February 23, 2004
Greens on the rise
Greens from across Europe have gathered in Rome to form a pan-European party. And according to Stratfor’s analysis, the future of the E.U. will be closely tied to such “narrow-issue parties” as the Greens because they will be able to transcend national borders.
Pan-European support for the Greens will not occur overnight. Party representation in European governments has been on the decline, and Green parties do not yet have a solid foothold in the 10 Central and Eastern European countries set to join the European Union in May. The new member countries -- mostly poor, former communist states -- place environmental issues low on their list of priorities. As a result, the Green Party will not pick up many seats in the European Parliament from new-member countries in the June elections.So I want Scott’s feedback. How do Germans generally feel about the Green party? What role does it play there? My other question is what are the chances of another narrow-issue party gaining influence if their issue is opposition to immigration – specifically Muslim immigration? I’m thinking here of someone like La Pen. I know people like to downplay his success as being a sort of aberration but it seems like the 17 percent of the vote he received is comparable to the Greens. Is there an anti-immigrant sentiment bubbling below the surface in other European countries? Could it become an issues in the E.U.?
As an expanded European Union matures, however, the Greens will be able to expand their power base, focusing first on the more advanced of the new members, such as Hungary, Slovenia and Cyprus. For example, they received a rather large boost in Latvia, where Indulis Emsis, a Green Party lawmaker, was named prime minister Feb. 20. This is the first Green Party member to become prime minister in any European country, but it certainly will not be the last. The Greens are on the rise.
Whoa. All of your questions amount to 2 dissertations, and I could talk forever about this. Still, I don't really know nearly as much about European Green parties as I'd like. You can learn more here.
http://www.europeangreens.org/news.html
I'm not sure how much you already know about the German Greens. Basically, they're the oldest and (as far as I know) most influential Green Party, because they are part of the governing coalition here. They garner a lot of support among educated boho types, students, and activists--as a student I'm constantly in contact with Green Party voters. However, the Greens have a certain reputation for impracticality among the larger population and their success is hampered by the fact (or perception) that they don't represent the interests of any particular class or large swath of the population, but on the contrary a certain set of ideas (an "ideological" party rather than a "Volkspartei"). Their ideology includes democratic party politics and democratic reforms, pacifism (or peace-oriented politics) and denuclearisation.
The Social Democrats (the majority governing party) are not as enthusiastic about abandoning nuclear power, but for the time being this difference is not beyond the realm of compromise. Denuclearisation was a major factor in the rise of the Greens in the 70s-80s (at that time the party included many conservatives as well) but as Chernobyl fades into memory the issue doesn't resonate like it used to.
The outstanding Green leader today is Joschka Fischer--a hero to many of us on the "responsible" Left. Under his leadership, the Greens joined the governing coalition back in 98. Back before his crusade against "Islamofascism", Paul Berman wrote a big article on Fischer's background, the history of the Greens, and the debate surrounding Kosovo.
http://www.tnr.com/082701/berman_partone082701.html
Suffice it to say that Fischer is the subject of a lot of criticism from the German Greens, as well as from foreign Green parties who are nowhere close to gaining power and thus (IMHO) tend to be more (overly) dogmatic when it comes to "principles".
I think, as a whole, it's easier for the Green Party to unite on a European front because 1) compared to others, the Greens are more concerned about principles than specific interests 2) most Green parties aren't represented in government and thus have the luxury of "principled" politics 3) the Greens are for a federalistic European government and (as far as I know) don't have any nationalistic tendencies 4) it's is pretty obvious that globalization can only be tamed if national parties work in concert and in solidarity with one another. Working together as a block just makes sense for the Greens. However, given the tension between power and principle, conflicts between the German government and the Green EU faction will continue to arise and undermine Green solidarity.
As for the anti-immigration parties.... I don't really know. It seems unlikely that they would band together (like the Greens) for EU parlament elections because despite having some common interests, these parties tend to be rather nationalistic and thus look out for their own interests. In any case, I do think we are a long way off from the emergence of a unified European party focused on stopping immigration, though I wouldn't rule out the idea. But it would require a generalized idea of "European" culture that ought to be defended against the enemy (Islam)--and it isn't easy to come up with consensus on something like that.
One reason for this is that different parties in different countries have different reasons for being anti-immigration, which limits the potential for cooperation and solidarity. For example, the Dutch Pim Fortyn party (see this article)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/1857918.stm
is/was much more culturally liberal than the Austrian Freedom party (led by Haider--note that it has already a lot of influence)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/464260.stm
The same thing goes for the movements in France and Denmark. In Germany, nothing has really taken off (yet)--see this article
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/2248961.stm
Clearly, the hysterical reaction to Le Pen in France shows that the vast majority of people associate such parties with fascism. Still, I think the conflict lines for a culture war between Muslim immigrants and more conventional Europeans are there, but it's hard to say which side will be on the "left" and which side on the "right".
One more thing---on Europe and Islam. The issue to watch in the coming months will be the debate on Turkey's inclusion into the EU. The German Christian Democrats are beginning to speak out against it--we'll see what position they ultimately decide to take. In France, the culture war debate is likely to be ferocious.
I'm inclined to believe that the larger cultural exchange that would result from including Turkey in the EU (and hence the greater EU influence in the Islamic world) is worth the economic and immigration burdens that might be imposed upon Europe. But then I haven't looked at the issue closely.