The American Friend: Trans-Atlantic Illiberal Events and Prospects for Joint Ideological Development

The American Friend: Trans-Atlantic Illiberal Events and Prospects for Joint Ideological Development

By Erik Piccoli

---

Keywords: illiberalism, trans-Atlantic relations, social network analysis, Europe, United States

---

In March 2023, political theorist Gladden Pappin published an essay entitled “In God We Trust” wherein he described how the American right was beginning “to build a new intellectual framework for analyzing and critiquing our liberal regime.”^[1] For Pappin, the term “postliberal” is the most applicable to this new framework, since it indicates how its adherents reject a liberal understanding of politics while also mentioning how other terms such as “common good conservative” and “integralist” also define their essence.^[2] He concludes by arguing that in both Europe and the United States the liberal order is being successfully challenged by postliberal intellectuals and politicians, citing as examples American scholar Adrian Vermeule’s writings and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s ability to construct a conservative country.^[3]

As this article illustrates, Pappin is openly opposed to his understanding of contemporary liberalism and has spent his intellectual career challenging it.^[4] This is exemplified by his role as deputy editor of American Affairs, a political journal whose purpose Pappin has described as reorienting “US political debate around essential themes of political and economic sovereignty,” and as president of the Hungarian Institute of International Affairs, a state-owned think tank.^[5] By occupying major roles within the postliberal matrix in both the United States and Europe, Pappin acts as an archetypal trans-Atlantic actor who is capable of spreading his postliberal ideology to a wide audience. Given this, one might ask: is he an exceptional case or is he part of a wider phenomenon?

Regardless of the terminology used to describe this reactionary movement, the rise of illiberalism as a viable alternative to the liberal order is a phenomenon observable on both sides of the Atlantic. The electoral success of leaders such as US President Donald Trump, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni represents, to varying degrees, the potential for right-wing backlash against the dominant liberal ideology to appear as an appealing political alternative. These forces inspire one another ideologically and the emergence of an illiberal trans-Atlantic relationship has the potential for political and societal transformations at home in their respective countries and to dismantle supranational institutions.^[6] In addition to characterizing political parties and actors, the term “illiberal” can be used to describe an intellectual worldview, with scholars and writers building out illiberalism’s ideological and philosophical dimensions.

Pappin is among the key figures in this sphere. Among the mass of other theorists, he stands out due to his ability to speak to both an American and European crowd underscoring how illiberalism in the United States and Europe share ideological traits. As this article demonstrates, he is just one actor within a wide trans-Atlantic illiberal constellation comprising a multitude of think tanks, publications, and conferences. All together, these individuals and organizations constitute a loose network capable of fostering ideological exposure and partnership-building. Before discussing the makeup of the illiberal network, it is important to emphasize that illiberalism is not a totalizing ideology, and that the actors and events that populate this network vary in the intensity and degree to which they display illiberal characteristics. Regardless of the internal dynamics, the guiding ethos of these events comes from a reactive impetus to either contest or replace contemporary liberalism as they see it,making “trans-Atlantic illiberalism” the appropriate definition.

While it is clear that these networks exist, analysis is needed to discern what they look like, who the main actors are that populate them, and whether they successfully promote constructive partnerships. In order to answer these questions, this article builds on of the work conducted by the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE), which has documented the full extent of far-right conferences.^[7] However, here the focus is specifically oriented toward those illiberal events that promote trans-Atlantic ties rather than those that attempt to build a continental or domestic network, listed here in Table 1.^[8]

To understand the extent to which these conferences bridge the trans-Atlantic divide, a social network analysis (SNA) was conducted. The first step involved identifying the nationality of actors who spoke at key events. From this, it is possible to discern if domestic audiences are being exposed to a foreign perspective and which nationalities dominate the network. The findings of this article demonstrate that while the trans-Atlantic illiberal networks’ major events appear to be compartmentalized along continental and national lines, while American speakers dominate the network, with American actors appearing frequently at European conferences. Therefore, the trans-Atlantic network demonstrates a one-directional slant toward promoting American perspectives in Europe rather than equal ideological exposure.^[9]

table 1:Trans-Atlantic events analyzed in the paper

Event name	Location	Time period
Conservative Political Action Conference	United States, Hungary	2019–2025
National Conservatism Conference	United States, Belgium, United Kingdom, Italy	2019–2024
Danube Geopolitical Summit	Hungary	2022–2024
Viva 24	Spain	2024
Intermarium Conference	Poland	2021

The Nature of Illiberalism and Transnationalism

As mentioned previously, there is no consensus, even among these actors, on what term should be used to define this movement. In this article, the term “illiberal” is used as it captures the essence of each actor and institution’s guiding principle: that is, that political liberalism is a failed project and needs to be re-evaluated. According to Laruelle, illiberalism “is a cluster of ideologies” that ultimately “promote majoritarianism, sovereignism, and traditional hierarchies (social, sexual, gender, cultural) and recognize the right to particularism and some forms of exclusivity.”^[10] Thus, using terms such as “conservative,” “radical right,” or “far right” are either reductive or inaccurately describe certain elements of this network. Actors who populate it frame themselves and their political ideas as an explicit reaction against liberalism and come from countries where the liberal project has long been established and cemented itself. It is for this reason that the term conservative, a moniker many within the network use to describe themselves, is too broad.^[11]

Still, the “illiberalism” on its own is a broad umbrella concept under which there are competing countercurrents and internal variations. Enyedi writes that illiberalism is indeed not “a stage between democracy and dictatorship” nor an ideology, but instead a “complex, internally differentiated ideational syndrome that inspires action against liberal democracy.”^[12] He proposes nine versions of illiberalism which include nativist, religious, and traditionalist strands. Scholars have also highlighted the existence of two intellectual lineages that provide illiberal actors with a claim to ideological legitimacy: revolutionary conservatism and national conservatism.^[13] While there is significant overlap between the two, national conservatives in the West value Christian heritage over all else, clearly distance themselves from fascism, and strongly defend the cultural cohesiveness of Western civilization vis-à-vis other geopolitical constructs.^[14] Therefore, this article focuses explicitly on the subsection of illiberalism that emerges from the nativist, religious, and traditionalist strands and supports a national-conservative ideological project. The following section discusses the main events that make up the illiberal trans-Atlantic constellation and why, based on the above classification, they fit this particular version of illiberalism.

The Trans-Atlantic Conferences and Summits

The rise of trans-Atlantic illiberalism has been made possible thanks in part to the institutions that facilitated the sharing of information and ideas and those that allowed politicians, activists, and other actors to interface directly within an enclosed environment. This latter aspect is best exemplified by the aforementioned plethora of conferences. It must also be noted that, in addition to events, publications and minor alliances have an important role to play in the illiberal constellation’s process of ideological co-development, but an analysis of these is beyond the scope of this article.

The Conservative Political Action Conference

Born out of a joint initiative of the American Conservative Union (ACU) and Young America’s Foundation, the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) was originally envisioned as a way for conservative Americans to network and discuss the future of their movement.^[15] When it eventually materialized, the conference initially attempted to purify the conservative movement by barring certain groups from attending, but eventually evolved to include additional right-wing perspectives, such as those on the libertarian right, in order to present a holistic understanding of the American right’s beliefs.^[16] However, in the age of Trump, the MAGA wing of the Republican Party has come to dominate the conference, with other factions within the party being sidelined.^[17]

One of the more significant developments in CPAC’s history, at least for this article, was its decision to go international. In December of 2017, its first international conference was held in Japan with the express purpose of “building solidarity among conservatives across the globe.”^[18] It would take another five years for CPAC to hold an event in Europe, but eventually, under the slogan “God, Homeland, Family,” CPAC Hungary was hosted in Budapest.^[19]  Much like CPAC’s other international events, this one sought to bridge the transnational divide by stressing how actors in both the United States and Hungary are united ideologically, on basic principles such as traditional values and the primacy of border security.^[20] This fact was stressed during Prime Minister Orbán’s speech wherein he urged those in the audience to take back “the two main sanctuaries of modern democracy, Washington and Brussels,” from liberals.^[21] Therefore, from day one, it was made clear how CPAC Hungary served as an ideological incubator and a site for American and European illiberals to jointly develop their political thought and doctrine in an environment conducive to their beliefs.

CPAC’s first event held on the old continent was, predictably, dominated by European speakers and panelists, with participants including politicians such as President of the French National Rally (Rassemblement National) party Jordan Bardella, and intellectuals such as Hungarian lawyer Balázs Orbán (no relation to the prime minister). However, notable American conservative politicians and activists were also featured, such as then candidate and future Congressman Mike Waltz, former Republican Senator from Pennsylvania Rick Santorum, and activist Candace Owens.^[22] Still in its formative stage, CPAC Hungary would only evolve into a significant gathering for illiberal trans-Atlanticism the following year when the American presence increased. This development coincided with growing collaboration between think tanks in Hungary and the United States, with the Hungarian Center for Fundamental Rights (CFR) standing out due to its role in organizing the event.^[23] CPAC Hungary, therefore, appears as one of the main European illiberal events offering actors and institutions the chance to strengthen both trans-Atlantic and pan-European ties.

CPAC’s ability to provide illiberal intellectuals and activists with these opportunities extends beyond its Hungarian events and is a notable feature of its annual American conference as well. During their trips to the United States, European think tanks have seized the opportunity to network with their American colleagues, exemplified by members of the Italian think tank Nazione Futura’s ability to connect with representatives from the Heritage Foundation, the America First Policy Institute, and Americans for Tax Reform, along with Center for Fundamental Rights President Miklós Szánthó’s participation at a book launch event with the Counterpoint Institute’s President Shea Bradley-Farrell. ^[24]

Finally, it is important to highlight that, in addition to the practical networking side of CPAC, there is an important symbolic aspect characterized by the conference’s ability to introduce illiberal politicians and thinkers to a foreign audience.^[25] In summary, CPAC has helped to solidify illiberal trans-Atlantic ties both by symbolically hosting political actors, along with offering these actors and their institutions a platform to discuss their political philosophy and network with foreign supporters. 

The National Conservatism Conference

While CPAC is arguably the best-known trans-Atlantic political event, the National Conservatism Conference, or NatCon, serves as its more intellectually oriented counterpart. Launched in 2019 by the Edmund Burke Foundation, an organization that seeks to promote the tenets of national-conservatism, NatCon fashions itself as a “movement” that seeks to “solidify and energize national conservatives, offering them a much-needed institutional base, substantial ideas in the areas of public policy, political theory, and economics, and an extensive support network across the country.”^[26] NatCon seeks to resolve the internal philosophical divisions within the wider conservative movement by offering a unified national-conservative response. Its statement of principles lists a series of illiberal tenets for “restoring” key “traditional beliefs, institutions, and liberties” in the Western world.^[27] While dominated by Americans, the list of signatories underscores NatCon’s truly trans-Atlantic scope by attempting to unify both continents under a single political banner.

On this issue of ideology-building, the statement of principles illustrates which fundamental values constitute the movement’s ethos. In 10 bullet points, the document addresses its stance on nationalism, religion, identity, and governance.^[28] It emphasizes that culture and religion must be safeguarded from government intervention and migrants; that the nation-state is the ultimate arbiter in foreign affairs, with supranational institutions leading to the rise of autocratic regimes; and attacks “liberal imperialism,” along with addressing the possibility for a strong government to intervene where “law and justice have been manifestly corrupted, or in which lawlessness, immorality, and dissolution reign.”^[29] Most of these tenets display the clear illiberal bent that influences the movement’s stance toward culture, social values, identity, governance, and international affairs—all elements that define the speeches and panels at NatCon events. 

With regard to these conferences, the themes largely reflect issues of importance to the United States as the host nation. Still, certain fundamental topics appear in most conferences, such as anti-liberalism/leftism (usually called wokeism or cultural Marxism) and the promotion of both conservative and religious values, along with addressing national sovereignty as a fundamental aspect of international affairs. Through these conferences, an attempt to unify the various illiberal currents into a cohesive movement can be observed.^[30] NatCon, therefore, can be described as an illiberal trans-Atlantic event in that it presents its supporters with an outlet to create a unified ideology and engage in debate.

The Minor Events of the Illiberal Constellation

While CPAC and NatCon represent the two largest and most influential conferences of the trans-Atlantic illiberal network, they are hardly alone. In addition to these two conferences, the Danube Geopolitical Summit, Viva 24, and the Intermarium conference are smaller yet nonetheless important events that promote illiberal trans-Atlantic ends.

Geopolitics is one of the many themes present at both CPAC and NatCon, whereas the Danube Geopolitical Summit represents the main trans-Atlantic illiberal event dedicated entirely to the topic. Established by the Danube Institute, a Hungarian think tank funded in part by the Orbán government, the summit focuses on topics such as trans-Atlantic relations and great-power competition.^[31] Since 2023, the Danube Institute has partnered with the Heritage Foundation, fully cementing the trans-Atlantic nature of the summit.^[32]

The summit’s scope and its participants are not illiberal by default. Yet an illiberal interpretation of geopolitics dominates the speeches and panels. This is made apparent by the fact that participants call for increasingly isolationist measures, frame gender theory and multiculturalism as the causes for the West’s self-destruction, seek to incentivize a traditional family model as an alternative to migration as a means to solving demographic problems, and promote an economic policy that protects national social values.^[33] In the keynote address at the 4th Danube Geopolitical Summit, Balázs Orbán stressed how the liberal “end of history,” as envisioned by Francis Fukuyama, had not come to pass, and that instead “the Age of Sovereignty” was rising from its ashes.^[34] This new world order would be distinctly sovereigntist, with Orbán arguing that political decisions by each country would be made not “on ideology, but rather, national interest.”^[35] These positions capture the overall illiberal essence of the Danube Geopolitical Summit. Therefore, in addition to the fact that the summit is sponsored by illiberal organizations like the Heritage Foundation and the Danube Institute, the positions of key speakers and underlying civilizationist worldview promoted during the summits betray the illiberal bent.^[36]

While the conferences listed thus far are run by think tanks, foundations, and political organizations, individual parties have also been the organizers behind these events. Such is the case of Viva 24, represents the latest iteration of the Spanish illiberal far-right party Vox’s Viva conference series.^[37] Hosted on September 18 and 19, 2024, the conference was described as a “convention of European patriots who will bring together people from all over the continent” in anticipation of the EU elections.^[38] In fact, the event featured speeches from important illiberal European politicians, namely Meloni, Orbán, Le Pen, and Vox party leader Santiago Abascal. However, it represented much more than that due to the presence of speakers coming from across the Atlantic. From the United States, ACU Chairman Matt Schlapp was joined by his wife and former White House Director of Strategic Communications under Donald Trump, Mercedes Schlapp, along with Heritage Foundation members Roger Severino and Andrés Martínez Fernández.^[39] Therefore, while marketed as an event for European conservatives, Viva 24 showcased the extent of the global illiberal right. In terms of the content of the speeches, each actor offered a perspective born out of their respective national concerns. However, a unifying theme of anti-globalism and support for traditional values exemplified each speech.^[40] Thus, while Viva 24 stands out as a noteworthy event worth including in the illiberal network due to its ability to bring together leading illiberal politicians from across Europe along with important actors from the United States, Latin America, and Israel.^[41]

Finally, the Intermarium Conference of 2021 represented the academic dimension of the illiberal trans-Atlantic network. The event was sponsored by the Collegium Intermarium, a Polish university in Warsaw that states that it provides an “education based on the classic values ​​of European civilization: Roman legal culture, Greek philosophy and Christian ethics.”^[42] According to its rector, Tymoteusz Zych, the university is intended as “the antithesis of [Hungarian entrepreneur George] Soros’ project” and his founding of the Central European University, and presents his own institution of higher education as part of a return to the foundations of classical culture.^[43] Among the partners of the Collegium are the illiberal Polish Catholic think tank Ordo Iuris and the French Institute of Social, Economic and Political Sciences, a private institute run by the far-right politician Marion Maréchal.^[44]

On May 28, 2021, a conference was held to inaugurate the Collegium on the topic of classical values in contemporary education and public debate.^[45] Featuring primarily academics and politicians from Central and Eastern Europe, the other speakers included aforementioned American illiberal actors such as Rod Dreher and Gladden Pappin. The conference itself was defined by three central narratives: “Natural Order,” “True Europe,” and “Gender Ideology.”^[46] In order, these themes refer to the existence of a divine natural order; a specific set of immutable traits that characterize the true, and inherently Christian, Europe; and the understanding that “increasingly diversified conceptions of gender and sexuality” violate the natural order, thus threatening human morality.^[47] It is these three narratives that define the conference and illustrate its illiberal core. While a one-off event, the conference represents how illiberal actors seek to consolidate themselves within the academic world. By hosting figures engaged in the illiberal intellectual debates from across Europe and the United States, the Intermarium Conference serves as a key event in the network that fosters ideological coherence within the academic sphere.

These events illustrate that illiberal actors are united through general or single-issue conferences, each contributing to the construction of an illiberal constellation that promotes a unified vision. However, determining whether these gatherings genuinely expose their audiences to a diverse and authentically trans-Atlantic perspective cannot be achieved solely by analyzing which organizations are sponsoring these events and where they are hosted. By conducting a social network analysis of the speakers at these events, it becomes possible to assess the extent to which they effectively bridge both sides of the Atlantic.

Methodology

To analyze the network of illiberal events that promote trans-Atlantic ends, a social network analysis (SNA) of the events and actors that populate it was conducted. An event refers to a “collection of subsets of actors” wherein actors refer to “individual, corporate, or collective social units.”^[48] The collection of events and nodes represents a two-way affiliation network. As Faust writes, this is a specific network that is “two-mode [and] non-dyadic,” wherein the two modes are the “set of actors and the set of events” that are non-dyadic, since “the affiliation relation relates each actor to a subset of events and relates each event to a subset of actors,” allowing for the study of the “dual perspectives.”^[49] In other words, a two-way affiliation network illustrates which events connect nodes to one another, rather than the nodes themselves connecting to one another. Due to the illiberal trans-Atlantic network unifying a series of events that relate to each other through shared actors, it can be defined as such.^[50]

Based on this distinction, the trans-Atlantic illiberal network appears like a constellation with no real hierarchy or centralized leadership. While the entities that manage events themselves display a formal leadership structure, there is no hierarchy, at least not an explicitly-defined one, among them. The paper showcases this by presenting each event as a single meeting point for a wider network of groups and activists, just like a constellation. While similar studies have demonstrated how illiberal think tanks act as builders of a transnational illiberal field, less attention has been focused on conferences.^[51] By mapping the structure of interactions between illiberal networked intellectuals, this article seeks to uncover both the national composition of the whole network and identify who more often acts as trans-Atlantic actors: that is, which nationalities constitute the majority of actors who travel between the two continents.^[52]

RQ1: Which nationalities appear most often in the network of illiberal conferences?

RQ2: Does a nationality represent the majority of trans-Atlantic actors?

To conduct this analysis, a list of event speakers was obtained either from the official agenda or, in the absence of said list, by viewing the official livestream of the event in question. The resulting list of 1,046 unique speakers was compiled into a single Microsoft Excel file, with separate sheets for each unique event which listed the name, nationality, and events they had attended. Data was obtained from 2019 to 2025 and collapsed into a single social network, thus not accounting for change over time.^[53] With this dataset, the software Gephi was used to illustrate the interconnected nature of the two-way affiliation network and identify which nationalities, and consequently which perspectives, are predominant at a given conference. This was done using the ForceAtlas2 layout in which nodes repulse one another while edges attract their nodes in order to create a balanced network.[54]

Finally, in order to establish which actors act as the bridges between events in Europe and the United States, a trans-Atlantic formula (TAF) is adopted.^[55] The following formula calculates, over all conferences, how many times a given speaker attends an American event A versus a European event E,with 0 denoting a node with no presence in either Europe or the United States and 1 denoting a perfect balance.

A Unidirectional Illiberal Network

From the affiliation network illustrated in Figure 1, it is possible to observe that most speakers attend one event. In fact, 64% of the total speakers attended exactly one conference. Furthermore, the network illustrates both a divide between European and American conferences along with the NatCon and CPAC events hosted in the United States. The former is visible by the clustering of both American events on the left of the chart opposite to the clusters of European conferences. With regard to the divide between the two American conference clusters, this is explained by the different types of speakers they seek to attract. While both are illiberal in nature, the American CPAC events primarily seek to chart the political course for the GOP while Nat Con is focused on promoting its brand of nationalistic conservatism. In all, the affiliation network reveals a fragmented, yet interconnected ecosystem of illiberal events split along continental and intellectual lines.

figure 1. Social network visualization of the conferences showcasing instances of overlap.

Note: Red = American speakers, Blue = European speakers, Green = other nationalities.

Source: Author’s elaboration with data obtained from CPAC, NatCon, Collegium Intermarium, Danube Institute, and Viva 24 speaker lists.

Furthermore, the balance of speakers is slanted toward the United States. As Figure 2 illustrates, both the CPAC and NatCon events attract the greatest number of speakers, with an overrepresentation of Americans. While there are more events in the United States, thus contributing to the speaker difference, the graph demonstrates that American events host few European speakers.

figure 2: Speaker participation by region and conference type.

Note: Diagonal lines = American speakers, Horizontal lines = European speakers.

Assigning the same color to all European speakers is useful in analyzing how the network is split along continental lines but obscures which specific nations from the old continent are most frequently represented. Speakers from the United States amounted to 66% of the total speaker list (641), 568 more than those from the second-most-numerous nationality, Great Britain. Therefore, the findings from this research support the conclusions of the GPAHE study in that only a small percentage of speakers were influential within the network, together with the American eclipse all other nationalities.^[56]

Furthermore, lumping all nationalities together would obfuscate whether the trans-Atlantic network is exposing domestic audiences to foreign perspectives. Thus, a more detailed analysis of the conference attendance is needed. Figure 3 illustrates that, when looking specifically at the conferences hosted in the United States, it is clear that Americans play a hegemonic role within their own country, with no other nationality exceeding more than 10 speakers at any given conference held there.

figure 3:Top 5 most frequent nationalities present at the American events.

With regard to the European conferences, the American presence is also comparatively strong. In fact, speakers from the United States represent either the largest number of speakers, are the second-largest, or are tied for second, as illustrated in Figure 4. The only exception is Viva 24, but American speakers there are still tied for third place. Therefore, even in conferences hosted in Europe, the trans-Atlantic network is still characterized by a strong American presence.

figure 4: Top 5 most frequent nationalities present at European events.

As mentioned previously, the dominance of speakers originating from the host nation is also observable, with British, Spanish, and Polish speakers taking the lion’s share of speakers at Nat Con London, Viva 24, and the Intermarium Conference. While coming in second at the first two CPAC conferences hosted in Budapest, Hungarians still represent the most numerous of the European nationalities at the three CPAC Hungary events, supporting the notion that speakers tend to come primarily from the host country.

These findings indicate a clear slant that favors American perspectives in Europe, but it remains unclear which European nationalities act as the old continent’s primary contribution to the trans-Atlantic bridge. To resolve this, the trans-Atlantic formula was applied to calculate whether the speakers travel more or less abroad. Of the total number of speakers, only 7.07% attended at least one conference in both Europe and the United States, indicating that the overwhelming majority of speakers do not operate as trans-Atlantic actors.

Of the 74 speakers who do bridge the split, 44 are American and 20 are European, while the remaining 10 come from other areas. Among the Europeans, the majority of speakers are British (6), followed by Hungarians (3), and finally a tie between Italians and Poles (2 each). These findings further support the SNA findings highlighting to the unidirectionality of the network. In fact, of the 10 speakers with a score of 1, only two, Senior Counselor to President Donald Trump James Carafano and Herzl Institute President Yoram Hazony, attended more than two conferences in both Europe and the United States.[57] To account for this, the original dataset of 1046 speakers was restricted to only include actors who attended a minimum of three events in either Europe or the United States, in order to obtain a more meaningful measure of sustained cross-continental engagement. From this finalized list of 44 speakers, 29 were American, 8 European, and 7 from other areas. Therefore, while these events openly market themselves as either trans-Atlantic in scope or laud their capacity to construct a united front against liberalism, in reality they struggle to foster a community of trans-Atlantic actors. Meanwhile, among the handful of those who connect the two types of events, American speakers take the lion’s share.

In summary, the results from the SNA indicate the conferences operating as unidirectional trans-Atlantic events. Actors within the network largely do not participate in other types of events within the network, and the network as a whole feature a clear bent in favor of American speakers. Of the 1,046 total speakers attending 23 conferences, the vast majority (972) spoke only at events on one side of the Atlantic, with only 74 speakers having bridged the divide. However, it is important to note that amongst those who attended eight or more events, trans-Atlantic overlap was observable. Finally, the results showcase that there is a significant American dominance even at events in Europe, as Americans represented 66% of the total number of speakers in the network and represented either the most or second-most-common nationality at 10 out of the 11 European conferences selected. Furthermore, among the trans-Atlantic actors, the number of speakers from the United States represents more than half of the total number of selected speakers. This underscores the truly one-directional nature of the events, with European speakers exhibiting a relatively insignificant presence in the United States while American speakers nonetheless have a major presence at many events in Europe.

Conclusion and Discussion

In his keynote speech delivered at CPAC Texas in 2022, Viktor Orbán stated that liberals “hate me and slander me and my country as they hate you and slander you and the America you stand for.”^[58] According to the Hungarian prime minister, “progressive liberals” did not want him to speak because he was there to tell Americans that they “should unite our forces.”^[59] This call for unity was answered and illiberal actors have since been able to interact thanks to a series of events which, all together, constitute an illiberal trans-Atlantic network. However, as this article demonstrates, few speakers appear consistently throughout this network, resulting in a strong degree of compartmentalization, as idea-sharing through speakers is limited due to minimal overlap. Furthermore, speakers from America dominate the network regardless of whether the conferences are held in the United States or Europe, allowing American issues or interpretations to appear more frequently. Still, overlap remains minimal, with most speakers attending only one conference, and those who attend eight or more conferences remaining confined to a certain conference ecosystem, such as that of CPAC and Nat Con. This suggests that while the network facilitates interaction among illiberal actors, it is far from cohesive, with limited cross-cluster engagement and a predominance of American voices.

A major limitation that this article faces is that it remains unknown which nationalities were present in the audiences at the conferences. Since the article’s methodology hinges on the fact that these events expose the local population to perspectives from different nations, particularly those from across the Atlantic, this unknown remains a cause for uncertainty about the implications of these results.

Furthermore, it remains impossible to assess what the speakers are saying during the private sessions at these events and whom they are speaking with. Seeing as the article focuses on the prospect of joint ideology-building, not knowing what is being said throughout an entire conference does present a gap in the findings. Finally, as mentioned previously, actors in the United States and Europe might have incorporated the beliefs of thinkers from overseas and be presenting repackaged formulations of their original theses. Yet, seeing as how these reformulations are likely informed by their respective national experiences, this does not pose a serious concern.

Future research on the network must focus more on the content of the speeches delivered at these events. In particular a discursive analysis of the speeches delivered by actors which bridge the network can help explain what type of issues they focus on and the overall themes of their discourse when they are at a given event. While the above findings showcase an American dominance within the network, it is important to assess whether American issues and an American framing appearing in their speeches. Here a comparative analysis of speeches conducted at the various events by the individuals that appear to bridge the Atlantic more frequently will showcase which themes and framings are more likely to appear transatlantically.

Furthermore, research in the area of ideological history can shed light on the impact of European and American intellectuals in shaping the topics discussed at these events. Finally, any future social network analysis should be expanded to discern if these events constitute a portion of a wider transnational illiberal network. While NatCon is primarily orientated toward the Western world, and the other events are oriented primarily toward a trans-Atlantic crowd, CPAC attempts to foster the creation of a global network by opening its platform to venues in Asia and Latin America. Therefore, expanding the network will uncover its global implications and allow for comparative analyses of various region-to-region dynamics. Trans-Atlantic illiberalism, while a real phenomenon characterized by a network of events, appears limited in its capacity to bring about ideological co-exposure and is American-centric.

---

[1] Gladden Pappin, “In God We Trust” Postliberal Order (blog), Substack, March 3, 2023, https://www.postliberalorder.com/p/in-god-we-trust.

[2] Pappin, “In God We Trust.”

[3] Pappin.

[4] In fact, Pappin, along with professor C. C. Pecknold, runs the blog Postliberal Order, which in its “About” page describes liberalism as a failed experiment that has led individuals to become detached from themselves, their families, their nation, and God. See Pappin, “In God We Trust.”

[5] “About American Affairs,” American Affairs website, https://americanaffairsjournal.org/about/; “The Hungarian Institute of International Affairs Is Reorganized,” Magyar Külügyi Intézet, April 14, 2023, https://hiia.hu/en/the-hungarian-institute-of-international-affairs-is-reorganized/; Pappin, “In God We Trust.”

[6] Giovanna Di Maio, “The Risk of an Illiberal Transatlantic Relationship,” Illiberalism Studies Program, Institute for European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies, The George Washington University, September 26, 2024, https://www.illiberalism.org/the-risk-of-an-illiberal-transatlantic-relationship/.

[7] “Mapping The Far Right: The Movement’s Conferences Illuminates Its Growing Transnational Networks,” Global Project against Hate and Extremism,  September 18, 2024, https://globalextremism.org/reports/mapping-the-far-right-the-movements-conferences-illuminate-its-growing-transnational-networks/.

[8] This refers to those events that seek to bring together illiberal organizations within their respective nations or continents. For example, in Europe, the Alliance for the Common Good represents one such node, as it brings together exclusively European illiberal think tanks.

[9] It is important here to mention that, while an American bent is observable, it does not mean that American intellectuals and politicians are not influenced by the ideals of European and other foreign thinkers, mainly through translations of books. In fact, illiberals in the United States have claimed to be indebted to the thought of Scottish philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre, while European fiction authors, namely Michel Houellebecq and Jean Raspail, are also seen as sources of inspiration. See Shadi Hamid, “The Rise of Anti-Liberalism,” The Atlantic, February 20, 2018, https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2018/02/liberalism-trump/553754/; Rod Dreher, “Good Lessons from a Bad Book,” The American Conservative, September 14, 2015, https://www.theamericanconservative.com/good-lessons-from-a-bad-book-raspail-camp-of-the-saints/; Daniel Addison, “A Difficult Marriage? Alasdair MacIntyre and the Postliberal Right,” Illiberalism Studies Program, Institute for European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies, The George Washington University, November 11, 2024, https://www.illiberalism.org/a-difficult-marriage-alasdair-macintyre-and-the-postliberal-right/.

[10] Marlene Laruelle, “Introduction: Illiberalism Studies as a Field,” in Marlene Laruelle, ed., The Oxford Handbook of Illiberalism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2024), 3, https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780197639108.013.49.

[11] As Fawcett writes, being conservative does not make one an illiberal by default, and conservatives can operate within liberal-democratic parameters. Therefore, lumping liberal-conservatives into the same camp as their illiberal counterparts muddies the waters of any serious scholarship on either phenomenon. See Edmund Fawcett, “Illiberalism and Conservatism,” in Marlene Laruelle, ed., The Oxford Handbook of Illiberalism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2024), p. 12, https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780197639108.013.42). 

[12] Zsolt Enyedi, “Concept and Varieties of Illiberalism,” Politics and Governance 12, (September 11, 2024), https://doi.org/10.17645/pag.8521.

[13] Mihai Varga and Aron Buzogány, “Genealogies of Illiberalism,” in Marlene Laruelle, ed., The Oxford Handbook of Illiberalism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2024), https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780197639108.013.3.

[14] Varga and Buzogány, “Genealogies of Illiberalism,” p. 118–119.

[15] Sara Diamond, Roads to Dominion: Right-Wing Movements and Political Power in the United States (New York: Guilford Press, 1995), p. 128. CPAC, to this day, is run by the ACU and serves as the latter’s annual conference. 

[16] Daniel Parker, “CPAC: The Origins and Role of the Conference in the Expansion and Consolidation of the Conservative Movement, 1974–1980” (PhD diss., University of Pennsylvania, 2015), 3–4, https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/76394985.pdf.

[17] Ben Jacobs, “CPAC Used to Be a Barometer. Now It’s All about Trump,” Vox (news site), March 3, 2023, https://www.vox.com/politics/2023/3/3/23624349/cpac-republicans-donald-trump; Lisa Lerer, “CPAC and the New Republicanism,” New York Times, February 27, 2021, sec. US, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/27/us/politics/cpac-trump-republicans.html.

[18] CPAC, “Standing for Freedom at CPAC Japan,” Conservative Political Action Conference, December 11, 2023, https://www.cpac.org/post/standing-for-freedom-at-cpac-japan.

[19] Flora Garamvolgyi, “Viktor Orbán Tells CPAC the Path to Power Is to ‘Have Your Own Media,’ ” Guardian, May 20, 2022, sec. US news, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/may/20/viktor-orban-cpac-republicans-hungary.

[20] Virág Lőrincz, “Budapest to Host the Largest American Conservative Conference,” Hungarian Conservative, October 13, 2021, https://www.hungarianconservative.com/articles/current/budapest-to-host-the-largest-american-conservative-conference/. This latter point was stated by Miklós Szánthó, director of the Hungarian conservative think tank, the Center for Fundamental Rights.

[21] Viktor Orbán, “Speech by Prime Minister Viktor Orbán at the Opening of the CPAC Hungary Conference,” Miniszterelnok (Hungarian Prime Minister’s Office website), May 5, 2023, https://miniszterelnok.hu/en/speech-by-prime-minister-viktor-orban-at-the-opening-of-the-cpac-hungary-conference/.

[22] Alapjogokért Központ, “CPAC Hungary 2022,” YouTube channel, May 19, 2022, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zkmj3dRM0M.

[23] Casey Tolan Devine, Anna-Maja Kyung Lah, and Curt Rappard, “American Conservatives Embrace Hungary’s Authoritarian Leader at Budapest Conference,” CNN, May 1, 2024, https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/01/politics/gop-conservatives-hungary-cpac-orban-invs/index.html; Márton Losonczi, “CPAC Hungary about to Kick Off with Illustrious Speakers,” Hungarian Conservative (news site), May 3, 2023, https://www.hungarianconservative.com/articles/current/cpac_hungary_may_2023_orban_carlson_lake_babis/. However, other non-Hungarian think tanks, such as the German Institute for Market Integration and Economic Policy and Italian conservative think tank Nazione Futura, were able to network with their American counterparts on the event’s margins. See Institute for Market Integration and Economic Policy, “Right Networking at the CPAC in Hungary,” MIWI Institute (think tank), May 7, 2023, https://miwi-institut.de/archives/2748.

[24] Joseph Cerrone, “Nazione Futura Expands US Network at CPAC,” Illiberalism Studies Program, Institute for European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies, The George Washington University, March 12, 2024, https://www.illiberalism.org/nazione-futura-expands-u-s-network-at-cpac/. In fact, Nazione Futura’s President Francesco Giubilei stated that its reason for attending CPAC was to construct a conservative network not only in Europe but in the West as a whole. See Francesco Giubilei, “Il nostro obiettivo è costruire una rete del mondo conservatore in Europa e Occidente, un progetto a cui lavoriamo da anni ma che stiamo intensificando per le europee e le presidenziali Usa, da qui la visita al Cpac. La mia intervista all’Huffington Post, grazie @PietroSalvatori https://t.co/xFvjGE1NEN.” Twitter/X, February 28, 2024, https://x.com/giubileif/status/1762832087592104427; Miklós Szánthó, “About Last Night . . . #friends of @CPAC Hungary Special Thanks to @KariLake, Great #foreword and Fantastic to Meet Again! This Is #indeed the Last #warning to the #West ⚠️ @DrShea_DC 📕 Launch in #WashingtonDC 🇺🇸 🇭🇺 Hungary’s #Triumph over Communism and the Woke Agenda Https://T.Co/pQmBsADpn6,” Twitter/X, February 23, 2024, https://x.com/MiklosSzantho/status/1761028824945312232.

[25] As mentioned previously, CPAC Hungary has featured prominent American politicians, primarily from the Trump wing of the GOP. The same has been done with CPAC’s American conference hosting European illiberal politicians, namely Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, Reform UK party leader Nigel Farage, and former National Rally party leader Marine Le Pen of France. By bringing American and European illiberal politicians together on the same stage, the illiberal electorate can see how these national movements fit into a broader transnational framework.

[26] “Overview,” National Conservatism website, n.d. https://nationalconservatism.org/about/.

[27] “National Conservatism: A Statement of Principles,” National Conservatism website, n.d. https://nationalconservatism.org/national-conservatism-a-statement-of-principles/. It is important to note that while the text focuses on the West, members of NatCon have brought in other voices from India and Japan to provide their perspectives on global issues. Furthermore, the text implies that Israel is a member of the West, since philosopher Ofir Haivry appears in the list of signers. The statement is notable in that it is cosigned by individuals both from Europe and the United States, with some notable names including American author Rod Dreher, American entrepreneur Peter Thiel, and the aforementioned Hungarian academic-turned-politician Balázs Orbán. Other signatories who have already appeared in this article include Michael Anton and Francesco Giubilei. 

[28] “National Conservatism,” National Conservatism website. In fact, migration is described as “uncontrolled,” becoming a “source of weakness and instability,” and the statement advocates the imposition of a “moratorium” on migration as a possible solution. Economic principles are also discussed, with the signatories endorsing an “economy based on private property and free enterprise” while cautioning against allowing transnational corporations to damage the moral values of the nation. The conference’s organizers also advocate for a national economic policy that pursues economic independence from “hostile powers.”

[29] “National Conservatism,” National Conservatism website.

[30] Yoram Hazony, the organizer of NatCon, has confirmed this during the second conference held in Washington DC, stating that there is no time for internal disagreement and there ought to be a sense of unity behind core values. “If we’re united,” he said, “we can achieve … restoration.” See Yoram Hazony, “Make the Ten Commandments Your Symbol,” National Conservatism website, July 8, 2024, https://nationalconservatism.org/natcon-4-2024/presenters/yoram-hazony/).

[31] The Danube Institute was founded by John O’Sullivan, a British national and frequent guest at NatCon events. Kenneth P. Vogel and Benjamin Novak, “Hungary’s Leader Fights Criticism in US via Vast Influence Campaign,” New York Times, October 4, 2021, sec. US, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/04/us/politics/hungary-orban-lobbying.html; “John O’Sullivan,” Danube Institute website, n.d., https://danubeinstitute.hu/en/authors/o-sullivan-john. Panels and speeches have covered the Russo-Ukrainian War, NATO’s role, national autonomy, and the state of Western democracy. See Ádám Bráder, “Second Danube Summit on Geopolitics, Security, and Defense (Day 1),” Hungarian Conservative, December 6, 2022, https://www.hungarianconservative.com/articles/current/second-danube-summit-on-geopolitics-security-and-defense-day-1/; Márton Losonczi, “Changing World Order, War and Security, Global Geopolitical Prospects: This Is What Happened at the Danube Geopolitical Summit,” Hungarian Conservative, September 28, 2023, https://www.hungarianconservative.com/articles/current/danube_geopolitical_summit_2023_tonny_abbott_lewis_libby_balazs_orban/; Ádám Bráder, “Fourth Danube-Heritage Geopolitical Summit: Whose Democracy? What Rules?” Hungarian Conservative, September 17, 2024, https://www.hungarianconservative.com/articles/current/fourth-geopolitical-summit-democracy-2024-whose-democracy-what-rules-david-frost-danube-institute/.

[32] Among the list of participants at these various events include previously-mentioned influential actors such as Gladden Pappin, Balázs Orbán, Heritage Foundation Vice President James Carafano, and Polish philosopher and Co-Chairman of the European Conservatives and Reformists Group in the European Parliament Ryszard Legutko.

[33] Kristóf Veres, “A ‘Safe Place’ for Dialogue: The Third Danube Geopolitical Summit,” Hungarian Conservative (news site), October 8, 2023, https://www.hungarianconservative.com/articles/opinion/third_danube_geopolitical_summit_safe_place_for_dialogue_opinion/; Losonczi, “Changing World Order, War and Security, Global Geopolitical Prospects;” Ádám Bráder, “Fourth Danube-Heritage Geopolitical Summit.” 

[34] Francis Fukuyama, The End of History and the Last Man (New York: The Free Press, 1992); Márton Losonczi. “Danube Institute Geopolitical Summit Kicks Off with Keynote Speech from Balázs Orbán,” Hungarian Conservative (news site), September 17, 2024, https://www.hungarianconservative.com/articles/current/danube-institute-heritage-foundation-geopolitical-summit-2024-balazs-orban/.

[35] Losonczi, “Danube Institute Geopolitical Summit Kicks Off with Keynote Speech from Balázs Orbán.”

[36] The geopolitical summit is not the only illiberal trans-Atlantic initiative promoted by the Danube Institute. In April of 2024, the Institute hosted its Transatlantic Patriot Summit, a one-day event promoting “deeper cooperation of conservative forces” in order to combat the “myriad of dangers” facing the West such as mass migration and the attack on traditional values committed by the “globalist Left.” See Zoltán Kottász, “Conservatives Have to Fight and Take Back the EU,” European Conservative, April 29, 2024, https://europeanconservative.com/articles/news/conservatives-have-to-fight-and-take-back-the-eu/.

[37] It is important to note that Viva 24 is one of three other Viva events (Viva 21 and 22). These other events are not included since they were not trans-Atlantic in scope.

[38] Rafael Nieto, “ ‘Europa Viva’ 24: La gran convención de patriotas europeos organizada por Vox,” Vox (news site), March 20, 2024, https://www.voxespana.es/noticias/europa-viva-24-la-gran-convencion-de-patriotas-europeos-organizada-por-vox-20240320.

[39] Conservative Political Action Conference, “CPAC Joins Forces with Vox for Europa Viva 24 in Spain,” CPAC website, May 21, 2024, https://www.cpac.org/post/cpac-joins-forces-with-vox-for-europa-viva-24-in-spain. Roger Severino, “Got to address an AMAZING crowd at #VIVA24,” Twitter/X, May 19, 2024, https://x.com/RogerSeverino_/status/1792133644833980646; Fundación Disenso, “#VIVA24 🇪🇸 | En el panel ‘El Futuro de Europa’, los eurodiputados @hermanntertsch y Kinga Gal junto a Andrés Martínez Fernández de la Fundación @Heritage y @wdechevilly de @europeanreform analizaron los desafíos y las oportunidades tras las elecciones europeas del 9 de junio ⬇️ https://t.co/nHLx9RhOSs,” Twitter/X, May 23, 2024, https://x.com/FDisenso/status/1793634988115874025.

[40] Steven Forti, “Taking Europe by Election: The Global Far Right in Madrid,” Illiberalism Studies Program, Institute for European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies, The George Washington University, May 30, 2024, https://www.illiberalism.org/taking-europe-by-election-the-global-far-right-in-madrid/.

[41] Forti, “Taking Europe by Election.”

[42] Collegium Intermarium, “Mission and Values,” Collegium Intermarium website, August 21, 2023, https://collegiumintermarium.org/en/our-mission.

[43] Andrej Sekulović, “Tymoteusz Zych: ‘Our University Is Based on the Immutable Ideas of Truth, Good and Beauty,’ ” Demokracija (news website), August 21, 2021, https://demokracija.eu/top2/tymoteusz-zych-our-university-is-based-on-the-immutable-ideas-of-truth-good-and-beauty/; “Soros’ project” refers to the belief that Hungarian-American entrepreneur George Soros is, through his founding of the Central European University (CEU), corrupting Eastern Europe and promoting liberalism in the region. Therefore, according to Zych, the Collegium Intermarium stands as a foil to his understanding of the CEU’s purpose, offering courses grounded in “Roman law, Greek philosophy and the living heritage of Christianity.”

[44] Collegium Intermarium, “Partners,” Collegium Intermarium website, July 12, 2023, https://web.archive.org/web/20240819035713/https://collegiumintermarium.org/partnerzy.

[45] “Intermarium: Space of Freedom and Order—English,” Konferencja Intermarium website, n.d. https://konferencjaintermarium.pl/en/.

[46] Eliza Fisher, Natural Law and Imagined Theocracies at Poland’s Collegium Intermarium (Washington DC: Illiberalism Studies Program, 2024), p. 5–15.

[47] Fisher, Natural Law and Imagined Theocracies at Poland’s Collegium Intermarium, p. 5, 10, 14.

[48] Katherine Faust, “Centrality in Affiliation Networks,” Social Networks 19, no. 2 (April 1997), p. 157, https://doi.org/10.1016/S0378-8733(96)00300-0; Stanley Wasserman and Katherine Faust, Social Network Analysis: Methods and Applications (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1994), p. 17. While actors can include multiple forms of social units, as we will see in the methods section, only individual speakers are considered actors in the network since the focus is on trans-Atlantic bridging and ideological development through events.

[49] Faust, “Centrality in Affiliation Networks,” p. 157–158; Wasserman and Faust, Social Network Analysis, p. 292.

[50] While individual think tanks might collaborate, create partnerships, and appear as key elements of the transnational illiberal network, analyzing these ties is beyond the scope of this essay since they are not events. While future research must look at the discrete partnerships that exist between think tanks (such as that signed between the Danube Institute and the Heritage Foundation) on a case-by-case basis to fully illustrate the true scope of transnational illiberalism, this article is focused primarily on those nodes that serve as a bridge connecting people and institutions in the pursuit of an explicitly trans-Atlantic objective or to ensure that their ideologies are unified.

[51] Ramona Coman, Emilien Paulis, Leonardo Puleo, and Noemi Trino, “Building and Legitimizing an Illiberal Transnational Field: Illiberal Think Tanks’ Struggle for Cultural Hegemony in Poland and Hungary,” European Political Science, ahead of print, June 26, 2025, https://doi.org/10.1057/s41304-025-00544-6.

[52] Wasserman and Faust, Social Network Analysis, p. 19.

[53] This timeframe was chosen as it represents the start of NatCon’s first conference. Collapsing the social network does not represent an issue in this analysis as the article seeks to uncover if there is trans-Atlantic overlap and the degree of sub clustering, not the network’s evolution.

[54] Mathieu Bastian, Sebastien Heymann, and Mathieu Jacomy. “Gephi: An Open Source Software for Exploring and Manipulating Networks.” Proceedings of the International AAAI Conference on Web and Social Media 3, no. 1 (2009): 361–62. https://doi.org/10.1609/icwsm.v3i1.13937; Mathieu Jacomy, Tommaso Venturini, Sebastien Heymann, and Mathieu Bastian. “ForceAtlas2, a Continuous Graph Layout Algorithm for Handy Network Visualization Designed for the Gephi Software.” PLOS ONE 9, no. 6 (2014): e98679. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0098679.

[55] Standard measurements used to study social networks, such as eigenvector centrality, do not work in the case of this article as it seeks to identify those that bridge the two types of conferences and not measure the influence of a node relative to the number of nodes it connects to.

[56] While the GPAHE network addresses the far right and illiberalism, many of the conferences (namely CPAC, NatCon, and the Danube Geopolitical Summit) are covered in the study, indicating a strong degree of overlap between the two networks.

[57] The Herzl Institute is a “research institute and training center” that states to study various issue areas such as “Jewish Political Thought,” the “History of Zionism and the State of Israel,” the “New Anti-Semitism,” and other topics. See the Herzl Institute–Machon Herzl website, n.d. https://herzlinstitute.org/en/.

[58] Viktor Orbán, “Speech by Prime Minister Viktor Orbán at the Opening of CPAC Texas,” Cabinet Office of the Prime Minister of Hungary, April 8, 2022, https://2015-2022.miniszterelnok.hu/speech-by-prime-minister-viktor-orban-at-the-opening-of-cpac-texas/?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

[59] Orbán, “Speech by Prime Minister Viktor Orbán at the Opening of CPAC Texas.”