One of the iconic moments in Australian sport occurred in at the 2002 Winter Olympics. Australians are strong in most summer sports, but we don’t have much in the way of a winter, so it was considered quite an achievement for Steven Bradbury to make the finals of the speed skating event. He was given little chance of winning, and was trailing the pack until the final seconds, when all four skaters ahead of him crashed spectacularly. Bradbury cruised past them to claim the gold medal, one of only six in Australia’s winter olympics history.
It strikes me that this is a metaphor for the current position of the EU. It’s long been regarded as an also-ran in the global economy, and geopolitics, trailing behind the US, China and Russia. And (at least 52 per cent of) the UK decided it could do much better outside. The EU has plenty of problems with the climate catastrophe, sluggish economic growth, the rise of the far-right and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
But compared to the crash of the others, it looks pretty good. It’s way ahead on decarbonization, has mostly recovered from the disaster of austerity, and has high living standards and (unlike the US) rising life expectancy. The far-right has had some wins, but nothing comparable to its takeover of the US Republican party. And Brexit has served as an awful warning to anyone contemplating leaving. The problem facing the EU now is how to deal with the queue of eager applicants.
Of course, prediction is difficult, especially about the future. The ECB could screw up again, and generate another long recession. The far-right could do better. On the other side of the coin, the Democrats could win convincingly enough in 2024 to put an end to the threat of Trumpism. But right now the EU seems to be dodging the worst of the global trainwreck.
{ 51 comments }
vorkosigan1 09.15.23 at 12:15 am
I dunno-Hungary, Poland and Italy suggest to me that the EU are in the running in the far-right sweepstakes.
John Q 09.15.23 at 1:19 am
In the running, but at the back of the pack. The others are crashing
hix 09.15.23 at 3:20 am
Winning zero sum sport by everyone else being worse is one thing, winning the competition for big political entity that does most to make life better like that another.
Let me try some mantra:
Aiwanger is harmless compared to Trump and he only polls at 17%
Aiwanger is harmless compared to Trump and he only polls at 17%
No not working. Not particular uplifting.
MisterMr 09.15.23 at 9:44 am
” in the global economy, and geopolitics, trailing behind the US, China”
certainly yes
” and Russia.”
not really.
Russia, for a lot of unfortunate reasons (some of which coming from the west) is an economic basket case with a huge army. It is not really a leading power in economics, nor really in geopolitics anymore actually.
The EU in term of geopolitics is more like a minor ally/vassal state of the USA (I mean no offense, but two of the main countries part of the EU, Germany and Italy, lost WW2 and their military/foreign policy since then has been designed to be that of a satellite of the USA, no reason to hide behind a finger), so it is difficult to say how much geopolitic power it would have by itself.
marcel proust 09.15.23 at 3:06 pm
*** PEDANTRY ALERT ***
:a href=”https://crookedtimber.org/2023/09/15/europes-bradbury-moment/#comment-825983″>@vorkosigan1
I dunno-Hungary, Poland and Italy suggest to me that the EU are in the running in the far-right sweepstakes.
@John Q (in response)
In the running, but at the back of the pack. The others are crashing
Not sure that crashing in this context or use has the same meaning as in the OP. If the others (Hungary, Poland, Italy) are in the running, I think that means they are having problems with far-right movements, but not yet as severe as other countries, e.g., the US?/1 If the US crashes, does that mean that Trump wins or another member of the far-right wins or something almost as bad? But in the context of Bradbury, when one group of people crash, that allows the one who is in the running to surge ahead in the same terms in which those who crashed were formerly leading.
So, in this passage, crashing must mean that the far-right does not come to power in the US. Then, the 3 countries which are in the running have a chance of beating the US by having far-right victories in their own countries. But in this case, the US has managed to avoid crashing in the sense that the word is used in the OP.
Oy. My head is spinning. I am about to crash.
1/ Being a typical United Statesian (United States of Americian?), I will use the US as my prime or typical example and ignore the mention of others in the same category, i.e., of Russia, China and the UK.
steven t johnson 09.15.23 at 3:09 pm
Votes and election are not how the “far-right” takes power, I think.
And, the Trumpian policies continued by the Democratic Party/Biden makes it unclear what the defeat of “Trumpism” would mean.
John Q 09.16.23 at 12:18 am
Hix @3 Maybe I started with lower expectations. I assume that there is 20% support for the far-right in every country, though it is more visible at some times than at others.
MisterMr @4 “The EU in term of geopolitics is more like a minor ally/vassal state of the USA” Historically true, but ceasing to be the case, which is the point of the post. For example, the EU has now pledged twice as much aid to Ukraine as the US https://www.ifw-kiel.de/publications/news/ukraine-support-tracker-europe-clearly-overtakes-us-with-total-commitments-now-twice-as-large/
Marcel @5 Touché ! I saw this problem, but, to mangle the metaphor still further, thought I could skate by.
STJ @6 Still channelling Ernst Thaelmann, I see.
logothete 09.16.23 at 12:45 am
The conscious, deliberate actions of a plurality of US/UK voters and politicians to enact polices that t make life worse for people in their countries is very different from a chance accident among atheletes who have done their best to succeed. It minimizes the achievement and work the Australian put in to get to that level of ability where he was one of the best in the world. I’m not sure countries “winning” when looking at how much they enable human flourishing for their inhabitants is of much use despite how common and human that tendency is. I think looking at how some states solve problems common to all nations can be useful in exploring different perspectives and consider how to implement it under their political and cultural system. Or it can be useful to see how differing social and political philosophies make other outcomes more likely. If we are going to compare whats going in the EU with its peers keep in mind those rankings will change. I don’t pay attention to sports let alone winter olympic sports so I don’t know if Australia is a powerhouse these days. Like other people have mentioned here there’s enough governments in the EU who might torpedo its current trajectory of increasing the EUits’ well being with their fascist-curious electorates and eager-authoritarian elected officials
Alex SL 09.16.23 at 1:09 am
Bit confused by a lot of this post.
In what sense has Europe ever been an “also-ran in the global economy”? It has long been one of three economic superpowers (USA, Europe, China, with Japan as third-and-a-half), and its soft regulatory power exceeds that of even the USA. Is this about slightly lower growth rates than the USA?
High living standards – I have never understood how people calculate that statistic to end up with a country at the top that has widespread crippling poverty, most people living in uninsulated plank boxes that fall apart the moment a tornado arrives instead of stone houses, most people living in ‘food deserts’, no functional health care system except for the rich, virtually no labour protections, ten days of annual leave, and everything organised around car ownership. I can only assume that the living standard statistic is designed to be driven mostly by car ownership and house size, because of course then the USA come out on top; but on everything that matters to me in terms of living standards, it would have consistently ranked behind Europe and eastern Asia for decades.
Conversely, in what sense are the USA and China now “crashing”? Because Trump might get reelected? I am sure even the democracy of the USA will survive another republican win, to the extremely limited degree that it is a democracy in the first place given rampant gerrymandering, the electoral college, how campaign donations warp all decision processes, and myriads of “you plebs have no standing to sue on this topic that affects you” style rulings in the judiciary. Nor would, of course, the economy or living standards necessarily fall off a cliff just because a kleptocrat gets another go. “There is a lot of ruin in a nation”, and especially in one as large, economically diversified, and federalist as the USA.
The same goes for other countries in Europe, by the way. I do not want neonazis to win an election, as they cause unnecessary suffering to the vulnerable and increase economic inequality. But in terms of will Europe also “crash” (?), the worst case scenario these days tends to be what the Republicans are inching towards: redesigning the electoral and judicial systems so that they cannot lose an election unless two thirds of voters are voting the other party, and getting away with more corruption. A strong economy survives that for decades. Even the UK is more bleeding out slowly rather than spectacularly falling on its face despite having been run by far right economic cranks and xenophobes since 2010, which is part of why so many people are still in denial about the inadvisability of Brexit.
DK2 09.16.23 at 1:46 am
Over the past couple of years, the US has massively outperformed the EU with respect to geopolitical power and GDP. EU pledges for future economic aid to Ukraine don’t outweigh US leadership in creating and expanding massive anti-Russian and anti-Chinese coalitions. And the US GDP is both far ahead of the EU and gaining rapidly.
It’s reasonable to argue the EU is ahead of the US on various quality of life metrics and possible to argue the EU is less infected with right-wing populism (though wrong in my opinion). It is not possible to argue the EU is gaining on the US with respect to the “global economy, and geopolitics.” The exact opposite is true.
I did, however, enjoy hearing about Steven Bradbury. That story deserves to be better-known. Consulting Wikipedia, it turns out that hanging back and hoping the leaders crashed was a deliberate strategy, and it worked in both the semi-finals and finals.
hix 09.16.23 at 4:11 am
My expectations are even lower (or higher) regarding the normal far right share Unfortunately, we are starting to get a bit of a special situation in Bavaria. We now got two crazy parties:
Freie Wähler with 17% and AFD with 13%. Traditionally Freie Wähler were by no means far right and even today i´d say most party members are not. Unfortunatly Aiwanger has turned Freie Wähler into a one man show the rank and file goes along with as long as it works in the polls. His rethoric is not even particular racist either. More a type of conspiracy populism mixed with very crude identity politics. Man of the normal people* against the woke left elites! The more absurd it gets, the better it works.
Recently he had a career ending scandal, showed no remorse, claimed to be the victim of a left wing witchhunt and his poll numbers went 3-5% up:
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66645801
Big picture, this is still harmless. Small picture: This is just too close to home to remain relaxed. It is just something else when you can watch and hear this scandal turned into i am a poor victim dynamic in person.
*As usual, Aiwangers imagined “normal” tends to squew married with children, rural, local since generations and middle till upper class, heterosexual, holding a regular job, thus excluding some 80% of the population. No surprise that most of his supporters are not that normal either.
MisterMr 09.16.23 at 6:40 am
John Q @7
There might be differences between the EU and the USA, but there is never opposition.
For example, when Bush invaded Iraq, Germany and France didn’t participate, but didn’t send help to Iran, or put sanctions against the USA, as we are now doing for Ukraine.
I’m not sure I would like an EU that goes in opposition to the USA, this would also require most EU countries to get out from NATO and then, since EU armies are clearly too weak out of NATO, the EU should start an arms race on its own, that is a bad thing.
So on the whole I’m ok with the EU is a minor partner of the USA, as long as it is possible.
Chris Bertram 09.16.23 at 6:42 am
I’m more concerned than John is. The nationalist right is doing very well across the EU, in part because their narrative on migration is validated by people who should know better. So in the medium term the EU faces the ruinous combination of an ageing population and hostility to the very migrant workers it needs. It has done OK (perhaps not “well”) on climate so far, but its car manufacturers have been slow to adapt to electric and now they are putting the pressures on for import controls that would insulate them from Chinese competition. The costs of the Ukraine war, increased defence expenditure, higher energy bills are all grist to the mill of the populist right as well. The post-Brexit UK looks pretty bad, and I’m a passionate rejoiner, but should rejoining ever be on the real political agenda, it may be that a comparatively liberal UK will be petitioning to rejoin an EU that is quite different from the one it left.
nastywoman 09.16.23 at 7:07 am
the View from Bristol –
(or to be more precise from the Harbour Hotel) is
‘The nationalist right is doing far too well across the EU, mainly because their narrative on migration is validated by people who should know better. So in the medium term the EU faces – I would say NOT ‘ruinous’ but ‘very difficult’ combination of an ageing population and hostility to the very migrant workers it needs.
It has done OK (perhaps not “well”) on climate so far, but its car manufacturers have been slow to adapt to electric BUT ‘the Benz’ also seems to rule here and the opposition to Ukraine DEFENCE are all grist to the mill of the populist right as well.
BUT
as long as the average European STILL can afford to live in Europe –
while Americans can’t anymore – as what ‘Average Human’ being is able to afford a shelter (rented or bought) in the US?
NOBODY!
And that makes Americans very, very unhappy and calling for Aiwangers too!
(and now down to the Tesco)
J-D 09.16.23 at 8:21 am
There are four national elections scheduled in EU members before the end of this year which could give indications of whether the nationalist right is gaining (electorally): Slovakia (30 September), Luxembourg (8 October), Poland (15 October), Netherlands (22 November). I’ll be watching to see how those go.
engels 09.16.23 at 10:26 am
mostly recovered from the disaster of austerity
“The operation was successful, the patient is dead.”
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/past-austerity-haunts-greek-election-voters-struggle-with-living-costs-2023-05-15/
https://www.amnesty.org.uk/press-releases/greece-covid-19-exposes-urgent-need-rescue-countrys-austerity-ravaged-health-system
Robert Weston 09.16.23 at 1:13 pm
“I’m more concerned than John is. The nationalist right is doing very well across the EU, in part because their narrative on migration is validated by people who should know better.”
An important point. It’s not just about polling, but the extent to which the far-right is setting the terms of debate. In France, for instance, the visceral hostility of a large swathe of the country’s elites to any sort of any anti-racist, pro-inclusion speech, suggests as much even though the country’s post-Revolution national myths play a big role in that narrative as well. Then, there’s the general atmosphere of suspicion towards Muslims (search “Abaya” for the most recent example). On an EU-wide level, look at migration policy cooperation with Libya and Tunisia.
steven t johnson 09.16.23 at 1:24 pm
John Quiggin@7 Better than channeling Chancellor Hermann Müller, the Interior Minister Carl Severing, the Prussian Prime Minister Otto Braun, Prussian Interior Minister Albert Grzesinski, and Berlin Police chief Karl Zörgiebel, I think. It takes two to make an alliance. To my knowledge, there isn’t a shred of evidence the SPD would ever have allied with the KPD absent a total abandonment of all revolutionary goals. So far as I can tell, the Popular Front was very close to that and all popular fronts ended with the supposed allies turning right. I think the real complaint here is that only a Loyal Opposition, aka the Outs, is permissible.
The Netflix series Babylon Berlin depicts the Blutmai of 1929 in its first season, btw.
Robert Weston 09.16.23 at 1:33 pm
JQ @6: “For example, the EU has now pledged twice as much aid to Ukraine as the US https://www.ifw-kiel.de/publications/news/ukraine-support-tracker-europe-clearly-overtakes-us-with-total-commitments-now-twice-as-large/”
Are we talking about both economic and military aid? Because the U.S. lobbied the EU to step up to the plate on the former; and many of the loudest calls for European arms deliveries came from Atlanticist voices on both sides of the pond. I don’t know that that speaks to Europe shedding its vassal status.
MisterMr @12: Agreed. I don’t think European foreign policy elites want strategic autonomy from the U.S., for both rational (“it’s worked well and it saves us money to outsource our defense to Washington”) and emotional reasons (“America freed us from the Nazis and protected us from the Soviets, so let’s keep the relationship going for old times’ sake”).
hix 09.16.23 at 4:15 pm
“since EU armies are clearly too weak out of NATO”
Too weak for what? My theory about the incompetence of the German army (conceeding it is not particular competent here not necessarily because i am convinced this is quite as true as seems consensus these days) is that there is simply no reason for competence. Competent people rarely join the army for lack of purpose (and for lack of wanting to get PTSD on some stupid developing country occupation). If they join, they got little interest in makeing the army work since there is just so obviously no point, no enemy. Neither is there any outside pressure to perform. All the room in the world to try to build some overengineered super tank as a technical toy for example. More fun for the engineers no matter if it is practical over the next two decades.
Now incompetent or not, i´d like to see the foreign army that can compete with the EUs sky high collective military budget in an entirely fictional conventional war. Russia, the usual excuse for those that just pretend nukes do not exist sure is not that enemy.
John Q 09.16.23 at 7:00 pm
STJ, nothing more from you on any of my posts please.
John Q 09.16.23 at 7:12 pm
Chris @13
I agree that the big problem is hostility to migration. But, as you have rightly argued, the case for migration should be based on personal freedom, rather than economic arguments pro and con. In particular, concerns about an ageing population are mostly spurious https://insidestory.org.au/the-ageing-alarmists-wont-let-go/
Tm 09.16.23 at 9:44 pm
I would be careful regarding life expectancy. Not declining as spectacularly as in the US but in recent years stagnating. E. g. Germany shows no net increase in at least 6 years:
https://www-genesis.destatis.de/genesis/online?sequenz=tabelleErgebnis&selectionname=12621-0002&zeitscheiben=16&sachmerkmal=ALT577&sachschluessel=ALTVOLL000,ALTVOLL020,ALTVOLL040,ALTVOLL060,ALTVOLL065,ALTVOLL080#abreadcrumb
Similar Switzerland (not EU but generally comparable or better than the most affluent EU countries), life expectancy in 2022 was almost identical to 2016. I’d like to see 2022 figures for other countries.
Maternal mortality is another interesting indicator. The US has managed to increase its rate since 2000, making it a huge outlier. Europe is much better both in absolute and relative terms but there have been slight increases since 2015.
https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789240068759
Tm 09.16.23 at 9:58 pm
MisterMr: „There might be differences between the EU and the USA, but there is never opposition. For example, when Bush invaded Iraq, Germany and France didn’t participate, but didn’t send help to Iran“
I take it you mean help to Iraq? If by opposition you mean confrontation, then I agree, no European government wants confrontation with the US. But neither does anybody else (not even Russia; China is perhaps ready for confrontation but more likely not). If I remember correctly, many countries opposed and condemned Bush’s 2003 invasion of Iraq but none endeavored to support Iraq, or sanction let alone fight the US. So the example doesn’t really prove much.
MisterMr 09.16.23 at 11:51 pm
@Hix 20
If the EU wanted to be a “superpower”, militarly, which I don’t think would be a good idea, it would need a collective army (without NATO) able to at least scare off other super powers (USA and China), it would need to dominate smaller neighbours like Russia (which however has much more nukes than the EU, only France has nukes in the whole EU) and it would need some power projection capability (I was reading a Wikipedia article yesterday that said that in the whole EU only France and Italy have power projection capabilities, I assume it meant the navy).
So if for some reason the EU wanted to play the superpower game without or against the USA, it would have to rearm big time.
nastywoman 09.17.23 at 7:56 am
‘But, as you have rightly argued, the case for migration should be based on personal freedom, rather than economic arguments pro and con’.
BUT
the economic argument seems to be –
especially in Germany –
(and the UK NOW)
the most successful argument against any Right Wing Racists – as they too complain about the lack of ‘HELP’ –
(as any Hotel or Restaurant Owner in Cornwall will tell’ya)
Tm 09.17.23 at 11:45 am
I should add to the above that maintaining a high level of life expectancy is a pretty good accomplishment. We shouldn’t expect life expectancy to keep increasing indefinitely.
MisterMr: Playing the superpower game is definitely not what I would want the EU to do. But if the US gets completely trumpified, which is a distinct possibility, what will happen to NATO is up in the air and the EU may feel forced to play its own superpower game, with unpredictable consequences for international stability. Another urgent reason why Trump needs to lose in 2024.
Alex SL 09.17.23 at 11:04 pm
Regarding life expectancy, it would be no surprise if that went down across the all countries now, given that the entire world has decided not to do anything to mitigate Covid19 anymore. Both because elderly people are particularly vulnerable (even dying at age 87 instead of age 89 as you would have without Covid19 will still shift the stats) and because of long-term effects e.g. on the vascular system of younger people. Eastern Asia may have a bit of an edge there because at least there appears to be no culture war attached with wearing masks as there is in many ‘Western’ countries (?).
MisterMr 09.17.23 at 11:28 pm
@Tm 27
I agree.
John Q 09.18.23 at 1:03 am
TM & MisterMr: The point of the metaphor is that the EU hasn’t tried to play the superpower game, while those who have done so, including Russia, and in a farcical fashion, Britain (England, really*), have come a cropper.
engels 09.18.23 at 9:16 am
So if I understand: far from being a geopolitical “also ran” the EU is much nicer than the US and (unless Trump throws a spanner in the works) can rely on US’s military and nuclear protection indefinitely (a privilege one can’t refuse?)
engels 09.18.23 at 9:56 am
Basically: Switzerland plus Frontex.
John Q 09.18.23 at 10:03 am
Engels: As the OP implies, Europe doesn’t need US military protection against Russia any more. Russia has lost most of its professional army, and its stockpile of tanks and artillery, in the process of grabbing a tiny fraction of Ukraine. To fill the gap, it’s drawn down its forces on other fronts to a fraction (about 20%) of what was there before. They know its safe enough to do so, because the Europeans have no desire to invade them, but they have no remaining capability to mount an invasion themselves.
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russian-forces-near-norway-are-20-fewer-than-before-ukraine-war-norways-armed-2023-09-16/
As for “nuclear protection”, I have never understood what this means when NATO hawks talk about it, but I don’t expect sense from them. Perhaps you can explain it.
engels 09.18.23 at 10:44 am
To be clear I’m not in favour of Euronukes and I meant “protection” in the mafia sense: I’m not sure the thread consensus of “build a war machine and make America pay” is such a geopolitical winner (or entirely in tune with Schiller).
TM 09.18.23 at 12:54 pm
JQ 30: ” the EU hasn’t tried to play the superpower game, while those who have done so, including Russia, and in a farcical fashion, Britain (England, really*), have come a cropper.”
Sounds about right. Imperial hubris has been disastrous for Russia, and hasn’t done the US and UK much good lately.
Alex 28: Covid is one thing but I also expect the effect of extreme heat events to continue to take a toll on vulnerable populations. I haven’t seen any numbers from this year but previous heat years have substantially increased mortality in Europe. That might explain why life expectancy was already stagnating before Covid. That’s a bit speculative, I haven’t seen a good overall analysis yet.
J-D 15: There are four national elections scheduled in EU members before the end of this year which could give indications of whether the nationalist right is gaining (electorally): Slovakia (30 September), Luxembourg (8 October), Poland (15 October), Netherlands (22 November).
There are also state elections in Bayern and Hessen on October 8. Both states are more populous than Slovakia and Luxembourg combined.
Switzerland will have its national election on October 22. Not an EU member but surrounded by the EU, so …
TM 09.18.23 at 1:16 pm
hix 3: “Let me try some mantra:
Aiwanger is harmless compared to Trump and he only polls at 17%
Aiwanger is harmless compared to Trump and he only polls at 17%
No not working. Not particular uplifting.”
I wasn’t as concerned about the AFD but I’m shocked by what happeneed with the CDU/CSU in only 3 years. The Aiwanger case (Aiwanger is the Bavarian vice head of government whose former Nazi sympathies have recently come to light) is symptomatic of the main conservative party’s Trumpification process. They are now openly trivializing antisemitism and Nazism, which very recently would have ended any successful political career, stating that only their own voters count as real Germans, use civil war-like rhetoric against the left, and employ Trumpian barrages of lies, attacking green energy and climate action (among the lies being repeated ad nauseam: the Greens have caused an energy crisis by decommissioning the nuclear power plants. In fact, nuclear decommissioning was enacted in 2011 with the support of all parties; 224 lawmakers of CDU/CSU voted in favor, only 5 against. New solar and windpower installation has already more than compensated for the nuclears etc).
TM 09.18.23 at 1:19 pm
engels 34: “the thread consensus of “build a war machine and make America pay””
Clarification needed.
Switzerland isn’t all that “nice” btw.
John Q 09.18.23 at 8:29 pm
TM @36 That’s depressing. Trumpification of the mainstream right is the big threat. Also happening with the UK Tories, but they’ll be out soon. Starmer is appalling, but mainly in the ways that soft-neoliberal governments always have been.
engels 09.18.23 at 9:20 pm
I think Sir Keir trying to make “unBritish” a thing (while labelling illegal boat crossings “terrorism”) may have opened a new chapter in the darker, grittier The Thick of It reboot we’re all being forced to watch.
engels 09.18.23 at 10:26 pm
“Clarification needed.” Well you for one said Trump urgently needs to lose to avoid the global nightmare scenario of a less pugnacious (or dollar denominated) NATO.
Peter T 09.19.23 at 4:46 am
A survey discussed by Adam Tooze throws some light on German attitudes: https://adamtooze.com/2023/08/26/chartbook-235/
TM 09.19.23 at 8:26 am
engels 40, I shouldn’t take the bait (when engels starts telling people what they meant when they said totally different things it’s time to leave) but the term “pugnacious” is curious in this context.
TM 09.19.23 at 9:20 am
Thanks for the link Peter T.
“The real concern is presumably that substantial slices of the CDU are actually minded to join the far-right in this populist discourse.” As I pointed out, its worse than that because it is precisely the post-Merkel leadership of the CDU that is pushing the party right.
But the next bit is interesting:
“29 percent of CDU supporters believe in an inexorable crisis that requires systemic change, the second highest after the AfD. In that regard the slippage in the conclusion of the FAZ piece – the FAZ being the conservative paper of record – from descriptive statistics to prescription is telling.”
This refers to the last figure in the blog post showing answers to the question whether we “need system change”. Counterintuitively, CDU voters are more likely to say this than even Left party voters and far more than the Greens. This is typical for the age of Trumpism and reflects the fact that the term “system change” in today’s politics is connoted with right wing politics (despite the occasional “system change not climate change” demo chant). It now has only one meaningful content: destroy liberal democracy. Everybody understands that the only system change realistically available is fascism.
nastywoman 09.19.23 at 9:58 am
@41 very… Anglo ‘conservative’? confusing:
‘The Allensbach study allows us to dig into this question with some precision. Amongst the 44 percent of AfD supporters who do not generally hold a neo-Nazi or far-right worldview, 87 percent said they were very concerned about the flow of refugees to Germany… These concerns overshadow all other issues such as climate policy or the war in Ukraine…
You might wonder how someone who, on account of their xenophobia was willing too support the AfD, could not be counted as at least far-right in their political views. This is a reflection of the Allesnbach methodology which scores respondents on their responses to the 10 prompts. Only those giving 5 positive responses count as far-right and 7 as “rechtsradikal”. So if xenophobia, racism, Islamophobia are your thing, but you do not “otherwise” have right-wing preferences, you fall outside the Allensbach classification.
Overall, the conclusion of the surveys seems quite clear. There has not been a general shift to the right. In addition to a base of far-right wing support, which makes up 15 percent of the population, the AfD is attracting a protest vote that takes it to slightly more than 20 percent support. This is driven by dissatisfaction with migration policy and a general fear of societal crisis.
What is striking is the conclusion drawn by Thomas Petersen and the FAZ editors from the Allensbach results, which I loosely translate as follows:
AfD supporters see Germany’s migration policy as a catastrophe. Until “Politik” (policy … mainstream policy AT) “gets a grip on this problem” and until it stops creating the impression “with citizens” that it treats anyone who is concerned about migration with condescension and moral superiority, the appeals of the AfD will continue to fall on fertile soil.
So what’s actually quite ‘striking’ is Adam Tooze’s conclusion that there has not been a general shift to the right –
just some kind of protest vote? –
like in the US??
where the people elected some kind of ‘Anti Mainstream Protest Dude’ and
NEVER
a Right Wing Racist Science Denying Lying Sex Abusing Amateur Fascist.
Alex SL 09.19.23 at 10:05 am
TM,
Good point regarding heat waves. It occurs to me that hardly anybody in Germany has air conditioning, because it wasn’t traditionally necessary.
I had not heard about a hard right-swing of the CDU/CSU; my parents have made no mention of it despite being social democrats. (Their main concerns have recently been energy prices and the uselessness of the Bundesbahn, with a side order of the FDP blocking the coalition government from doing anything useful.)
An important difference to USA and UK is, however, that Germany has proportional representation. If the major centre-right party in a first past the post system is trumpified, it still gets 40+% of the vote simply because it isn’t the major centre-left party. If the same happens in proportional representation, moderate voters have alternatives.
TM 09.19.23 at 1:21 pm
Alex: One effect of the rise of the AFD is that there won’t be a right wing majority without the AFD. So even if the CDU comes first in a proportional election, they have to choose whether to enter into an alliance with the AFD, or govern with the SPD or the Greens (as they already do in several states). Now they have recently attacked the Greens (and the coalition government in general) so viciously that one has to wonder whether such an alliance is still possible. And so many expect that it won’t be long until the first CDU-AFD coalition, and then the so-called firewall against the extreme right is obsolete.
As a postscript to 43 above, the willingness of even CDU voters to say that the parliamentary “system” needs to be dismantled shows how absurd it is to refer to the modern right wing as “conservative”.
TM 09.19.23 at 1:53 pm
I apologize for too many comments (I should try to be more concise) but to give an example, Söder recently called the government the “worst that Germany ever had”, thus suggesting that Chancellor Hitler was preferable to Scholz. Söder is the CSU leader and Bavarian minister president who stands by his deputy Aiwanger despite his past Nazi activities (and Merz, the CDU leader, stands by Söder). No, I don’t believe that Söder is a Nazi but I don’t trust him the least bit to defend liberal democracy, and he seemed a decent, even somewhat liberal politician as recently as 2020. The right wing attacks on the government (which let’s remember is not even a left wing government, since the right wing FDP has veto power over everything) are not regular opposition work any more, this is Republican style flame war to divide, scare and scandalize the population, using inflammatory rhetoric and a barrage of lies that the media are too lazy to correct (a reminder of Trump’s initial treatment by the media). Working hard to turn the population against any kind of actual climate action, conjuring a non-existing migration crisis, saying out loud that urban parts of the country are not “real Germany”, deflecting the Aiwanger scandal with classical victim blaming, they are ticking off the whole Trumpian playbook. And the CDU mayor of Berlin recently told lies about 14 year old girls being forced into prostitution in Berlin’s public parks (the police rejected that claim).
Maybe I’m exaggerating, I hope I am, but I was “exaggerating” too in 2016…
Jonathan 09.20.23 at 3:27 am
Speaking of destroying liberal democracy and/or the failure of Liberalism, plus actively promoting regime change too (Deneen) the prospect of this project gaining power in 2025 is darkly disturbing. It has the combined resources of at least 72 deep pocket right wing propaganda outfits backing it.
http://www.project2025.org
When fascism comes to Amerika —-
stostosto 09.20.23 at 8:45 am
Doesn’t that tracker significantly overcount multiyear commitments? First, by lumping them with and thus comparing them to short term commitments which may in some countries be renewed and extended on a regular basis rather than having to have them be part of longer-term packages. Second, and especially, when comparing countries’ contributions relative to their GDP, surely multiyear-commitments ought to be divided by a corresponding multiyear GDP.
(Btw, hilarious with that Bradbury guy! Well played by him! :-D)
John Q 09.20.23 at 10:39 am
Stostosto On the first point, I think it’s reasonable to add in the renewals and extensions when and if they occur. On the second, if we set (say) a five-year horizon and compared total commitments to 5 years GDP, there would be no relative change.
Given that we are interested in US-EU comparisons, I’d be making adjustments in the opposite direction. There’s a big risk that the US won’t deliver even on short-term commitments – Congress can’t manage to pass their own military budget or fill senior command positions, after all. US could be sending aid to Russia by 2025.
stostosto 09.20.23 at 5:24 pm
“On the second, if we set (say) a five-year horizon and compared total commitments to 5 years GDP, there would be no relative change.”
Well, if you count a year’s expenditure as a share of that year’s GDP, there is a relative change.
I feel the risk that the EU won’t deliver on commitments made is unfortunately at least as big as that of the US failing to renew its support. In fact, I trust the US to continue to come through. Maybe just me.
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