Fascists have made substantial breakthroughs as European Elections results send a shockwave across Europe
Fascists and the far right have swept the board across the European Elections. The results are a stark warning that must sound the alarm for anti racists and anti fascists everywhere to urgently organise and build movements to challenge and oppose racism and division and to expose the fascists.
In France the European Elections saw the fascist Rassemblement Nationale (RN) led by Marine Le Pen take 32 percent of the vote, double the the vote of Emmanuel Macron’s alliance and gaining a nearly 9 percentage point rise on the RN’s 2019 vote, triggering Macron to call a snap general election. Just a few months before the US elections threaten the return of Trump to the White House, the French general election could see Fascist Le Pen and the RN win the presidency. The fascist Reconquête! party led by Eric Zemmour and Marion Maréchal Le Pen took another 5.5 percent of the vote. Now the leader of the mainstream right party Les Républicains has announced he would back an alliance with the far right in the snap legislative elections.
In Germany there was more horror, with the far right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) gaining 16 percent—with the conservative CDU-CSU in second place on 30 percent. In Italy, fascist Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy polled 29 percent of the vote.
In Austria, the fascist Freiheitliche Partei Österreichs (FPO) was the leading party with 29 percent of the vote, 12 percentage points higher than in 2019. At the same time the conservative OVP (Austrian People’s Party) was down 13 points.
In the Netherlands, Geert Wilders far right PVV (Party for Freedom) took 17 percent of the vote, while the fascist FvD (Forum for Democracy) lost a seat with 2.5 percent of the vote.
In Portugal the far right Chega party came third with nearly 10 percent of the vote and in Spain the far right Vox party also came third with close to 10 percent of the vote.
In Poland the right wing populist Law and Justice Party took 36 percent of the vote, losing 5 seats, while the far right Confederation gained 6 seats with 12 percent of the vote.
In Ireland, the council elections that came alongside the European Elections saw the fascist Irish Freedom Party and the far right National Party both gain their first ever seat. However in the European Elections, where results are still to be finalised, it doesn’t appear that these forces have made any breakthrough.
In France there have been big demonstrations against racism, in Germany a mass movement against the AfD, and in Austria anti racists and anti fascists inspired by the protests in Germany also took to the streets. In each country, 2024 has seen tens of thousands marching and protesting, showing the capacity for a movement that can take on the threat from the fascists.
The experience of the defeat fascist organisation in Greece bears out that when confronted with an effective anti fascist strategy of mass mobilisation, and a broad united campaign with organised working class at its centre, even the most terrifying violent expressions of fascist organisation can be driven back and broken.
The story of the European Elections, and its shockwave of the terrible advances by fascists and the far right, is one of sharpening polarisation in which mainstream governments have vied for the same ground—pushing Islamophobia and anti migrant and anti refugee racist Fortress Europe border policies—and emboldened the growth of a far right and fascist movement increasing in power.
We have seen an increasing convergence of the mainstream right, right wing populism and the far right—a dymamic reflected in Britain’s political context, if to a much less developed degree. Fascists across Europe are making breakthroughs from this toxic atmosphere, after decades of establishing their electoral organisation and strategy.
In Britain, no such fascist organisation or strategy is established, in large part due to the tradition and method of mass united campaigns that have headed off any breakthroughs on the part of fascists at the pass—from the Anti Nazi League and Rock Against Racism, to Unite Against Fascism and Love Music Hate Racism, to Stand Up To Racism. While fascist organisation in Britain is no where near the levels of what we are witnessing across Europe, and instead profoundly weak and splintered, the mobilisation by fascist Tommy Robinson on 1 June, supported by Lawrence Fox and Katie Hopkins where over 5,000 turned out, was a sign of the capacity for those forces to grow, and particularly amidst the shifting sands of what comes out the general election period, with the convergence of the hard right of the Tory party and Reform UK. This is encapsulated by Suella Braverman’s call for Nigel Farage to lead the Tories. Farage’s campaign to be elected as an MP in Clacton must be met with a mass and effective campaign to stop him.
It is the duty of anti racists and anti fascists everywhere to assert strongly the lessons of the 1930s—that for Never Again to be a reality, we have to organise, we have the challenge the threat, and we have to fight hard to build mass, widespread, broad and united opposition that exposes and opposes the threat of fascism. It is also not the 1930s. While fascists have made extreme advances in the parliamentary sphere, reflected so starkly in the European Election results, they do not currently have the same storm troopers, the street armies, that were a critical element in the rise to power by Hitler and Mussolini. The European Elections also have taken place in the wake of one of the biggest mass movements on the streets in generations, with centre government parties under immense pressure and a political crisis. While polarisation deepens, we see the growth of the far right and gains for fascist forces, but there is also the existence and capacity to develop the seeds of the mass anti racist and anti fascist movements that could turn the tide.