FAULT LINES IN CIVILIZATIONS AND RIGHT-WING EXTREMISM: GERMANY’S EXPERIMENT WITH DOMESTIC RESPONSIBILITY VS. INTERNATIONAL OBLIGATION

Abstract

The influx of refugees in 2015 an aftermath of the Syrian Civil War, propelled European leadership into a predicament of maintaining a cautious balance between international obligations and domestic responsibilities. While most nations adopted harder migration policies, Germany decided to navigate through such a conundrum by adopting pro-migration policies. However, the simultaneous rise in right-wing extremism posed a significant threat to those who were considered to be ‘non-German’. The paper thus analyses the right-wing extremist spectrum in Germany from 2015-2018 and further employs The Clash of Civilisations thesis with Populism to explain the upsurge in right-wing extremism.