A strong showing by anti-immigrant and anti-EU parties in the recent elections for the European Parliament has astonished many. While French Socialist Prime Minister, Manuel Valls called it “an earthquake,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel called the vote surge by populists and rightists “remarkable, and also regrettable.” This result could translate into further visa restrictions for the EU and non-EU students, workers and families.
In the election held on May 22-25 in 28 member states of the EU, anti-immigration and anti-EU parties won 140 of the 751 seats at the European Parliament. Most notable was its ubiquitous surge in important member states.
In the United Kingdom, the right-wing UK Independence Party (UKIP), led by Nigel Farage, won 24 of the UK’s 73 seats, bettering both the Conservatives (19 seats) and Labour (20 seats). In France, the anti-immigrant far right party, Front National, has emerged as the largest party with 24 seats.
Likewise in Denmark, anti-immigrant Danish People’s Party (DF) secured 26.7% of the votes. Anti-Europe and anti-immigrant parties also made gains in Hungary, Germany, Austria and the Netherlands. In Sweden, the far-right Sweden democrats won 7 percent support compared to 3.3 percent in 2009. However, especially troubling were the gains made by Greece based Golden Dawn, a neo-Nazi party, which secured 10% of the vote.
This anger against immigration policies was on show during the previous European Parliament election as well. In 2009 far-right groups and fringe parties gained large support in Netherlands, Austria, Hungary, Denmark, Slovakia and Finland.
On February 9 this year, when Switzerland, a non-European Union (EU) member, voted in referendum to impose quotas on immigrants, far-right anti-immigrant parties in Europe were encouraged. In Netherlands’ Geert Wilders, head of the anti-immigrant Dutch Freedom Party had tweeted, “What the Swiss can do, we can do too: Cut immigration and leave the EU.”
Immigration reform has been at the center of political debate in Europe. In the UK, according the Office for National Statistics, there was a rise of more than 30% in net migration to Britain in the year to September 2013. Most migrants’ into UK came from recession-hit EU countries. Net migration to Britain from the EU has doubled in the past year and is at the highest level since 1964.
Given the stricter visa regimes, the number of non-EU migrants has declined in the same time period. The number of students coming in for higher education was down by 34%. South Asian student too have increasingly found it difficult to get a visa to the UK: the number of overseas students from India has fallen by 21%, and from Pakistan by 55%.
However, not all political analysts are too alarmed. Dough Sauders of The Globe and the Mail writes, ‘these parties (anti-immigrant and anti-EU) will play not part in the governing of Europe, as no mainstream parties will work with them.’
Indeed, even with 140 seats anti-immigrant parties do not have the numbers to control the European government; the conservative caucus, EPP, still remains the largest group with 214 seats, followed by the moderate centre-left with 188 seats; liberals with 64; and Greens with 52.
Similarly, Cas Mudde, author of Populist Radical Right Parties in Europe, argues “that thesis of a new radical right has been used at least three times since the early 1980s and, whether we like it or not, the new new radical right is actually quite old.”
Regardless, the continuing trend of vote surge of anti-immigrant parties throughout Europe is deeply troubling. The vote against immigration is a vote against the status quo. It questions Europe’s attempts to balance diversity, social welfare, investment, and identity.
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