(Pseudo)intellectualism and democratic (il)liberalism: on Aurelien Mondon and Aaron Winter's "Reactionary democracy"

In "Reactionary Democracy", Aurelien Mondon and Aaron Winter frame modern liberal democracy as fundamentally exclusionary. Appeals to liberal democratic principles that both institutionalize and normalize political inequality have not only allowed but actively facilitated the rise of the "alt-" and far-right. In the book, the authors expound the "fuzzy" demarcation between "illiberal" and "liberal" racism, the latter encompassing not only an adherence to principles of universalism, individualism, meritocracy and equality alongside a wilful denial of the effects of systemic racism in multicultural Western societies, but an instrumental support of group self-determination only when and where it serves to further liberal credentials. This review will discuss, given the arguments in the book, the limits of "mainstreaming" support for racial justice in the UK and the challenges for academics, critical theorists of race and scholar activists posed by the increasing pseudo-intellectualization of both illiberal and liberal racist narratives in academia and public discourse.