In less than a month, Europe has had to mourn two tragic events. The far right won elections in Germany for the first time since the days of Nazism, when the Alternative for Germany (AfD) took first place in regional elections in Thuringia. This Sunday, it was in Austria that the far right won the legislative elections for the first time since the Second World War.
According to polls, the Austrian Freedom Party (FPÖ), also winner of the European elections in June, obtained first place in the federal legislative elections with 29% of the votes.
It’s true that The Austrian far right has a much longer history of institutional approval than in the rest of Europe. He governed the country in coalition with the Christian Democrats of the Austrian People’s Party (ÖVP), second in these elections with 26% of the vote, on two occasions. Which leads us to suspect that the center right might be willing to facilitate the FPÖ government, provided that it removes the controversial leader from its leadership. Herbert Kickl. It would thus be ineffective, unlike Germany or France, the firewall democracy to which the other parties are committed.
But even if the FPÖ has obtained good results in Austria for at least two decades, until today it has never reached this percentage of votes nor won a legislative election. Who talks about ghost of extremism that haunts Europe.
With the rise of another Eurosceptic and pro-Russian party (under the subterfuge of “neutrality” and “pacifism”), the reactionary bloc led by the Hungarian expanded. Viktor Orban. It is terrible news that nativist and isolationist options are triumphant in a world that needs to strengthen multilateralism to collectively face the attacks of the autocratic axis against the international order.
We are witnessing the collapse of the post-war European consensus which sponsored a period of unprecedented prosperity and stability, among which was the exclusion of radicalism from the governance of countries. The tectonic shifts in political culture are so marked that even two nations traumatized by the horror of nationalism seem ready to submit to them again.
What all rising far-right forces have in common is that they prey on tensions generated by irregular immigration to scapegoat foreigners for their countries’ problems. In Austria, the European country with the most asylum seekers relative to its population, immigration has become the main concern of its citizens.
So the problem is real. And if moderate European parties do not take responsible but firm responsibility for the issue of immigration, promoting orderly flows and favoring the integration of asylum seekers, They will be overwhelmed by extremists, who will fill this void with inflammatory and maximalist speeches.
You can also get a Spanish-language reading on the rise of the far right in Europe. Even if our country still remains sheltered from this reactionary wave: the PP was, among the four major EU countries, the party which obtained the greatest percentage of votes in the European elections. And the extreme right in Spain does not exceed around 10%, while in many European countries it already brings together almost a third of the voters (which also destroys the discourse of the ultra threat of the PSOE).
This is why, If it wants to continue being the hegemonic party, the PP must take into account the case of our neighborswhich shows that the center-right and the extreme right are communicating vessels. Populists thrive at the expense of traditional conservatives, when they do not resist their branding.
The only way for liberals to avoid being overwhelmed by extremists is to flatly refuse to collaborate with them. When election time arrives, the PP will have to remember this evidence and clearly send the message that it will not govern alongside Vox.
