Orwell’s anticipation of the ‘nationalism’ of Donald Trump

OTTAWA—Donald Trump has now passed the threshold where he has enough delegate support to assure him the Republican nomination for president. This development has intensified discussion about where Trump and his supporters fall on the political spectrum. Robert Kagan of the Brookings Institution wrote an op-ed article, “This is How Fascism comes to America," for The Washington Post this month, which sees parallels between Trump and his supporters and the movements of Hitler and Mussolini. Stanley Payne, a professor emeritus at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, is less alarmist, describing the Trump phenomenon as “right-wing populist nationalism.” Payne’s label is one Trump himself would probably accept. His main campaign slogan, “Make America Great Again” clearly appeals to nationalist emotions as does his nativist rhetoric, rejection of international trade agreements and mix of bellicose and neo-isolationist foreign policy. But the most important features of the kind of “nationalism” Trump and his followers exemplify were anticipated and warned against over 70 years ago by George Orwell in his 1945 essay, “Notes on Nationalism.” Orwell defined “nationalism” in a wider sense than its usual meaning of devotion to a particular nation state. For him it was an approach to politics which may be in support of or opposition to any power unit. This definition is particularly relevant for analyzing Trump, whose nationalist impulses are focused less on the U.S. than on his own cult of leadership. Orwell states that the three defining characteristics of the type of nationalist thought he is criticizing are obsession, instability, and indifference to reality. Its adherents think “solely, or mainly, in terms of competitive prestige,” and their “thoughts always turn on victories, defeats, triumphs, and humiliations.” Anyone who has watched and listened to Trump since he declared his candidacy will find this a remarkably accurate anticipation of the character and style of his campaign. He is obsessed with the idea that he alone is smart and tough enough to make America great again, while all his rivals and any critics are weak, stupid, corrupt, or all three. The instability in what he stands for is amply illustrated by comparing his platform when he briefly sought the Reform Party nomination in 2000 and what he stands for today. In 2000, he supported universal health insurance, a ban on assault weapons, and abortion rights, although expressing concern about late-term abortions. His 2016 campaign takes the polar opposite position on all these issues to bring them into line with Republican orthodoxy. In 2000, he denounced his right-wing rivals for the Reform nomination, David Duke and Pat Buchanan, as “Hitler lovers.” In 2016, he only very reluctantly disavowed support from Duke and was prepared to put another outspoken white supremacist on his list of delegates in the California primary until the man’s views were exposed by the media. What has remained constant is Trump’s own certainty that he alone has the solution to America’s problems. His solutions have changed radically and they may change radically again. As Orwell observed, for the nationalist, “Actions are held to be good or bad, not on their own merits, but according to who does them.” For Trump, policies are neither good nor bad on their merits but according to whether he supports them or not. Finally, Trump is indifferent to reality. He has shown himself willing to accept as true any story which supports his claims or puts his opponents in a bad light without any attempt to verify its accuracy. Throughout his campaign independent fact checkers have found over twice as many distortions, inaccuracies and outright lies in what he says as for any other candidate. Of course, most politicians play fast and loose with the truth on occasion, but Trump has done so on a scale that dwarfs that of any other candidate in this or any prior election. Moreover, when his false claims are exposed, he keeps right on repeating them without shame or apology. One might wonder how his supporters square this indifference to the facts with their claim that he is the candidate “who tells it like it is.” Orwell, however, would not have been surprised. He pointed out that devoted nationalists do not look to their leaders “for an appraisal of the facts, but for the stimulation of nationalist loyalties.” Trump may not know or care what the truth is, but he understands what his supporters want to hear and who they see as their enemies. They do not want someone who will tell them where they are wrong. They want someone who champions their causes unreservedly and claims to have the street smarts and ruthlessness to bring them victory and humiliate their foes. Trump’s disdain for international treaty obligations, his willingness to use torture and his no-holds-barred rhetoric and tactics, far from causing them concern, affirm for them that he is the leader they have been looking for. What Trump is selling his supporters is fantasies of power. All that is required to make these fantasies come true is a leader, like him, strong enough, tough enough and smart enough to forcefully assert American interests. In the face of such a leader, and all their enemies will capitulate and all their problems will be solved. Trump’s flaunting of his supposed sexual prowess is of a piece with this. His power fantasies are like adolescent masturbation fantasies where the person we desire always welcomes our sexual advances, if these are made forcefully enough to demonstrate our potency. “Some nationalists,” Orwell observes in words that well describe many of Trump’s supporters, “are not far from schizophrenia, living quite happily amid dreams of power and conquest which have no connection with the physical world.…As soon as fear, hatred, jealousy and power worship are involved, the sense of reality becomes unhinged. And… the sense of right and wrong becomes unhinged also. There is no crime, absolutely none, that cannot be condoned when ‘our’ side commits it.” Trump is not a fascist. He has not adopted a totalitarian ideology, denounced democracy or yet organized groups of thugs like Hitler’s brownshirts to beat up his opponents. But he clearly espouses and believes in the kind of “nationalist” thinking Orwell warned against over 70 years ago: a “power hunger, tempered by self-deception.” The endorsement of Trump, and with him the warped and dangerous outlook he represents, by so many of those in the Republican Party who opposed him in the primaries is a sad commentary on how much their hatred and fear of Hillary Clinton and the Democrats has unhinged their ability to see where the true danger to the Republic lies in the coming election. The Hill Times