.
And that’s one key to the adulation that the President now enjoys from his followers. Rosenthal explains that a psychological shift lies at the heart of the parlor trick that Trump engineered in 2016: “The looked-down-upon now collectively feel themselves looking down. The populists together become contemptuous of the elite. This is the social psychological step, the flip-flop, that’s needed to turn populist sentiment into a political mobilization.”
The Right’s upside-down identity politics
As a scholar of Right-Wing politics, Rosenthal intensively studied the Tea Party and the political reversals suffered by the Right that led to it. He ascribes to Sarah Palin’s campaign for Vice President in 2008 one of the critical antecedents of Trump’s victory eight years later. Palin “ushered in . . . an inverted version of conventional identity politics, a version that would ramify and establish itself as the core of the Tea Party movement, and would then become radicalized as the core of the Trump movement. . .” Rosenthal argues that “traditional identity movements felt themselves deprived of a seat at the table.” By contrast, in the Right’s upside-down brand of identity politics, “these new movements feel themselves dispossessed of their seat at the table.” [Italics are mine.] And “in Trump’s community, identity emerges through othering; defining ‘us’ as a negation of the odious ‘them.'”
Yet the racist and anti-immigrant feelings that came to the surface in millions of Americans, cheered on by Donald Trump, were solidly grounded in real-world conditions. “The economic dispossession of the white working class was a forty-year wave that, in politics, finally broke in the 2016 election cycle.” And the neoliberal policies that served up that reality were the product of both Republicans and Democrats, most notably in the Reagan, Clinton, and Bush II Administrations. Although the social and economic contours of the world we live in today were half a century in the making, Republicans alone can’t be blamed. “Moderate” Democrats share responsibility for joining the neoliberal consensus and shaping the conditions that gave rise to Trumpism.
“Zero-sum thinking is central to Right-Wing politics”
In one of his most intriguing insights, the author notes that “zero-sum thinking is the logic behind the very idea of liberty in right-wing thinking.” He cites Robert Bork’s reasoning about the 1964 Civil Rights Act that “the idea that lunch-counter owners could not deny service based on race took away the owners’ freedom to deal only with whom they wished. . . There was nothing inherently superior in the black person’s right to be served as compared to the owner’s right to deny service.” And when Bork was questioned in 1987 during his Supreme Court confirmation hearing, “he was forced to carry his concept to the logical conclusion that the judiciary could not rightly call for the abolition of slavery.
“The freedom to hold slaves, in Borkian principle, enjoys the same protection as the freedom from slavery.” And I thought we liberals were the only ones guilty of championing cultural relativism! Yet didn’t that same reasoning rear its ugly head in 2017 when the President of the United States defended the “good people” among the neo-Nazis and white supremacists at Charlottesville?
Has fascism come to America?
So, are we witnessing the emergence of fascism in America? Lawrence Rosenthal is one of the nation’s leading authorities on fascism, and his answer to this question is a resounding no. “We are not in a moment stalked by a real fascist movement. Fascism’s novel political invention was the marriage of an electoral party with a private militia.” However, “that absence was not for a want of trying. . . . The goal of the August 2017 Unite the Right rallies they organized at the home of the University of Virginia was to create a unified right militia.” But, despite the “good people” Trump celebrated, they failed.
Although Rosenthal notes many superficial similarities between Donald Trump and Benito Mussolini, he finds a closer and much more instructive analogy in Silvio Berlusconi, the Right-Wing billionaire media mogul who was Italy’s longest-serving Prime Minister since World War II. Berlusconi is best remembered for his conviction on tax fraud and his victimization of young women. It’s far too early to tell how Donald Trump will be remembered.
In the larger historical perspective
What’s missing from Empire of Resentment is a broader historical perspective. That might be unreasonable to expect from a scholar of Right-Wing politics as we experience its ascendancy in the USA today. The book rightly delves deeply into the weeds of today’s reality. But the omission is significant nonetheless.
From an historical perspective, the ascendancy of Donald Trump and the proto-fascist political movement he personifies is more than merely a political phenomenon. In its rejection of science, its immersion in conspiracy theories, its tacit support for Biblical fundamentalism, and its insistence that the facts it finds inconvenient are simply “fake news,” Trumpism represents a turn away from the rationalism of the Enlightenment that informed the Founders of the American Republic.
Rosenthal quotes Hannah Arendt (The New Yorker, February 25, 1967) on this point: “‘The result of a consistent and total substitution of lies for factual truth is not that the lie will now be accepted as truth and truth be defamed as a lie, but that the sense by which we take our bearings in the real world—and the category of truth versus falsehood is among the mental means to this end—is being destroyed.'”
During his time in George W. Bush’s White House, Karl Rove famously distinguished between the “reality-based community” and what others termed the “faith-based community.” But as Rosenthal notes, “Trump rendered Rove’s dichotomy a mere warm-up act. Under Trump, the reality-based community were no longer simply bystanders, they became the Other.” And again and again, in so many ways—on social media, on Fox News, at Trump’s rallies, and in White House policies—the claims they make violate the fundamental principle that reality can only be understood through observable fact.
Donald Trump follows no ideology
In the final analysis, there is no ideology that serves as the foundation for the Trump movement. In fact, “Trump’s camp followers are reverse-engineering an intellectual doctrine to match Trump’s basic instincts.” And the powers that otherwise be in the Republican Party today act as though they are in thrall to the man they all seem to think is an idiot simply because he has given them what they want above all: “conservative” Supreme Court Justices and tax cuts for the rich and big corporations. It’s an ugly and ultimately bankrupt bargain.
Empire of Resentment is not an easy read. Rosenthal writes like the scholar of Right-Wing politics that he is, reveling in such terms as “epidermic ideology”—skin-deep, get it?—and “fascistogenic potential.” However, it’s well worth wading through the occasional passage that might send you rushing to the dictionary or the footnotes. This book is a worthy addition to the growing body of literature that seeks to understand Donald Trump and how he came to inhabit the Oval Office.
About the author
Dr. Lawrence Rosenthal founded the Center for Right-Wing Studies at the University of California, Berkeley in 2009. Based in part on his extensive knowledge of Italian politics, he is currently working on a study of the contemporary American Right in comparison to movements of the Right in 20th century Europe.
Because, as UC Berkeley’s Lawrence Rosenthal explains in Empire of Resentment, conservatism comes in many flavors, of which the following are the most prominent:
** Neoliberalism advocates letting free-market capitalism loose on the world with few, if any, restraints.
** Paleoconservatism glories in American nationalism and Christian ethics, pushing for restrictions on immigration and multiculturalism.
** Right-Wing populism (which Rosenthal terms right populism) combines populist rhetoric and anti-elitist sentiments. “Emotion—more than ideology or dogma—is the motor force of populism.”
This leading scholar of Right-Wing politics goes to the heart of the matter
And here’s the gist of Rosenthal’s argument, as laid out on the book’s second page: “Donald Trump won the 2016 election by convincing America’s right-wing populists to migrate ideologically—from the Tea Party’s free-market fundamentalism to Trump’s anti-immigrant, America-First nationalism.” He managed to do so by co-opting the Christian Right as well. And how did Trump pull this off, when on all sides it was agreed that he came to the campaign in 2015 wholly unprepared to be President?
“What the mainstream media missed in the analysis of the day,” Rosenthal writes, “was how Trump’s immersion in right-wing media had loaded him up with a stockpile of Tea Party speak, complete with its resentments, conspiracy ideas, passions, and convictions.”
Trump’s broad coalition of disparate forces
Yet Donald Trump’s success rested on far more than “the working class. He brought in the fringe of American politics as well. They came in two forms.” Neither group was a comfortable fit with its more prominent bedfellows in the new coalition, but Trump mashed them together all the same:
** White nationalists. “The white supremacist right that had had no role in national politics (though some in regional politics) since the 1920s. These were the members and sympathizers of the Ku Klux Klan and neo-Nazi and similar white power groups . . .”
** Nihilistic gamers. “An alienated and largely nihilistic population, chiefly of young men, who inhabited an online subculture that had largely developed out of online gaming. The border between these young men and the alt-right was blurry . . .”
“The looked-down-upon now look down”
Apparently, Donald Trump’s seemingly clueless references to how brilliant he is are no accident. As conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer (1950-2018) wrote in 2002, “Conservatives think liberals are stupid” because we—yes, I am of the Left—indulge in “compassionate condescension.” Hence, when the President refers to “Donald Trump’s very, very large brain” and characterizes himself as “not smart, but genius. . . and a very stable genius at that!” he is merely confirming his followers in the belief that their leaders—and, by extension, they themselves—are smarter than the rest of us.
And that’s one key to the adulation that the President now enjoys from his followers. Rosenthal explains that a psychological shift lies at the heart of the parlor trick that Trump engineered in 2016: “The looked-down-upon now collectively feel themselves looking down. The populists together become contemptuous of the elite. This is the social psychological step, the flip-flop, that’s needed to turn populist sentiment into a political mobilization.”
The Right’s upside-down identity politics
As a scholar of Right-Wing politics, Rosenthal intensively studied the Tea Party and the political reversals suffered by the Right that led to it. He ascribes to Sarah Palin’s campaign for Vice President in 2008 one of the critical antecedents of Trump’s victory eight years later. Palin “ushered in . . . an inverted version of conventional identity politics, a version that would ramify and establish itself as the core of the Tea Party movement, and would then become radicalized as the core of the Trump movement. . .” Rosenthal argues that “traditional identity movements felt themselves deprived of a seat at the table.” By contrast, in the Right’s upside-down brand of identity politics, “these new movements feel themselves dispossessed of their seat at the table.” [Italics are mine.] And “in Trump’s community, identity emerges through othering; defining ‘us’ as a negation of the odious ‘them.'”
Yet the racist and anti-immigrant feelings that came to the surface in millions of Americans, cheered on by Donald Trump, were solidly grounded in real-world conditions. “The economic dispossession of the white working class was a forty-year wave that, in politics, finally broke in the 2016 election cycle.” And the neoliberal policies that served up that reality were the product of both Republicans and Democrats, most notably in the Reagan, Clinton, and Bush II Administrations. Although the social and economic contours of the world we live in today were half a century in the making, Republicans alone can’t be blamed. “Moderate” Democrats share responsibility for joining the neoliberal consensus and shaping the conditions that gave rise to Trumpism.
“Zero-sum thinking is central to Right-Wing politics”
In one of his most intriguing insights, the author notes that “zero-sum thinking is the logic behind the very idea of liberty in right-wing thinking.” He cites Robert Bork’s reasoning about the 1964 Civil Rights Act that “the idea that lunch-counter owners could not deny service based on race took away the owners’ freedom to deal only with whom they wished. . . There was nothing inherently superior in the black person’s right to be served as compared to the owner’s right to deny service.” And when Bork was questioned in 1987 during his Supreme Court confirmation hearing, “he was forced to carry his concept to the logical conclusion that the judiciary could not rightly call for the abolition of slavery.
“The freedom to hold slaves, in Borkian principle, enjoys the same protection as the freedom from slavery.” And I thought we liberals were the only ones guilty of championing cultural relativism! Yet didn’t that same reasoning rear its ugly head in 2017 when the President of the United States defended the “good people” among the neo-Nazis and white supremacists at Charlottesville?
Has fascism come to America?
So, are we witnessing the emergence of fascism in America? Lawrence Rosenthal is one of the nation’s leading authorities on fascism, and his answer to this question is a resounding no. “We are not in a moment stalked by a real fascist movement. Fascism’s novel political invention was the marriage of an electoral party with a private militia.” However, “that absence was not for a want of trying. . . . The goal of the August 2017 Unite the Right rallies they organized at the home of the University of Virginia was to create a unified right militia.” But, despite the “good people” Trump celebrated, they failed.
Although Rosenthal notes many superficial similarities between Donald Trump and Benito Mussolini, he finds a closer and much more instructive analogy in Silvio Berlusconi, the Right-Wing billionaire media mogul who was Italy’s longest-serving Prime Minister since World War II. Berlusconi is best remembered for his conviction on tax fraud and his victimization of young women. It’s far too early to tell how Donald Trump will be remembered.
In the larger historical perspective
What’s missing from Empire of Resentment is a broader historical perspective. That might be unreasonable to expect from a scholar of Right-Wing politics as we experience its ascendancy in the USA today. The book rightly delves deeply into the weeds of today’s reality. But the omission is significant nonetheless.
From an historical perspective, the ascendancy of Donald Trump and the proto-fascist political movement he personifies is more than merely a political phenomenon. In its rejection of science, its immersion in conspiracy theories, its tacit support for Biblical fundamentalism, and its insistence that the facts it finds inconvenient are simply “fake news,” Trumpism represents a turn away from the rationalism of the Enlightenment that informed the Founders of the American Republic.
Rosenthal quotes Hannah Arendt (The New Yorker, February 25, 1967) on this point: “‘The result of a consistent and total substitution of lies for factual truth is not that the lie will now be accepted as truth and truth be defamed as a lie, but that the sense by which we take our bearings in the real world—and the category of truth versus falsehood is among the mental means to this end—is being destroyed.'”
During his time in George W. Bush’s White House, Karl Rove famously distinguished between the “reality-based community” and what others termed the “faith-based community.” But as Rosenthal notes, “Trump rendered Rove’s dichotomy a mere warm-up act. Under Trump, the reality-based community were no longer simply bystanders, they became the Other.” And again and again, in so many ways—on social media, on Fox News, at Trump’s rallies, and in White House policies—the claims they make violate the fundamental principle that reality can only be understood through observable fact.
Donald Trump follows no ideology
In the final analysis, there is no ideology that serves as the foundation for the Trump movement. In fact, “Trump’s camp followers are reverse-engineering an intellectual doctrine to match Trump’s basic instincts.” And the powers that otherwise be in the Republican Party today act as though they are in thrall to the man they all seem to think is an idiot simply because he has given them what they want above all: “conservative” Supreme Court Justices and tax cuts for the rich and big corporations. It’s an ugly and ultimately bankrupt bargain.
Empire of Resentment is not an easy read. Rosenthal writes like the scholar of Right-Wing politics that he is, reveling in such terms as “epidermic ideology”—skin-deep, get it?—and “fascistogenic potential.” However, it’s well worth wading through the occasional passage that might send you rushing to the dictionary or the footnotes. This book is a worthy addition to the growing body of literature that seeks to understand Donald Trump and how he came to inhabit the Oval Office.
About the author
Dr. Lawrence Rosenthal founded the Center for Right-Wing Studies at the University of California, Berkeley in 2009. Based in part on his extensive knowledge of Italian politics, he is currently working on a study of the contemporary American Right in comparison to movements of the Right in 20th century Europe.
August 31, 2020
Empire of Resentment: Populism's Toxic Embrace of Nationalism by Lawrence Rosenthal is a detailed yet accessible account of the shifting tide of right wing populism in both the United States and internationally.
Rosenthal's stated purpose in this book is to try to make the right wing populist movement more understandable to those not a part of it. In that goal he has succeeded quite well. There is not the over-the-top accusations of some other well-intentioned and, frankly, very accurate accounts. It isn't so much that the same things aren't mentioned here but rather that they are supported and explained so that they come out as results of putting the pieces together. To put another way, they explain what has and is happening (both historically and currently) then draw reasonable and logical conclusions. Those conclusions often resemble the accusations of other writers but here it is supported far better.
I was reading a section that highlights the similarities and differences between fascism (Mussolini) and what we have in the United States right now. Rosenthal shows that Trump is only one step away from being truly fascist as compared to progressing toward fascism, namely a militia to openly use terror and violence to keep opposition both legal and extralegal off balance. While reading this I was also reading reports of armed "Trump supporters" roaming streets and using violence to intimidate and even kill protesters. It would seem, then, that Trump's final piece is just about in place to legitimately be termed fascist.
I would recommend this to anyone in any country that is experiencing this dangerous shift to an extreme nationalism. For those appalled by the movement, this offers a historical and sociological explanation with examples drawn from events as recent as the COVID pandemic. This understanding should help you to better understand what is happening, why, and what may or may not work against it. For those who support the movement to the extreme right I think if you can read this with an open mind you might be better able to understand what you're supporting. You may not change your mind, but if you're only thinking about a couple aspects of the shift in making your decision you may come to see the bigger picture and come away less convinced that the extreme is the best place to be.
My single biggest takeaway, other than gaining a better understanding of what happened, is about what we must do. The left, and even the center, need to do more than just point out the destructive and unethical aspects of Trumpism. Those supporting him already know those things and are comfortable being unethical and immoral if it serves their emotional needs. We must put together policy ideas and programs to battle the foundational issues that drove so many to Trump. And we must do so before a capable authoritarian picks up where Trump will leave off, in some ways Trump's narcissism and ineptitude have capped what he will accomplish in his dismantling of democracy, but the pieces are in place for a more intelligent (which means able to read and synthesize information) person to finish destroying us. This is my takeaway and understanding, not an attempt to restate what Rosenthal says, so don't hold him responsible if you don't like my conclusion.
Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley.
Rosenthal's stated purpose in this book is to try to make the right wing populist movement more understandable to those not a part of it. In that goal he has succeeded quite well. There is not the over-the-top accusations of some other well-intentioned and, frankly, very accurate accounts. It isn't so much that the same things aren't mentioned here but rather that they are supported and explained so that they come out as results of putting the pieces together. To put another way, they explain what has and is happening (both historically and currently) then draw reasonable and logical conclusions. Those conclusions often resemble the accusations of other writers but here it is supported far better.
I was reading a section that highlights the similarities and differences between fascism (Mussolini) and what we have in the United States right now. Rosenthal shows that Trump is only one step away from being truly fascist as compared to progressing toward fascism, namely a militia to openly use terror and violence to keep opposition both legal and extralegal off balance. While reading this I was also reading reports of armed "Trump supporters" roaming streets and using violence to intimidate and even kill protesters. It would seem, then, that Trump's final piece is just about in place to legitimately be termed fascist.
I would recommend this to anyone in any country that is experiencing this dangerous shift to an extreme nationalism. For those appalled by the movement, this offers a historical and sociological explanation with examples drawn from events as recent as the COVID pandemic. This understanding should help you to better understand what is happening, why, and what may or may not work against it. For those who support the movement to the extreme right I think if you can read this with an open mind you might be better able to understand what you're supporting. You may not change your mind, but if you're only thinking about a couple aspects of the shift in making your decision you may come to see the bigger picture and come away less convinced that the extreme is the best place to be.
My single biggest takeaway, other than gaining a better understanding of what happened, is about what we must do. The left, and even the center, need to do more than just point out the destructive and unethical aspects of Trumpism. Those supporting him already know those things and are comfortable being unethical and immoral if it serves their emotional needs. We must put together policy ideas and programs to battle the foundational issues that drove so many to Trump. And we must do so before a capable authoritarian picks up where Trump will leave off, in some ways Trump's narcissism and ineptitude have capped what he will accomplish in his dismantling of democracy, but the pieces are in place for a more intelligent (which means able to read and synthesize information) person to finish destroying us. This is my takeaway and understanding, not an attempt to restate what Rosenthal says, so don't hold him responsible if you don't like my conclusion.
Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley.
November 23, 2020
"better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak out and remove all doubt."
I like to read books from both sides, because there are absolutely brilliant people with either perspective. However, this book was just a wad of propaganda mouthpiece idiocy. Zero truth in this book- even though he claims he’s “studied” the topic for a long time.. it’s all based on his feelings, and wildly divisive and a bitter collection of finger pointing and blaming the other side.
I like to read books from both sides, because there are absolutely brilliant people with either perspective. However, this book was just a wad of propaganda mouthpiece idiocy. Zero truth in this book- even though he claims he’s “studied” the topic for a long time.. it’s all based on his feelings, and wildly divisive and a bitter collection of finger pointing and blaming the other side.
June 8, 2026
Book Review: Empire of Resentment: Populism’s Toxic Embrace of Nationalism by Lawrence Rosenthal
Rating: ★★★★☆ (4.03 out of 5 stars)
Full review available here: https://prairiefoxreads.blogspot.com/...
Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All opinions and analyses presented below are completely my own and strictly unbiased.
Publication and Context
Title: Empire of Resentment: Populism’s Toxic Embrace of Nationalism
Author: Lawrence Rosenthal
Publication Date: September 8, 2020
Publisher: The New Press
Page Count: 305 pages
Format: Kindle Edition (ASIN: B07VPL2FTW / ISBN: 9781620975114)
Genres: Politics / Nonfiction / History / Sociology / Political Science
Contextual Backdrop:
Published in the highly charged autumn of 2020, right before a pivotal US presidential election, Empire of Resentment arrived at a flashpoint in modern democratic history. Lawrence Rosenthal, the founder of UC Berkeley’s Center for Right-Wing Studies, offers a scholarly yet urgent dissection of a global political phenomenon. Reading this book in 2026 provides a fascinating retrospective lens; Rosenthal’s analysis of the global “Nationalist International” remains incredibly prescient when examining the political trajectories of the US, Europe, and South America over the current decade.
Purpose and Themes of the Work
The core thesis of the book challenges the mainstream narrative that right-wing populism simply “emerged” in 2016. Instead, Rosenthal argues that it transformed. The defining theme is that modern right-wing populism is fundamentally a protean, ideologically flexible force fueled primarily by one psychological driver: resentment toward perceived cultural and political elites.
The purpose of Rosenthal’s work is to map this transformation. He seeks to explain how a movement can pivot from the libertarian, free-market obsessiveness of the Tea Party to the protectionist, anti-immigrant, ethno-nationalism of the Trump era, demonstrating that the connective tissue isn’t economic policy, but cultural grievance.
Summary of the Work
Over 305 pages, Rosenthal paints a vivid sociological and psychological portrait of the modern far-right. He traces the American populist migration from the Tea Party to Donald Trump’s “America First” nationalism, arguing that this pivot was the single most crucial factor in Trump’s 2016 victory.
Crucially, Rosenthal expands his lens beyond the United States. He examines how this is a transnational epidemic, using case studies like the UK’s Brexit vote and Italy’s Northern League—a party that successfully reinvented itself by shifting its ire from Southern Italians to international immigrants. The book meticulously details how this ideological flexibility has allowed right-wing populists to gain power in over a dozen countries. Finally, Rosenthal warns of the dangerous mainstreaming of once-fringe elements, like white supremacy, and posits that the survival of democratic politics relies on the left’s ability to mobilize a compelling, progressive counter-narrative.
Analysis and Evaluation
Format, Pacing, and Structure
As expected from a leading academic, the book is meticulously researched and structurally sound. Rosenthal divides the narrative logically, establishing the psychological framework of “resentment” before applying it to specific historical and global case studies. While it is an academic text rooted in political science and sociology, the pacing is accessible. It avoids overly dense jargon, making it readable for the layperson interested in global politics.
Subjects and Voices
Rosenthal writes with the cool, analytical authority of a seasoned sociologist. He does not rely on hyperbole; instead, he uses historical data, political tracking, and sociological theory to make his case. His ability to dissect the psychological motivations of voters—moving the conversation past the cliché of “economic anxiety” and into the realm of cultural identity and resentment—is the book’s most compelling feature.
Strengths and Limitations
Strengths: The book’s greatest strength is its global perspective. By linking the American political right to movements in Italy, the UK, and elsewhere, Rosenthal successfully proves that Trumpism is not an isolated American anomaly, but part of a calculated, global political strategy. His diagnosis of “resentment” as the unifying glue is brilliantly articulated.
Limitations: Because the book was published in late 2020, it inherently misses the seismic events that followed, such as the January 6th Capitol attack or the subsequent global elections of the mid-2020s. However, rather than rendering the book obsolete, these missing events actually serve as a testament to the accuracy of Rosenthal’s predictive framework.
Suitability and Audience Guidance
Content Considerations: Contains in-depth discussions of xenophobia, white supremacy, and political polarization.
Target Audience: Ideal for political junkies, students of sociology and history, and any reader trying to make sense of the ideological shifts in conservative politics over the last decade. It is highly recommended for those who appreciate data-driven, academic approaches to modern history.
Conclusion and Verdict
Empire of Resentment is a sobering, essential text for understanding the mechanics of modern populism. Lawrence Rosenthal masterfully dismantles the illusion that right-wing nationalism is driven by rigid policy goals, exposing it instead as a highly adaptable vehicle for cultural grievance. Unbiased by my receipt of a free copy, I can confidently say this is a sharply written, deeply researched book that remains a vital key to decoding the current global political era.
Supplementary Elements: Reading Companions
“What to Read Next”
For readers looking to further explore the sociological and historical roots of modern political divides:
Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right by Arlie Russell Hochschild – A perfect companion piece that dives deep into the deeply personal, emotional, and sociological drivers of the American right-wing voter.
How Democracies Die by Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt – An essential political science text that explores how modern democracies are dismantled not by military coups, but by the gradual erosion of norms by elected populists.
Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism by Anne Applebaum – A brilliant look at why some of the author’s own contemporaries in the global political elite have abandoned democratic ideals in favor of nationalist populism.
Rating: ★★★★ 4.03 / 5
- Prairie Fox 🦊📖
Rating: ★★★★☆ (4.03 out of 5 stars)
Full review available here: https://prairiefoxreads.blogspot.com/...
Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All opinions and analyses presented below are completely my own and strictly unbiased.
Publication and Context
Title: Empire of Resentment: Populism’s Toxic Embrace of Nationalism
Author: Lawrence Rosenthal
Publication Date: September 8, 2020
Publisher: The New Press
Page Count: 305 pages
Format: Kindle Edition (ASIN: B07VPL2FTW / ISBN: 9781620975114)
Genres: Politics / Nonfiction / History / Sociology / Political Science
Contextual Backdrop:
Published in the highly charged autumn of 2020, right before a pivotal US presidential election, Empire of Resentment arrived at a flashpoint in modern democratic history. Lawrence Rosenthal, the founder of UC Berkeley’s Center for Right-Wing Studies, offers a scholarly yet urgent dissection of a global political phenomenon. Reading this book in 2026 provides a fascinating retrospective lens; Rosenthal’s analysis of the global “Nationalist International” remains incredibly prescient when examining the political trajectories of the US, Europe, and South America over the current decade.
Purpose and Themes of the Work
The core thesis of the book challenges the mainstream narrative that right-wing populism simply “emerged” in 2016. Instead, Rosenthal argues that it transformed. The defining theme is that modern right-wing populism is fundamentally a protean, ideologically flexible force fueled primarily by one psychological driver: resentment toward perceived cultural and political elites.
The purpose of Rosenthal’s work is to map this transformation. He seeks to explain how a movement can pivot from the libertarian, free-market obsessiveness of the Tea Party to the protectionist, anti-immigrant, ethno-nationalism of the Trump era, demonstrating that the connective tissue isn’t economic policy, but cultural grievance.
Summary of the Work
Over 305 pages, Rosenthal paints a vivid sociological and psychological portrait of the modern far-right. He traces the American populist migration from the Tea Party to Donald Trump’s “America First” nationalism, arguing that this pivot was the single most crucial factor in Trump’s 2016 victory.
Crucially, Rosenthal expands his lens beyond the United States. He examines how this is a transnational epidemic, using case studies like the UK’s Brexit vote and Italy’s Northern League—a party that successfully reinvented itself by shifting its ire from Southern Italians to international immigrants. The book meticulously details how this ideological flexibility has allowed right-wing populists to gain power in over a dozen countries. Finally, Rosenthal warns of the dangerous mainstreaming of once-fringe elements, like white supremacy, and posits that the survival of democratic politics relies on the left’s ability to mobilize a compelling, progressive counter-narrative.
Analysis and Evaluation
Format, Pacing, and Structure
As expected from a leading academic, the book is meticulously researched and structurally sound. Rosenthal divides the narrative logically, establishing the psychological framework of “resentment” before applying it to specific historical and global case studies. While it is an academic text rooted in political science and sociology, the pacing is accessible. It avoids overly dense jargon, making it readable for the layperson interested in global politics.
Subjects and Voices
Rosenthal writes with the cool, analytical authority of a seasoned sociologist. He does not rely on hyperbole; instead, he uses historical data, political tracking, and sociological theory to make his case. His ability to dissect the psychological motivations of voters—moving the conversation past the cliché of “economic anxiety” and into the realm of cultural identity and resentment—is the book’s most compelling feature.
Strengths and Limitations
Strengths: The book’s greatest strength is its global perspective. By linking the American political right to movements in Italy, the UK, and elsewhere, Rosenthal successfully proves that Trumpism is not an isolated American anomaly, but part of a calculated, global political strategy. His diagnosis of “resentment” as the unifying glue is brilliantly articulated.
Limitations: Because the book was published in late 2020, it inherently misses the seismic events that followed, such as the January 6th Capitol attack or the subsequent global elections of the mid-2020s. However, rather than rendering the book obsolete, these missing events actually serve as a testament to the accuracy of Rosenthal’s predictive framework.
Suitability and Audience Guidance
Content Considerations: Contains in-depth discussions of xenophobia, white supremacy, and political polarization.
Target Audience: Ideal for political junkies, students of sociology and history, and any reader trying to make sense of the ideological shifts in conservative politics over the last decade. It is highly recommended for those who appreciate data-driven, academic approaches to modern history.
Conclusion and Verdict
Empire of Resentment is a sobering, essential text for understanding the mechanics of modern populism. Lawrence Rosenthal masterfully dismantles the illusion that right-wing nationalism is driven by rigid policy goals, exposing it instead as a highly adaptable vehicle for cultural grievance. Unbiased by my receipt of a free copy, I can confidently say this is a sharply written, deeply researched book that remains a vital key to decoding the current global political era.
Supplementary Elements: Reading Companions
“What to Read Next”
For readers looking to further explore the sociological and historical roots of modern political divides:
Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right by Arlie Russell Hochschild – A perfect companion piece that dives deep into the deeply personal, emotional, and sociological drivers of the American right-wing voter.
How Democracies Die by Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt – An essential political science text that explores how modern democracies are dismantled not by military coups, but by the gradual erosion of norms by elected populists.
Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism by Anne Applebaum – A brilliant look at why some of the author’s own contemporaries in the global political elite have abandoned democratic ideals in favor of nationalist populism.
Rating: ★★★★ 4.03 / 5
- Prairie Fox 🦊📖
November 21, 2021
Understanding the modern history of the Republican Party and the various factions that make it up is key to understanding the Trump phenomenon, as well as liberals' response to it. Rosenthal analyzes each in a serious way that most others tend to oversimplify.
Empire of Resentment is fun to read for addressing such consequential issues. I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to know more about the political and cultural forces that are shaping the country today.
Empire of Resentment is fun to read for addressing such consequential issues. I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to know more about the political and cultural forces that are shaping the country today.
June 12, 2021
Rosenthal does a good job of explaining how the wave of nationalism stoked by Trump and right wing media brought Trump into power. Rosenrhal’s take on the devolving Republican Party through its embrace of nationalism is striking and explains much of our divided country.
December 8, 2020
Straight-forward, extremely informative and insightful, and not too difficult to read.
April 26, 2025
A journey through the origins and dynamics of the (mostly) American urge for a populist dictatorship and many of its sad and tawdry entanglement with racism
June 24, 2026
Reading Empire of Resentment is like watching a slow-motion car crash you already knew was coming. Rosenthal holds a mirror to the simmering rage I've witnessed in family, friends, and colleagues over the past decade uncomfortable, jarring, and absolutely essential.
What makes this book devastatingly brilliant is how it dissects the soul of a movement, tracing the Tea Party's economic grievances into Trump-era xenophobic nationalism. It's a masterclass in political anatomy, exposing the cultural resentment elites have failed to understand.
This isn't just for academics. It's for anyone desperate to understand our current reality, for concerned citizens who want to see beyond the noise and grasp the architecture of the populist wave engulfing the world 👀.
It left me deeply unsettled but clearer than ever. It forced me to confront uncomfortable truths, and for that, I am grateful 🙏. If you want to understand where we are and where we're going, read this book. Essential. Mind-opening. Unforgettable 🔥🧠.
What makes this book devastatingly brilliant is how it dissects the soul of a movement, tracing the Tea Party's economic grievances into Trump-era xenophobic nationalism. It's a masterclass in political anatomy, exposing the cultural resentment elites have failed to understand.
This isn't just for academics. It's for anyone desperate to understand our current reality, for concerned citizens who want to see beyond the noise and grasp the architecture of the populist wave engulfing the world 👀.
It left me deeply unsettled but clearer than ever. It forced me to confront uncomfortable truths, and for that, I am grateful 🙏. If you want to understand where we are and where we're going, read this book. Essential. Mind-opening. Unforgettable 🔥🧠.
November 8, 2022
This was okay--short, at least, and moderately organized. But there are better books on the topic out there, and I suspect that Rosenthal got the book contract because of his position at a research center, rather than his skill as an author. Caveas. My latin might not be the best.
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