Britain | The haters

The evolution of Britain’s extreme right

White nationalism has become more amorphous and more online

collage in red, white, and black showing Oswald Mosley, leader of the British Union of Fascists, giving a Nazi salute on the left. On the right, Tommy Robinson speaks into a microphone. In the center, a group of people in hooded jackets and masks stand together. Background includes flags and splashes of red, with a police officer partially visible on the right.
Illustration: Nate Kitch

THEY BROKE through the hotel doors soon after midday on August 4th. Around 700 far-right activists had gathered outside the Holiday Inn Express in Manvers, a suburb in the deprived northern town of Rotherham, that morning. The mob chanted “get them out” and “burn it down” at asylum seekers housed inside and hurled chairs, planks and bricks at the police. Hotel staff erected barricades. One rioter started a fire in a doorway. It is remarkable no one was badly hurt.

Explore more

This article appeared in the Britain section of the print edition under the headline “The haters”

From the August 10th 2024 edition

Discover stories from this section and more in the list of contents

Explore the edition

Discover more

British MPs vote in favour of assisted dying

A monumental social reform is closer to being realised

This illustration depicts Keith Starmer and Rachel Reeves set against a background of UK, US, and Chinese flag elements.

The slow death of a Labour buzzword

And what that says about Britain’s place in the world



Britain’s Supreme Court considers what a woman is

At last. Britons had been wondering what those 34m people who are not men might be

Can potholes fuel populism?

A new paper looks at one explanation for the rise of Reform UK

Are British voters as clueless as Labour’s intelligentsia thinks? 

How the idea of false consciousness conquered the governing party