Florian G. Kern
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floriangkern.bsky.social
Florian G. Kern
@floriangkern.bsky.social
1.5K followers 2.4K following 120 posts
Associate Professor, political scientist, Dep of Government, Univ of Essex, comparative politics in Africa, mixed methods, Visiting Senior Fellow LSE Dep of Methodology; Co-Director @africasigessex; ESRC MCCRA

https://sites.google.com/site/floriangkern
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Reposted by Florian G. Kern
ryanlcooper.com
extremely well put
An actual pragmatist would evaluate and change course. Someone who understood public opinion might notice that anti-immigrant sentiment responds to media coverage, not objective reality. They might reason that this is not a problem that can be addressed by policy concessions because policy is not what is causing it. They might even consider offering a different narrative and seeing whether that makes a dent. A truly daring politician might consider telling the British public the truth: that they are being lied to by the right-wing press about the cause of the country's problems, and that Reform is capitalising on this for political gain. The government does not seem inclined to do any of this. Despite understanding themselves as critical thinkers, reactionary centrists are conformists at heart. And they are so unmoored in our current age because, increasingly, there is no social consensus for them to conform to. Affluent countries the world over are balkanising into fascist and anti-fascist factions. One must simply pick a side. There is no longer such a thing as “British public opinion” (if there ever was). Rather, half the country supports socially illiberal parties and half supports (broadly speaking) liberal ones, similar to the split in the Brexit referendum. If we follow international trends, the values of these two sides will only grow more irreconcilable. Starmer is—though you would never guess it—the captain of the liberal team. His job is not to find consensus, but to hold his own coalition together.
October 1, 2025 at 1:56 PM
floriangkern.bsky.social
It’s that old Arminius and Teutoburg forest spirit.
September 19, 2025 at 1:24 PM
floriangkern.bsky.social
The vanilla manosphere.
September 17, 2025 at 10:43 AM
floriangkern.bsky.social
That’s awesome and very much deserved @carlmc.bsky.social! Congrats!
September 5, 2025 at 1:09 PM
floriangkern.bsky.social
Congrats @dianebolet.bsky.social! looking forward to seeing what you find.
September 5, 2025 at 1:08 PM
floriangkern.bsky.social
Ever heard of The Self Sabotage Workshop? @teodannemann.bsky.social @riadsala.bsky.social
August 27, 2025 at 7:36 AM