The European Union and Euroskeptic Populism

By Henry Srebrnik, [Summerside, PEI] Journal Pioneer

In the past decade, the European Union (EU) has been hit by three crises -- a financial crisis, a refugee crisis, and the results of the 2016 Brexit referendum in Britain. 

These have increased voter pessimism with the EU, creating a favourable context for Euroskeptic populist parties expressing anti-establishment positions.

The French National Front (FN) is a prototype of the populist radical right in Western Europe, exhibiting its key characteristic features -- nativism, authoritarianism, and populism. 

Since its electoral breakthrough in 1984, the FN has established itself as a major actor in French politics, and a vehicle for Euroskepticism.

It has made significant electoral gains since 2008, especially after Marine Le Pen took over the party in 2011.

In Germany, the rise of the Alternative for Germany (AfD) from its inception in late 2012 to its unexpectedly strong performance in the 2017 federal election, when it came third, has moved the party beyond opposition to aspects of the European integration process into a more profound critique of German society and politics.

For the first time since the early 1950s, a political party has occupied viable political space to the right of the Christian Democrats (CDU).

The AfD was founded by German conservatives who were unhappy with the centrist direction of the CDU under Angela Merkel’s leadership.

The economic and financial crisis in Europe, and Germany’s central role in leading responses to it, provided the mobilizing narrative for the AfD. The party successfully presented a clear political message to a distinct set of German voters. It has shaken up the German political system.

Greece has been an EU member since 1981 but its relationship with the organization has always been problematic.

More recently, it was one of the leading protagonists in the Eurozone crisis, which not only put the future of the euro in question but even the country’s membership of the monetary union. 

Greece was also one of the frontline states during the refugee crisis due to its proximity to sender regions, such as the Middle East and North Africa.

This resulted in the perception among the Greek population that the EU was not doing enough to help the country manage the crisis. 

As a consequence, support for the mainstream pro-EU New Democracy declined, whereas the Coalition of the Radical Left (SYRIZA), a previously minor populist party, effectively replaced the mainstream pro-EU Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK) as the main left-wing contender for power.

The Italian party system includes populist parties that have opposed the pan-European project.

The Italian Northern League (LN) is in the populist radical right party family, while the Italian 5 Star Movement (M5S) started out as an anti-establishment party with left-libertarian concerns, but increasingly adopted nativist tones.

The LN has, ever since its establishment in the early 1990s, centred its political activity on the defence of the “common man” against the elites. 

It has progressively moved towards a politics of nativism and authoritarianism by including xenophobia and “law and order” in its discourse.

The M5S, organized as a full-fledged party in 2009, gradually developed a pronounced Euroskeptic profile. In the 2018 election, it received the largest number of votes, and formed a coalition government with the LN.

In the Netherlands, the Dutch Party for Freedom (PVV) has become the main contender on the populist right since its entry into parliament in 2006. 

It blames political elites for an array of social problems, related to the spread of multiculturalism and the supposed “‘Islamisation” of Dutch society. It also describes the EU as an undemocratic “super state.”

The 2008 recession also moved the Portuguese and Spanish party systems in a populist Euroskeptic direction.

The Portuguese Left Bloc (BE) jumped from 5.2 per cent of the vote in the 2011 general election to 10 per cent in 2015; and the newly born Podemos in Spain received 21 per cent of the vote and became the third largest party in the parliament in the 2015 election.

In the Swedish election of Sept. 9, the ultra-right Sweden Democrats won 17.6 per cent of the vote, and ended the day as the country’s third largest political party. 

In 2010 they had entered the Riksdag, Sweden’s parliament, with just 5.7 per cent. 

An anti-immigrant spectre is haunting Europe, and traditional parties have failed to respond to the sense of discontent that exists.