Racially-charged nationalist parties have grown across Europe and the Americas the past several years, to the point of gaining seats in legislatures and running for the highest offices. It's possible the current chaos is part of a short-term trend following the global financial meltdown from 2007/8:
One, political polarization and fractionalization rise. The middle hollows out, and parties on the far right benefit more than those on the far left. In fact, on average, the far right sees an increase in vote share of about 30 percent in the five years following a financial crisis.
Two, governing becomes much harder, precisely because of this splintering. There are more political crises, and there’s more leadership turnover.
And three, social unrest — anti-government demonstrations, strikes, riots — increases.
These patterns generally do not occur in the wake of normal recessions or major macroeconomic shocks that are not financial in nature.
“People see financial crises as man-made disasters,” explains Moritz Schularick, an economics professor at the University of Bonn and study co-author. This means that afterward, there is a popular impulse to punish those thought to be responsible.
The scapegoats are often minorities and elites...
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The one silver lining buried in this depressing study? Right-wing populism may already have peaked. The researchers find that the political effects they document diminish over time, generally reverting back to pre-crisis conditions about 10 years after a crisis.