© REUTERS/Piroschka van de Wouw

Charismatic, young, and still remarkably popular at home―and abroad: Sebastian Kurz of the right-wing Austrian People’s Party (ÖVP) increasingly sees himself as a mediator between the Europe’s various right-wing movements. His aim of uniting the continent’s right-wing populists under one umbrella has placed Austria in the once-familiar role of axle between East and West.

Before 1989, Vienna was perched just beyond the fringes of the Iron Curtain, serving as a hub for dialogue between the Soviet Union and Western powers; now, it facilitates dialogue between right-wing extremists and the more moderate, traditionally center-right parties across Europe. The Austrian Chancellor has managed to garner respect from right-wing euroskeptic governments in Hungary and Italy and keep the doors of dialogue open to the European establishment in Berlin and Paris, allowing him to serve as a go-between.

At least that’s the image that Kurz is keen to present, repeatedly and with pride, especially since his country took over the rotating presidency of the Council of the European Union in July. The conservative US ambassador to Germany, Richard Grenell, recently dubbed Kurz the “rock star” of the European neocons―and rightly so.

Kurz, however, has taken neoconservatism in Austria a step further: after his party won the largest share in the country’s national elections last year, he promptly formed a coalition government with the far-right Freiheitliche Partei Österreichs (FPÖ) and its leader, Heinz-Christian Strache. The FPÖ secured key ministerial posts, including the foreign ministry, the labor and social affairs ministry, and the transport and interior ministry, where the new minister, Herbert Kickl, has taken a hard line on tightening security in the country. Kickl and the FPÖ are already pointing to their achievements, claiming to have bolstered the police, curbed illegal immigration, and stepped up deportations.

Kurz, meanwhile, has installed a member of his own ÖVP party in the influential finance ministry, and established himself as the face of the Austrian government. Ahead of last year’s vote, Kurz painted himself as the savior of the Abendland, or Christian West—as the man who closed the Balkan Route to migrants and effectively put an end to the 2015 refugee crisis. Now, he’s brought that mantle onto the European stage.

Anti-foreigner sentiments and slogans, once only uttered by the far-right, have now been adopted by Kurz and his government as part of an “Austria First” platform. Only extremely racist, anti-Semitic, or misogynist sentiments remain unpalatable―and they continue to appear on FPÖ platforms. That, in turn, makes Kurz appear as a moderate, center-right leader.

Kurz has also urged Brussels to show more understanding for Eastern European member states, repeatedly seeking sympathy for anti-immigration positions held by Hungary, Slovakia, Poland, and the Czech Republic―all of which reject German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s more liberal asylum policies and the EU’s refugee redistribution program.

The Anti-Merkel

The motto of Austria’s EU Council Presidency is “A Europe that protects,” a page from French President Emmanuel Macron’s book. But unlike Macron, Kurz doesn’t mean protection against unemployment or social inequality, but rather against illegal migration and for more security.

For the Bavarian Christian Social Union (CSU) and other critics of the German chancellor, Kurz is an obliging anti-Merkel, and they appear eager to deepen ties. The German health minister Jens Spahn, a member of Merkel’s own CDU party who is openly critical of her policies, paid a visit to the Vienna Opera Ball with his husband last February; a few months later, Kurz and members of his government hopped on a train to the Austrian city of Linz to meet with the Bavarian government.

So what do these alliances portend? Some observers beliebe he may be positioning himself as a candidate for the EU Commission presidency―possibly for the 2024 European elections, when Kurz will be just 37 years old. The first step would be to claim an important role within the European People’s Party. “The young guns are angling for the EPP leadership,” wrote influential Austrian journalist Thomas Mayer from the left-leaning daily Der Standard. Mayer noted that Kurz’s style of politics was a clear departure from the more traditional, post-war ideals and sense of responsibility that informed Chancellor Angela Merkel’s approach to human rights and refugee policies.

Indeed, a growing number of Austrian media have come to describe Kurz’s politics as a type of “alpine Orbanism,” in reference to the “illiberal democracy” championed by Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. These commenatires and analyses are always accompanied by a stark warning that even well-established democracies like Austria are at risk of back-sliding into semi-authoritarianism. The danger, they point out, stems not only from right-wing, nationalist parties like the FPÖ), but also from centrist parties that have adopted far-right platforms.

One of Kurz’s harshest critics is Matthias Strolz, the long-time leader of Austria’s neocon movement and erstwhile ally of the Austrian Chancellor. In a widely read interview with the Austria Press Agency (APA) in June 2018, Strolz wrote that the “hour of Merkel’s antagonists” had arrived and accused the Austrian chancellor of heading up an “axis of the unscrupulous.” In his stinging rebuke, Strolz called the Austrian chancellor a stooge of right-wing populists, Trump supporters, and Putin loyalists―a wolf in sheep’s clothing, a slick and shiny right-wing populist who rose to a position where he can destroy the European Union from within.

The Far-Right Legitimized

Under the leadership of Heinz-Christian Strache, the party’s chairman and the vice chancellor, the FPÖ has become one of the best-connected right-wing populist parties in Europe, with an alternative news platform―Unzensuriert.at, or uncensored, a media outlet linked to the FPÖ―and deep ties to Russia’s Vladimir Putin, which have grown deeper since the party entered government and gained more legitimacy.

The strategy has been tried and tested in the past: start as an opposition party; build a propaganda platform cleverly disguised as alternative news; take over power of the government and control of public broadcasters; attack independent, critical media outlets. Austria is a prime example of how well this works.

“We tried to take a communication deficit and turn it to an advantage,” the FPÖ’s former general secretary Herbert Kickl once said in an interview. Kickl, now the interior minister, is waging a campaign against critical media.

The extent to which Europe’s right-wing populists are linked was made evident at the 2016 “Defenders of Europe” conference in Linz, a gathering of far-right and anti-Semitic groups. Kickl attended, and leading members of the German right-wing scene were also on hand―including Jürgen Elsässer, editor-in-chief of Compact, a fast-growing nationalist, right-wing magazine in Germany.

Walter Asperl, director of Unzensuriert.at, serves as a member of an FPÖ parliamentary group and has been accused of inciting hatred against Muslims, refugees, and homosexuals.

“A Need For Good Dialogue”

Meanwhile, Russia’s Putin is buttressing right-wing populist, euroskeptic movements across Europe. His United Russia party inked a friendship treaty with the FPÖ in 2016, with Strache paying a personal visit to Moscow to sign. Putin’s much-publicized attendance at Austrian Foreign Minister Karin Kneissl’s private wedding this summer was a potent symbol of this new bond. Images of Kneissl, who was nominated by the FPÖ, curtseying to Putin were beamed around the world and sparked huge controversy. Kneissl argued it was merely a sign of respect for a foreign leader. But the traditional dance reflects the two cornerstones of the Austrian government’s foreign policy―legitimize the far-right and build bridges to Russia.

Kurz was guarded in his reaction to the curtsy controvery, but shortly thereafter, he traveled to St. Petersburg to join Vladimir Putin in opening an exhibition at the State Hermitage Museum―the fourth meeting between the two leaders this year. “There is a need for good dialogue, especially with neighbors with whom there are tensions,” Kurz said in a press conference.

In this way, Kurz assumes the role of a steady-handed pilot steering his crew through a bumpy patch―and in doing so, he racks up points with FPÖ voters well right of the middle. He’s already picked up center-right voters in the national vote with his combination of polite, non-aggressive politics and sweeping security policies. The suave far-right centrist is a role Kurz has now perfected.

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© REUTERS/ TT News Agency

Swedes woke up to an uncertain political situation on Monday, with no declared winners after a nail-biting election that brought the center-left and center-right political blocs to a deadlock, with neither able to form a majority government. Meanwhile, the far-right, anti-immigration Sweden Democrats declared themselves the “true winners” and kingmakers.

While the Sweden Democrats had hoped to become the second biggest or even the biggest party, they ended up well short of the 25 percent some polls had predicted. Still, there were jubilations among members when preliminary results showed them cementing their position as Sweden’s third party, advancing from just under 13 percent to just under 18 percent. They are clearly a rising force in Swedish politics.

With 28.4 percent of the vote, the Social Democrats fared better than some polls had predicted, though they still performed worse than they have done in over a century. And their coalition partner, the Greens, came dangerously close to falling below the four percent needed to enter parliament. However, Social Democrat leader and (potentially outgoing) prime minister Stefan Löfven refused to heed calls from the opposition to step down on election night.

All in all, just a tenth of a percent now separates the center-left and center-right blocs. While the center-left (the two government parties plus the Left Party) now has one parliamentary seat more than the center-right, the result may shift again on Wednesday after all the early votes and votes cast abroad have been counted and a final result is declared.

Immigration as a Key Issue?

As in other recent elections across Europe – from Italy to Germany – immigration was a key issue in Sweden, with opinion polls in the months running up to the vote showing it to be among the top three concerns for voters, along with healthcare and education. However, on the day of the vote Swedes’ priorities appear to have changed, as immigration dropped to eighth place according to exit polls. The Sweden Democrats, who according to the preliminary results gained 17.6 percent of the vote, were apparently able to capitalize on discontent around mass immigration: in 2015 alone, over 160,000 asylum seekers arrived in Sweden. The Scandinavian nation, with a population of 10 million, took in most migrants per capita of any European country. And in total numbers, only Germany took in more.

During the election campaign, immigration and integration dominated the political debate, and the Sweden Democrats linked those issues to everything ranging from healthcare and schools to crime and the welfare state. The party proposes that Sweden should, at least temporarily, halt the admission of quota refugees and stop granting asylum permits. They also want to offer incentives for repatriation and to limit immigrants’ access to welfare. They say that instead of taking more refugees in, Sweden should instead help those fleeing their home countries by offering assistance in or near the war-torn areas, for instance in the form of aid to organizations operating in refugee camps.

While other parties, too, campaigned on stricter immigration policies, many Swedes apparently felt the Sweden Democrats were more credible in this area. Efforts to win back voters by approaching or adopting the politics of populist parties like the Sweden Democrats are bound to fail, according to Thomas Sommerer, an associate professor in political science at Stockholm University. “When it comes to holding on to voters, tightening one’s migration policy is not a strategy that has worked for the Social Democrats nor for the main opposition party, the Moderates – no matter how hard they tried before the election,” he said.

Neo-Nazi Roots

The Sweden Democrat Party has been around for 30 years now. Among the party’s early founders and members were individuals who had previously been involved with neo-Nazi and racist groups. And as the election drew closer, Swedish media continued to expose current representatives for sharing racist content online, such as anti-Semitic memes and conspiracy theories.

The party’s history prevents the other seven parliamentary parties from considering them as a coalition partner—they made that clear before the election. However, with the center-left and center-right blocs winning around 40 percent of the vote each, Sweden will now need another minority government.

However, being ostracized will not keep the Sweden Democrats from wielding significant influence. Arguably, they also shaped the political debate and set the tone for the entire election, making migration more salient than it otherwise would be. Prime Minister Löfven has called them “a neo-Fascist single-issue party which respects neither people’s differences nor Sweden’s democratic institutions.”

The fact that the Sweden Democrats have the support of 17.6 percent of the Swedes is a sign of the divide between the political class and the wider population, many of whom have abandoned old parties. By casting their vote for the Sweden Democrats, these people expressed that they do want their policies to shape Swedish society.

For the Social Democrats, who have dominated Swedish politics since the 1930s and formed a coalition with the Green Party in 2014, the 2018 general election represents the greatest loss in a century. This downward trend is not unique to the Swedish Social Democrats of course, but has also afflicted their sister parties across the West, as Sommerer pointed out.

”In Sweden, as in Germany, the major political players on the left and right have moved to the political center over the past couple of decades and so, in reality, voters in both countries have been left with few genuine political alternatives,” Sommerer said. “Those who do not appreciate the general shift towards the center—and in Sweden both the Social Democrats and the main opposition, the conservative Moderate Party, have made this shift—now tend to go for smaller parties with clearer ideologies.”

Indeed, smaller parties have gained from this trend, and a record 41 percent of Swedes switched party allegiances in this election, according to exit polls on Sunday. Sweden’s Left Party rose from 5.7 percent in the 2014 election to 7.9 percent in this year’s vote. Other small parties experienced a boost in the final stages of the campaign. The Christian Democrats, for instance, long looked unlikely to make the four-percent electoral threshold but in the end got 6.4 percent of the vote.

Making Inroads

The Sweden Democrats also made significant inroads in traditional Social Democrat strongholds like the northernmost regions of Sweden and in some former industrial towns. A poll in June showed that a quarter of Swedish Trade Union Confederation members planned to vote for the Sweden Democrats. “As the previously dominating parties shrink—in Germany, Sweden and elsewhere—political majorities are becoming a thing of the past,” said Sommerer. “So one is left with two alternatives. One is to form broader coalitions with a larger number of parties—but that also becomes complicated when some alliances are being ruled out in advance. In Sweden, collaboration with the Sweden Democrats was ruled out by the other parties; in Germany the parallel taboo is to collaborate with the Alternative für Deutschland.”

“The other alternative is to collaborate across the political blocs and one change we’re seeing in Germany is that the Green Party is abandoning its old stance of working exclusively with leftist parties. There, the pragmatic sections of the party have become more dominant in recent years and have started collaborating with conservatives. It remains to be seen if the Swedish Greens will follow that lead. I wouldn’t be surprised if some parties are forced to become more flexible here,” said Sommerer.

The day after the election, the bargaining over political power has begun and looks set to continue for some time. The Social Democrats’ group leader Anders Ygeman told Swedish media on Monday that it “could take months” before Sweden has a new government.

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