As Germany goes to vote, far-right AfD puts leftists & moderates on notice

A decade ago, Germany had a resilient economy, a fiscal discipline that was admired, and a premier seen as the leader of Europe. Today, Germany is the sick person of Europe with the longest ongoing recession since World War II, loss of confidence in its industry, and energy and migration crises that have torn the nation’s sociopolitical landscape.

As Germany votes in the snap election on Sunday , the turnaround over the past decade is on the ballot.

In the opinion polls, the incumbent Olaf Scholz’ Social Democratic Party (SDP) is placed third and is set for a rout, the conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) is leading and its leader, Friedrich Merz, is predicted in polls to be the front-runner for the chancellor’s job, but the biggest story is that of first runner-up Alternative for Germany (AfD) and its leader Alice Weidel.

In a nation that swore to never again let fascism take over after the horrors of the Nazi regime, the far-right, neo-Nazi AfD has put the leftist and centrist mainstream politicians on notice. The message is clear: if they don’t clean up Germany’s socio-economic mess, their time is up and, just like AfD came from being a nobody to number two in a decade, it can very well form the government too in later elections.

READ MORE: German Election Live Updates: Voting proceeds smoothly in high-stakes federal election

While there are national reasons and consequences for the rise of AfD, it is part of the broader rise of the far-right as well across the West where extremists are shaking up politics —and even running governments— in many countries. Just like the Soviet Union was once committed to the spread of communism or Iran is committed to the spread of Islamic Revolution, US President Donald Trump’s principal ally Elon Musk is currently running a juggernaut across West targeting leaders and governments opposed to far-right leaders — Trump and Musk have already endorsed AfD in a case of blatant election interference.

Far-right thrives on Germany’s many crises

The AfD is a reactionary as well as a revivalist movement. While its rise is rooted in the reaction to the migration and the accompanying economic and security crises that have plagued Germany for nearly a decade, it ideologically flirts with Nazism that Germans sought to discard long back.

Not all voters leaning towards AfD are necessarily neo-Nazis and the party’s political popularity can largely be read as a reaction to the migration, economic, and security crises that Germany is facing, says Prof. Ummu Salma Bava, the Chairperson and Jean Monnet Chair at the Centre for European Studies at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi.

Bava tells Firstpost, “Since 2015, around 1 million Syrians have arrived in Germany. Hundreds of thousands have also arrived from Iraq and Afghanistan. Since 2022, Ukrainian refugees have also been arriving. This has led to a situation where so much money is being spent on refugees’ welfare that there is disgruntlement among Germans. The surge in refugees’ arrival has coincided with continuously falling economic growth and rising attacks — many of them involving migrants. All of this has led to the far-right’s surge.”

Currently, there are around 3.4 million refugees in Germany — nearly 1 million arriving from Syria since 2015 when Russia intervened in the civil war in favour of Bashar al Assad and another 1 million from Ukraine since the Russian invasion in 2022. At a time when Germany’s electricity prices are the highest in the European Union (EU), the country ends up spending $31 billion on refugees’ welfare — more than half of the defence budget.

Consider these facts too: Germany’s economy has been in recession for three years, its cherished automobile industry is struggling in the face of competition from China, manufacturing is continuously declining, and labour costs are worsening.

Amid such conditions, the AfD like other far-right movements called for an insular state that prioritises Germans instead of refugees or aid to Ukraine and that message resonated with many people reeling under the economic crisis, says Bava.

These crises are of Germany’s own making over the past 15 years. Even though Angela Markel was long celebrated as the leader of Europe, her sympathetic policy towards migrants pouring through open borders, shutdown of nuclear power plants, and dependence on Russian energy imports have been main drivers of Germany’s migration and energy crises.

Can German ‘firewall’ halt AfD’s march?

All major mainstream German parties across the spectrum have said they would not form a coalition with the AfD. The arrangement is being called a ‘firewall’ to stop AfD from forming the government — or joining a coalition government.

However, the AfD is still polling second ahead of SDP and leftist parties but behind conservative CDU. As per the Politico’s poll of polls, 30 per cent Germans favour CDU, 30 per cent favour AfD, and 16 per cent SDP.

Bava tells Firstpost, “The CDU, SDP, Greens, and Liberals will likely prevent AfD from coming to power this time, but if they do not address the underlying issues driving the far-right’s surge, the migration and economic crises, they may not keep the party out of power in the coming years.”

The problem facing these parties is complex as they are not just facing AfD but also its vast international support base. US President Donald Trump, his principal ally Elon Musk, and deputy JD Vance have endorsed AfD and blasted German parties for shunning AfD. AfD is also being supported by Russia and China — AfD leader Weidel’s secret yearslong relationship with a senior Chinese diplomat has just been revealed. Whether German parties can withstand the combined push from Trump, Russia, and China remains to be seen.

Even as AfD focuses on economy, there’s no hiding its Nazism ties

Even though economic crises and a sense of misplaced priorities with the expenditure on refugees are major drivers of the surge of the far-right, there is a growing concern across Europe that AfD is normalising the Nazism of yesteryears, with many of its voters and supporters backing the movement — Musk did a Nazi salute at Trump’s inauguration and later told AfD supporters at a rally that they need to move beyond “past guilt”.

It was a reference to Germany’s Nazi past and the association of AfD’s leaders with the Nazi movement’s revival in Germany.

Musk said that there is “frankly too much of a focus on past guilt and we need to move beyond that” and that “children should not be guilty of the sins of their parents, let alone their parents, their great-grandparents” — AfD’s chancellor candidate Weidel’s grandfather was a prominent Nazi judge appointed by Adolf Hitler himself.

READ MORE: How Elon Musk is boosting far-right’s influence in Germany ahead of crucial elections

Maximilian Krah, AfD’s member in the European parliament, has said that a member of Nazi paramilitary organisation SS —which conducted the Holocaust— is “not automatically a criminal”. Siegbert Droese, another leading figure, has openly admired Hitler by posting photos from Hitler’s headquarters and driving in a car with a number plate associated with Hitler. Bjordn Hocke, who led the party to historic results in Thuringia state, has lamented that “Hitler is portrayed as absolute evil” and wondered why Nazi territorial expansion remains unacceptable. He has also called Holocaust memorials as “monuments of shame” and has called for a “180-degree turnaround in the politics of remembrance” of Holocaust.

Even though Weidel has pitched herself as a moderate face of the party —with her polished English, educated language, economist’s credentials, open-collared shirts, and pearl necklaces— she is onboard with the party’s extremist agenda and has had no effect in softening the party’s stand. Even as she is gay and is raising two children with her foreign-born wife, her party rejects gay marriage and gay parental rights.

How AfD fares in Germany will have an impact on the trajectory that Europe takes. After all, the parallels with the 1930s could not be starker — a raging Nazi movement in Germany, an expansionist force in the continent (Russia), and a leader (Trump) appeasing the invading force’s leader (Putin).