In this conversation with RevDem editor Ferenc Laczó, Thomas Biebricher – author of the new book Mitte/Rechts: Die international Krise des Konservatismus (Center/Right: The International Crisis of Conservatism) – discusses conservatism’s various types and how each relates to the political center and to authoritarianism; illuminates the contemporary crisis of the center right in three major European countries; explains what has driven the culturalization of politics and the redrawing of enemy images, and why the authoritarian right has been a prime beneficiary of those trends; and reflects on how his approach and special emphases relate and add to other contributions to the ongoing debate on the present state and future prospects of liberal democracy.

Thomas Biebricher is Heisenberg-Professor in Political Sciences at Goethe University Frankfurt, with special emphases on political theory, the history of ideas, and theories of the economy. He has written widely on neoliberalism, ordoliberalism, German and European conservatism as well as on intellectuals such as Michel Foucault or Jürgen Habermas.

Mitte/Rechts: Die internationale Krise des Konservatismus has been published by Suhrkamp.

In collaboration with Lucie Hunter.