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Neo-Nazi groups say they are breaking up, but this may not be their end, experts say
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Neo-Nazi groups say they are breaking up, but this may not be their end, experts say

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Australia’s most prominent neo-Nazi group has been dealt a “significant” blow by proposed hate speech laws, experts say, as they warn the movement is likely to adapt rather than disappear.
The proposed laws would allow the Home Secretary – under security and legal oversight – to ban groups that commit or advocate hate crimes based on race, nationality or ethnic origin, even if they do not meet the threshold for designation as a terrorist organization.
Membership, recruitment and material support for such groups can then become criminal offences. Organizers face up to 15 years in prison if found guilty of “intentionally” directing the activities of a designated hate group, while members could face up to seven years in prison.
When Home Secretary Tony Burke highlighted the reforms late last year, he said the consequences for such groups would “in fact correspond very closely” to those currently applicable to designated terror organizations.
After the proposed legislation was unveiled Tuesday, the white supremacist group the National Socialist Network (NSN) said. it would dissolve completely by the end of the week, along with his “co-projects” White Australia, the White Australia Party and the European Australian Movement (EAM).

Home Secretary Tony Burke has vowed to continue disbanding organizations that hate Australia. Source: MONKEY / Dominic Giannini

The leadership of the NSN said its dissolution is intended to prevent members from being arrested and charged under the proposed laws. The group was never banned as a terrorist organization because it did not meet criteria such as evidence of active planning or advocacy for a terrorist attack.

In a statement on Telegram, leader Thomas Sewell and other senior members said there was no way the group – which advocates a white ethno-state driven by Nazi ideology – could avoid a ban if the laws were passed by parliament.

Burke had previously indicated that the NSN, along with the Islamist organization Hizb ut-Tahrir, could be included in the reforms.

Is the game suitable for organized neo-Nazis?

The legislation, assuming it is passed, marks “the biggest bump in the road” the NSN has faced as an organization, said Jordan McSwiney, a senior research fellow at the University of Canberra’s Center for Deliberative Democracy who researches far-right politics.
“It appears the game is set for a formal, openly neo-Nazi organization in Australia for now,” McSwiney told SBS News.

“That’s positive, that’s good news.”

But McSwiney warned that the networks the NSN leadership has spent years building are unlikely to disappear, and could instead become “more diffuse and informal.”
This is something the federal government seems to be aware of.
Burke said Thursday, “Every day the Nazis take a step back is a good day,” arguing that the group’s response showed the proposed legislation was both urgent and effective.

But he warned that while the laws would make it harder for them to organize, it did not mean “the hatred of these individuals goes away.”

Efforts to build ‘community’

Although the NSN has primarily attracted attention for its public meetings, they have also organized activities such as martial arts-oriented “active clubs.” There were also concerns the group organized “mother groups”, which the Victorian government said in December it was investigating.
McSwiney said the NSN has been preparing for a moment like this for some time, and has made a concerted effort to build a “sustainable community of white supremacists” within. When announcing its plans to disband, the NSN made no mention of shuttering programs such as its fitness groups.
Kaz Ross, an independent researcher on far-right extremism, agreed that the NSN probably knew for some time that such a move by the government was coming, because it had long specialized in walking the line of legality but not crossing it.
“They have taken a cold, hard look at what the legislation means for them and have found that there is no wiggle room for them at all,” she told SBS News. The decision to dissolve, she said, was likely intended to preserve future opportunities for reform.

“I think they may naively and wrongly believe that by not existing on Sunday night they will escape a ban. I think Tony Burke is going to ban them anyway, and that will hinder their efforts to form a new political structure.”

The NSN’s move follows a year in which it has taken steps to increase its public visibility.

“They entered a new phase of populism and construction,” Ross said. “Hopefully this sets them back significantly, but I think they will pop up again.”

A man speaks on the steps of a building to a large crowd of people, many holding Australian flags.

National Socialist Network leader Thomas Sewell addressed thousands of people at the anti-immigration march for Australia in August last year. Source: Getty / SOPA images / LightRocket / Ye Myo Khant

Labor MP Josh Burns said it was a “fundamentally good thing” that the NSN had said it would disband in the wake of the draft legislation, but that the group and its members would remain under scrutiny.

“I don’t trust their public statements for a second,” Burns told ABC radio on Wednesday. “We will therefore have to ensure that the organization and its members do not continue to promote or recruit.”

Opposition home affairs spokesman Jonathon Duniam has also expressed concern that the group could avoid responsibility by “pulling down a banner and resurfacing under a different name”.

‘Definitely a headache for them’

It remains to be seen what scope the final legislation could have in banning new entities, but Ross said on behalf of his core members: “You’re not going to do anything to change their goal, which is to make Australia a white-only, white supremacist country.”
“They’re going to keep trying to find a way,” she said.
If the organization somehow resurfaces, it wouldn’t be the first time. The dissolution of the NSN and EAM follows the collapse of previous incarnations such as the Lads Society, United Patriots Front and Reclaim Australia.

Notably, one of the “co-projects” that the organization said would be cut in its announcement was the White Australia Party – the planned political party for which it has spent much of the past year trying to shore up support in its efforts for legitimacy.

In November, senior NSN member Jack Eltis claimed the group had reached 1,500 registered members required by the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) for a party to be registered. On Wednesday, Eltis said it planned to send out membership confirmations this weekend and submit documentation to the AEC later this month. Now those ambitions seem to have reached a dead end.
“They’ve put a lot of time and effort into building this infrastructure, this organizational infrastructure, especially around building to try to get a party registered, and this seems to at least put a pin in that, and I think that’s a pretty positive development,” McSwiney said.
He believes, like Ross, that key NSN figures will likely eventually try to form another organization to avoid falling foul of the proposed legislation.
“In the meantime, there are still many other opportunities where they can be involved in organized racist activism.
“It is not clear to what extent this will prevent committed members of the group from continuing their activities just outside the formal structures of the organization. But I think it will, for example, make it more difficult to recruit new members. It will certainly be a headache for them.”

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