The European Elections: A Continent Divided
As Britain looks forward to our own general election, we should pay attention to what is happening in our neighbouring countries for a potential sign of what is to come for the UK and the EU. 2024 is set to be a record year for democracy: some of the world’s biggest elections are happening and soon the continentals will be voting for members of the European Parliament. For decades, Euroscepticism has been growing and issues such as immigration and now, Israel and Palestine have divided opinion in multiple European countries, resulting in infighting and smaller parties rising. Rather than being too big to fail, with so many rival factions and competing interests, the bloc seems so big it will inevitably fail. The outcome of the vote could mean that the EU faces an unstable future.
With the people in 28 member states electing MEPs, like-minded parties from different countries form groups in the parliament – with the governing European Commission currently dominated by three groups. The third largest political group and one of the partners in the governing coalition is Renew, an alliance of pro-European centrist parties. Recently, the group’s Dutch party, the VVD, entered a coalition with the right-wing populist Geert Wilders after his shock election victory in the Netherlands. The VVD now faces expulsion from Renew because they dared to work with another party in their own country. Whether Europe’s mainstream politicians like it or not, the Dutch people supported Wilders in large numbers. The VVD had to work with him to stay relevant and have influence in the Dutch government. It’s somewhat ironic that an alliance of parties who claim to stand for liberal democracy have become rather intolerant towards their colleagues who dared to work with someone who they disagreed with after he was democratically elected. The vote to expel the VVD from Renew not only highlights the hypocrisy of Europe’s supposed liberals – the UK’s Lib Dems certainly fit in with them – but it shows that the politics of the individual countries can be so different from that of the EU. The Dutch now find themselves in the absurd position of having a four-way coalition government based in Amsterdam, including a centrist party who have fallen out with their colleagues in a three-way coalition in Brussels and Strasbourg. Proportional representation is a positive system as it encourages people from the left and right of politics to put their differences aside and work together, but when there are so many tiers of government, it just makes way for more conflict.
Renew are not the only ones in the European Parliament falling out with each other: the right-wing Eurosceptic Identity and Democracy group recently expelled Germany’s anti-immigration party the AfD over disagreements with Marine Le Pen on the language around deporting migrants and after their lead candidate Maximillian Krah had a disaster of an interview. The MEP was asked whether every member of the SS was a criminal, to which he answered that stormtroopers had to be judged on a case-by-case basis. This bad press, along with a scandal involving an aide allegedly spying for Russia and China, may cost the party votes but most Germans probably don’t know or care about the internal workings of the European Parliament and the populists are still riding high in the polls at nearly 20%. Whatever people may think about the AfD, voters all over Europe are crying out for a grown-up conversation about immigration, a conversation on issues such as Islam and immigration, especially after the recent stabbing spree at an anti-Islam rally in Mannheim? It’s a conversation some are determined to shut down: last month, a German court upheld a fine for a young AfD politician who wrote an objection to a local mayor’s scheme to house asylum seekers, citing government statistics on migrant crime. Even if people object to what she wrote, a legal penalty for stating factual information sets a dangerous precedent for free speech. This comes on top of recent serious talk from German institutions about banning the AfD entirely. This fine and talk of proscribing a mainstream party is not only anti-democratic and illiberal, but it could also be counterproductive: the AfD will now be seen as an underdog and now have a martyr to their cause.
Similar events are happening right on the UK’s doorstep in the Republic of Ireland. After multiple children were stabbed outside a school in Dublin. The attacker was an Algerian man with a history of mental health issues who had been living in Ireland illegally for years. Riots ensued and there have been huge protests since against the country’s rising immigration levels, some peaceful, some less so. At Ireland’s last general election, anti-immigration parties failed to make any real impact. Could right-wing populists finally have a breakthrough in Ireland this time around?
Another issue that could impact the elections in Ireland – and elsewhere in Europe – is foreign policy. Ireland has a long history of staying neutral and avoiding getting heavily involved in interventionist wars. The outbreak of war in Ukraine posed a test for Irish neutrality: the EU are clearly on Ukraine’s side, but Ireland is unlikely to join NATO, although they have taken in far more Ukrainian refugees than the UK. Then there’s the Israel and Gaza conflict: Sinn Fein have been outspoken in their support for Palestine and made significant gains at the last general election. The Irish government recently made the historic decision to recognize Palestine as a state but it may not be enough to stop the left from capitalizing on an emotive issue to mobilize support. The President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, was supportive of Israel after the October 7th massacre and has since faced criticism now as the death toll in Gaza continues to increase, with the independent MEP for Dublin, Clare Daly, labelling her “Frau Genocide.” Whilst most Irish MEPs voted for a motion condemning October 7th and demanding a humanitarian pause, four of them, including Sinn Fein, voted against it, arguing that it did not go far enough. Votes like this will most likely be brought up to win votes from the Irish people.
In France, both immigration and the Israel-Palestine conflict are big issues for President Macron to deal with. He once again faces Marine Le Pen’s National Rally who won 23 of France’s 79 seats in the European Parliament at the last election. After the Paris knife attack by an Islamic extremist who claimed to be motivated by the Israel-Palestine conflict, French voters may be fearful of terrorism again and lend their vote to the nationalist delegation led by Le Pen’s poster boy Jordan Bardella. Macron also faces a growing threat from a coalition of radical left-wing parties in France led by Jean-Luc Mélenchon. The leader of La France Insoumise and his allies have been outspoken in their support for both migrants and Palestine and have recently challenged Macron to recognize a Palestinian state. When France has the largest Muslim population in Europe, the left could gain millions of votes – we saw how these issues played out here in the UK in the Rochdale by-election and now a somewhat similar phenomenon may take place on a far bigger scale, with more radical parties benefiting from the system of proportional representation. After pushing through with his unpopular pension reforms and raising the retirement age, Macron’s party could lose a lot of seats, with the National Rally racing ahead in the polls and the radical left chasing behind, hoping to make a few gains too.
It is in France we perhaps see the clearest parallels with our own election here in the UK: a wealthy elitist leader with a background in banking is increasingly unpopular with his people and squeezed from both the left and the right. The big difference, of course, is that the European Parliament – like most European countries – has a form of proportional representation, whereas under the UK’s first past the post system means that often one party can govern alone with support from less than half of the population. The European Union has its flaws but representation from a wider range of parties means that people from across the spectrum must co-operate and without the need to vote tactically, people don’t have to see each other as enemies. Of course, when it comes to issues such as immigration and Israel-Palestine emotions do run high and sometimes people do hate each other for a different opinion: just recently an AfD politician was attacked with a knife.
Whilst we should be concerned about some of the most extreme parties, the European Union needs a shake-up. Just two years ago, the EU was hit by yet another corruption scandal, with MEPs and other officials arrested for taking bags of cash from Qatari donors. When the EU is now complaining to the organizers of Eurovision about a ban on the EU flag, it’s clear they have their priorities wrong. The European Commission is also warning the Dutch government that they cannot opt out of the EU’s migration policies and that dictating another country’s border policy is an erosion of that country’s sovereignty and independence. When the EU’s member states and politicians are so divided, the small things they interfere with are considered trivial and the big issues they interfere with are so emotive, it’s no wonder more and more people are, like the British, becoming disillusioned with the project.