Harbinger in the East: What AfD’s Victory Means for Germany

Björn Höcke (L), lead candidate of the right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) in Thuringia, and Mario Voigt, lead candidate of the German Christian Democrats (CDU), wait to speak in an interview in Erfurt, Germany, on Sept. 1, 2024. Jens Schlueter/Getty Images

News Analysis

The populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) has made an unprecedented breakthrough in state elections, emerging as the dominant political force in eastern Germany and a harbinger for change in the country.

Many news reports and politicians worldwide have described AfD’s win as the first time a far-right party has secured a state election in Germany since the Nazi era.

But how accurate is this portrayal? And is there anything to AfD’s claims that their victory is a symptom of the political mainstream’s chronic neglect of the common worker’s concerns, especially regarding immigration? What does it mean for the future of German politics?

Analysts say the AfD’s unprecedented success and growing influence are reshaping Germany’s political future. They argue that the results have dismantled Germany’s political mainstream, opening the door for new politics to gain influence, including a new left-conservative, anti-establishment, anti-immigration party.

However, some have questioned how far the current ruling coalition might go in employing repressive and censorial tactics to maintain its grip on power.

Powerful Negotiating Position

On Sept. 1, the party emerged as the dominant political force in recent state elections in eastern Germany, securing nearly 33 percent of the vote in Thuringia and almost 31 percent in Saxony.

Björn Höcke, leader of the AfD in Thuringia, hailed the election outcome as a “historic victory,” framing it as a clear message to Berlin’s political elite. He credited the party’s success to a unified effort, declaring that the AfD is now positioned to influence national debates in a way that would have been unimaginable just a few years ago.

Höcke, a father of four and former teacher, wrote on Facebook: “All together we achieved this historic election victory. We are not only sending a clear message to the political Berlin, but also to the party and its environment: Together we are strong!”

The top candidate of the AfD (Alternative for Germany) party for regional elections in Thuringia Björn Höcke attends a TV debate in Erfurt, eastern Germany, on Sept. 1, 2024. Ronny Hartmann/AFP via Getty Images

Richard Schenk, research fellow at the think tank MCC Brussels, told The Epoch Times that the AfD victory will significantly affect federal politics.

He described Eastern Germany as the “avant-garde” of German political trends, where changes often manifest first.

Schenk said that the AfD’s win puts them in a “very powerful negotiating position.”

“Now they have over one-third of the seats, which means that the Constitution cannot be changed without their approval. This is an important milestone,” he said.

People take part in a protest rally of the German party "Alternative fuer Deutschland" (AfD, "Alternative for Germany") in Berlin on Nov. 7, 2015. Michael Sohn/AP Photo

Schenk said that while immigration control is largely under federal jurisdiction, local governments and police can still influence migration through measures such as targeted controls and reduced assistance to asylum seekers.

“He said that he wants to enact smaller measures that could drive immigrants out of Thuringia, for example, through police controls that are targeting them,” Schenk said.

The AfD now controls key areas such as education, culture, and universities and could potentially withdraw funding from public broadcasters.

“He could also use his votes in the Federal Council to push for tougher migration policies,” Schenk added.

As AfD continues to make waves, Höcke remains a controversial figure operating under Germany’s strict speech laws and penal code, which prohibits publicly denying the Holocaust and disseminating Nazi propaganda, both offline and online.

‘He’s Pushing the Boundaries’

Höcke was previously convicted for using Nazi-era slogans, such as “Everything for Germany!” He denied the charges, claiming that he didn’t know the phrase’s origins.

“He’s pushing the boundaries as far as he can,” said Schenk, noting that Höcke aims to present himself as someone who tests the system.

Schenk pointed out that the AfD, originally a protest movement, has evolved, with 70 percent of Thuringia voters now supporting its policies.

He said that according to exit polls, the AfD has the highest ratings in migration among all parties but also in fields such as education and the economy, with voters now increasingly seeing them as a mainstream party.

“This is [a] very new phenomenon,” Schenk said.

He also said that growing discontent with the mainstream left-wing Social Democratic Party of Germany, which voters feel has neglected the working class in favor of minority interests, has now made it “irrelevant among workers.”

“Industrial production in general has never recovered from COVID,” he said, noting that there is great economic pressure on the middle class.

Far Right

The AfD has been labeled as right-wing extremist by domestic intelligence agencies in some German states.

Domestic security services have treated the main AfD as a potentially extremist party since 2021, granting security services the right to keep it under surveillance. However, the party denies that it is extremist.

In both Saxony and Thuringia, the regional branches of the AfD are considered even more right-wing than the main party. Notably, its Young Alternative Thuringia was classified as “right-wing extremist” in March.

Germany’s Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution stated that the AfD and its representatives’ statements “often reflect an ethno-cultural concept of the nation, which contradicts the broad understanding of the nation enshrined in Germany’s constitution, the Basic Law.”

It noted that not all party members support the extremist tendencies within the party.

Policies

A closer look at the party’s policies reveals a complex picture.

Their platform includes not only anti-immigration stances but also opposition to the Ukraine war, skepticism about climate change policies, and critiques of EU integration.

Their politicians were labeled “far-right” for appearing at anti-lockdown rallies during the pandemic when the country implemented strict COVID-19 measures, including a nationwide lockdown for the unvaccinated at one point.

Protesters from the business and culture sectors demand an end to lockdown measures in Munich on March 7, 2021. Andreas Gebert/Getty Images

On the European Union, the party’s 2017 manifesto maintained that “behind the scenes, a small and powerful elite within the political parties secretly controls, and is responsible for the misguided development of past decades.”

AfD leaders have called for strict border controls and a reduction in asylum seekers. The party has also pushed for preserving what it sees as traditional German culture and says that “Islam does not belong to Germany.”

Part of the AfD’s rise can be attributed to Germany’s handling of the 2015 migrant crisis, when former Chancellor Angela Merkel allowed more than a million asylum seekers to enter the country, which sparked backlash among many citizens.

Anger and growing skepticism toward immigrants have intensified, particularly in response to recent high-profile stabbings. According to official crime statistics, 34.4 percent of criminal suspects in 2023 were non-German citizens—a 13.5 percent increase from the previous year, compared with a 1 percent rise among German citizens. Non-German citizens make up 15 percent of the population.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz

Widespread frustration with Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s liberal-left coalition, which includes the Greens and FDP, has grown as many Germans believe that the AfD addresses issues more effectively than the established parties.

These parties are often seen as prioritizing ideological positions over rational solutions, reflecting a deepening divide between eastern and western Germany.

However, in response to the AfD becoming the strongest party in a federal state for the first time, Scholz urged other parties to block the AfD from governing.

“All democratic parties are now called upon to form stable governments without right-wing extremists,” he said, calling the results “bitter” and “worrying.”

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz attends the weekly cabinet meeting of the German government at the chancellery in Berlin on Jan. 25, 2023. Markus Schreiber/AP Photo

AfD co-leader Alice Weidel responded by saying that voters in Thuringia and Saxony had given her party a “very clear mandate to govern.”

She urged parties to ignore Mr. Scholz’s call to form government coalitions without the AfD, arguing that doing so would “undermine the democratic participation of large sections of the population.”

Political Realignment

Writer and researcher Thomas Fazi, in an essay for Unherd, said that the “AfD has destroyed Germany’s political mainstream.”

He said that the Sept. 1 vote confirmed migration as the “mother of all domestic policy problems” and that the inability to manage migration effectively has “eroded public trust in traditional parties.”

As a result, established parties have also allowed a new opponent—a left-wing nationalist, populist, Eurosceptic, and socially conservative party called the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance—to increase its voter share.

The party came in third in both Thuringia and Saxony by combining a new brand of left-leaning economics with conservative migration policies and opposition to the Ukraine war.

Fazi told The Epoch Times by email that he believed that as far as the ruling coalition is concerned, “they’ve gone too far down the rabbit hole to be able to come back from this.”

“So I expect them to maybe do some token concessions to the populists, for example on immigration, but essentially they'll stick to the status quo and resort to increasingly repressive and censorial measures to try to keep the plebs at bay,” he said.

Global Transatlantic Establishment

He said that he expects Germany to continue down an “escalatingly authoritarian path in the following months,” especially approaching next year’s general election.

“It’s important to realize that Germany’s ruling coalition exemplifies the kind of post-democratic and post-national politics that are becoming increasingly common across Europe, whereby political parties don’t derive their authority and legitimacy from popular consent but rather from the global transatlantic EU-US-NATO establishment,” Fazi said.

“They know that by sticking to the globalist agenda they will be compensated once their term in office is over, so maintaining domestic consensus becomes less and less important.”

He called Sahra Wagenknecht’s left-populist or left-conservative platform a “very welcome addition to Western politics” and one that has huge potential.

“Right-populism has clearly tapped into widespread anxiety about immigration and cultural upheavals. But that can only go so far in addressing the material concerns of people,” he said.

Migrants board a train after arriving at the border station between Hegyeshalom, Hungary, and Nickelsdorf, Austria, on Sept. 5, 2015. Christian Bruna/AP Photo

Fazi said he believes that a populist synthesis such as Wagenknecht’s holds significant potential because it redefines “security” and “conservatism” more comprehensively than most right-populist parties.

“Rather than focusing solely on public safety—such as security in the streets and reducing crime—by addressing uncontrolled immigration, Wagenknecht’s approach also emphasizes economic security through interventionist pro-labor and pro-welfare policies,” he said.

Left-populism also tackles national security by “challenging reckless militarism and nuclear brinkmanship,” which have become increasingly relevant in the context of NATO, Fazi said.

Reuters contributed to this report.