ABSTRACT
This conclusion presents some closing thoughts on the key concepts discussed in the preceding chapters of this book. The book examines the spread of populist nationalism today to the consolidation of neoliberalism and globalization – which has exacerbated nationalist sentiments fed by a sense of powerless and the seeming indifference of discredited political elites – as well as a steep rise in immigration in many parts of the world. It shows how the focus of Alternative für Deutschland's populism shifted from threats to the "common person" from a class elite within Germany, to threats to the nation from without – namely from Islam, multiculturalism, and "gender ideology." The book explains populist nationalism as resulting from the consolidations of the modern state starting in the late 1700s. It contends that as a political project, nationalism appeared in the eighteenth century "because it presented an attractive way for people to comprehend changes taking place in the modern world.".
