How does the far-right French party Front National (FN) frame terrorist attacks in their attempt to justify its anti-immigrant agenda? In a new paper, published in the journal Nations and Nationalism, CUNY political scientist Rachel D. Hutchins and Daphne Halikiopoulou from the University of Reading (UK) show that the FN has switched to arguments about cultural and political-civic differences in order to cast terrorist as outsiders that threaten French liberties. In contrast to this, older documents from the FN ethno‐racial as well as economic frames in addition to cultural and political-civic ones.
As the authors explain, far-right parties face an incentive to tone down their rhetoric, because “the most electorally successful far‐right parties in Western Europe are those that are able to build mainstream support by avoiding overtly racist language.” (p.3). Against this backdrop, the FN publications “consistently place [terrorism] within the nationalism framework, connecting security, nationalism, and immigration.” (p. 10). This focus on a nationalist narrative that pits immigrants against “native” citizens re-frames immigration as an issue of assimilation. The “immigration problem” is, then, created by immigrants who are unwilling or unable to adapt. This is a departure from older, more biologically racialized frames and also presents an opportunity for far-right actors to cast second- or third-generation immigrants as “others”.