Using the Left’s weapons against them

Can an intellectual conservative right make use of its opponent’s weapons? Can the Left’s analytical perspectives and concepts be turned against the Left?

In principle, yes. At least sometimes. And this is simply because the radical Left, which, during the 1960s, 70s, and 80s, formulated a well-reasoned and sometimes sophisticated critique of the social order of the time, has now become part of the prevailing order. The power structures remain the same. Yet, those who hold power today do not belong to the old bourgeoisie but rather to the new radical-left social elite that has slowly but surely moved into politics, government agencies, and the media.

Much of the social critique formulated half a century ago by thinkers such as Michel Foucault and Pierre Bourdieu has been dismissed by modern right-wing intellectuals as being overly obsessed with power. Jordan Peterson is one contemporary intellectual who has pointed out that hierarchies are not inherently evil. Nor are hierarchies based solely on unjust oppression. Instead, they sort out competence in a way that benefits all members of society. If the best writers, thinkers, architects, engineers, journalists, and politicians manage to rise within the social hierarchy by leveraging their competence, society stands to gain. We should not, therefore, fear hierarchies; rather, we should embrace them and ensure that as many people as possible can compete for the most coveted positions.

That is the usual argument. And it sounds appealing. But is it always so appealing?

Don’t people with right-wing sympathies also complain about hierarchies? Isn’t it the case that even people on the right complain about unjust power structures in which the left-liberal establishment allows itself to occupy as many positions as possible in the media, government agencies, universities, and politics? And isn’t it true that what the right calls the left-liberal establishment does exactly what the old conservative establishment did—namely, portraying its own power as self-evident and apolitical? And that is precisely what thinkers like Michel Foucault and Pierre Bourdieu dissected in their works.

Power, as Foucault and Bourdieu argued, does not openly reveal itself as power. Power does not declare that it is exercising power; instead, it presents its position in society as self-evident and unproblematic. Power is democracy; power is decency; power is knowledge. Consequently, anyone who questions power must also question the validity of democratic institutions, the legitimacy of mainstream media, and, ultimately, the entire social order.

Let us take the media as an example. Viewed through the lens of Pierre Bourdieu’s perspective and terminology, European media operates within a “social field.” A field is an abstract space within society where individuals and institutions compete for status, legitimacy, and power. Those who possess significant “capital” within a field are the ones who hold status and credibility. In the media landscape, this involves the distinction between, on the one hand, the older, established media—which can be said to form part of the broad societal establishment that upholds the status quo—and, on the other, the new “alternative” media. The latter allows for the expression of conservative and nationalist perspectives that challenge political correctness and, by extension, the prevailing social hierarchies.

Let us consider what Pierre Bourdieu wrote in 1980 (in a book with the French title “Questions de sociologie”) regarding the rivalry between these two groups as it plays out within the journalistic field:

“Those who, given the prevailing balance of power, have more or less completely monopolized the specific capital forming the basis of the power or specific authority characterizing a field, are inclined to develop conservative strategies that—within the field of cultural production—tend to defend orthodoxy. Conversely, those least endowed with capital (often newcomers, and thus usually the youngest) are inclined to develop subversive, heretical strategies. It is heresy—heterodoxy—acting as a critical break with *doxa* (often linked to a crisis within the field) that compels the dominant players to abandon their silence and speak out in defense of orthodoxy. This defense aims to find a righteous and straightforward way to restore something resembling a silent consensus around the doxa.”

Anyone currently working in the field of journalism—specifically within the right-leaning alternative media that challenges traditional media today—will recognize what Bourdieu describes here. Those who lack the capital of established media must mount challenges using subversive strategies. One must be faster, bolder, and willing to break the rules. After all, challenging the rules to which established media clings so tightly is also a way of challenging that media’s dominant position. This is why alternative media outlets and activist journalists on YouTube allow themselves to be bolder, faster, and braver.

And, exactly as Bourdieu describes, this new, challenging media forces the older, more established media to respond to provocations. Such responses invariably take the form of condemnation. The new media do not follow established rules; they lie, they spin, and they cannot be regarded as serious journalism.

So, what we can learn from Bourdieu is, of course, that the established and dominant cultural producers—journalists, but also singers, writers, artists, intellectuals, and so on—who today align themselves with the radical left-wing establishment are defending not only their political stances but also the dominant positions they hold within the various fields of culture and intellectual life.

It is not, therefore, solely a matter of politics, ideology, and truth. It is also about status and prestige. It is about social positions. It is not just about truth, but also about the social positions from which one is deemed to possess a truth that one typically does not need to defend.

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There is nothing inherently wrong with reading the intellectual icons of the Left. Their analyses of power are far from uninteresting. And the new intellectual Right has every reason to take down the overbearing Left using its own analytical tools.