Building capacity to counter the new right.
As the neoliberal world order becomes undone, we are involved in a vital contest over the future. Within the pluri-crisis, the new right is gaining the upper hand. Combining renewed autocratic strategies with nationalist populism, it harnesses growing discontent with stalled economic growth and the negative impacts of capitalist globalisation. Across Europe, both the left and liberal progressives are on the back foot. How can we build capacity within our movements to push back? What is needed to resist the growth of the far right? How can we offer alternatives that can undermine the appeal of these reactive forces? How can we build a counter force grounded in solidarity?
These are big questions and the road ahead will be challenging. A training like this cannot realistically aim to offer all the answers. But it can support us to become better equipped to analyse the socio-political conditions we work within, to identify the challenges and opportunities that exist, and to begin to strategise more effectively to build capacity to make a real difference.
This will be a space where, together, we can:
We will bring together experienced activists from across the Ulex network of partner organisations and actors, to gather valuable case studies and experience, enabling us to learn from each others’ work. We will also be inviting people having important impacts on these issues to join us online, to offer presentations and prompt discussion that can enhance our understanding.
Key areas will include:
Who is it aimed at?
This training is aimed at experienced organisers whose work involves them directly facing the challenges of the growth of the far right and their narratives. You should be embedded in movement work in such a way that learning from this training can be used to directly strengthen efforts to organise to counter the far right.
Preparation
Participants will be asked to prepare an analysis of the ways the far right and far right narratives are shaping the context they work within. These can be presented as a short written document or audio/video message. It should include: 1. Identifying key far right actors, their strategies and tactics; 2. The historical background to their emergence, as well as current socio-political conditions that support their development; 3. Actors building counter power and forms of resistance/opposition to the far right in your context: 4. Relevant opportunities and threats that currently exist. These documents will be treated as confidential and only made available to the trainers and participants.
The main spoken language on the course will be English.
For accessibility and venue information see <here>.
In the solidarity economy:
(See details of our approach to radical economics here)
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An Maeyens (she/her) is a facilitator and trainer with over two decades of experience in grassroots movements. She specialises in creative, inclusive agenda design and brings deep expertise on group culture, power dynamics, and transformative learning. Starting of in the anti-globalisation movement she has trained thousands in civil disobedience, supported international coalitions, and developed multilingual training programmes and toolkits. Her work spans movements, cultures, and countries, guided by a commitment to care, accessibility, and leaderful organising.
Location:
Ari’s activism began in 2002, at age 16, as a Bosnian refugee in Canada, where they founded and coordinated a group for LGBTIQ high school students and allies. They were a co-founder and leader at kolekTIRV in Croatia and Trans Network Balkan, involved in community organizing, advocacy, program management, team coordination, capacity building, education, media work, campaigns, events, fundraising, etc. In 2024, they joined the Supervisory Board of the Croatian Trade Union Collective of United Precarious Workers and Activists (SKUPA).
Beyond the Balkan region, Ari served as a Board member at Transgender Europe (TGEU), where they held roles as Secretary, Treasurer, and later Co-chair. They have also been a trainer with the Center for Artistic Activism and served on the Advisory Committee and since 2022 as a Community Care Facilitator at FRIDA — The Young Feminist Fund. Since 2024 they are the Operations Manager at Global Philanthropy Project.
Location:
Sergio (all pronouns) was born in Romania and migrated to Germany in the early 2010s. In the past, he was a social worker with homeless people and a social consultant for Eastern European migrants for various organisations. Trained as a filmmaker, he spent two years making a documentary about the ‘civic reawakening’ in Romania and the waves of protest it brought with it. In connection to this, Sergio is currently co-steering the development of an online open-source participative knowledge production platform on activism in Romania. Over the past nine years, Sergiu has offered his skills to various journalists, grassroots collectives and campaigns, mostly working within the labour rights, climate justice, international solidarity and anti-authoritarian movements in Germany and Romania. Nonetheless, his biggest focus since 2020 has been his work as an organiser with the anarcho-syndicalist Free Workers Union, where he focuses mostly on organising Romanian migrant workers on construction sites, in factories and in the agricultural field.
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Jeroen (he/him pronouns) has been involved in grassroots social movements for more than two decades now, starting back when he was fifteen. Throughout the years the fights for “climate justice” and “migrant justice” have been consistently on top of the list of struggles that make his heart beat faster. A key transformative moment for Jeroen was reading Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed. Freire’s revolutionary pedagogy gave him a language to support the creation of emancipatory learning environments, rooted in a desire for collective liberation. Jeroen has also been exploring in depth Boal’s Theatre of the Oppressed and Joanna Macy’s The Work That Reconnects among other methodologies to build his trainer’s toolkit. Inspired by the liberatory possibilities of these traditions, he started an organization with a friend, LABO vzw, based in Belgium, where he has worked as a trainer and campaigner between 2013 and 2023.
Ulex: del latín, (tojo en castellano, argelaga en catalán) nombre.
1. Arbusto espinoso de hoja perenne y floración, con gran capacidad de regeneración y resistencia. Sus púas se abren al entrar en contacto con el fuego y vuelve a brotar de los tocones carbonizados. Planta sucesional que crece bien en condiciones difíciles. Mejora la fertilidad del suelo mediante la fijación de nitrógeno, preparando el terreno para una renovada biodiversidad.
2. Una opción tradicional para encender fuegos. Arde con intensidad y brillo.
3. Un proyecto en red que aporta nutrición y fertilidad a los movimientos sociales europeos a través de la formación
