New Zealand 'neofascism' has spluttered back into life after racist anti-Asian leaflets were distributed in Auckland and Christchurch. Why are such groups so feeble and weak here? It wasn't that way during the seventies and early eighties, largely due to the right-wing, authoritarian Muldoon administration. While New Zealand has never had large scale gangs of violent skinheads attacking immigrants, refugees (and Jews, lesbians and gay men), the problem was more insidious back then. The New Zealand League of Rights preferred a more genteel, entryist approach toward 'conservative' groups, but it was actually the progeny of the Australian League of Rights, which had been investigated by ASIO during the Second World War for Axis sympathies. Given the gullible, social isolationist and conspiracist naivety of the Christian Right, it was easy to infiltrate or morally compromise or declare shared cause with their organisations. They even shared platforms and were free to distribute their literature. However, the Muldoon era was their heyday. Thereafter, they went into sharp decline and quietly expired altogether several years ago. They were replaced by the New Zealand National Front, based on the notorious British neofascist movement of the sixties and seventies, and didn't try to camouflague its anti-Asian racism, antisemitism or homophobia- which is one indication of its marginalised, underclass constituency. It was based predominantly in Christchurch and Waikanae (in the Central North Island). The Front's dysfunctional misfit membership proved incapable of establishing or maintaining a long-term. coherent organisation, let alone embrace pragmatic electoral constituency or local body politics as the British National Party or French Front National have done. In its turn, it quickly expired, although there's probably some overlapping membership between the Front and racist skinhead Kyle Chapman's new "Right Wing Resistance", I should imagine. And yes, they're homophobes too. The League of Rights campaigned against homosexual law reform and were allowed to distribute antigay literature through the Coalition of Concerned Citizens. National Front members participated in Destiny Church's Enough is Enough march against civil unions in August 2004, although with a tiny presence. Are they a threat? Only on the individual level. Avoid the proverbial dark alleyways in Christchurch, and Cathedral Square, especially late at night. However, given their feeble track record, there is every likelihood that this too will pass. Craig Young - 17th May 2011