European Populist Parties: Alternative for Germany

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ne common feature of European populist parties has been their anti-establishment and alternative claims. They desired radical changes, such as opposition to the EU or NATO, or opposition to the common currency. However, over time, they have become more compatible with both global power and national hierarchies. They have not shied away from making concessions in order to realise their policies through power rather than by remaining in opposition. One of the most important reasons for the existence of the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party was the 2015 refugee influx and Merkel’s acceptance of it with her ‘we can do it’ motto.

What popularised the AfD, however, were its ‘remigration’ policies based on opposition to refugees. When it was founded in 2013, it was a party of anti-EU conservative liberal professors and senior executives, feeding on elitist reactions rather than being a people’s party.

The 2015 refugee influx, accompanied by Islamophobic connotations and the fears it brought, helped the AfD movement gain traction within society, with nationalist radicals within the party coming to the fore. When the riots and assaults during New Year’s celebrations in Cologne at the end of 2015 were blamed on North Africans, the AfD’s rhetoric and fears had already found their social counterpart.

A party looking to the future

At the beginning of 2015, despite losing popularity after an internal power struggle, the party’s support surged from 3% to over 10% following the refugee influx and Merkel’s famous ‘We can do it’ statement. However, the party still lacked a clearly defined programme. The party, which had undergone a change in leadership, saw different factions rallying behind different names. It was filled with small groups of leaders comprising libertarians, conservatives and radical nationalists.

Populist parties such as the AfD position themselves not as nationalist parties looking to the past, but rather as parties focused on the future. Therefore, instead of reckoning with the past, they take on the task of cleansing the future. The AfD speaks not of a thousand years of history, but of a thousand years of hope. A protectionism based on the future rather than on past superiority distances populist parties from ‘crime’. Ultimately, there is no place for refugees in their clean future. In this context, they consider themselves protective rather than exclusionary.

Rather than ridding themselves of the dregs of the past, they are sanitising the future. Ultimately, this kind of pacifist attitude also protects populist parties from encountering criminal law. On the other hand, Höcke, one of the party’s radicals, makes subtextual references to the ‘thousand-year Reich’ when talking about the future, which actually shows that the message is intended to hit home. Furthermore, the AfD’s use of the term ‘old parties’ when referring to parties outside its own ranks can also be considered part of its future-oriented politics.

When it was first established, the AfD relied on conservative upper-middle-class reactions based on opposition to the single currency and the EU, while also managing to garner the reactions of the lower classes during the 2015 refugee wave. Today, however, it can easily abandon or postpone its policy of reducing the number of refugees and foreigners in order to share power. Moreover, it does not include the supremacy of the dominant culture, with its nationalist connotations, in its programme.

The understanding of dominant culture based on establishing a cultural hierarchy has been replaced by a more pacifist claim to preserve culture. In this sense, it is increasingly taking the place of conservative right-wing parties. The political stance defending German dominant culture (leitkultur) and based on opposition to refugees made the AfD the leading party in the last decade but failed to bring it into power. The AfD parliamentary group has seen that the path to sharing power lies in compromising on dominant culture and opposition to refugees and has therefore not hesitated to change its political stance.

The desire for power and east Germany

Across Europe, there is a growing tendency for populist parties to seek power through Melonization. Pragmatic populism increases its concessions on core policies as it approaches power. One of the common characteristics of European populist parties is their pragmatism regarding power. Populist parties that have managed to transform their anti-Semitism into Islamophobia, which is less harmful to them and even gains them sympathy, and their belief in the superiority of their own nation into claims that preserve their political identity, have few principles they will not abandon on the path to power. The development of the AfD is somewhat different. Other populist parties in Europe have come to power with radical rhetoric and gradually abandoned it on their path to power.

The AfD, on the other hand, presented itself with liberal and conservative rhetoric such as opposition to the euro and reached around 5 per cent, found its footing with radical rhetoric such as opposition to refugees and Islam, but finally surpassed 20 per cent with claims of preserving the dominant culture and reverse migration, softening its exclusionary rhetoric in order to share power. Its emergence as the leading party with around 25 per cent in the latest opinion polls has triggered the AfD’s desire for power, and the harshness of its rhetoric has softened. On the other hand, the Christian Democrats have directed their opposition particularly towards Chancellor Merz in order to force him into a coalition with them.

The conservative right, based on Christian Democrats, has long sought to counter populist parties by adopting their slogans, thereby further legitimising parties such as the AfD within the political spectrum. The opposition to power-sharing with populist parties, constructed like a ‘firewall’ in German politics, is losing its meaning as the AfD grows. The fact that the coalition does not allow any party to implement only its own policies also leads to populist parties accusing conservatives of not keeping their word. Parties that consider themselves large enough to share power, such as the AfD, are particularly putting pressure on conservative parties and forcing them into coalition with themselves.

Reactions rather than political concepts

They readily soften their political claims in order to overcome the political firewall that excludes them. It still seems sociologically impossible for parties like the AfD, which are based on reactions rather than political concepts, to have the majority needed to govern the country alone. Therefore, they must enter into a coalition and share power. Their quick abandonment of the political claims reflected in their slogans is actually partly due to their sociological limitations.

The AfD draws a large portion of its social support from East Germany. In a sense, East German opposition to reunification is concentrated in the AfD. East Germans perceive reunification as an unequal relationship and believe they have no influence in German politics. Although the proportion of foreigners in their cities is not high, their location on the front lines of the refugee influx fuels xenophobia. They are also not in line with the federal government’s anti-Russian policies. Russia, with whom they have collaborated for many years, is not an enemy in the eyes of East Germans.

On the other hand, while struggling with economic backwardness, they also find the environmental and green policies of the West German welfare state unnecessary. For this reason, the party they are furthest from is the Greens. However, apart from the CDU, the other traditional parties already have a significant share of the vote. Apart from the CDU, they have no serious political rival other than Sahra Wagenknecht’s Union (BSW), which has culturally right-wing and economically left-wing policies.

Their belief that East Germany’s backwardness and political problems can only be solved with strong leadership strengthens their inclination towards the AfD. On the other hand, the migration of qualified and young people from East Germany due to underdevelopment, while older and less educated people remain behind, also increases the tendency towards parties such as the AfD. Like other populist parties, the AfD also relies heavily on the theme that the people have been abandoned by the elite and those in power.