Chetan Bhatt

Chetan Bhatt is Professor of Sociology at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), where he joined in 2010 and served as Director of the Centre for the Study of Human Rights until 2017. Previously, he was Professor of Sociology and Head of Department at Goldsmiths, University of London, and taught at the Universities of Essex and Southampton.

His educational background includes a PhD in Politics and Sociology from Birkbeck College, University of London, and a BA Hons in Social and Political Sciences from Sidney Sussex College, University of Cambridge. He served as a member of the HEFCE REF 2018 Sub-panel for Sociology, demonstrating his standing in the academic community.

Bhatt's research critically examines the global rise of authoritarian movements, with particular focus on Western far-right ideologies, identity politics, and human rights challenges. His work spans analyses of Hindutva movements, political Islamism, Dalit human rights, and the geopolitical sociology of South Asia and the Middle East. He argues that contemporary identity politics has paradoxically weakened the Western left while creating space for right-wing populism, as explored in his 2024 book The Revolutionary Road to Me and forthcoming 2025 work White Extinction.

His publication record shows consistent scholarly output across multiple disciplines, with recent work increasingly focused on the metaphysical elements of Western fascism, the relationship between words and violence in Islamist extremism, and the transformation of war in human rights discourse. The thematic progression reveals a deepening engagement with the philosophical underpinnings of contemporary political movements.

• Member of HEFCE REF 2018 Sub-panel for Sociology
• Author of multiple influential books including Hindu Nationalism: Origins, Ideologies and Modern Myths (2001) and Liberation and Purity: Race, New Religious Movements and the Ethics of Postmodernity (1997)
• Delivered TEDx talk Dare to refuse the origin myths that claim who you are (2015) viewed over 1.4 million times

Bhatt actively supervises PhD students working on political violence in Turkey, movements in Syria and Palestine, racism and migrant detention, and the history of black and antiracist movements in the UK. His teaching includes MSc courses on Fascism, Authoritarianism, Populism; Modern Personhoods and Identitarian Thought; and Contemporary Social Thought. He is a member of the Politics and Human Rights research cluster at LSE, connecting his theoretical work with practical human rights concerns.