But there is a growing body of evidence that as rich majority-white countries admit more foreign-born people, far-right parties thrive by politicizing the perceived threat of the foreign-born to national culture. That concept will sound familiar to anybody who watched the 2016 U.S. presidential race, but it’s a truly global trend. A 2015 study of immigration and far-right attitudes in Austria found that the proximity of low and medium-skilled immigrants “causes Austrian voters to turn to the far right.” The effect was strongest in areas with higher unemployment, suggesting that culture and economics might reinforce each other in this equation. Last week, the far-right Austrian party triumphed in the nation’s election.

This is where the story finally connects with welfare and the future of liberalism. Rich countries tend to redistribute wealth from the rich few to the less-rich multitude. But when that multitude suddenly includes minorities who are seen as outsiders, the white majority can turn resentful and take back their egalitarian promises. Take, for example, the Twin Cities of Minnesota. They were once revered for their liberal local policies—like corporate-tax redistribution from rich areas to poor neighborhoods and low-income housing construction near business districts. But since the 1980s, as the metro area attracted more nonwhite immigrants, the metro has become deeply segregated by income and race and affordable-housing construction has backtracked. Or take Finland, that renowned “Santa Claus State” of cradle-to-grave social services, where the welfare state is being “systematically dismantled.” The far right has emerged in the last few decades, just as foreign-born population has suddenly grown.