Right-wing populists around the world have supported Dutch farmers’ protests. They use them as fuel for their agenda against globalization and climate policy.
– We support the Dutch farmers who fight bravely for their freedom, the former US president Donald Trump said at a campaign rally in Arizona last week.
He referred to the farmers’ protests in Holland, which have been going on for a long time and have turned violent in some places, which has previously reported on.
The leader of the French right-wing populist party, the National Front, Marine Le Pen took a stand on the matter on Twitter.
– I support Dutch farmers! Le Pen wrote on paper in Dutch in a video attached to the tweet.
Why in the world is the domestic political question that has stirred the Netherlands all summer interesting even to populist leaders in France and the United States?
Farmers’ protests have become a symbol of climate policy opponents
In the Netherlands, farmers oppose the government’s intention to limit agricultural nitrogen emissions. In practice, the emission requirements are so drastic and fast that many farms have to close their operations completely.
It is the closing of facilities that is a powerful symbol that right-wing populists have adopted.
– They want half of your cattle away. You are next! Trump told supporters in Arizona.
In reality, according to the Dutch government’s plan, livestock farming should be reduced by about 30 percent.
However, it is not a significant difference in terms of the message. Farms are planned to be closed and livestock to be reduced.
Although the decision is not directly related to climate policy, its opponents have bound the decision as part of it.
Their message is clear: This is what climate policy really means. Small people’s farms are taken away.
– We oppose climate fanatics, Trump emphasized in his speech.
Protests are used in conspiracy theories
When farmers’ protests took off in Holland in the early summer, several far-right alternative media, especially from the United States and Canada, immediately traveled to the scene.
They told the story of the struggle between ordinary citizens and a corrupt global elite.
The messages spread quickly in the networks of the nationalist far-right, which are the radicalism researcher at Leiden University by Jelle van Buuren including internationalized in recent years.
The networks have actively referred to the so-called “The Great Reset” conspiracy theory. The theory takes its name from the book of the same name written by Klaus Schwab, the founder of the World Economic Forum.
Schwab argued in his book in 2020 that the corona pandemic would provide an opportunity for the structural economic reforms that would be needed to curb climate change.
Conspiracy theorists claim that Schwab and the World Economic Forum actually orchestrated the corona pandemic so that they could speed up the Great Reset.
According to conspiracy theorists, the goal of the World Economic Forum is to nationalize all people’s property under the guise of climate policy.
– Now that Corona has moved to the background, farmers have taken its place, radicalism researcher van Buuren says (you switch to another service) For the Dutch public broadcaster NOS.
Conspiracy theorists claim that behind the law limiting farmers’ nitrogen emissions is actually the World Economic Forum, which wants to confiscate farmers’ farms.
The alliance between the far-right and the farmers is loose
In Holland, the conspiracy theory of the great reset has been spread especially by the extreme right-wing Forum voor Democratie FvD party, which received about five percent of the votes in the last parliamentary elections.
Party chairman Thierry Baudet claimed that even a war of aggression against Russia would be about the West’s desire to carry out a major reset.
– First there were two years of the corona scam, and now we have the Russia scam, Baudet said (you switch to another service) in a parliamentary session just days after the large-scale attack began.
Baudet has also actively supported farmers’ protests. It does not mean that even the most radical farmers will automatically become FvD supporters.
Many of them reject the anti-globalization and anti-EU agenda of the FvD and other far-right parties.
In terms of money, the Netherlands is the world’s second largest exporter of agricultural products after the United States, and farmers get most of their income specifically from exports. In addition, EU agricultural subsidies are an important source of income for many.
Bad politics behind the protests
In the Netherlands, the nitrogen problem has been known for a long time.
Emissions acidify the soil, which can become unfit for cultivation over time. In addition, they cause damage to Natura 2000 nature reserves, which the Netherlands must protect under EU legislation.
Already in 2015, the Dutch government, led by the current center-right main government party VVD, decided to reduce nitrogen emissions.
Among other things, farmers were encouraged to make expensive investments that would help with emission reductions.
However, they did not produce results. In 2019, the Dutch Supreme Court ruled that the country’s government had acted insufficiently.
After that, the government made a complete turnaround. It decided on drastic emission reductions and reduction of livestock farming.
Farmers have been furious. They feel that they have been ignored by the government.
Inflation and low income levels that plague farmers give more fuel to the protests. Dutch Audit Office by (you switch to another service) 36 percent of farmers Earn less than the country’s minimum wage. The country’s inflation is among the highest in Europe.
The Dutch government has tried to calm the situation by appointing a mediator. However, farmers see the mediator as biased and have continued to protest.
Confidence in the administration is also not improved by the fact that the Dutch police shot a 16-year-old protester driving a tractor in July.
According to the police, the situation was threatening. However, the prosecutor suspects that the police did not have a justified reason for the shooting.
The protests have become something of a yellow vest phenomenon in Holland.