The Great Replacement (French: grand remplacement), also known as the replacement theory, is a white nationalist far-right conspiracy theory which states that, with the complicity or cooperation of "replacist" elites, the white French population—as well as white European population at large—is being progressively replaced with non-European peoples—specifically Arab, Berber and sub-Saharan Muslim populations from Africa and the Middle East—through mass migration, demographic growth and a European drop in the birth rate. Scholars have generally dismissed the claims of a "great replacement" as being rooted in a misreading of immigration statistics and unscientific, racist views.While similar themes have characterized various far-right theories, the term "Great Replacement" was popularized by the French author Renaud Camus in his 2011 book Le Grand Remplacement (English: The Great Replacement). It specifically associated the presence of Muslims in France with potential danger and destruction of French culture and civilization. Camus and other conspiracy theorists attribute this process to intentional policies advanced by global and liberal elites (i.e., the "replacists") from within the Government of France, the European Union, or the United Nations, and describe it as a "genocide by substitution".The "Great Replacement" is included in a larger white genocide conspiracy theory that has spread in Western far-right movements since the late 20th century. Despite their common reference to a "genocide" of indigenous white peoples and a global plan led by a conspiring power, Camus's theory does not include an antisemitic Jewish plot. His removal of antisemitism from the original neo-Nazi conspiracy theory, along with his use of simple catch-all slogans, have been cited as reasons for its broader appeal.
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