Trumpist Movement and the Radicalization Process

Interesting and well-argued. Published on the eve of the election, seems chillingly prophetic in retrospect

https://lawfareblog.com/cve-white-people-trumpist-movement-and-radicalization-process

...."Here’s a different frame with which to think about the Trump movement: We have a vigorous academic literature on the issue of radicalism and radicalization, some of which overlaps with the burgeoning scholarship on countering violent extremism. With five days left before Americans finish voting, we want to pose the question of what this literature has to teach about the Trump movement.
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But here’s what we are saying: Trumpism, like the Brotherhood, is a political movement built on the mass mobilization of faith—in the one case religious faith and in the other case faith in a single charismatic individual. Like the Brotherhood, it is a movement that exists within an electoral system but which has a deeply ambivalent relationship with the democratic norms of that system, a movement which both formally rejects violence yet manages also to tolerate or encourage it. Recall that less than a week ago, Trump declared that “we should just cancel the election and just give it to Trump” and has suggested he will concede the election only if he “wins.”

And at the fringes of both movements are radicals, some of whom are violent. The line between the Brotherhood and certain ultra-conservative Salafist and even violent Islamist groups in Egypt is a somewhat fuzzy one. This is more similar to than different from the Trump campaign which has, and often cheerfully accepts, the overt support of domestic white supremacists and members of the so-called “alt-right” movement—essentially white supremacy with a sheen of pseudo-intellectualism and a gleefully nihilist rejection of democracy in favor of authoritarian leadership. The most overt example of this is Trump’s connection to Breitbart, which Trump campaign CEO and on-leave Breitbartchairman Steve Bannon has called “the platform for the alt-right.” Prominent white supremacist and alt-right “founder” Richard Spencer has given severalinterviews expressing his delight at the prospect of a Trump presidency and at the new prominence his movement has received thanks to the campaign. He recently declared, “If you wear a Trump hat in many places, you might as well be wearing a swastika.” Former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke has professed himself“Trump’s most loyal advocate.” Trump’s disavowal of such supports has been occasional—and equivocal.

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There’s a simple measure for whether our basic theory here is, in a general sense, right: If it is, we will see a significant spike in white supremacist violence over the next few years. The Trump campaign has provided a baseline undemocratic ideation to hundreds of millions of people and also provided a platform through which extremists, both violent and non-violent, can recruit and cultivate. If our collective understanding of the process of violent radicalization is correct, the result will be blood."