Germany’s firewall was meant to hold the far right at bay. It may have done the reverse
In just over two weeks’ time, Saxony-Anhalt – home to historic timber-framed houses, the dramatic Harz mountains and the birthplace of Martin Luther – will hold what could prove one of the most significant state elections in Germany’s postwar history. The vote, on 6 September, could see a far-right party whose local branch is officially classified by the country’s domestic intelligence service as “confirmed rightwing extremist” appoint a state premier and govern a state alone, for the first time. That could have big consequences for both Germany and Europe. With more state elections a fortnight later in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and Berlin, it could also end the consensus that, since the second world war, has kept the far right at bay in Germany. The far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) has led most German national polls since April last year. It is comfortably ahead in eastern Saxony-Anhalt and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, and is even second in famously liberal Berlin. In Saxony-Anhalt, the party – which dabbles in Nazi imagery, differentiates between “biological” and “passport” Germans, and whose rhetoric and policies are often way more extreme than many other EU far-right parties – is polling at up to 42%. Under Germany’s proportional representation threshold, which excludes parties that capture less than 5% of the vote, a score in the low-to-mid 40s could quite conceivably secure AfD an absolute majority in the Saxony-Anhalt parliament. As the Centre for Strategic and International Studies points out, that would have an immediate domestic impact. Germany’s 16 states exercise constitutional authority over education, policing, public broadcasting and regional civil administration. AfD’s proposed state-level measures include revising the school history curriculum to emphasise Germany’s “achievements” over its wartime crimes, defunding anti-racism initiatives, removing pride flags and rewriting the mandates of public TV and radio. An AfD government could exploit state-level public recruitment criteria and make political appointments favouring ideologically aligned candidates, and, more broadly, create an intimidating environment where state employees prefer silence to conflict. At the federal level, winning a state government would also give the AfD seats in the Bundesrat upper house representing the states. That would not allow it to block legislation unilaterally, but it could table new policy initiatives and disrupt consensus. On the EU stage, while the party is somewhat sidelined within parliament – it heads the uber-nationalist ESN group, including France’s Reconquest and Italy’s National Future – its increased influence in Germany would weaken European unity. An increasingly fragmented German political landscape would undermine Berlin’s role as an engine of European integration, affecting decision-making in key areas such as environment policy (AfD rejects the need for climate action). In other vital areas – such as policy towards Ukraine – a more influential AfD’s hostility to further military aid for Kyiv and eagerness to normalise relations with Moscow would directly benefit Russia’s efforts to sap western unity. More broadly, an AfD victory would be a potent signal that even the EU’s biggest economy is vulnerable to the far right, boosting nativist parties in countries with crunch national elections in the next 18 months, such as France, Italy, Spain and Poland. But there’s another dimension to a possible AfD victory in Saxony-Anhalt that deserves a closer look. For decades, Germany’s political parties have operated a so-called “Brandmauer”, or firewall, to prevent the normalisation of far-right extremism. *** A Brandmauer backfire
In essence, the firewall should rule out any form of coalition or structural cooperation with the AfD. In 2018, the centre-right CDU of Chancellor Friedrich Merz even codified the Brandmauer into a formal “incompatibility resolution”. The objective, of course, was to prevent support for the AfD increasing, its influence expanding, and, ultimately, the far-right party winning power. It hasn’t worked – and analysts now suggest there may be three distinct flaws with the firewall strategy. First, as The Economist argued, by making the AfD a political pariah, the Brandmauer has in effect insulated the party from the compromises and failures of government. With no need to deliver actual results, it can promise voters whatever it likes (and it does). That, of course, has made it even more appealing. Unlike many other European far-right parties that have experienced the accountability that accompanies regional or national power, the AfD has not been obliged to moderate its language or its ideas. Second, as the German academic Alexander Görlach observed, the firewall has “hollowed-out” the centre: to build majorities excluding the far right, the CDU has had to enter “Grand Coalitions” with its historic adversary, the centre-left SPD. Over time, this constant reliance on uncomfortable alliances and ideological compromise has blurred the distinctions between the mainstream parties, reinforcing the AfD’s line that the establishment forces are carbon-copy “cartel parties”. With the far-right party dominating polling in eastern Germany, the CDU’s rigid observance of the firewall has led it into unnatural, unstable and thus largely ineffective alliances, further frustrating voters and driving support for extremes. In 2018, four years before he became CDU leader, Merz promised to halve the AfD’s score. Since then, it has almost doubled. As elsewhere in Europe, shifting rightward, notably on immigration, has served only to validate the far right’s agenda. It could be, of course, that the AfD does not win an absolute majority on 6 September. But even if it does not, the CDU may be forced to ally with pretty much every other party in parliament, including the radical-left Die Linke, to keep it out. That, analysts suggest, may prove a bridge too far for some senior party figures, and could have dire, even fatal consequences for Merz’s leadership – at around 13%, his approval ratings are already among the lowest of any postwar chancellor. But the fate of Germany’s Brandmauer is worth pondering. That’s not to say it isn’t a good idea to try to isolate the far right. But if you don’t have the policies to actually beat it at the ballot box, the net result may be that the cycle of ideological compromises you are forced into merely alienates voters further – and drives them into the arms of the very far right you sought to contain. To receive the complete version of This Is Europe in your inbox every Wednesday, please subscribe here.
