Less than four months from now, voters across Europe will head to the polls to choose their representatives in the European Parliament. Amidst the financial crisis and falling public trust in political institutions, there is an expectation in Brussels, Paris and Berlin that the elections will deliver record success for parties that subscribe to right-wing extremist or Eurosceptic beliefs, and which are often crudely lumped together under the far-right umbrella. Much of this concern has been driven by the latest polls, which suggest that the “usual suspects” will continue their march from the margins to the mainstream.
In France, Marine Le Pen’s Front National looks on course to treble its level of support in 2009, possibly finishing first with over 20 per cent of the vote. In the Netherlands, Geert Wilders’ radical right Party for Freedom may also finish in the top spot, while in Austria the Freedom Party will also take over 20 per cent. Yet Greece and Hungary elicit most concern. In the latter, support for the anti-Roma and anti-Semitic Jobbik is holding steady at around 14 per cent, while Golden Dawn is likely to attract at least 9 per cent, introducing the real prospect of neo-Nazi MEPs sitting in Brussels. Even if the neo-Nazi party is forcibly disbanded, they have pledged to form a new party in time for the elections (the imaginatively titled “National Dawn”).
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