The European Union anticipates elections in early June, where 720 members of the European Parliament will be elected, representing over 400 million voters from the 27 EU member states. Explore the rising influence of radical forces in Europe and their potential impact on EU decision-making in the exclusive column by Stefano Braghiroli, PhD at the Institute for Political Research at the University of Tartu, exclusively for Apostrophe.
Two non-systemic party groups
I think that by now it's quite clear that we might expect that the far right and the national conservatives to gain more votes. I would say that in general, we might expect the non-mainstream forces to grow in terms of relevance. So this means not only the far right and the national conservatives, but let's say on the other side of the parliament, also the radical left. So basically euroskeptics, national conservatives, far-right, populists, everything which is not mainstream.
There are many reasons for this. In general, there is a large part of the European societies feel kind of detached from politics, disenfranchised, and to some extent, let's say, dissatisfied with the way in which liberal democracy works.
This also play to a large extent in Russia's hands, since again, Russia has been trying consistently to undermine European liberal democracy.
In terms of what we might expect, again, we might expect that these forces will get more seats in the European Parliament. And if we focus more specifically on the side of far rights and the national conservatives, we might expect that the far right will grow in numbers.
There are countries in which this is more likely to happen. I expect, for example, this to happen quite consistently in Germany, in France, to maintain a high degree of support in Italy. And if we move away from Western Europe, we might see this to grow also in Poland, for example.
To some extent, you might expect this also to happen in Scandinavia, although at the lower level. In terms of what this means in the European Parliament, it means that there will be more seats given to the far-right than the national conservatives.
However, and this is what we need to be in mind, is that the key question will be, how good will be these parties and these parliamentarians to stick together? Traditionally, what we know is that the far-right has not been very good to kind of, you know, create a cohesive and united group. So we might expect that, we will stick in the two groups.
On the one hand, the more on the right, there is Еurosceptic ID (Identity and Democracy), and on the other one, let's say, on the more soft Eurosceptic side, and more conservative rather than far-right is European conservatives and reformists.
I would argue that one of the main reasons why this division remains is that most of the parties that are part of the ID-group are traditionally very connected to the Kremlin. I mean, at least if we focus on the war in Ukraine, on the geopolitical challenge going on.
So again, if we think of the League in Italy, or Altamative Alternative für Deutschland or Rassemblement National - these are parties that traditionally have very close connections to the Russian establishment. A few of them even have still an ongoing memorandum of understanding.
And on the other hand, if we look at ECR, we might expect that they tend to be much more skeptic towards Russia, and in general, fairly supportive towards Ukraine.
So the point is that if the far right is not able to create a unified group, its impact on the policymaking dynamics and even on the votes in the European parliament will be more limited. So we might expect that ECR will be, to some extent, part of the mainstream in the parliament, while ID will be more marginalized.
Ukraine as an argument in battles
One of the main factors that the far right will try to profit from speculations regarding the conflict in Ukraine, suggesting that the finances and resources of European nations are more suitably allocated to their domestic priorities.
I really don't like to call it kind of the war fatigue because I think the only country that then claim to feel war fatigue is Ukraine. But on the other hand, I think that there are sectors of the European societies that feel that their governments are paying more attention to, let's say, the international situation, including the war in Ukraine, than to their welfare.
The two things are absolutely not connected. Again, even an example - there was a recent analysis that basically said that every Italian citizen gives to Ukraine, if we consider basically the support that Italy gives to Ukraine, around seven euros per year. So obviously, it's not something that changes anything in terms of welfare or well-being.
But in a way, this can be easily capitalized by the forces that, let's say, play against the system. So in a way, those sectors of the society that feel ignored, marginalized, not considered, are very receptive to this sort of message.
And on the other hand, even the mainstream politicians, of course, their first goal is to be elected. So we are in a sort of dynamic in which the governing parties and the governing leaders feel the pressure of responding to this sort of disappointment.
And this will mean that when far right end up in the European Parliament, they, of course, will try to play with limiting Europe's role in supporting Ukraine.
But there is a single factor I would mention. If the far right, national conservative, but also, the radical left, if they don't cover more than one-third of the whole amount of members in the European Parliament, they cannot provoke big changes
It means that the main parties, like the People's Party, the Social Democrats, the Liberal Democrats, together with the Greens and ECR, would still be able to kind of, you know, maintain a majority that supports Ukraine.
However, should it happen, that the far-right, the Eurosceptics and the radical left get more than one-third of the votes, then basically, it would be more complicated to maintain the support at the European level.
I would say that far-rights use Ukraine more as a sort of justification for those actions than as the main reason, as we saw in Poland. I mean, the main reason behind this is that somehow certain forces feel that the governments don't care enough about these sectors of the society. And in a way, Ukraine is used as a sort of argument to backup this position.
But I wouldn't say that from point of view of the Konfederacja and so on, Ukraine is the main dish. The main dish is to try to undermine the government, and Ukraine can be used in order to do that.
Again, if you think, of these farmers' protests, it become clearly that Poland is not the only case. Of course, in Poland, this is more directly connected to Ukraine because of the border and so on. But you have seen farmers' protests in many European capital, from Berlin to Brussels, from Rome to Paris. And in any case, they are playing in Putin's and in Russia's hands. Because, to some extent, they become functional to delegitimize liberal democracy and the action of basically the mainstream forces.
The old political divide is no more
However, what's been said above is only part of the story. The other part of the story, I think, has to do more with what I would call divided societies. It's the same story that we see much bigger and much more than, say, augmented in the US.
And I think that, to some extent, it's the same story that we see much bigger and much more than, say, augmented in the US.
The point is that in many societies, politics have become extremely polarized. And, you know, in many of these societies are not anymore polarized between black and white, but they are polarized between liberal and the illiberal or between mainstream and not mainstream.
We saw this in Poland. But I would say, Germany is also a very good example.There we see that both on the radical left, with die Linke, and on the far right, with the Alternative für Deutschland, and now, by the way, also with the new Sarah Wegenknecht's ‘Alliance for Reason and Justice’, what is like a growing group of citizens that really feel that their main enemy are the liberals. And so this really creates a very high degree of polarization and, in a way, transform the political opponent into enemy.
Іf we try to bring this out of the European context, and we look, for example, at the message that comes from Russia, but also from China, from other authoritarian regimes, we will see they are basically telling us is that their big enemy is liberal democracy.
Аmong many of these forces, both on the left and on the right, Russia has becomea reference point. Because of traditional values or Putin's muscular or masculine leadership or so on. And on the other hand, when it comes to the radical left, you know, Russia is playing with the memories of communism or of, let's say, anti-NATO and so on and so forth. So in that sense, Russia is playing with all this. It uses a different language to achieve the same goal.
Is support for Ukraine in danger?
The European Parliament has almost no power in foreign policy and security. At the same time, the European Parliament has voted a resolution to call Russia a state-supporting terrorism. The Council has included this at least in its final conclusion, so it's not completely missed.
The European Parliament has advocated for the creation of a court to judge Russian crimes. The European Parliament has been the first to advocate for a European framework to militarily support Ukraine, the European Parliament has decided to block the validation of the Council's budget. Basically saying that the European Council needs to find seven Patriot systems to send to Ukraine. The argument was that there are more than hundred Patriot systems in the EU, and it's a shame that we cannot find seven of them to send to Ukraine. The European Parliament is using its financial and basically budgetary check powers in order to force the Council and the member states to act in foreign policy for Ukraine. This is extremely innovative.
I do not think that, let's say, what you can call, say, the anti-Ukrainian far-right and the radical left would get more than one-third of the seats. But this idea, you would say, is the threshold, beyond which we might become concerned.
Is Europe's future gloomy?
Based on the above, the question arises: can marginal parties gain control over European institutions in the future?
I think it's very unlikely. When it comes to the Parliament, I've already expressed my opinion.When it comes to the European Council, the problem is that the European Council consists of prime ministers or presidents of the member states.In order to have a chance there, marginal forces need to win elections at home, be ready to form a majority in their national parliaments. And this is much more difficult than getting a vote in the elections to the European Parliament.
What we can expect, however, is that if the far-right gets a lot of votes in the national elections, basically, in order to keep mainstream governments in the member states, there will be the need to form large coalition.
Let's say, from the center-right to the center-left, so that in the long term might push more citizens to vote for the far-right. So, it's a sort of self-eroding process. But I would say that this is not necessarily an issue for the short term, it's more an issue for the long term.
