Program: Is the rise of the far right in Europe inevitable? It’s complicated

The results of the recent European Parliament elections have only fuelled the growing concern across the member nations of the European Union that far-right, radical right, Eurosceptic and otherwise anti-immigrant parties are, once again, on the rise.

The mainstream parties of the centre-right and centre-left — the European People’s Party, the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats, and Renew Europe — look set to retain their sizeable majority (around 400) among the parliament’s 720 seats, but radical right and far-right parties nonetheless made sizeable gains since the last election in 2019 and now stand to win a record number of seats (closer to 165).

The concern is not so much that this showing represents some seismic lurch to the radical right. Indeed, the EPP gained nearly enough seats to offset those of the far-right Identity and Democracy group (associated with Marine Le Pen of the Rassemblement National, National Rally, in France) and the hard right European Conservatives and Reformists party (associated primarily with Italian Prime Minister Georgia Meloni). The fear, in part, is that these latter groups — particularly when combined with independent MEPs drawn from the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (Alternative for Germany) and Viktor Orbán’s hard right Fidesz party in Hungary, among others — will prove successful in realigning the European Parliament’s policies and priorities, not least regarding immigration and climate change. So, even if the parliamentary centre currently holds, the question is: For how long?

But what is perhaps even more salient is the fact that the seats won by candidates associated with Rassemblement National and Alternative für Deutschland came overwhelmingly at the expense of French President Emmanuel Macron’s Renaissance party and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats, respectively. European Parliament elections have often been regarded as harbingers of national elections, and it is therefore unsurprising that Macron himself would see the success of the party of Le Pen and her protégé Jordan Bardella as an imminent threat to his own presidency — so much so that he immediately dissolved the lower house of Parliament and a general election beginning at the end of this month. As Macron said:

“The rise of nationalists and demagogues is a danger for our nation and for Europe. After this day, I cannot go on as though nothing has happened.”

But with the UK and the United States both similarly conducting elections this year, and with Hindu nationalist Narendra Modi recently re-elected as India’s Prime Minister for a third term (albeit, with a reduced parliamentary majority), does the renewed popularity of far-right and hard right parties in the EU hold out any warnings outside of Europe? Do these political movements and the popular sentiments to which they appeal have enough in common to discern the existence of deeper anti-democratic or even authoritarian energies?

The political philosopher Pierre Rosanvallon has discerned at the heart of anti-pluralistic and more broadly “populist” movements a certain antipathy toward representative bodies, parliamentary procedure and judicial oversight, as well as a hostility toward “elites” and opposition to immigration. They tend to engage, instead, in what Rosavallon calls a radical simplification — of the identity of “the people” (the social bond, as he puts it), of the threat confronting the nation (“enemies of the people”, associated with immigrants and their “elite” patrons), and of the nature of the political power needed to overcome it (embodied in the charismatic leader). Are the European Parliament elections a further step down this path? Can it be averted?

Recommended Reading:

• Anne Applebaum, “Trump Is Not America’s Le Pen”, The Atlantic, 11 June 2024.
• Roger Cohen, “In Calling Elections in France, Macron Makes a Huge Gamble”, New York Times, 10 June 2024.

Guest: Simon Tormey is Executive Dean of Arts and Education at Deakin University. He is the author of The End of Representative Politics and Populism: A Beginner’s Guide.