The hard right is absorbing left critiques of capitalism and removing their structural content.

Evidence

And now our critiques of oligarchic rule are being fully absorbed by the hard right and turned into dark doppelgangers of themselves. The structural critiques of capitalism are gone, and in their place are discombobulated conspiracies that somehow frame deregulated capitalism as communism in disguise. This trend is perfectly distilled by Giorgia Meloni, who became Italy’s first female prime minister in October 2022 and is leader of the Fratelli d’Italia (Brothers of Italy), which has deep fascist roots in the country. An early partner in Steve Bannon’s international populist project, Meloni threads her speeches with pop-culture references and rails against a system that reduces everyone to consumers. She also declared, in a supposed rebuke to “woke” ideology, that “I am a woman, I am a mother, I am Italian, I am Christian.” — Naomi Klein, Doppelganger, 405

Categorization

• DEFINE: Concrete instance of the diagonalism thesis: a figure like Meloni joins anti-consumerism rhetoric to fascist roots.