Far-right parties in Europe tend to rise—and fall

IMAGINE THE dinner party from hell and it would look a lot like the one politicians from Forum for Democracy (FVD), a Dutch far-right party, held in November. It began with a row over the backing music, with guests torn between classical music or Ava Max’s “Kings & Queens”, a trashy dance hit. Over lobster and wine, allegations of anti-Semitism among the party’s youth ranks were dismissed by its leader, Thierry Baudet. Guests were asked how many people they would let die for the sake of freedom (“three million” was Mr Baudet’s offer). Later, the FVD’S leader suggested that covid-19 was the work of George Soros. In the days that followed, as accounts of the dinner surfaced, politicians from the party lined up to quit. It was a spectacular collapse after a remarkable rise. Founded only in 2016, FVD was feted as the future of the far right in the EU, briefly topping opinion polls in 2019. Its piano-playing, Hegel-quoting leader was breathlessly profiled in the press. Now it goes into a general election in March hoping for a few seats at best.

A clown ceiling exists in EU politics, which has kept Eurosceptic parties such as FVD from gaining too much power. Such parties tend to grow quickly before collapsing, often due to their own risible ineptitude. The pattern repeats itself across Europe: a rapid ascent, a noisy thud against the ceiling and a swift retreat. In Germany, Alternative for Germany (AfD) emerged in 2013. By the 2017 election, AfD was the biggest opposition party in parliament. Since then, it has been marred by far-right extremism and infighting, both metaphorical and physical. (During one row, a senior AfD politician gave a colleague a “friendly bop to the sides”, which ruptured his spleen.) Once known as the “professor party” because of the boffins in its ranks, it is now associated with thugs. In Europe, those who are most willing to lead upstart movements are often the least suited for the long-term task.