Everyday transnationalism of the far right: an interdisciplinary study of Polish immigrants' participation in far-right groups in Britain

作为2004年欧盟扩大的结果，超过一百万波兰人移居英国，在英国几乎每个城镇都建立了波兰人社区。尽管已经有大量的研究调查了现在英国最大的少数民族之一，但对他们的政治活动的研究仍然缺乏。此外，有令人担忧的迹象表明，极右翼意识形态和团体在波兰移民中越来越受欢迎。媒体、监督激进化的非政府组织，以及波兰社区本身，都报导了这个问题，他们绝大多数都不愿将极右翼意识形态合法化。这一趋势也引起了英国当局的兴趣，因为波兰移民在英国犯下的种族暴力行为明显增加。再加上波兰极右翼势力的影响力日益增强，很明显，我们正在目睹一种新的极右翼政治跨国化，不仅表现在不同民族群体之间的跨国联系上，还表现在欧洲移民被接收国由当地居民经营的极右翼团体所吸引。此外，许多波兰政党和组织在英国很活跃，其中一些与当地政党结成联盟。例如，居住在威尔士的一位著名的波兰极右翼活动家也是英国独立党2021年地方选举的候选人。该项目是对这一新现象的开创性、冒险性和创新性研究，结合了民族志、定性方法和话语和意识形态分析的政治科学工具。在英国的六个地点，我们将对这些组织的公共活动、仪式和集会进行观察。我们将对这些团体的成员进行半结构化的采访，并采访他们的英国同事和波兰的一些成员。除此之外，我们还将对他们的书面交流进行话语分析——宣言、小册子、博客、歌曲、政治宣言等等。我们的目标是探索人们的移民激进化轨迹，他们加入极右翼团体的原因，他们的激进主义在多大程度上是由他们的移民历史输入或刺激的，以及他们如何理解他们作为移民、欧洲白人、英国人和/或波兰人的极右翼思想。该项目还将探索英国地方作为激进刺激因素的程度。我们将特别分析英国和波兰极右翼团体之间的知识、实践和人员交流。由于极右翼民粹主义的兴起，该项目的出发点是，作为希望了解意识形态背后的人的民族志学家，而不是作为遥远的外部观察者，对实地现象进行研究是至关重要的。因此，该项目的首要目标是了解以预防和减轻。我们认为，为了设计教育和政策工具，防止人们被极右翼言论所吸引，或根据极右翼思想采取行动，与极右翼团体成员接触、交谈、理解和智力参与是至关重要的。因此，这项研究在当地和国际上都具有明显的社会影响。该项目将在用户群体中传播研究结果，如：国家机构、政治决策者以及波兰当地社区，他们会发现这些知识在试图理解和解决本项目所研究的现象时很有用。

As a consequence of EU enlargement in 2004 over one million Polish nationals have moved to the UK, creating Polish communities in almost every British town. Although there has been a significant amount of research looking into what is now one of the biggest British ethnic minorities, research into their political activism is still lacking. Furthermore, there are worrying signs of growth in popularity of far-right ideologies and groups among Polish immigrants. This issue has been reported by the media, NGOs monitoring radicalisation and Polish communities themselves who in vast majority refrain from legitimizing far-right ideologies. The trend has also attracted the interest of the British authorities due to an observable increase in racially aggravated acts of violence perpetrated by Polish immigrants in the UK. Coupled with growing influence of the far right in Poland, it is clear that we are witnessing a new kind of transnationalisation of far-right politics not just in terms of transnational connections between distinct national groups, but in terms of immigrants from Europe being attracted to far-right groups in receiving countries, run by host local populations. In addition, many Polish political parties and organisations are active in the UK, some of them forming alliances with local political parties. For example, a well-known Polish far-right activist living in Wales was also a candidate in 2021 local elections on behalf of UKIP.This project is a pioneering, risky and innovative study of this new phenomenon using a combination of ethnographic, qualitative methods and political science tools of discourse and ideology analysis. In six locations in Britain we will carry out observations of public events, rituals and gatherings of these organisations. We will conduct semi-structured interviews with members of these groups, as well as interviewing their British colleagues, and some members in Poland. Alongside this, we will conduct discourse analysis of their written communication - manifestos, pamphlets, blogs, songs, political declarations and so on.We aim to explore the migration-radicalisation trajectory of people, their reasons to join far-right groups, the extent to which their activism was imported or stimulated by their migration history, and how they make sense of their far-right ideas as migrants, white Europeans, Brits and/or Poles. The project will also explore the extent to which British localities have acted as radicalisation stimuli. In particular we will analyse the intellectual, practical and personnel exchanges between the British and the Polish far-right groups.Due to rise of far-right populism the project's departing assumption is that it is vital to examine the phenomena on the ground not as distant and external observers but as ethnographers who wish to understand the person behind the ideology. The overarching objective of this project is therefore to understand in order to prevent and mitigate. We believe it is crucial to approach, talk to, understand and intellectually engage members of far-right groups in order to design educational and policy tools to prevent people from being attracted by far-right discourse or acting upon far-right ideas. This research thus has clear social impact, both locally and internationally. This project will disseminate the findings among user groups such as: state institutions, and political decision-makers as well as local Polish communities that will find this knowledge useful when attempting to understand and address the phenomena examined by this project.