The European Brandmauer?

By Floris Cooijmans

The word is out. At the Maastricht debate between the Spitzenkandidaten of the European political groups, incumbent European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen stated that she is open to working with the far-right ECR group. When asked whether she would cooperate with them during the next term, she said that “it depends very much on how the composition of the Parliament is”. The ECR group, which includes parties such as the Finns Party, the Polish Law and Justice party and Vox from Spain, would be the first far-right political group in parliament which would have real power.

Von der Leyen’s pivot to possibly seeking cooperation with the far-right after mostly leaning on the social-democrats and liberals this past legislature is characterising for the position of far-right parties in European politics. While seemingly having been talking about the “rise of the far-right” for the last decade at least, it is now evident, it has risen. In most countries far-right parties have become a political force to be reckoned with. How the other parties in the political arena do this reckoning, varies widely per country.

A mainstream notion among centre-right parties is that the far-right can be “tamed”. This is a two-pronged approach. First, they adopted their political style and ideology, in order to win back the voters, they lost to the far-right, thus aiming at reducing their size in democratically elected assemblies. The second approach is forming coalitions with them. The reasoning goes that their racist/Islamophobic/transphobic or anti-women's rights standpoints can be “shaved off” during negotiations, with the resulting policies not being nearly as bad for minorities or the rule of law as expected.

However, we have seen that both these strategies of the centre-right do not work. By adopting their rhetoric, it only normalises far-right political parties and ideology, and by bringing them into government, their influence on for instance abortion legislation, or the independence of the judiciary can be devastating. Undoing this damage is a difficult process as the new Polish government is finding out.

So what do we do with parties which can not be tolerated to be in power? We built a Brandmauer. This concept, the German word for firewall, a political cordon sanitaire, is not new, but with the current political situation in Europe, we have a renewed need for it. We need a Brandmauer, as Germany is still one of the few European countries where there is a big taboo on governing with the far-right, making von der Leyens comments all the stranger, all those years in Brussels do take some kind of toll apparently.

The typical argument made in other countries, that it would be undemocratic to completely ignore far-right parties, even if they do well in elections, does not fly in Germany. Because of historical experiences, there is a deeper understanding that parties which actively threaten democracy are not considered legitimate coalition partners.

In Germany, this Brandmauer around the far-right AfD party, goes quite far. AfD politicians are generally not invited to events, such as political discussions, where other parties are invited to. When on a state level, the CDU (Christian-democrats) and FDP (Liberals) managed to pass a new budget with the help of the AfD, there was national outrage. In other countries, the centre-right wouldn’t bat an eye at such cooperation with the far-right.

The Brandmauer can also get personal. In a recent change of policy, members of the AfD are no longer allowed to join the football club of the German Parliament, the FC Bundestag. And a prominent former party member, Frauke Petry, was not invited to her high-school reunion. In this case proving a direct correlation with her political activities is impossible, but it stands for a larger phenomenon where personal relationships are nullified over harbouring AfD sympathies.

The Brandmauer is also not just an agreement between all so-called democratic parties. Earlier this year, a wave of anti-AfD demonstration took place all over Germany, after the independent journalistic medium Correctiv, documented that high-level AfD politicians were involved in a conference discussing the “remigration” of Germans with an immigrant background. One of the most used slogans at these protests: “Wir sind die Brandmauer” (we are the firewall).

It also needs saying that the Brandmauer is under pressure domestically. Like in other European countries, the centre right is accused of normalising the far-right. Some sections of the CDU, and in particular the CSU, their Bavarian sister party, have adopted far-right talking points, such blaming migrants for all the country’s woes or raging against “woke” (definition pending). But at the same time, prominent party members, such as prime-minister of North-Rhine Westphalia, Hendrik Wüst called the AfD a “nazi party”, the gravest insult in German politics, and party leader Friedrich Merz had to quickly withdraw a statement about potentially being open to working with the AfD on a local level after backlash from within his own party.

It would also be folly to deny there are no problems with the far-right in Germany. Every couple weeks, news breaks that police men or members of the army are being investigated for having far-right sympathies, and in 2022 a right-wing terror cell was arrested after planning a coup against the German government. And despite having little actual political power, the AfD is doing well in opinion polling. This year, three German states where they are polling for 1st place will have elections. Depending on which other parties clear the electoral threshold of 5%, it is going to be extremely challenging to form a majority coalition without the AfD.

With the coming European elections, the new European parliament is set to become more right wing then ever, with the EPP, ECR and ID groups possibly getting a majority. It will be up to the EPP, the right-wing party closest to the centre, to decide whether they want to cooperate with parties on their right or keep working with the centrist parties. The future of the Brandmauer is all but certain.

All rights reserved ®