A supine labour movement, a recession and an increasingly frustrated layer of long-term unemployed and small business people are the classic conditions for the growth of racism and fascism. And the British fascist organizations have started both to grow and step up their activity since Thatcher's fall.
They have put their wilderness years to good use. Their tactics now are much more refined. Last September, before Thatcher went, the most prominent of the British groups, the British National Party (BNP), won 25% of the white working class vote in a council by-election in east immigrants, tapping into anger and frustration in the white working class in one of London's most deprived areas.The BNP will be standing about 20 candidates at the next general election and another fascist group, the National Front, may be standing another dozen.
Left-wing activists attacked