4 days ago
Europe's far-right paradox
Photo by Diego Radames/Anadolu via Getty Images
A toxic dynamic centred on refugee policy is creating political instability across much of Europe. As established mainstream parties struggle to figure out how best to deal with the far right, they are succumbing to pressure to get tougher on asylum seekers and thus mainstreaming and normalising far-right rhetoric and policy. But whether they exclude those movements from government or seek to cooperate with them, it is becoming increasingly difficult to form stable governments in Europe.
On 3 June, the Dutch government collapsed when Geert Wilders withdrew his far-right Freedom Party (PVV) from the four-party coalition just over a year after it was formed. After the election in November 2023 in which the PVV emerged as the biggest party in the Dutch parliament, it took six months to form a government that included the centre-right People's Party (VVD) and was led by Dick Schoof, a career civil servant. New elections will now be held, though the date has not yet been set.
After the 2023 election, Wilders had promised 'the toughest asylum policy ever' and made sure that his party controlled the asylum ministry so that it could implement his radical ten-point plan. This included deploying the army at Dutch borders, turning away all new asylum seekers, deporting Syrians whose claims were already being processed, and rejecting EU quotas. But on 3 June, he declared that the new government had not gone far enough or quickly enough and pulled out.
In the Netherlands, mainstream parties have long cooperated with the far right. As far back as 2010, the then-VVD leader Mark Rutte led a minority government that had a confidence-and-supply agreement with the PVV. This week's events illustrate the fragility of that approach. Wilders hopes his party will do even better in the new elections and that he will be able to become prime minister himself. Centrists, meanwhile, hope his move will backfire and that voters will punish him for his unreasonableness.
In Germany, meanwhile, where the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) became the second biggest party in the Bundestag after the election that took place in February, the mainstream parties have taken a different approach. Cooperation with the far right is much more of a taboo in Germany than in the Netherlands – there is a consensus around the idea that what are often called 'democratic forces' must maintain a Brandmauer, or firewall, to keep the far right away from power.
The new chancellor Friedrich Merz has actually gone quite far in cooperating with them, by German standards at least. During the election campaign last year, he cooperated with the AfD to push an 'influx limitation bill' through the Bundestag. But as controversial as this was – it alienated the Social Democrats (SPD), with whom Merz knew he would likely have to cooperate after the election – it falls a long way short of what has happened in the Netherlands. It remains politically impossible for Germany's Christian Democrats to form a minority government dependent on AfD votes as Rutte did, let alone actually form a coalition with it. This meant that, after the election, Merz's only option was to form a grand coalition with the Social Democrats. (Some right-wing Christian Democrats, such as the historian Andreas Rödder, are beginning to argue that they need to break the taboo on cooperation with the AfD if only to give themselves other options and thus increase their power in negotiations with the SPD.)
Yet despite this different approach, the political situation in Germany is now remarkably similar to that in the Netherlands. Like Wilders, Merz ran on a promise to get even tougher on asylum seekers – he promised a 'de-facto entry ban' that would have violated EU law. For all the obsessive focus on maintaining the Brandmauer, the boundaries between the centrists and the far right on refugee policy have long been blurred – in fact Wilders argues that Germany is already doing much of what he wants to do.
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However, while Merz and the Social Democrats had settled on a compromise on asylum policy – the coalition agreement promised a 'deportation offensive' but Merz was forced to dilute his promise of an entry ban – it could yet unravel. This week, a Berlin court ruled that it was unlawful for German border guards to push back three Somalis who had crossed the border from Poland and sought to claim asylum in Germany. In response, Merz seemed to suggest that he might be prepared to ignore the ruling.
In doing so, Merz is threatening to abandon the compromise he reached with the SPD and, with an eye on the AfD, reverting to the approach he took during the election campaign. The Social Democrats, who have themselves moved to the right on refugee policy but stopped short of rejecting German court rulings and EU law, have insisted that the government must adhere to the rule of law – after all, this, Germany's 'democratic forces' have always insisted, is what differentiates them from 'populist' parties like the AfD.
It is unlikely that the coalition will collapse over this issue. But that is itself largely because the Christian Democrats and SPD fear that if there were new elections, as there will now be in the Netherlands, the AfD would do even better than it did in February.
The problem, not just in Germany but also elsewhere in Europe, is that incoherent coalitions of centrist parties formed only to keep the far right out of power also tend to strengthen the far right.
[See also: Labour's muddled message]
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