-Caveat Lector-
> WSWS : News & Analysis : Europe : Germany
>
> The European Union elections and the German far-right
>
> By Max Rodenberg
> 26 June 1999
>
> Back to screen version
>
> Seldom have the pollsters tried so hard to turn an election result on
> its head, as in the aftermath of the German elections for the European
> Parliament. Seldom has this task proved so difficult, which is not
> hard to understand since the results were so unequivocal.
>
> In the elections, held two weeks ago, the Social Democratic Party
> (SPD) suffered a debacle, capturing a mere 31 percent of the votes
> cast, a drop of 10 percent compared to the party's vote in the German
> federal elections last autumn. The SPD's coalition partners, the
> Greens, were just able to maintain their share of the vote at 6.4
> percent. Less than half of the electorate went to the polls, the
> lowest turnout since the first direct elections to the European
> Parliament in 1979.
>
> The �big victory� of the Christian Democrats�they registered an 11
> percent nation-wide gain, as compared to the federal elections, in
> their share of the votes cast�was actually based on a loss of 3.4
> million votes in absolute terms. Such a result cannot be interpreted
> as heralding a �quick march by the Christian Democrats back to power�,
> as even the daily S�ddeutsche Zeitung noted.
>
> All of the parties in Bonn maintain that the war in Yugoslavia played
> no role in the election. Nothing could be further from the truth. At
> the very least, it showed a remarkable lack of enthusiasm for the war
> among broad layers of the population.
>
> Germany's first offensive military action since the Second World War
> has upset political conditions. Almost uncritical support for the
> bombing of Yugoslavia ran straight through the political
> establishment, marking an historical turning point in German foreign
> policy.
>
> The reawakening of German militarism will increasingly come to set the
> direction for domestic policy as well. Chancellor Gerhard Schr�der's
> words�that German domestic policy must attain the same level of
> excellence as German foreign policy�could hardly be more threatening.
>
> What should working people expect? A further political turn to the
> right. Schr�der can be expected to propose a �tax and budget cuts
> concept� and warn of �difficult times� ahead.
>
> The massive loss of votes by the Social Democrats expresses not only
> �disappointment with the �New Middle'�, (The German equivalent of Tony
> Blair's �Third Way�), or frustration over the record of the
> �Red-Green� government coalition. Broad layers of working people who
> put an end to the Kohl era last autumn by voting for the SPD have now
> turned their backs on all the parties in Bonn.
>
> The experience of the last nine months has provided proof positive
> that the SPD and the Greens have moved rapidly to the right. For the
> first time in the history of the Federal Republic of Germany, the
> establishment parties have received support from less than half the
> electorate. From its share of the poll in the European election, the
> governing SPD only represents 13.7 percent of all eligible voters.
>
> The fact that in Germany the growing alienation of the mass of working
> people from the political establishment did not express itself in
> increased votes for the extreme right is another important aspect of
> the elections. The far right, like the bigger parties in Bonn,
> received a cold shoulder. In contrast to the bourgeois parties like
> the SPD, Greens, Christian Democrats and Liberals, there has been no
> turn to the right in the general population.
>
> The National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD) received 107,500 votes
> (0.4 percent). Compared with their result in the federal elections,
> they lost 20,000 votes. However, in comparison with their result in
> the 1994 European elections, they gained 30,000 votes�making them the
> only party to increase their vote in absolute terms.
>
> The German Peoples Union (DVU), which has in the past garnered a
> relatively high percentage of the protest vote, did not participate in
> the European elections. They did, however, stand candidates in the
> local elections, which were being held in six states, but did not
> register exceptional results. In Saxony Anhalt, where they captured
> over 12 percent of the vote in the last state elections, they only
> managed 0.4 percent.
>
> The clearest losses could be seen in the vote for the Republikaner
> (Republicans), the largest party of the far right. They received just
> 1.7 percent, a smaller share than in the federal elections last
> September. Compared with the last European elections, they have lost
> more than half their 3.9 percent share of the vote. At that time some
> 1.3 million voters supported them; in this election their vote fell to
> 460,000. Like last time, they will not be represented in the European
> Parliament. In the 1989 European elections, the Republikaner won a 7.1
> percent share, which was sufficient to give them six deputies.
> Together with the French and Belgian far-right parties, Front National
> and Vlaams Blok, they were able to form a �technical faction� in the
> European Parliament.
>
> It would, however, be a serious mistake to conclude that the election
> results mean the German far-right have become an insignificant factor.
> Such a superficial approach underestimates the significance of these
> extreme right-wing tendencies.
>
> The Republikaner were formed in 1983 as a right-wing split-off from
> the Bavarian Christian Social Union (CSU�election partners of the
> Christian Democratic Union). Their initial electoral success brought
> them seats in many local councils, the state legislature of
> Badem-W�rttemberg, and, in 1989, the European Parliament. With such
> institutional successes, they sought to distance themselves from their
> thuggish past and were able to attract conservative layers of voters.
> In the Badem-W�rttemberg state elections of 1992 they recorded their
> best results in the well-off belt around the city of Stuttgart. This
> state also boasts the highest per capita income of all Germany.
>
> An increasingly fascist tendency has now concentrated itself inside
> the NPD. While they like to present themselves as right-wing
> intellectuals, the National Democrats deliberately recruit militant
> youth and skinheads from the hot-spots of former East Germany. The NPD
> have authoritatively participated in providing a theoretical
> orientation to the far-right, using the Junge Freiheit (Young Freedom)
> newspaper.
>
> The more the establishment parties have adopted the policies of the
> extreme right, the more the independent basis for such parties has
> disappeared. Their loss of votes in the European elections shows that
> Germany's far-right tendencies are returning to the bosom of the
> mainstream parties.
>
> This development can most clearly be seen in Bavaria. The CSU is
> credited with having achieved a �powerful victory,� its share of the
> votes cast having risen from 48.9 percent in 1994 to 64 percent today,
> a jump of 15.1 percent. In actual votes, however, this translates into
> an increase of only 140,000. A total of 2.5 million voted for the CSU.
>
> In comparison, the Republikaner lost 250,000 votes (a decline of 75
> percent). The right-wing policies of the CSU and their Bavarian Prime
> Minister Edmund Stoiber have simply made the Republikaner superfluous.
> If such tendencies are now starting to become active inside the
> establishment parties, it is because the latter are increasingly
> amenable to nationalist and racist politics.
>
>
>
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
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>
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> World Socialist Web Site
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>
>
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