In this ECPS interview, Dr. Aaron Winter examines how the 2026 UK elections reveal not simply electoral volatility, but the accelerating mainstreaming of far-right discourse within British political life. Reflecting on Reform UK’s rise, anti-immigration politics, Brexit, Islamophobia, and the crisis of democratic legitimacy, Dr. Winter argues that Britain is increasingly witnessing “the mainstreaming of the far right” through narratives once considered politically marginal. Drawing on his scholarship on racism, populism, and “reactionary democracy,” he warns that anti-migrant politics now functions as a broader vehicle for exclusionary nationalism, white victimhood, and democratic erosion. The interview explores the normalization of “liberal racism,” the racialization of the “left behind,” and the growing convergence between establishment politics and reactionary nationalism in contemporary Britain.
Interview by Selcuk Gultasli
The 2026 local and devolved elections in the United Kingdom unfolded amid mounting concerns over democratic legitimacy, political representation, and the accelerating normalization of far-right discourse within mainstream public life. Against a backdrop of Labour’s declining support in key constituencies, the electoral rise of Reform UK, intensifying anti-immigration rhetoric, and growing polarization around nationalism and belonging, Britain increasingly appears caught in what many scholars describe as a broader crisis of liberal democracy. It is within this context that the European Center for Populism Studies (ECPS) speaks with Dr. Aaron Winter, Senior Lecturer in Sociology (Race and Anti-Racism) at Lancaster University and Research Associate at the University of the Witwatersrand, whose influential scholarship has long examined racism, populism, Islamophobia, reactionary politics, and the mainstreaming of the far right.
In this wide-ranging interview, Dr. Winter argues that contemporary British politics cannot be understood simply through the language of protest voting or electoral fragmentation. Rather, he contends that Britain is witnessing “the mainstreaming of the far right,” in which immigration, racism, and reactionary politics have increasingly become “the focal points of political discussion and ‘debate’” across both establishment and insurgent political actors. According to Dr. Winter, what is especially striking is not merely the electoral growth of Reform UK, but the extent to which “politics is now increasingly conducted from the center-right through the use of ideas that originate with the far right.”
Drawing on his collaborative work with Aurelien Mondon, Dr. Winter examines how overt forms of racism historically associated with fascism and white supremacy have increasingly been replaced by “liberal, colorblind racism and Islamophobia” articulated through the language of free speech, women’s rights, national security, and the protection of liberal values. He warns that this process has steadily expanded the political legitimacy of exclusionary nationalism while simultaneously hollowing out democratic alternatives. “We have hollowed out the left while simultaneously accelerating the trajectory toward authoritarianism and fascism,” he argues.
Particularly significant in this interview is Dr. Winter’s analysis of how the discourse of the “white working class” and the “left behind” has functioned as a vehicle for racialized nationalism after Brexit. He contends that contemporary British politics increasingly revolves around a much more explicit form of ethno-nationalism: “What we witnessed this weekend in London with the rallies,” he states, “is the emergence of a much more overt white supremacist and ethno-nationalist discourse operating irrespective of, and far beyond, class.”
The interview also explores the intersections between Brexit, Islamophobia, austerity, anti-migrant politics, and democratic decline, situating Britain within broader international patterns visible in Trumpism, European radical-right populism, and authoritarian nationalism. Throughout the conversation, Dr. Winter repeatedly emphasizes that the crisis facing Britain is not simply electoral, but structural: a crisis of capitalism, democracy, and political imagination itself. Yet he also insists that alternatives remain possible—provided democratic politics moves toward “radical reform, anti-racism, and opposition to inequality.”
