The Kremlin's support for right-wing and populist movements and parties in Europe is a growing concern for European politicians as we approach this summer's European Parliament elections. However, support for the Kremlin is not the reason for the growing popularity of radical agendas. Experts point to a long-term trend of declining voter confidence in mainstream centrist parties on both the right and the left. As such, we can expect the extreme right to almost double its representation in the European Parliament, while the centrist super-coalition will shrink significantly. Although this will not lead to a definitive loss of dominance, the far right may be able to escape its status on the periphery and significantly expand its influence when it comes to political decisions in a number of areas. At the same time, the European extreme right does not form a single pan-European movement. Their growing popularity in different parts of Europe is a response to different concerns and problems. To limit the influence of the extreme right, pro-European politicians should not declare them part of a united anti-European front, but rather seek their own response to these concerns at the national level, according to experts from the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR).
Last week, Investigate Europe published the results of an investigation into Russia's secret influence on European politics (Meduza published a Russian translation). Russia invests in political forces that oppose support for Ukraine, promote Eurosceptic narratives and anti-liberalism, and directly or indirectly adhere to pro-Russian positions. European media over the past few years has exposed the Kremlin's ties to a number of parties: the Alternative for Germany, the Dutch Freedom Party, the French National Rally, and Italy's Northern League. Moreover, in February 2024, MEPs passed a resolution condemning Russia's attempts to interfere in European politics. The resolution points to cases where Russia has financed European parties and individual politicians, attempts to introduce a network of agents, and the Kremlin's propaganda pressure on European public opinion. The severity of this issue is increasing as the European Parliament elections are approaching, against the backdrop of the ever-increasing position of extreme right-wing parties in national and regional elections in European countries.
While many of the allegations of Kremlin ties seem irrefutable or convincing, it is clear that such influence is hardly capable of shaping political agendas and long-term trends in European politics. Rather, it is capable of supporting trends and widening fissures. As recently as 15 years ago, it would not have occurred to anyone to accuse authoritarian and developing countries of manipulating European politics. On the contrary, it was these countries that accused the West of trying to influence their domestic politics, and these accusations were usually based on the domestic political problems of these countries.
Crises in European politics are supported and stimulated by the Kremlin, but not instigated by it, manifesting themselves in a long-term trend of declining popularity of mainstream (centrist) political forces, both left and right, and growing support for radical and minor parties across Europe, which has led to a fragmentation of the party system at both national and pan-European levels, analysts at the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) argue in their report, titled 'A Steep Turn to the Right'.
Based on an original statistical model summarising data from opinion polls at the national level and the results of European Parliament elections in 2009-2019, the report predicts the outcome of the June 2024 elections. Anti-European populists are likely to lead in nine countries — Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, France, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland and Slovakia — and come second or third in another nine countries — Bulgaria, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden and Spain. As a result, the two largest centrist coalitions in the European Parliament — the European People's Party and the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats — will lose 15 seats each. The Greens-European Free Alliance will lose another 10 seats. But the radical right-wing coalition Identity and Democracy will almost double its representation — from 58 to 98 seats, while the right-wing European Conservatives and Reformists will gain 18 seats. The combined representation of the latter two parties will increase by a third, from 125 to 183.
This summer;s elections will not ‘overturn’ anything, according to analysts. Most likely, the European People's Party will remain the largest faction in the European Parliament and will be able to shape the agenda, including retaining the final say in approving the next president of the European Commission. However, the far right will escape its place on the political periphery and the centrist super coalition will shrink to half of the seats in the European Parliament. This will limit, in particular, its ability to make many foreign policy decisions, ECFR analysts believe.
A broad representation of the extreme right in the European Parliament could help it transform from a national protest movement into a pan-European force. However, this is not an inevitable turn of events. In fact, national far-right movements do not form a united pan-European front, write Ivan Krastev and Mark Leonard in another ECFR review, but respond to different localised crisis agendas. At the same time, centrist and pro-European politicians are focusing on two strategies in their attempts to counter them: they are trying to respond to the far right's concerns about immigration on the one hand, and to focus on the successes of EU collective action in fighting climate change, responding to the Covid pandemic and countering Putin's aggression in Ukraine on the other.
However, the success of the far right across Europe is not the result of any single discontent. On the contrary, this discontent has a different profile in different parts of Europe, Krastev and Leonard conclude on the basis of ECFR polls. For example, immigration is not a common concern: in the eastern part of Europe, there is much more concern emigration — the outflow of their fellow citizens to wealthier European countries — rather than immigration.
In seeking to articulate a common response to the rise of extreme right-wing movements in Europe, pro-European politicians do not have their finger on the pulse when it comes to national concerns, and as such are only widening the gap between their pro-European narratives and narratives of localised discontent. In the poorer countries of southern Europe, for example, economic problems are the central issue. Voters here are concerned that they will have to pay the same price as richer countries for fighting climate change and supporting Ukraine. Moreover, calls by pro-European centrist politicians to support these very agendas as European unity agendas repel voters.
At the same time, in the richer countries (where migrants predominantly seek to migrate), voters are not so much in favour of closing borders as they are concerned about losing the ability to control at the national level who comes into the country and in what numbers.
Given this, an over-focus on 'Russian influence' as a driving force behind the growth of extreme right-wing movements may also paint a false picture, demonstrating rather a lack of attention to localised concerns. As Krastev and Leonard write, more than the 'Russian threat' theme, the issue of European geopolitical subjectivity in the context of Trump's likely return to the White House may prove to be a unifying thread for Europe.
Generally speaking, the rise of far-right movements in Europe should be seen as a result of the frictions emerging between national and supranational agendas in European politics. According to the experts, in 2019, against the backdrop of Brexit, centrist parties won the European Parliament elections by making EU preservation the main focus of their agenda. This time, however, such a trick will not work. On the contrary, by declaring various national-level concerns as undermining EU unity, they will only erode their credibility. The same can apparently be said for the topic of the 'Russian footprint' in the rise of extreme right-wing movements: the fact that such a footprint exists does not negate the fact that the causes of this trend are completely different.