George Michael

Westfield State University · Department of Criminal Justice

This chapter focuses on left-wing radicalism, with special focus on the movement known as Antifa. Over the past few years, this movement has gained widespread notoriety. It featured prominently at the Unite the Right Rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, in August 2017. Although one woman was killed in the fracas, this episode elevated the stature of...

President Donald Trump's efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election were brazenly antidemocratic. Yet Trump and his supporters nonetheless justified their actions under the dubious pretense of preserving American democracy-as a matter of getting the vote right, of reversing voter fraud. There's a good reason they took this approach. Autho...

Are the experiences of DMT drug trips real or imagined?

The relationship between the American far right and Russia has varied over time. During the Cold War, American right-wing populists were in the forefront of opposition to the Soviet Union. But as the Cold War waned, the far right became more sympathetic to Russia, viewing it as the last remaining white bastion nation in a world in which a “rising t...

Following the first installment of this series, where the historical origins of modern white supremacy were explored in depth, and a subsequent essay that examined the ways white supremacy has influenced mainstream American politics, here are three of the nation’s foremost scholars on white supremacy, discussing similar issues at length. This is th...

Following the first part of this series, where the historical origins of modern white supremacy were explored in depth, and a subsequent essay that examined the ways white supremacy has influenced mainstream American politics, here are three of the nation’s foremost scholars on white supremacy, discussing similar issues at length. Jeffrey Kaplan is...

Over the past several years, sporadic lone wolf terror attacks have bedeviled the United States and Europe. Acting alone, or in very small groups, lone wolves carry out terrorism on their own initiative without answering to any formal leadership hierarchy. Not only are lone wolf attacks becoming more common, they are also becoming

Populism has a long history in American politics. In the current U.S. presidential campaign, two widely different incarnations of populism have gained widespread support at the same time. On the political left, Bernie Sanders champions redistributive economic policies that resonate with members of the millennial generation who feel left behind in t...

The Tea Party, which arose shortly after President Barack Obama assumed office, is the most recent incarnation of American populism. Numerous issues – including a protracted economic recession, alarming federal budget deficits, concern over immigration, fiscal deficits, and a seemingly ineffective government response to these problems – appear to b...

The Tea Party, which arose shortly after President Barack Obama assumed office, is the most recent incarnation of American populism. Numerous issues - including a protracted economic recession, alarming federal budget deficits, concern over immigration, fiscal deficits, and a seemingly ineffective government response to these problems - appear to b...

Perhaps the most recognized Muslim leader in the United States, Louis Farrakhan has long sought to build bridges to the Middle East. Despite his controversial reputation in America, he was often treated as a foreign dignitary when visiting Libya and various Middle Eastern nations opposed to United States policies. During his long career, he met wit...

For over 50 years, scientists involved in the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) have searched for evidence of alien civilizations, and several messages have been transmitted into space with the intention of communicating with intelligent extraterrestrial beings. In April 2010, the esteemed British astrophysicist Stephen Hawking warned...

This essay examines strategies to counter the threat of lone wolf terrorism. Lone wolves implement a tactical approach dubbed “leaderless resistance,” which has become popular in several extremist subcultures. Although most episodes of lone wolf terrorism have not been highly destructive, there are notable exceptions that have claimed a substantial...

The Tea Party, which arose shortly after President Barack Obama assumed office, is the most recent incarnation of American populism. Largely dormant over the past decade, the American far right saw an opportunity to ride the new populist wave in the form of the Tea Party. Although the demographic profiles of members of the far right and the Tea Par...

Michael, George. (2012) Dealing with the Bomb: Nonproliferation, Missile Defense, and the Quest to Develop Usable Weapons. International Studies Review, doi: 10.1111/j.1468‐2486.2012.01097.x

Ron Rosenbaum, How the End Begins: The Road to a Nuclear World War III. Simon & Schuster, 2011. 305 pages, $28.

On July 22, 2011, Anders Behring Breivik detonated a car bomb in downtown Oslo, Norway. He didn't stop there, traveling several hours from the city to ambush a youth camp while the rest of Norway was distracted by his earlier attack. That's where the facts end. But what motivated him? Did he have help staging the attacks? The evidence suggests a st...

The scientific worldview of Michio Kaku—a prominent theoretical physicist and popularizer of science—can be viewed as a humanistic religion based on the principles of physics and how they relate to humanity's place in the cosmos. In a sense, he follows in the tradition of Isaac Newton, Galileo Galilei, and Albert Einstein, all of whom searched for...

After the death of Ben Klassen in 1993, the Church of the Creator languished for a few years, but in 1995, an enterprising young law student, Matthew Hale, revived the church and became the movement’s recognized leader. He rechristened the organization as the “World Church of the Creator” and in the months that followed, numerous Creativity branche...

This essay examines the origins of the Church of the Creator. Founded by Ben Klassen in 1973, the racist cult aspired to unite the white race into a global community with a shared religion called ‘Creativity.’ To that end, the organization sought to proselytize elements of the extreme right to its ideology, which included a strident critique of Chr...

Several novels have attained popularity in the extreme right subculture, most notably, The Turner Diaries—a tale of race war that convulses America. Some observers have characterized these novels as blueprints for revolution and terrorist campaigns. The medium of fiction can be an effective vehicle for propagandizing to those persons who may not be...

In the late 1990s, Horst Mahler, a former leader of the Red Army Faction and scion of the radical left, announced his affinity for the extreme right and joined the National Democratic Party of Germany (Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands; NPD)—Germany's principal far right party. Later distancing himself from party politics, he founded the De...

Although a relatively obscure figure, the late David Lane had a major impact on the ideology of the global white power movement. His ‘14 words’ credo – ‘We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children’ – became a call for action for racial activists around the globe. Imprisoned for over twenty years for his involvement in...

Three events in late 2005—Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath in New Orleans, the Muslim riots in the suburbs of Paris, and the Cronulla 'uprising' in Australia—were interpreted by the American extreme right as confirmation of a long-feared impending racial cataclysm. Michael and Mulloy examine analyses of these events from various representatives...

This essay examines the career of Michael Collins Piper, an important figure in the American far right subculture. A prolific writer, his underground books advancing various conspiracy theories have in recent years found a receptive audience in the Islamic world. Casting himself as an alternative media representative, he has conferred with leading...

This article compares and contrasts the responses to right-wing extremism in the United States and the Federal Republic of Germany. Essentially, the approaches of these respective countries represent two polarities on a continuum. Whereas in theory, the United States allows extremist groups much more freedom to espouse unpopular ideas, the Federal...

This article surveys the history of the World Church of the Creator, a small and obscure organization, which has nevertheless had a significant influence on the international far right. The Creativity movement has had an impact on the far right in several ways, including spearheading an anti-Christian orientation among its younger activists, introd...

In 2005, suicide attacks in Iraq reached an unprecedented level in the history of modern terrorism. Recent research on the topic of suicide terrorism suggests that this tactic is ‘rational’ in the sense that it fulfills a strategic purpose, that is, to expel foreign occupiers from one's homeland. While this approach may have proven viable in previo...