“Wokeism Is a Virus That Destroys Nations From Within”—Political Scientist Agustín Laje

"Wokeism" is an enemy of any sane society in the 21st century. As  Laje points out, “It conditions us to be governed by minorities, dissolving the natural bonds of society.”

From The European Conservative

By Javier Villamor

“It conditions us to be governed by minorities, dissolving the natural bonds of society,” says Javier Milei’s right-hand man.

Agustín Laje, Argentine political scientist, writer, and one of the most prominent intellectual voices of the new Latin American Right, is known as President Javier Milei’s closest ideologue. The author of impactful books like Cultural Battle and Idiot Generation, Laje has managed to combine theoretical reflection with political action.This year, he was one of the keynote speakers at CPAC Hungary 2025, held in Budapest—the largest gathering of the international Right in Europe. He shared his views on wokeism, the structural weaknesses of the European Union, the differences between European and Latin American right-wing movements, and the challenges facing parties like Vox in Spain.

You’ve spoken at the conference about the “anti-woke” concept, but why do you think people still don’t understand what wokeism really is?

Because it’s a new concept, an Anglicism that we’ve imported into the Spanish-speaking world and often confuse with progressivism. People think progressivism and wokeism are the same, but they’re not. Progressivism has a history dating back to the 18th century. Wokeism is barely a decade old. While progressivism is based on the idea of accumulating rights as a supposed form of human progress, wokeism goes far beyond that: it inserts the oppressor-oppressed dialectic into every form of social relationship and every personal identity. It’s much more destructive.

This dualistic worldview shatters the national organism. It injects a virus into all intermediary institutions: the family, businesses, churches, civil associations, sports, music, and cinema. It reaches absurd extremes, like the “fat studies” in the U.S., where there’s an obese activist movement fighting against slimness stereotypes. Wokeism is so dangerous because it conditions us to be governed by minorities instead of majorities, destroying democratic logic and dissolving the natural bonds of society.

Today, people are also talking about the “woke right.” How does that fit into your worldview?

The so-called woke Right is actually the center-right, which, from my perspective, is not truly right-wing. It is globalist and part of the establishment. In Germany, for instance, we’ve seen how the center-right prefers to form pacts with the center-left rather than with the real Right. They share the same systemic worldview.

The center-right only offers an economic liberal recipe: lower taxes, fewer regulations. But on cultural, moral, and identity issues, it aligns with the left. They defend the European status quo—the very one that has led our societies to the brink of moral collapse.

As a Latin American, how do you see the European Union?

I’ve always found it hard to understand its nature. I can grasp an economic or monetary union, but not a political structure that imposes laws from above on countries with different histories, cultures, and languages. In Latin America, we have much more in common, and still, we haven’t created a supranational power to legislate over everyone. Europe’s structure sounds like pure and simple domination to me.

In the specific case of Spain, I see an aging society with an archaic media consumption habit, heavily controlled by the State. It’s shocking to see elderly women with purple-dyed hair at feminist rallies—an image that causes secondhand embarrassment. I also observe a profound sexual crisis: women deceived by feminism and men terrified by the legal consequences of engaging with them. It’s a cultural time bomb that will eventually explode politically.

What lessons do you think Europe can learn from the Milei phenomenon?

What attracts people most about Milei is his style: confrontational, clear, and unapologetic. He knows how to translate the technical language of economics into something understandable for the common person. That’s what can be imported into Spain: the style and the doctrine. But the context is different. In Argentina, we had a full-blown economic crisis that triggered his rise to power. In Spain, they won’t experience something similar—not because they manage things better, but because they don’t have monetary sovereignty. They can’t print money at will.

So, is Europe shielded from radical political change?

At least in the short and medium term, yes. If Spain isn’t already a Chavista-style dictatorship, it’s because the European Union doesn’t allow it. Sánchez lacks the autonomy that Kirchnerism had with its own currency. Moreover, Spanish socialism relies on pacts with separatists and terrorists, not on a continental current like the São Paulo Forum.

In Europe, for the new Right to have a real shot, the PP must first fail spectacularly. That may cause some discomfort, but it’s the most realistic scenario. The alternative will only emerge once the current instrument proves useless.