Rise of the Reich Citizens movement reflects the shifts that have taken place on the far-right end of the political spectrum in recent years, says expert
The recent alleged plot to over through the German government by suspected far-right extremists stemmed from a mixture of anger related to COVID pandemic restrictions and conspiracy theories, say experts.
In an interview by Associated Press on Friday, December 9, Johannes Kiess from Else-Frenkel-Brunswik Institute for Democracy Studies suggested that people are susceptible to all kinds of conspiracy theories. “We now really have the middle classes being open to all sorts of conspiracy theories,” Kiess said. He added, “Outright opposition to the existing order was once a fringe position but anger at the restrictions imposed during the coronavirus pandemic have proved fertile ground for the anti-government sentiment”.
Kiess also said that the rise of the Reich Citizens movement reflects the shifts that have taken place on the far-right end of the political spectrum in recent years, the report said.
Explaining Reich Citizens or Reichsbuerger, the report states that it refers to ´the first modern pan-German nation formed when Prussia’s King Wilhelm I and his chancellor, Otto von Bismarck, united numerous smaller states into a single empire, or Reich, in 1871´.
“To some extent, they distance themselves from the Third Reich,” said Kiess, while discussing the Reich Citizens movement. He added, “But they have very little problems working together with any outright neo-Nazi groups”.
Kiess also said the recent development in Germany was similar to the U.S., where white supremacist groups have joined people who believe that the government is controlled by a deep state that opposes a peaceful transition of power.
Meanwhile, Martina Renner, a member of the opposition Left party in Germany, also compared the situation to the U.S. In a quote cited in the report she said, “What we saw with the storming of the Capitol in the United States is like a blueprint for what’s happening here,” she said. “It’s being strongly taken up here and there are attempts to repeat it”.
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