Far-Right Parties On The Rise Across Europe

 Overview

Numerous political changes are taking place around the world, altering and reshaping policies and transforming bilateral and multilateral relationships on a global scale. These changes are mainly attributed to power shifts among political parties, popularity growth, and parliament seat gains.

Recently, Europe started to witness a noticeable rise in extreme right parties, for they managed to gain substantial popularity among people, earning ground, and advocates who championed and believed in their political strategies and ideas.

Over time, the fear of the extreme right is slowly diminishing as extreme right political parties start to strengthen their position and presence in the political landscape.

Far-right leaders are quickly rising in popularity and gaining supporters in several European countries. This significant political development was fueled by many factors.

The Remarkable Development Of The Political Landscape In Europe 

In recent decades, the fear of fascism started to disappear as extreme right parties succeeded in gaining huge popularity and advocates compared to their left counterparts and dominating the polls across the European continent.

 

This noticeable political development started to take place very recently. In France, extreme right representative Marie le Pen’s national rally party earned more than 30% of votes compared to the Emanuel Macron renaissance party, which had 20% of votes.

Far-right parties are gaining momentum and empowering their position within the political landscape as their strategies of electoral engagement start to show results. 

 

Macron’s attempt to rally democratic parties to stand against the extreme right has failed. One prominent center-right politician stated that his party will join the national rally (Marie le Pen’s far-right party) in a coalition. According to a recent statistic, more than a third of national assembly voters are between 18 and 34 years old. This finding shows that far-right parties attract a considerable portion of young people.

The rise of extreme right parties was attributed to many factors that played a major role in growing and expanding their popularity across Europe.

 

Due to cultural, economic, and social reasons, radical right parties managed to gain huge momentum and dominance recently. The economic crisis of 2008 forced most European Union countries to adopt austerity measures in order to reduce and limit governments’ budget deficits. This strategy has further widened the gap between poor and wealthy people, which has allowed radical right political parties to harness the dissatisfaction of those who have been struggling and revolting against the government. 

 

Furthermore, the huge increase in levels of immigration to Europe from developing countries sparked fear and worry among people. This created a form of irrational fear among nationalists who claim that these waves of migrants might pose a serious threat to their national identity and security. As some British radical right advocates said during an anti-migrant protest, “The British are losing their Britishness.”.

Far-right political parties often emphasize the concept of nationalism and traditional values as they put rigorous and strict immigration rules and conditions in place.

 

Moreover, the idea to reclaim national sovereignty and preserve identity is always championed and praised by right-wing advocates, and some extreme-right politicians use social media platforms to mobilize support for their movement. 

Bottomline

The rise of far-right parties in Europe was attributed to many factors that played a critical role in this political development despite anti-radical organizations and movements.