Adam Pankratz: AfD’s rise a sign that European leaders have failed their citizens

Members and supporters of the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party react after the announcement of the first exit poll results on public television at the AfD's election party following Saxony-Anhalt's state elections in Magdeburg, Germany, on Sunday. Photo by Ronny HARTMANN/AFP via Getty Images

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Over the weekend, a thunderbolt reverberated through German politics as the right-wing, anti-immigration Alternative for Germany (AfD) party took home a thumping victory in the state of Saxony-Anhalt, receiving 43.8 per cent of the vote. Its next-closest rival, the centrist Christian Democratic Union (CDU), came in a distant second at 17.2 per cent. Notable were the vote differences from 2021: the AfD’s share went up 23 points, while the CDU lost nearly 20 points.

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However, due to Germany’s system of proportional representation, the AfD does not have an absolute majority in the state legislature and will need the support of another party — likely the socially conservative but economically left-leaning Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance, which received 5.3 per cent — if it is to govern.

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Regardless of whether AfD successfully forms a government, it has upended Germany politics and sent waves of panic flooding through the mainstream parties. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz of the CDU has explicitly ruled out any co-operation with the AfD in Saxony-Anhalt and will work to cobble together a shaky alliance of parties to keep it from power.

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The panic has spread well beyond Germany, with other European leaders voicing their concerns about the result. French Finance Minister Roland Lescure said the world must “resist” the “populist wave” sweeping the globe. Independent journalist Tilo Jung went further, asking at an AfD press conference if it saw any parallels between its success over the weekend and 1932, when the then-state of Anhalt elected the first Nazi state president.

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That the AfD says untasteful things and has used language uncomfortably close to the rhetoric of Nazi Germany is well documented. However, lost in the insults and panic that surround the AfD is any recognition of why it might be popular and why people are voting for it.

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It is both intellectually lazy and dishonest to simply believe that suddenly half of Saxony-Anhalt has found a rekindled love of the Nazis, rather than consider that perhaps voters are fed up with current governments that have not lived up to their promises. These same voters are looking to anyone who might offer something different. In this, the AfD has similarities with U.S. President Donald Trump, whose popularity some still refuse to try to understand.

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One of the lightning rods for the AfD’s rise has been immigration. In 2015, in response to the Syrian refugee crisis, then-chancellor Angela Merkel famously said, “Wir schaffen das” (“We can do it”). What Germany could apparently do was take in 1.2 million migrants from countries like Syria. Even by 2020, it was clear that there were huge problems associated with this move as many immigrants remained poorly integrated and unemployed.