What is needed is a progressive vision of national sovereignty

The author contends that the rise of right-wing populism, Brexit, and Donald Trump are symptoms of a deeper structural crisis of neoliberalism and globalisation that began in the 1970s. This crisis is characterized by financialisation, stagnant wages, and an ecological crisis. The author argues that the Right has successfully monopolised the idea of national sovereignty to appeal to disenfranchised masses, while the Left has mistakenly viewed the nation-state as obsolete. The document calls for a 'progressive vision of national sovereignty' based on democratic economic control and social justice, which would allow for a renewed form of international cooperation on global issues like climate change.

• The current rise of anti-establishment and right-wing movements in the West—including Brexit, the election of Donald Trump, and the rise of the National Front in France—is a reaction to the neoliberal order that has dominated for thirty years.
• Neoliberalism's structural crisis began in the 1970s with the collapse of the Fordist-Keynesian model, leading to a regime of trade liberalisation, deregulation, and a decline in the share of national income going to salaries.
• To counter the stagnation of wages and purchasing power, capitalism turned to 'financialisation and debt-based consumption,' which created unsustainable asset bubbles that collapsed between 2007 and 2009.
• The collapse of the neoliberal order is driven by four primary crises: the failure of the neoliberal economic model to generate consensus, the crisis of globalisation due to competition from countries like China, the ecological crisis regarding energy and biophysical resources, and the decline of US hegemony.
• Neoliberalism achieved 'depoliticisation' by hollowing out national sovereignty to insulate macroeconomic policies from popular contestation and place economic power in the hands of financial interests.
• The author argues that the Left has failed to offer an alternative because it accepted the narrative that nation-states are obsolete and that change can only happen at the supranational level.
• A progressive vision of national sovereignty should focus on popular sovereignty, democratic economic control, and the 'socioecological transformation of production and society,' while maintaining multilateral cooperation on global issues such as climate change.

APA

Fazi, T. (2017). What is needed is a progressive vision of national sovereignty. Green European Journal. https://www.greeneuropeanjournal.eu/what-is-needed-is-a-progressive-vision-of-national-sovereignty/

Chicago

Fazi, Thomas. What is needed is a progressive vision of national sovereignty. Green European Journal, 2017. https://www.greeneuropeanjournal.eu/what-is-needed-is-a-progressive-vision-of-national-sovereignty/.

Wikipedia

{{cite press release |last1=Fazi |first1=Thomas |title=What is needed is a progressive vision of national sovereignty |publisher=Green European Journal |date=9 May 2017 |url=https://www.greeneuropeanjournal.eu/what-is-needed-is-a-progressive-vision-of-national-sovereignty/ |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@misc{fazi2017what, author = {Fazi, Thomas}, title = {{What is needed is a progressive vision of national sovereignty}}, publisher = {Green European Journal}, year = {2017}, month = may, url = {https://www.greeneuropeanjournal.eu/what-is-needed-is-a-progressive-vision-of-national-sovereignty/}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }