Roger Griffin

Griffin obtained a First in French and German Literature from Oxford University in 1970, then began teaching History of ideas at Oxford Polytechnic (now Oxford Brookes University). Becoming interested in the study of extremist right-wing movements and regimes which have shaped modern history, Griffin obtained a DPhil from Oxford University in 1990. He first developed his palingenesis theory of fascism in his PhD thesis., which laid the foundation for his subsequent research, teaching and publications in comparative fascist studies. In May 2011, he received an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Leuven in recognition of his services to the comparative study of fascism. Griffin's theory of fascism, set out first in The Nature of Fascism in 1991 and more recently in Fascism: An Introduction to Comparative Fascist Studies (2017) and Fascism. Quick Immersion (2020) suggests that a useful working definition of core ideology is that it is a form of revolutionary organic nationalism, (his term is 'palingenetic ultranationalism'). In other words, fascism seeks, by directly mobilising popular energies or working through an elite, to eventually conquer cultural, social and political hegemony for new values, to bring about the total rebirth of the 'ultranation' from its present state of decline and decadence, whether the nation is conceived as a historically formed nation-state or a racially determined 'ethnos'. Conceived in these terms, fascism is an ideology that has assumed a large number of specific national permutations and several distinct organizational forms. Moreover, it is a political project that continues to evolve to this day throughout the Europeanized world, though it remains highly marginalised compared with the central place it occupied in inter-war Europe, and its central role in identity politics has been largely replaced by non-revolutionary forms of radical right-wing populism. It most dangerous contemporary forms are not mass movements or political parties, but in terrorist cells and the most radical forms of modern identitarian politics which attack the basic principles of liberalism, multiculturalism, and transcultural humanism and breed inter-ethnic and inter-cultural hatred and violence. Roger Griffin has also taken an active interest in the dynamics of radicalization and terrorism, and in 2012 published Terrorist's Creed: Fanatical Violence and the Human Need for Meaning with its influential theory of Heroic Doubling. This theme will be pursued and deepened in his next monograph The Divisible Self: Heroic Doubling and the Origins of Modern Violence (Columbia: Agenda, Columbia University Press, September 2022). Roger Griffin was co-founder of the open access journal Fascism (Brill) and co-founder of COMFAS, International Association for the Comparative Study of Fascism, directed by Professor Constantin Iordachi (Central European University).