Search

Popülizm kavramı 1990’lardan itibaren Avrupa’da siyasal düzeni etkisi altına aldı ve günümüz itibariyle popülist partiler hatırı sayılır oy oranlarına ulaşmış durumdalar. Yabancı düşmanlığı, ırkçılık, yolsuzluk, işsizlik ve diğer dinlere olan müsamahasızlık olarak ortaya çıkan popülizm sadece aşırı-sağda değil aşırı- solda da taban bulmaktadır. Popülist partilerin yükselmesi Avrupa Birliği (AB) için de tehdit oluşturmakta ve uzun vadede birliğin çözülme ihtimalini akıllara getirmektedir. Nitekim İngiltere’nin AB’den ayrılmasında popülist partilerin rolü büyüktür. Avrupalı popülist partiler içinde en farklı olanı Hollanda merkezli Parti Võro de Vrijheid (PVV)’dir. Geert Wilders’in başkanı ve tek üyesi olduğu PVV’nin en önemli farkı Yahudi karşıtlığı yapmaması ve Yahudi lobilerinden ve İsrail’den finansal destek almasıdır. PVV ırkçı bir parti olmakla birlikte yabancı düşmanlığında seçici davranmaktadır. Parti bilhassa İslam’a düşmanlık beslemekte ve aleyhte kampanyalar düzenlemektedir. Bu çalışma Avrupa’daki popülist partiler hakkında özel bilgiler vermesinin yanı sıra PVV’nin kendine münhasır özelliklerini ve parti başkanı Geert Wilders’in siyaset ve ırkçılık üzerindeki etkisini ortaya çıkarmayı amaçlamaktadır. The term “Populism” has affected political order in Europe since 1990s and populist parties get condereable number of votes in current period. Appearing as xenophobia, racism, corruption, unemployment, and intolerance to other religions, populism has gained base not only in far-right but also in far-left. The rise of populist parties is also a threat to the European Union (EU) and bring into minds the possibility of dissolution of the Union in the long-term. Thus, the role of populist parties had great impact on Brexit. Among all European populist parties, the Netherlands based Partij voor de Vrijheid (PVV) is the most different one. PVV, whose president and the only member is Geert Wilders, is disctinctive as it is not anti-semitist and gets financial help from Jewish lobby and Israel. Though being a racist party, PVV is selective in xenophobia. The party is particularly hostile to Islam and organizes anti-Islamist campaigns. This study, besides providing special information about European populist parties, aims to reveal PVV’s unique characteristics and party leader Geert Wilders’ impact on politics and racism.

The paper approaches the rise of far right populism in Europe with a feminist lens and on the background of the discursively constructed sexist and racist features of the current moral panic debate. It is argued that we can follow up a continuum of normalised culturalist gendered discourses in Europe, and in the Netherlands in particular, for some time. The paper is organised by looking, first, at the place of gender in far right discourses and the role of women in far right wing populist parties. Second, a feminist critique of processes of normalisation is presented helping to clarify the term ‘culturalism’. To illustrate the dynamics of gendered culturalism and the way it impacts the everyday life of Muslim women in the Netherlands, some interview sequences of an empirical study (2012) with female Dutch-Moroccan citizens are discussed. The experiences of the women illustrate how far right populist perspectives and prejudices entered their daily lives, and which counter strategies, the women used to resist intimidations. The paper concludes that foremost the Dutch far right and the PVV party leader, Geert Wilders, were successful in normalising gendered culturalist views about Muslim minority women vis-a-vis a ‘pseudo-emancipatory’ nativist claim of cultural superiority with respect to majority women (and men) in liberal European societies.