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Rightwing populists are reportedly adopting a new strategy to woo European voters: the promise of higher welfare benefits.
This pro-welfare stance is paying off. Rightwing parties in Sweden (Swedish Democrats) and Austria (Freedom Party of Austria) have seen their ratings rise as they promise more state spending on citizens.
For the first time in modern history, this year far-right populist parties simultaneously topped the polls in Europe’s three biggest economies – France (National Rally), Germany (Alternative for Germany) and the UK (Reform) — all of which have touted similar agendas.
From raising state pensions and rolling back the retirement age, to increasing spending on healthcare, the far-right increasingly promises to protect the interests of the working class – but only for the national ‘in-group’. Migrants and other ‘outsiders’, they take pains to clarify, are excluded – a position known as “welfare chauvinism”, which stands in stark contrast to social protection as a human right.
How has welfare — long the cornerstone of the left — become a vote-winner for the far-right?