The world our children inherit is shaped by what adults accept today. Racist intimidation, the scapegoating of minorities and the weakening of democratic safeguards deserve direct scrutiny. Remembering past atrocities matters, but remembrance becomes hollow if we refuse to examine present conduct.
This article looks at documented examples in England and Wales, Germany and the United States, alongside international research. They illustrate different problems, not identical regimes. The evidence supports serious concern; it does not establish a single worldwide rate of rising racism or justify calling every political opponent a fascist.
Published 7 October 2026. The examples and reporting periods are dated below. Analysis is distinguished from official findings; this is a sourced overview, not an exhaustive survey of every country.
Racism, authoritarianism and fascism: what are we discussing?
Racism assigns people unequal worth or treatment because of race, ethnicity or ancestry. It can appear in individual abuse, institutional practices or political programmes. Xenophobia targets people perceived as foreign. Religious hatred can overlap with racial hostility, but the categories should not simply be collapsed.
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum describes fascism as an authoritarian, ultranationalist political philosophy hostile to democratic government, equality and individual rights. Exclusionary nationalism, perceived national decline, paramilitary activity and the celebration of violence are important characteristics.
Authoritarianism concerns the concentration of power and restrictions on meaningful opposition and accountability. It can exist without the particular ideology or mass movement associated with fascism. Racism can flourish within a democracy; democratic backsliding is not automatically proof of fascism.
Precision should make criticism stronger. The questions are what a movement says, whom its policies target, what its supporters do, and how it treats courts, elections, journalists and dissent. A label needs an argument, not merely outrage.
England and Wales: hatred with real victims
The Home Office’s year-ending-March-2025 bulletin reported 82,490 police-recorded race hate crimes excluding the Metropolitan Police, a 6% increase on the comparable previous year. Recorded religious hate crimes targeting Muslims rose 19% to 3,199 on that same exclusion basis, with a spike in August 2024.
The bulletin also reported 10,097 racially or religiously aggravated offences in August 2024, including Metropolitan Police data—the highest monthly total recorded. These followed the Southport murders and subsequent disorder. These aggravated offences are a different statistical series from the hate-crime totals; they should not be added together.
There are important limits. Recording practices change, many incidents are not reported, and the Metropolitan Police’s recording problems affect comparisons. The Home Office explicitly warns that police figures do not provide reliable long-term trends or a complete measure of prevalence. The evidence demonstrates a serious documented problem, not a precise count of every racist act.
Parliament’s report on the 2024 summer disorder documents false claims that the Southport attacker was an asylum seeker and violence outside Southport Mosque. It also notes that many protests remained peaceful and that the precise extent to which misinformation drove disorder was unclear. We should neither excuse racist violence nor attribute identical motives to every participant.
A crime committed by one person does not make a religious or ethnic community collectively guilty. When grief is redirected towards unrelated neighbours, a tragedy becomes an opportunity for scapegoating. That is a present concern with consequences for children’s safety and sense of belonging.
Germany: the AfD and the importance of an accurate account
Germany’s Alternative für Deutschland, or AfD, provides a concrete case of concern and legal dispute. The Cologne Administrative Court’s decision of 26 February 2026 records the intelligence agency BfV’s May 2025 assessment that the party’s ethnic conception of national belonging devalued people with migrant backgrounds, particularly those from Muslim-majority countries.
The AfD challenged that assessment. In the February interim decision, the court prohibited the BfV from treating the party as a confirmed right-wing extremist endeavour until the first-instance main proceedings conclude. It distinguished evidence of unconstitutional positions from sufficient proof that such positions characterised the entire party. Describing the challenged classification as an uncontested final finding would therefore be inaccurate.
The ruling does not require silence about exclusionary statements. It requires care about what has been established, by whom and under which standard. Our concern is the underlying principle: citizenship and equal rights must not become conditional on a preferred ancestry. Specific rhetoric and proposals deserve scrutiny without treating every voter as responsible for every statement.
The United States: Trump, migration language and concentrated power
Donald Trump’s 20 January 2025 executive order is titled “Protecting the American People Against Invasion”. Its opening presents unauthorised immigration as a threat and directs a broad enforcement programme. This is the administration’s own language, not an opponent’s paraphrase.
Our interpretation is that describing migration through an invasion frame risks treating a varied civilian population as a collective enemy. Governments can debate immigration levels and enforce lawful rules. Those debates still require evidence, individual responsibility and respect for human dignity. The existence of that rhetoric alone does not establish that an entire administration meets a historical definition of fascism.
There is also a separate institutional concern. In its March 2026 release reporting on 2025, the University of Gothenburg’s V-Dem Institute reported a 24% fall in the United States’ Liberal Democracy Index score and a rapid concentration of power during Trump’s second term. Its assessment identified pressure on checks and balances, the judiciary, the press and dissent.
That percentage concerns an index score, not a claim that 24% of citizens lost their rights. V-Dem’s assessment is research using a particular measurement framework, not a court judgment or a classification of the United States as fascist. Its release also notes that election-specific indicators were not reassessed in 2025 because it was not a national election year.
A broader warning—and evidence that decline can be resisted
V-Dem identified nearly a quarter of countries as undergoing autocratization in 2025. It also identified 18 countries moving towards democracy, including continuing improvements in Brazil and Poland. That mixed picture matters: deterioration is serious, but neither universal nor inevitable. Read the institute’s findings and reporting scope.
In joint guidance issued on 3 February 2026, UN committees on racial discrimination and migrant workers warned about the escalating effects of xenophobia and narratives blaming migrants for social, economic and political problems. This is a contemporary international human-rights warning, rather than a measurement proving the same trend in every nation.
Housing shortages, strained services and insecurity are real subjects for public debate. A convincing explanation examines decisions, resources and evidence. Blaming an entire minority offers an easier story, but it does not demonstrate who caused the problem or which remedy would work.
What history warns us to examine
The Holocaust Memorial Museum’s account of the conditions that enabled the Holocaust connects Nazi racism and antisemitism with the destruction of democratic institutions and free expression. Under Adolf Hitler, exclusion became state persecution and systematic mass murder. Those victims and events must be understood in their own historical specificity.
History does not tell us that every current controversy is a repeat of the 1930s. It gives us questions to ask before abuses deepen: are minorities depicted as contaminants or enemies? Are political opponents denied legitimacy? Is intimidation excused? Are leaders trying to evade independent scrutiny? Are rights being made contingent on ancestry, religion or loyalty?
These are warning signs for investigation, not a checklist that automatically delivers a diagnosis. Look for documented patterns, distinguish allegations from findings, and apply the same standards to people and parties you support.
What we can do for our children and grandchildren
Teach children to ask where a claim came from, whether a photograph or video has context, and whether an allegation concerns an individual or unfairly blames a group. Make room for questions. Model disagreement that does not humiliate or dehumanise.
Support people targeted by prejudice: listen, offer practical help and challenge discriminatory treatment through appropriate school, workplace or community channels. If confrontation could be dangerous, prioritise getting help and supporting the person affected. Do not make a child responsible for confronting a threatening adult.
Before sharing inflammatory material, check its origin and date. Report threats through relevant platform or local reporting channels. Support independent journalism, historical education and organisations working for equal treatment. Participate peacefully in democratic life and judge proposals by their effects on everyone’s rights.
The principles must be consistent. Antisemitism, anti-Muslim hatred, anti-Black racism and hostility towards other ethnic communities deserve opposition even when condemning them is inconvenient to our preferred political argument.
The future is a responsibility
We do not need to wait for agreement on the word fascism before opposing documented racism, intimidation or attacks on accountability. Equally, concern does not permit careless accusations. Accurate evidence and moral clarity belong together.
Our children should inherit more than warnings about what previous generations allowed. They should see adults protecting equal dignity now, insisting that power answer to the public, and refusing to turn neighbours into enemies.
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Sources checked 7 October 2026. The featured image is an AI-generated editorial illustration, not a photograph of an actual family or event.