New UC Berkeley Center Created to Study Right-Wing Movements

The UC Berkeley Institute for the Study of Social Change has launched the Center for the Comparative Study of Right-wing Movements, which is funded by a $777,000 donation from an anonymous donor.

The center will focus on right-wing movements in the United States, Europe and Latin America over the past hundred years, according to the institute's Web site.

"There is a general point of view that the right wing is under-studied," said Larry Rosenthal, lead researcher of the center and a visiting researcher at the institute. "(It) tends to be studied in individual instance and not in a larger contextual point of view."

In addition to supporting graduate research, the center would host colloquia and other public events, Rosenthal said. He added that he hopes the center will begin research in the fall of the next academic year.

The mission of the center is to identify how right-wing movements aligned and survived as well as how the ideology operates, according to the institute's Web site. This will then be used to understand modern right-wing movements and identify their likely direction.

Paola Bacchetta, a UC Berkeley associate professor of sociology who expressed interest in joining the center, said it might have been created to bring together the knowledge of professors and scholars on campus who have studied right-wing movements.

"Historically there has just been a lot more work on left-wing movements," she said. "(This center) would be a step toward maybe an equilibrium but ... one center won't change everything."

Jiesi Zhao, president of the Berkeley College Republicans, said this center will help rally Republicans around a common purpose and expose students to alternative perspectives.

"I'm pleasantly surprised that they would open up a (right-wing) center, especially at Berkeley," she said. "All college campuses are more liberal, but Berkeley is kind of notoriously so."

Cal Berkeley Democrats External Affairs Vice President Morgan Wallace said the center would contribute to the campus's political debate.

"It's always good to get both sides of (the) political spectrum when trying to get a full education," he said. "So I think it would be a nice thing to have."

Tags: RIGHT-WING POLITICS