Supremacism and the Radical Right in Canada

Session of the seminar Racism and Anti-Semitism: global, national and local perspectives with Brieg Capitaine.

Based on a thematic content analysis of the websites and facebook accounts of seven white supremacist groups and the radical right in Canada, this research identifies the objects of hatred and attachment of these actors and looks at how whose latter mobilize the symbolic codes of the civil sphere to defile certain institutions (media, justice, parliament) or certain groups (elites, religious or gender minorities) and thus strengthen the contours of what a “good” society would be. These movements and actors are often dismissed outside the civil sphere and reduced to a pathology of the social system. However, these movements do not rotate in an independent orbit. They produce symbols and use communication institutions to disseminate their representations of good and evil through videos, images or speeches. By simply qualifying these movements as deviant or dysfunction of the social system, we prevent ourselves from understanding the role of evil in the production of society and in the maintenance of morals.

Brieg Capitaine holds a PhD in sociology from the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (Paris). Following a SSHRC postdoctoral fellowship at McGill University, he is now Professor of Sociology at the School of Sociological and Anthropological Studies of the University of Ottawa. He is also co-director of Participation and Citizenship research axis at the Centre of Interdisciplinary Research on Citizenship and minorities (CIRCEM) at the University of Ottawa. He has published many journal articles and book chapters on Indigenous movements, violence, racism and the politics of recognition. He is the co-editor with Geoffrey Pleyers of the book Mouvements sociaux au XXIe siècle. Quand le sujet devient acteur (Éditions des Maisons des sciences de l’Homme, Paris, 2016). He is also co-editor with Karine Vanthuyne of the book Re-Storying Indian Residential Schools in Canada (University of British Columbia Press).