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EU parliament election sees shaken centre hold – but far right now has chances to show its strength
the conversation ^ | June 10, 2024

Posted on 06/10/2024 3:31:37 AM PDT by Cronos

After the four-day, 27-state democratic marathon that is the European parliamentary election, a picture has emerged of a fragile centre just holding amid a shift to the right that carries a significant potential to shape the near future of the EU, despite having fallen short of producing the earthquake some predicted.

The big shock came in France, with President Emmanuele Macron’s defeat at that hands of the RN (Rassemblement National – National Rally) party prompting him to call snap national parliamentary elections. France needed not only “a clear majority” argued Macron, but citizens capable of “choosing to write history, not be driven by it”.

French fissures After some early relief among centrists over Dutch and German projected returns, the French figures provided a swift jolt, with the RN (led by Marine Le Pen’s protege Jordan Bardella) producing its highest ever nationals levels, decimating Macron’s own “Renew Europe” coalition led by Valérie Hayer into the “second-lowest EU election finish ever for a party in French government”.

Across the EU though, the picture is more nuanced. Despite predictions that the European Parliament would garner more members than ever before from the populist and extreme right, the EPP representing mainstream conservative views in Europe has increased its overall size in this election, having retained the centre ground, in its role as “the chamber’s historically dominant force”, on track to gain roughly 25% of the parliament itself with 184 MEPs.

The centre-left Socialists and Democrats (S&D) group also retained its previous toehold. Having reconsolidated its power base, the EPP will retain clear responsibilities regarding EU policy, including industrial, agricultural and climate policies now deeply contentious with EU citizens. To do so, the EPP now needs to identify its preferred leadership in the next stage of EU institution elections, including to the European Commission.

Still a good night for the far right While the EPP and S&D have retained the centre ground, far right parties still did remarkably well. They represent a range of views, and it was already impossible for them to band into a single electoral group, due to intractable splits on everything from Russia to European defence.

In France, the Len Pen/Bardella RN walked off with a stunning third of votes, while in Italy a quarter of voters backing Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy. Totalling up the remaining far right votes across the EU illustrates that two key parliamentary groups on the hard right (ECR), and far right (ID) will between them control 131 seats. Alongside, there are 34 additional hard right independents drawn from Germany’s AfD, Viktor Orbán’s Hungarian Fidesz party, and those from Poland and Bulgaria.

There may be just enough in common among some of those to pull together nationalist, anti immigration blocs in the European parliament, setting them up as 2024’s biggest winners, eminently capable of shifting EU strategic policies to the right including on immigration, trade, agriculture and climate change.

The numbers suggest that a single far right group would be the EP’s second largest party after the EPP. Coalition-building is tricky particularly amongst far right groups, but the numbers certainly count for something; “its sheer size will nonetheless put rightward pressure on EU policy,” reported specialist site Politico Europe.

Even if not formally consolidated, a conglomerate of far right voices will concern the EPP and & S&D groups. At this point, far right successes have three significant consequences. First: they confirm the anticipated tilt to the right of the parliament itself; second they may further entrench far-right preferences in a sizeable minority of EU member states; third, within the parliament – and across the EU – they send an signal to international partners, including the US, that the EU may abruptly change tack in terms of policy, and preferred partners.

Green Means Go(ne)? In the Netherlands, despite heavy predictions that Geert Wilders’ far right Freedom party (PVV) party would triumph in the parliamentary election, the Dutch Labour/Green alliance tied with them, with seven seats apiece. For the Labour/Green alliance leader and former EU Commissioner Frans Timmermans, the outcome is something of a Pyrrhic victory. While no clear reprieve is in sight for the Netherlands itself in the face of recent slides to the right, the Dutch Labour/Green alliance has held together sufficiently to return an even number of seats to the EP, and in symbolic terms. It gives them, said Timmermans, much-needed “strength to keep fighting for a social and green Europe” at the EU level.

Green triumphs elsewhere were harder to find. German results for example put them fourth, a drop of 8.5% from 2019. In France, the Greens returned roughly 5%, the minimum electable threshold for MEPs. Absent the backing of French and German Greens and despite small increases in the Netherlands and Denmark, Europe’s Greens will now slip from fourth to sixth in the parliament, making them far less of a policy leader than previously, despite the extreme climate crisis facing Europe.

Does the European Parliament = the EU? For many, the parliamentary election outcome is totemic of where the EU as a whole is headed: these results serve as a barometer of where national politics is headed in some of Europe’s most crucial capitals. In 2019, the EP returned a “green wave” of MEPs which catalysed a slew of ensuing green actions on climate change and green deals aimed at restructuring the EU from top to bottom in climate-friendly terms. Despite the ideological differences between conservative, populist, groups on the one side and the far and hard right on the other, the critical mass of avowedly Eurosceptic groups represents a categoric desire to remake key parts of the EU’s legislature, possibly decoupling the EU project itself from its post-war foundations.

For others, the parliament is not a microcosm of the EU. Not only will the series of right-leaning parties struggle to produce a super-group of any coherence within the party-specific complexities of the EP, the EU is a leadership-based entity, its key policies steered by big chiefs leading the European Commission, the European Council, the foreign policy chief, and to a far lesser extent, the parliament itself. The composition of the parliament, they will contend, has less to do with the strategic direction the EU will take post-election, and indicates instead preferences which are far more salient at national level, rather than continental.

Weeks of coalition talks With weeks of coalition building on the cards for core parties and individual MEPs, at least five big-ticket items remain for the parliament, and indeed the EU as a whole, beginning with the package of executive elections to EU institutions. Most important is the two-stage process by which Ursula von der Leyen needs first to be backed by the EU Council (heads of state) for a second term as President of the Commission, and whether she now has the 361 votes needed in the 720-seat parliament (she won by only nine in 2019).

After that, with new teams in place, the to-do list will include the war in the Ukraine and European security, the Israel-Hamas conflict, and ongoing cost of living squeezes, which currently comprises a lethal cocktail of “high consumer prices, loss of purchasing power, rising social inequalities and stagnant economic growth”, as well as migration and asylum issues, and retooling climate change obligations. Set against the outcomes of the UK and indeed US elections later in the year, the EU’s inbox – and the EP as watchdog for both the EU budget and key policies – is still at the mercy of the “polycrisis” phenomenon: a mix of volatile and protracted emergencies without real resolution.


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: eu; farright; farrightwins; parliament


1 posted on 06/10/2024 3:31:37 AM PDT by Cronos
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To: Cronos
When the European press refers to the “far right” they're referring to those who believe in borders...believe in the uniqueness of European culture and society...believe in lower taxes...believe in less regulation...etc.
2 posted on 06/10/2024 3:47:24 AM PDT by Gay State Conservative (Never Trust A Man Whose Uncle Was Eaten By Cannibals)
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To: Cronos

The Zelensky Curse strikes again.


3 posted on 06/10/2024 3:49:17 AM PDT by JonPreston ( ✌ ☮️ )
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To: Gay State Conservative

“far right” ???

But, but Hitler and his band of Nazi’s were far right. (sarc)

I’m tired of the world MSM calling normal peace loving people that want to protect their culture and way of life as “far right”. Twenty years ago or so such peoples would be classified as center.

The issue is the left has moved so far left that what was center is far right.


4 posted on 06/10/2024 3:56:12 AM PDT by redfreedom (Joseph Stalin: "It does not mater how anyone votes, how votes are counted is what matters.")
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To: Cronos

No one here cares about the EU.


5 posted on 06/10/2024 3:57:05 AM PDT by central_va (I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn...)
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To: central_va

I’m not sure that that’s true.


6 posted on 06/10/2024 4:04:43 AM PDT by Gay State Conservative (Never Trust A Man Whose Uncle Was Eaten By Cannibals)
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To: Cronos

At first being called ‘far right’ by the Euroweenies and our MSM and the left is annoying, however considering that these entities consider calling RINOs ‘right wing’ am glad to called far right as not to be confused with those sellouts in the traitorous uniparty.


7 posted on 06/10/2024 4:16:29 AM PDT by quantim (Victory is not relative, it is absolute. )
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To: Cronos
After the four-day, 27-state democratic Mob Rule marathon that is the European parliamentary election, a picture has emerged of a fragile centre just holding...

Screw the EU and their Fascist/Socialist Islamic Terrorist loving Degenerate Scum.

8 posted on 06/10/2024 4:32:44 AM PDT by Navy Patriot (Celebrate Decivilization)
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To: Cronos

“The centre-left Socialists and Democrats (S&D)”

LOL!


9 posted on 06/10/2024 4:34:13 AM PDT by HYPOCRACY (Brandon's pronouns: Xi/Hur)
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To: redfreedom

“I’m tired of the world MSM calling normal peace loving people that want to protect their culture and way of life as “far right”.”

But it works...or the ‘far right’ would have FULL CONTROL now. The term is managing to turn off enough Europeans to still allow the Fascists (meaning far left) to stay in power.

THEY own the media, THEY get to write the stories.


10 posted on 06/10/2024 4:50:49 AM PDT by BobL
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To: Cronos

The EU is just a way to strip Europe of Christianity, to eliminate national pride, and to turn the continent muslim.


11 posted on 06/10/2024 4:53:09 AM PDT by I want the USA back (Voltaire: To learn who rules over you, simply find out who you are not allowed to criticize.)
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To: central_va
No one here cares about the EU

I care. There are a great many Americans who died and are buried in Europe.

We owe it to them to stay engaged.

12 posted on 06/10/2024 5:33:11 AM PDT by airborne (Thank you Rush for helping me find FreeRepublic! )
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To: Cronos

Here is how the EU media classifies "far right"

13 posted on 06/10/2024 6:30:56 AM PDT by aMorePerfectUnion
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To: aMorePerfectUnion
Alex Armstrong

@alexharmstrong

The left have gone so far left that everything else seems right wing.

• Scientific / biological facts = far right
• Countries should have border controls = far right
• Freedom of speech = far right
• Want lower taxes = far right
• Question the government = far right
• Country has a right to defend itself = far right
• Capitalism = far right

14 posted on 06/10/2024 6:33:00 AM PDT by aMorePerfectUnion
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To: aMorePerfectUnion

15 posted on 06/10/2024 6:35:13 AM PDT by aMorePerfectUnion
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To: aMorePerfectUnion

I was the guy slightly left of center, but in 1981.


16 posted on 06/10/2024 6:41:08 AM PDT by stevio (Fight until you die.)
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To: central_va

You evidently do care about the EU.

how are things in central Venezuela?


17 posted on 06/10/2024 7:05:02 AM PDT by Cronos (I identify as an ambulance, my pronounces are wee/woo)
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To: Cronos

European is pronounced: you’re a peon.


18 posted on 06/10/2024 7:15:35 AM PDT by central_va (I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn...)
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To: central_va

They should care.

We should keep our friends close, and our enemies closer.

Guess which category the EU falls into.


19 posted on 06/10/2024 7:17:50 AM PDT by mewzilla (Never give up; never surrender!)
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To: central_va

🤣🤣🤣🤣

I am sooooo stealing that!


20 posted on 06/10/2024 7:18:29 AM PDT by mewzilla (Never give up; never surrender!)
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