Budapest Post

Cum Deo pro Patria et Libertate
Budapest, Europe and world news

Orbán, Le Pen... voters are sending a chilling message to Europe’s beleaguered centre

Orbán, Le Pen... voters are sending a chilling message to Europe’s beleaguered centre

Emmanuel Macron faces the fight of his political life as the presidential election opens today. His fate has lessons for parties continent-wide
Today’s Brexit Conservatives will hate the comparison, but there are inconvenient parallels between their domestic agenda and Hungary’s newly elected, self-confessed apostle of democratic illiberalism, Viktor Orbán, French uber-nationalist and anti-immigrant Marine Le Pen and Poland’s murky Law and Justice party. All trumpet a boastful nationalism and disregard international law, all aim to create a hostile climate for immigrants, all believe the electoral system should be manipulated for their advantage, all distrust a pluralist media, all want to limit dissent and expand summary policing powers, all incline to traditional views about sexuality and the family and, to varying degrees, all are climate change deniers.

All habitually dissimulate and even lie; criticism is fake news. The Johnson government’s police, nationality and borders and election bills come from these same rightwing, anti-Enlightenment, illiberal roots, as does its assault on public service broadcasting and, of course, the big beast of them all, Brexit. Paradoxically, Brexit Toryism is very European – if Europe at its worst.

Yet for the mainstream centre and liberal left the threat is that electorates, far from caring about this retreat from openness and democracy into nationalist, anti-democratic closure, happily collude with it, even vote for it. Orbán emphatically won two-thirds of the vote in Hungary last Sunday as war raged in Ukraine, even if aided and abetted by a rigged media and voting system. Similarly, French voters, having briefly rallied to President Emmanuel Macron as war leader, are now inclining to Le Pen, who is expected to run him a close second in the first round of the presidential election today. In the final runoff on 24 April, the pollsters are saying the result is too close to call – even if Macron is still considered to be just ahead.

What’s going on? One factor is the impact of globalisation on advanced economies’ economic and social structures, captured by the famous “elephant curve” depicting how globalisation has influenced global income distribution over the decades. The curve in the middle is the relative improvement of incomes in many medium-income countries, particularly of their middle class, who have been helped as their countries catch up with richer neighbours. The elephant’s long, drooping tail is the continuing disadvantage faced by the world’s poor, the downward sloping of the trunk is what has happened to the incomes of the mass of workers in industrialised countries, while the last triumphant upward curve of the U-shaped trunk describes the ever lusher incomes of the elite – globalisation’s unchallenged beneficiaries. When ordinary French voters, at the wrong end of this global phenomenon, accuse Macron of being the president of the rich, this is what they mean.

But the political ramifications are not playing out traditionally, as the French elections show. Voters may want to vent their anger on the unfairness, but rather than look to a fragmented left for reform and an affirmation of social solidarities, they are tempted by explanations that blame foreigners’ incursions into their national space and many believe that illiberal, quasi-racist patriotism offers the best response. Le Pen is a brilliant exponent. France knows her time-honoured hostility to immigrants and especially Muslims, but criss-crossing France on her presidential campaign she has emphasised how her “patriotic” economic policies favouring small business and local producers will mean independence from foreigners, more jobs and lower prices. She has abandoned talking about France leaving the EU – the self-defeating nature of Brexit is obvious even to her – which has helped her court mainstream voters, aided by having an even more extravagant anti-immigrant candidate, Éric Zemmour, on her right adding to her apparent new reasonableness.

But she remains toxic. She is an “organicist”, seeing French society as “a living being threatened by foreign bodies”, as Ivanne Trippenbach and Franck Johannès wrote in Le Monde last week. Her project is to regenerate organic French society by privileging pure French nationals. This will involve a constitutional coup – rewriting the constitution with its roots in the 1789 revolution, suspending much EU law and withdrawing from the European convention on human rights. “Politics,” she says, “comes before law.” Moreover, her economic programme is unworkable. Her election would split France, stop its economic resurgence in its tracks, unleash racist demons and transfix the EU.

France’s left, like Britain’s, has had to perform a difficult straddling act. It needed to keep its lines open to the disconcerted centre with its worries about crime and immigration, while challenging capitalism’s worst proclivities, as well as affirm its commitment to strong social support and above all assert its belief in the best of Enlightenment values. It has failed calamitously, in part because of its own endemic divisions and in part because Macron made a better pitch to the centre. But Macron is discovering, as Tony Blair did in Britain, that you cannot govern just as a centrist. Durable governing coalitions are of the centre and centre-left or centre and centre-right, otherwise there is no organising governing political philosophy or sufficient electoral ballast. Macron is in difficulty because he has jettisoned too much of the left. He has a fortnight to reclaim that ground and build a durable coalition.

Yet Ukraine’s incredible stand against Vladimir Putin’s criminal war – and President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s eloquent appeals to the best of what Europe and the west must stand for – is a game-changer. It has not only relegitimised the EU and brought it together – it is a forceful call to all western electorates about where illiberalism, uber-nationalism and suppression lead.

Blaming foreigners, appealing to a mystic conception of your country and trying to transmute you and your party into unchallenged masters of the state lead to what is happening in Ukraine. The centre and centre-left – in Britain, in France, indeed everywhere in Europe – have to make that case, along with feasible if aggressive programmes that make capitalism work for the common good. It is time to reassert the best of ourselves and it falls to Macron over the next fortnight to find the words, energy, his moderate left-of-centre roots and the elan to do just that. It is a common European fight. Epic times.
AI Disclaimer: An advanced artificial intelligence (AI) system generated the content of this page on its own. This innovative technology conducts extensive research from a variety of reliable sources, performs rigorous fact-checking and verification, cleans up and balances biased or manipulated content, and presents a minimal factual summary that is just enough yet essential for you to function as an informed and educated citizen. Please keep in mind, however, that this system is an evolving technology, and as a result, the article may contain accidental inaccuracies or errors. We urge you to help us improve our site by reporting any inaccuracies you find using the "Contact Us" link at the bottom of this page. Your helpful feedback helps us improve our system and deliver more precise content. When you find an article of interest here, please look for the full and extensive coverage of this topic in traditional news sources, as they are written by professional journalists that we try to support, not replace. We appreciate your understanding and assistance.
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
IMF Upgrades Global Growth Forecast as Weaker Dollar Supports Outlook
House Republicans Move to Defund OECD Over Global Tax Dispute
France Opens Criminal Investigation into X Over Algorithm Manipulation Allegations
Trump Steamrolls EU in Landmark Trade Win: US–EU Trade Deal Imposes 15% Tariff on European Imports
ChatGPT CEO Sam Altman says people share personal info with ChatGPT but don’t know chats can be used as court evidence in legal cases.
Intel Reports Revenue Beats but Sees 81% Rise in Losses
Politics is a good business: Barack Obama’s Reported Net Worth Growth, 1990–2025
UN's Top Court Declares Environmental Protection a Legal Obligation Under International Law
"Crazy Thing": OpenAI's Sam Altman Warns Of AI Voice Fraud Crisis In Banking
The Podcaster Who Accidentally Revealed He Earns Over $10 Million a Year
UK Government Considers Dropping Demand for Apple Encryption Backdoor
Japanese Man Discovers Family Connection Through DNA Testing After Decades of Separation
Russia Signals Openness to Ukraine Peace Talks Amid Escalating Drone Warfare
Switzerland Implements Ban on Mammography Screening
Pogacar Extends Dominance with Stage Fifteen Triumph at Tour de France
President Trump Diagnosed with Chronic Venous Insufficiency After Leg Swelling
CEO Resigns Amid Controversy Over Relationship with HR Executive
NVIDIA Achieves $4 Trillion Valuation Amid AI Demand
Tulsi Gabbard Unveils Evidence Alleging Political Manipulation of Intelligence During Trump Administration
Centrist Criticism of von der Leyen Resurfaces as she Survives EU Confidence Vote
Trump Announces Coca-Cola to Shift to Cane Sugar in U.S. Production
FIFA Pressured to Rethink World Cup Calendar Due to Climate Change
Zelensky Reshuffles Cabinet to Win Support at Home and in Washington
"Can You Hit Moscow?" Trump Asked Zelensky To Make Putin "Feel The Pain"
Church of England Removes 1991 Sexuality Guidelines from Clergy Selection
Superman Franchise Achieves Success with Latest Release
Hungary's Viktor Orban Rejects Agreements on Illegal Migration
Air India Pilot’s Mental Health Records Under Scrutiny
Jamie Dimon Warns Europe Is Losing Global Competitiveness and Flags Market Complacency
Moonshot AI Unveils Kimi K2: A New Open-Source AI Model
Martha Wells Says Humanity Still Far from True Artificial Intelligence
Nvidia Becomes World’s First Four‑Trillion‑Dollar Company Amid AI Boom
EU Delays Retaliatory Tariffs Amid New U.S. Threats on Imports
Trump Proposes Supplying Arms to Ukraine Through NATO Allies
US Opens First Rare Earth Mine in Over 70 Years in Wyoming
Bitcoin Reaches New Milestone of $116,000
Severe Heatwave Claims 2,300 Lives Across Europe
Declining Beer Consumption Signals Cultural Shift in Germany
Emails Leaked: How Passenger Luggage Became a Side Income for Airport Workers
Polish MEP: “Dear Leftists - China is laughing at you, Russia is laughing, India is laughing”
Western Europe Records Hottest June on Record
BRICS Expands Membership with Indonesia and Ten New Partner Countries
Elon Musk Founds a Party Following a Poll on X: "You Wanted It – You Got It!"
China’s Central Bank Consults European Peers on Low-Rate Strategies
France Requests Airlines to Cut Flights at Paris Airports Amid Planned Air Traffic Controller Strike
Poland Implements Border Checks Amid Growing Migration Tensions
Emirates Airline Expands Market Share with New $20 Million Campaign
Amazon Reaches Milestone with Deployment of One Millionth Robot
Yulia Putintseva Calls for Spectator Ejection at Wimbledon Over Safety Concerns
House Oversight Committee Subpoenas Former Jill Biden Aide Amid Investigation into Alleged Concealment of President Biden's Cognitive Health
×