It’s one thing for Finland or Belgium (the Flemish separatist Vlaams Belang party heads the polls) to veer onto a far-right rail. When it begins to happen in Germany, however, it’s time to start plotting an escape route.
Over the past year, support for the anti-immigrant, pro-Russian Alternative for Germany party (AfD) has nearly doubled to more than 20 percent in POLITICO’s Poll of Polls, a record.
The party is now in second place, just five percentage points behind the center-right Christian Democrats. Over the summer, the AfD has also succeeded in widening its lead over the Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats.
One thing I think doesn’t get mentioned enough is that the European far-right has pretty representative demographics, while the American equivalent is all old and/or uneducated people. They have completely different makeups and probably completely different sociology.
Whether that makes the European version a terrifyingly viable challenge to democracy or likely to merge into the mainstream right without drama is up for argument.