Jeffrey Stevenson Murer, an Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science at Swarthmore College in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, received his Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Chicago, for which he was awarded the Annual Graduate Dissertation Prize in 2000. Before coming to Swarthmore, he held appointments at Illinois Wesleyan University and Providence College. He has also been a guest lecture and researcher at the Volgograd Academy for State Service in Russia, the Center for Research and Study of Psychopathology in Toulouse, France, and Central European University in Budapest, Hungary.
His research focuses on the responses to the political and economic transitions in Central and Eastern Europe. He is particularly interested in the rise of illiberal politics in the early transitions, its continued appeal, and the connections between social transitions and political violence. He is the author of numerous articles and book chapters, and is current working on a book length manuscript that addresses the contemporary resurgence of nationalist and antisemitic rhetoric in Hungary.
Research Agenda
As my research agenda has evolved over the past four years, I find myself increasingly engaged in the debates and the literature of transitiology. The interrogation of the structures, institutions and impacts of transitioning to a market based economy based on the philosophy of liberalism would suggest, at first glance, that my research would be focused, geographically speaking, on Central and Eastern Europe. Yet, as the transitions in those regions are shaped by the policy initiatives of Western Europe, namely through the protocols of the Acquis Communtaire of the European Union, I find myself studying political phenomena across the continent. What began in the mid-1990's as a project to explain the resurgence of anti-Semitism and irredentist nationalist rhetoric in Hungary has evolved into a research agenda that examines reactions to the impositions of neo-liberal structures and policies throughout Europe. I have found numerous connections and repetitions of collective action tying Central and Eastern Europe to Western Europe. However, I find the examination of what distinguishes reactions in one polity from that of another to be most important and most exciting.
For example, as I examined the rhetorical structures employed by István Csurka leader of the Hungarian Truth and Life Party (MIÉP), I found numerous connections, including intense personal ties, with Jean Marie LePen and the French Front Nationale. Similarly, the former Prime Minister of Hungary, Victor Orbán and his Young Democratic League/Civic Party (Fidesz) maintained tight strategic relations with Jörg Haider and the Austrian Freedom Party (FPÖ) and Silvio Berlusconi and Forza Italia. This is significant as Hungarian reactions to the European Union often replicated language and forms of the Western European counterparts. Thus, finding a continuum or reaction across the continent suggests the Cold War Area Studies division of East and West is no longer as applicable.
In describing these reactions I am also interested in dismantling analysis based upon simplistic left/right orientations along a single axis. In my most recent publication, "Mainstreaming Extremism," I suggest that more would be elucidated by examining politics along a series of continuums which would include one oriented along an individualist/communitarian cleavage. This would dispel the notion that liberalism somehow exists as a neutral or mid position. It is a pole onto itself. Such a reorientation also allows for the grouping of neo-socialist, neo-fascist elements along the same end of the continuum, rather than attempting to explain the possibility of a "red/brown" coalition. This I argue is particularly useful when evaluating Romanian politics. The most recent election there, which pitted the former Communist Ion Illiescu against the "Extremist" reactionary Vladim Tudor, was not a battle of the left/right extremes, but rather a contest among illiberal forces, battling over the degree and the language of resisting liberal reforms.
Thus my research focuses on the pockets of resistance to the neo-liberal projects and impositions of advanced capitalism. I find it necessary to understand the anxiety, frustrations, and fears of these political elements in order to combat their xenophobia, antisemitism, and violence. To accomplish this, I synthesize critical theory approaches of examining political economy with psychoanalytically informed approaches to exploring collective political action. Understanding how the virulent reactions of ethnic hatred and xenophobia are connected to the experience of anxiety and fear, and how both sides of this coin contribute to the construction of social identity, offers a course of amelioration which may not otherwise be apparent. Identifying the sources of trauma and revealing the structures of coping mechanisms can provide policy makers with the tools to address root causes of political violence rather than treating the symptoms.