White Skin, Black Fuel: On the Danger of Fossil Fascism by Andreas Malm

White Skin, Black Fuel: On the Danger of Fossil Fascism Reviews

• 
  lindsi

  The first half of the book contains too many chapters devoted to the minutiae of contemporary European politics without tying them to larger geopolitical trends or meaning, but the theory and history portions of this work are fantastic. I learned a lot of new vocabulary with which to discuss capital accumulation and I found the chapter explaining fascism as a historical force particularly insightful. Overall, very worth the read.
• 
  Malcolm

  We really shouldn’t have to look too hard to find the hard right, neo- and not-so-neo-fascists in the coal shed or gas tank. Much of the fossil fuel industry – coal and oil – have been very open about their funding of and other support to politicians such as Trump, Bolsanaro and the like who channel and provide voice to those reactionary tendencies. Elsewhere (think Poland and Germany) these extreme right forces, including those in government, latch on to coal and along with the oil industry types push the agenda and rhetoric of energy sovereignty. Yet many of us don’t necessarily link that language of energy sovereignty in any clear way to the other rhetorics of nationalism – the ‘race purity’, white supremacy and anti-immigrant claims of the radical right. These links are exactly those that are made in this richly crafted and powerful piece of work that surveys much of the right in Europe and the Americas.
  
  Structured in two parts the case is clear: first, there is a survey of the emergence of this hard right alliance between nationalism, processes of fascisation, what the authors call fossil capitalism – that is both the extractive industries and those whose very existence depends on fossil fuels (recognising the difference between those fractions also), and the growing power of electoral and non-electoral political formations –although most of the focus is on electoral groups (in Hungary, for instance, Fidesz, not Jobbik, in Germany AfD not PEGIDA). The second section then explores these alliances through a reading of 20th century fascism (principally the ideologies and practices of Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy) and other hard right nationalisms, of the kind seen in Henry Ford and Charles Lindberg.
  
  The first section is more expansive with considerable discussion of not just of fascistic parties such as The Finns, Rassemblement National (the Le Pen platform after the FN), UKIP, Sweden Democrats, AfD and the like, as well as other forces that seem to adopt their language, such as the anti-immigrant practices of Denmark’s Social Democrats. This is alongside the focus on those hard right forces in government (Lega Nord in Italy, Poland’s PiD, Vox in Spain, the Tories in the UK, and of course Trump and Bolsanaro – the exploration extends beyond Europe to the USA and Brazil). The second section narrows the geographic sweep but broadens the conceptual and analytical frame making good use of a diverse set of theorists and analysts.
  
  There are several very real strengths in the book. First, it is collectively written – listing 21 authors, plus Malm as having ‘coordinated the writing’. This approach means that there is an extensive reach and deep engagement with multi-lingual sources and local conditions, while Malm seems to have been able to develop a relatively coherent voice across the collective. Second, it treats its readers as smart – the authors assume that we can ‘get’ the big and complex ideas, but also recognise that these things take time – so the conceptual stuff is developed in stages. A common approach is the outline a conceptual or theoretical point, and then further explore and test that point to refine and develop – it’s a kind of theorisation by stealth and it works well (many of the rest of us in academia could learn a lot from this approach!) and develops rather than ‘tests’ theory and concepts.
  
  Third, and related to #2, it is willing to be conditional, of the ‘this is what we know now’ kind while noting that circumstances might change and not imposing a single model. This allows them to be quite open about contradictory and countervailing tendencies such that while they reject the legitimacy of nationalist responses (the evisceration of Green Nationalism is a delight) they also recognise widely divergent nation and nationalist approaches and practices. Four, this means that they recognise the distinctions between climate change denial and capitalist climate governance while still being able to criticise both. Finally, there is a careful retheorisation of recent notions of fascism not as an overthrow of the state but of the seizure of the state from within.
  
  But it’s this final point that I am left pondering as it relates to capitalist climate governance and the place of increasingly ineffectual attempts at management of this existential crisis, and how that affects and effects class fractions as the crisis of legitimacy that lies at the heart of this fascisation plays out.
  
  In these I have barely scratched the surface of this rich, nuanced, sharp and compelling analysis, especially the careful crafting of the notion of an Ideological State Apparatus the lies across all manner of institutions and practices, made more complex by the development of privatised spaces for state-supporting ideological work to a much greater extent than when Althusser popularised the notion of the ISA 50 years ago. Even more, I like the notion the develop (drawing on Cas Mudde) that the reach of this ISA is leading to a pathological normalisation of these fascistic tendencies, rather than seeing those tendencies as a normal pathology.
  
  This, then, is a big sprawling book – not because it is loose but because it is doing vital work linking tendencies often seen as discrete and building a transnational analysis drawing out commonalities and distinctiveness while also highlighting a class fraction whose interests are served and challenging us rethink conceptions of historic and contemporary fascism. I am also looking forward to what analysts of tendencies to fascisation in states such as India and Turkey do with these ideas. There is much to quibble with here, as we’d expect such a case, but the overall model and approach is compelling.
• 
  Kai

  comprehensive and at many points compelling analysis of the numerous historical, practical, and potential intersections between the far right, fossil fuels, and (anti-)ecological politics. this extensive analysis is written by Andreas Malm and the Zetkin Collective, a group of scholars, students, and activists who are researching these relationships. I have met a few members of the Zetkin Collective, and participated in one of the conferences that resulted in this book, so I was waiting for it for some time. (as an authorial note, it feels sort of like the group might have wanted the book to be solely collectively authored, but the former's name recognition required the awkward co-authorship for marketing purposes. nonetheless, if you've read any of Malm's other books, the writing style and tone is essentially the same).
  
  The book consists of a survey of major statements and potential policy goals of far-right parties in several European countries, as well as Brazil and the United States. This includes somewhat exhaustive analyses of denialism, border violence and scapegoating of refugees, updated malthusian theories of 'great replacement', the possibility of green nationalism, and historic analyses of Naziism. Analytically, the book takes a somewhat marxist perspective, influenced primarily by the Frankfurt school and Adorno in particular, with an Althusserian ISA sort of analysis as well. the sharpness of this conceptual toolkit comes out the clearest when discussing the far right in psychoanalytic terms, while its bluntness appears in the sparseness of class analysis.
  
  as mentioned above, large chunks of the book are deeply compelling. but this is not a quick read, and its style is somewhat odd. presented as an inductive analysis, one is not given an introduction or allowed to stray from the book's 508 page arc (plus Coda plus pandemic afterword). preliminary conclusions are made in early chapters which are substantially modified later. and the chapters are not broken up into readable chunks; each tends to be around 70 pages. summary and roadmapping could have done a lot to cut down the book to a more manageable load--a move that IMO would seem pretty important for garnering the wider readership on the Verso adjacent left that this topic deserves.
  
  i have just two major disagreements. first and more briefly, the limited geographical focus leads to a somewhat blinkered treatment of both imperialism (GN/GS inequality) and their implication in the existence of the far right in the GS beyond Brazil (Modi and Duterte come to mind, but also a few forms of reactionary fundamentalism). ((major aside: sort of astonishing given the title's crib from Fanon!! who is briefly mentioned a few times)) and second, a more immanent critique: because the book is focused on understanding "the far right" and "fossil fuel driven combustion leading to climate change," the historical parts of the text feel like the authors are finding the argument they have already assumed. in particular, chapters 9 and 10 felt very unconvincing to me, respectively analyzing the relationship between fascism and fuel, and technological modernity. each chapter sets out to describe Italian and German rhetoric and actions which sought to accelerate destruction and domination of nature with promotion of the race and industry. and though it is briefly acknowledged that other forms of social organization are capable of performing similar tricks (442-443), the argument is made that fascism in fact had some particularly brutal *material* relation to combustive fuel and modern technology. this, to me, seems to make a few mistakes: 1) it lets the overwhelmingly *liberal* politics of modernity and progress off the hook, 2) it fall into the trap of isolating aspects of incoherent fascist ideology and making them seem coherent (through interpreting, ironing out the contradictions between say German romanticism and Italian futurism, or, less geographically, Nazi modernism and anti-modernism). and 3) in desiring to 'prove' that some aspects of fascism were at its core (technological modernity) and others incidental or inessential (anti-modernism or romanticism), it seems to let go of the main theoretical tools of the Frankfurt/ISA combo: that these are more interesting and ought to be understood as psychoses, not disproven by their "really" ecological or anti-ecological character. that's sort of a complicated argument to make on my part, and i'm doing it short shrift (and likely to be unconvincing) but this is a hastily written goodreads review after all.
  
  still, it is a helpful contribution from which I learned quite a bit, especially being somewhat removed from understanding far right European politics (aside from the neverending barrage of Brexit analyses).
• 
  Martin Empson

  I didn't 100 percent agree or more accurately wasn't convinced by everything in White Skin, Black Fuel, but the book gets 4 stars from me for being a stimulating read that explores many neglected aspects to the climate crisis - particularly racism and fascism.
• 
  Dan

  A brilliantly argued and wide-ranging historical analysis of the relationship between fossil fuel, ecological awareness, and the far right in its various permutations. Tremendously insightful and compulsively readable – my highest recommendation!
• 
  Rhys

  A timely and important discussion on the shift towards authoritarianism as it relates to accelerants like climate change.
  
  "Indeed, one way of understanding the rise of the far right in the early twenty-first century is to see it as a reaction – first pre-emptive, later direct – to the quickly approaching crunch time of the climate crisis. Some of the deep structural forces in society that resist any transition appear to have gravitated towards this political pole. The worse the crisis, on this logic, the stronger the attraction, and these tendencies pertain not only to mitigation" (p.251).
• 
  Feral Academic

  Some good stuff but would be improved by slashing like 50% of it. The arguments get meandering and repetitive and the analysis would be sharpened if the trends discussed didn't have so many hundreds of pages separating them.
• 
  Charles Heath

  MALM HAS THE STRONGEST REALEST MARXIST GAME IN HISTORY TOWN.
  Fucking dude is incredible, and has written not one, but two, maybe of the best histories of the past ten years: Fossil Capital and this one.
• 
  Daisy

  This is the last book I’ve read in 2022. White Skin, Black Fuel: On the Danger of Fossil Fascism by Andreas Malm discusses the Far Right’s stance on the Climate Crisis after analyzing over 40 European Countries’ Far Right parties in recent history. It’s that intersection between race, politics and environmentalism that I love to learn more about. I could not recommend this book this 500 page book enough. This book introduces some critical concepts like green nationalism, capitalist climate governance, fossil fascism, and climate skepticism.
  
  Once of the things I love about this book is that this book does a good job of fighting against overpopulation myths. Overpopulation myth the idea that there are too many people, specifically non-white people, and it’s unsustainable. This overpopulation is exacerbating the climate crisis.
  
  Adding to this, the book discuses the extremally flawed belief of Green nationalism because if all they can think of is violence towards migrants (specifically Muslims), it would leave fossil capital unchallenged. And so far, all green nationalism has to show for it is a body count and a rap sheet of hate crimes against anyone not white. The book is able to objectively denounce anyone who spews green nationalist ideologies.
  
  I enjoyed the section on Capitalist climate governance. One of my favorite quotes from this was this; ‘What is fascism?’ asked Antonio Gramsci in 1921: ‘It is the attempt to resolve the problems of production and exchange with machine-guns and pistol-shots’ & "If future generations will have to sift through the reasons for why so little was done to prevent a climate catastrophe foretold, this will be one of them: the fictional problem of an immigrant invasion and a Muslim takeover supplanted the real thing."
  
  At the core of it, the book argues the intentionality of white supremacy and fossil fascism; why we don’t have a more aggressive renewable energy plan is because If resources were distributed fairly, the harm done to disadvantaged groups would be stopped and the general drivers of degradation shut down. This is why Justice then, is not the negation but the ESSENCE of sustainability. The path forward for environmentalists is to incorporate environmental justice as a core part of their activism.
  
  It’s crucial to understand the far right’s climate change stance and challenge them at every turn because Any rise of fascism is resistible at every stage. ON top of that, we must bring forth policies that radically challenge capitalism with an emphasis on addressing the needs and concerns of BIPOC folks, for that’s who green nationalist will attack first. I couldn’t recommend this book enough if you are interested in this topic. Please go read White Skin, Black Fuel by Andreas Malm.
  
• 
  joseph

  essential reading on the articulations of fossil capital to racial capitalism over the longue duree and in the present conjuncture, a broad - albeit avowedly eurocentric - and detailed mix of history, theory and reportage. it's a clarion call to leftists in the coming climate struggles and a useful resource for climate and anti-racist activists to understand their enemy. for now it looks as if a far-right resolution to the environmental crisis would be fossil fascist - arrantly denialist, sadistically extractive, and viciously xeno-racist - rather than eco-fascist in any meaningful sense of the term. but the collective doesn't rule out the latter, which is in any case tantamount to a form of denialism in all but the nominal sense, given that eco-fascists deny the really existing social drivers of climate change in favour of spurious racist explanations. the authors - all twenty of them - are adept at showing the structures and interests that uphold fossil capitalism - primitive fossil capital, fossil capital in general, and the political and media isas - and how they do and might in future interact with the far right. the book - whose richness is impossible to precis in a dashed-off capsule review- is written in a recognisably malmian style - and he did coordinate the writing of it. it's malm at his best - historically engaged rather than gallingly polemical as he has been in his other two, much shorter post-covid books.
• 
  Daire Dempsey

  This was about half mind-blowingly insightful (exploring the conceptual and philosophical far right links to fossil fuels and resistance to renewable energy, their focus on anti-immigration, the tendency of liberal capitalism to fall back on fascism in times of crisis, extrapolating into the future) but the other half was a bit of a slog (personally I could have done without the lengthy dig into Nazism and Futurism). I extremely recommend it, especially if (like me) you need to learn more about what exactly drives the right/far right, just a heads up that it’s p long and dry.
• 
  Ned Netherwood

  Yes, it's a chunky beast. I initially wondered if I'd even be able to finish it but it was such an eye-opener, it's central premise of the links between climate change denial and racism hits you right between the eyes.
• 
  Brian Doering

  Surprised to see that the intersection of racism and fossil fuels is capitalism*
  
  *no. I’m not.
• 
  Mayowa

  Good book idk why he had to use the n word tho
• 
  Simon Butler

  This is great. An excellent, thorough study of the connections between the politics of climate denial and racism. It offers very detailed critiques of the various iterations of the far-right's political ecology worldwide (described as a nascent or proto- 'fossil fascism'), while also looking at other dangerous variants such as ecofascism and green nationalism. A much-needed book for those who want to better understand the enemy.