Demobilising far-right demonstration campaigns: Coercive counter-mobilisation, state social control, and the demobilisation of the Hess Gedenkmarsch campaign

Abstract

Studies of social movements have often focused on mobilisation and campaigning; by comparison, demobilisation has received little attention. This article adds to the body of literature on demobilisation by examining one case of demonstration campaign demobilisation. The ‘Hess Gedenkmarsch’ campaign in Germany, initiated in the late 1980s and demobilised by the mid-1990s, is not only a case of a causal mechanism of demobilisation, but also particularly important within far-right social movement activity: it was the vanguard campaign in a emergent pattern of ‘demonstration politics’ by far-right groups in Germany. The case exhibits a process whereby anti-far-right activists effectively engaged in a sort of kamikaze counter-mobilisation, seeking to shut down far-right events; this, in turn, spurred state authorities to act, imposing coercive measures that demobilised the far-right campaign. This case illustrates a causal mechanism of negative demobilisation that can be observed in other demonstration campaigns, and is particularly relevant to other cases of far-right activism.