Despite the SPD’s victory in Brandenburg, the AfD has gained ground again. A political scientist sees mistakes in the election campaigns of the other parties.
The election in Brandenburg is over – many voters of the SPD, which gained strength in the final stages of the election campaign, are likely to be relieved that the AfD has not become the strongest party. And yet, projections showed early on that the AfD has also gained support in the third eastern federal state. Why is it apparently so difficult to find an effective means of combating the right-wing populists?
Werner Krause, political scientist at the University of Potsdam, sees possible shortcomings and possibly wrong priorities on the part of the other parties, as he said in a conversation with IPPEN.MEDIA explained. “The AfD’s election campaign with the issue of immigration has gained an incredible amount of weight,” he states. He also stresses: “The focus on the issue of migration has not harmed the AfD, we can clearly see that.” A lesson that the CSU in Bavaria had also learned – in the meantime.
Brandenburg election: “A vote for the AfD is always a punishment for the traffic light coalition”
Krause recently saw “mistakes in all election campaigns”. The political scientist, who researches, among other things, the circumstances of the rise of radical right-wing parties, also made a clear assessment with regard to Thuringia and Saxony: “These mistakes were made in all three election campaigns.” The CDU suffered a clear defeat on Sunday anyway.
However, there were also factors outside of state politics. “On the other hand, a vote for the AfD is always a punishment for the traffic light coalition, the federal government,” explained Krause. In addition, he sees a structural problem with regard to the right-wing populists: “We also know that once these parties are established in a party system, it is no longer so easy to develop efficient counter-strategies – because the AfD is of course able to bring its core issues to the public again and again.”
The fact that the election victory ultimately went to the SPD and not to the AfD is due to a highly polarized election campaign – Krause and his colleague Peter Ulrich from the Institute of Local Government Studies at the University of Potsdam agree on this. The SPD was able to mobilize strongly in the final phase. “Many votes, probably also from the CDU, went to the SPD in order to prevent the AfD from winning the election,” Ulrich suspects. However, he also sees specific factors in the Brandenburg election.
The threat by SPD Prime Minister Dietmar Woidke to resign if the AfD won the election apparently had “extreme impact”. Woidke could also have won additional votes as a “state father from the transformation regions”, i.e. the coal mining areas in Lusatia. The traditional strength of the SPD is also “really something special”.
Result in Brandenburg with record voter turnout “a democratic success”
Ulrich emphasized in conversation with IPPEN.MEDIAthat the SPD is also quite strong in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania – unlike in Thuringia or Saxony. “In this respect, you cannot say that the east is where the AfD is strong – rather, there are different electoral geographies in the east too, depending on the federal state.” The result in Brandenburg was “a democratic success” with a record voter turnout. Ulrich speculates that there is a kind of longing for “normality” – which could speak in favor of a grand coalition. Whether this would receive a majority was unclear on election night, however.
Despite the polarization in the Brandenburg election and regional peculiarities, the AfD does not seem to have been contained or pushed back. In view of the heated debates about migration during the election campaign, expert Krause is skeptical about the future: “It remains to be seen whether the parties will consider a different strategy for the next federal election campaign.”
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