Europe, Brazil and beyond: Is the populist wave gathering momentum?

Hello, and welcome back to Independent Thinking from Chatham House, where every week we take a deep dive into the forces shaping world affairs. I'm Bronwyn Maddox. Today we're talking about the way right-wing parties are making gains across Europe. In Germany, the Alternative for Deutschland has won a first-ever regional presidency after a strong result in Saxony and Hull last month. In France, well, we can see the protests by students all over the television screens, but Marine Le Pen's Rassemblement National is well ahead in the polls as Emmanuel Macron approaches the end of his decade in power, and France looks towards the presidential election next year. And in Spain, Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez is also taking a gamble, as it has been called. He's called a snap election to shore up his position, but after this summer's migration crisis, the campaign will take place in a country increasingly divided. The common thread is the growing pressure on Europe's traditional centre, and beleaguered politicians are saying we have to do some uncomfortable things, but please don't go and vote for those populists over there, though finding that voters are in fact doing just that. This isn't just a European story. In Brazil, a tense presidential runoff pits President Lula against Flavio Bolsonaro, son of the former president, himself under house arrest under his role in a coup plot. So we're going to talk about whether the power of these far-right parties is really growing, what is generating that, what does its mean for democracy, and what could, in Europe's case, a more right-wing inclination in its main parties mean. Gregoire Roux, director of the Europe and Russia and Eurasia programs at Chatham House, is joining us, travelling between Europe and the UK. Welcome back, Gregoire. Thank you, Bronwyn. Happy to be back. Also joining us is Nick Lawley, special advisor in my office, who, among other things, specialises in the politics of Spain. Thanks for joining us, Nick. Thanks for having me. And later in the show, we will have Chris Sabatini, director of our Latin American program, to talk about Brazil. But let's start off with where we are right now. And Gregoire, perhaps we can start with France, of why politics are so febrile at the moment, and where you think Marine Le Pen's party is. Well, I think it's another kind of a challenge for Marine Le Pen's party, as they've been entangled in some sort of scandal for the past week, after a newspaper produced evidence that Jordan Bardella, the president of the party, and the person poised to become prime minister, should Marine Le Pen be elected president, apparently has written or wrote in the anti-Semitic remarks, brutal ones, for that matter, less than a decade ago. So many observers have actually looked at Bardella in a very different way for the past week, and they say that his political future might be compromised. So this is a blow to Le Pen, who has worked tirelessly, one must say this, for the past 15 years to get rid of those anti-Semites within her party, to the extent that she actually expelled her own father from the party. And now it will be a difficult challenge to overcome, although I would be tempted to say that many voters do not actually care because their level of anger and rejection of President Macron and mainstream parties is too strong. That's the first thing. The second is, of course, the kind of gap we see in the emotions on the streets of France between the visit of the Pope two weeks ago and the students now taken to the streets with civil unrest, and the far left that is for some members of parliament and local officials taking part in the riots. So this might play in favor of Le Pen insofar as she's kept a low profile in a way that she can emerge as someone who stands above the emotions of the day and could bring back some stability to the country, which is something that she thinks she can achieve. But of course, looking at the manifesto, there's little to think that stability will be on the horizon should she be elected. And just dropping back to the point you made about the rage, the anger against President Macron, what are the causes of that? Well, we might need more than a podcast to go through all the causes of the rejection of President Macron. There are three things, mostly. One is, of course, the policies, his political agenda. Many French people are rejecting his approach to, let's say, a free market economy, working harder, fewer taxes. And I think that's one of the reasons why he's not going to be elected. And that's the principle that dictates that the state cannot remain neutral towards those, any party, any movement trying to destroy the democratic foundations, the democratic framework of the country, and must therefore actively defend itself using specific tools. The best known is the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution. The Germany's domestic intelligence agency was tasked with actively monitoring anti-constitutional threats, including far-right threats. And that federal office has actually designated the AfD as a right-wing extremist organization. And then you have constitutional party bans. And the only thing is that now on the CDU side… So the Christian Democrats, the ruling party of Chancellor Metz, might be waking up a bit too late, calling for a ban on the AfD, which is, of course, politically undoable now after they've won by a landslide in at least one land. Thank you for that and for that detail, because the details were laid down over years and with some thought for this kind of thing, to try to keep some inclinations of politics. I want to ask you both to take a step back and say what you think the common characteristics of these parties are. Nick? The common threads are essentially a refocus on the nation and therefore not going abroad, i.e. Ukraine in many cases. And it was interesting to hear Pedro Sanchez specifically citing his support for Ukraine on the steps of La Moncloa, the palace where he lives, and its immigration. And in Spain, that saw a real moment. In the summer, when the Spanish province of Celta, which is on the African continent, received approximately 80,000 immigrants in a rush, the city itself has about 80,000 people in it. So you can really imagine the sort of the feeling that was felt there. And this led to very shocking images to many Spaniards. And that saw a real increase in the support for Vox. And Vox has really, really used it. And Vox has used some pretty horrific language and linked it to Maribor. Carmen, the lady who has died, who started the process, referring to her saying that if she had been Muslim, then she would never have been kicked out of her house. And so they have been linking immigration to the issues that people are talking about, like housing, and linking it all together. And I'm also interested in the pro-Russian element that the AFD and Marine Le Pen have shown at times. Not just, let's not go and fight foreign wars, therefore Ukraine, but actually sympathetic. To Putin. Yeah, I think in this regard, the AFD and the National Rally are going in two distinct directions. Not necessarily opposite, but distinct directions when it comes to Russia, but also for that matter, when it comes to China. The National Rally went from finding financial support in Russia 10 years ago, to moving to Hungary, supported by Viktor Orban, to now trying to sell funds in France. It's still a struggle, but they're very aware. Of the political liability of being associated with Russia. The AFD has no problem showing and showcasing its love of Russia, its association with Russia. They want to reinstate language courses, Russian language courses in school. They want to lift sanctions and reinstate, bring back energy and economic relations with Russia. And more interestingly, Marine Le Pen has said clearly Russia attacked Ukraine and this war is unlawful. It does not mean that she has not been associated. With Russia in the past, but she has moderated her position. The AFD has not. The AFD has said we don't want Ukrainian refugees anymore. Russia is an important partner of ours, and this war should be dealt with between Russia and Ukraine, and it's not our problem. So positions are very different. And for now, it reflects also the psychology of the electorate. In France, the electorate, even those staunch supporters of Marine Le Pen and the National Rally are not. All pro-Russians, this has changed. Of course, you still have pro-Russian elements, but the major part of the electorate is calling for a more balanced approach. In Germany, especially in the former German Democratic Republic, there is still a nostalgia of the old order of the Cold War, and therefore of close association and friendship with Russia. Can I also just bring in, though, that Russia will be following these elections, and particularly Spain, closely, and they will be trying to interfere. We saw that with Delta. There was clear indications that they were spreading rumors, re-sharing, using the bot farms to share things across social media. Previously, they have stoked up problems in Spain around Catalan independence, particularly around 2017. And they will see an opportunity here to really put it in to Sanchez, who has been a supporter of Ukraine. And we should expect that kind of activity to happen because it is in their interest to destabilize Europe. And when we have Chris Sabatini on the line, I'm going to ask him a question. I'm going to ask him about the way the U.S. is also very, J.D. Vance, particularly the Vice President, is particularly interested in the rise of these right-of-center parties and doing his best to cheer them on. Just briefly, each of you, do you see this as a failure of the centrist parties, or are they up against big new forces like aging populations and migration? The economy stupid is always something that's used in general elections. And yet Spain's economy, objectively, has been doing fantastic. And yet this is not being felt by people. And I fear that Sanchez is leaning into something that happened to Biden, where the economy, objectively, is looking great, but people are not feeling it. And when they're not feeling it, they will look around and look to blame other people. And immigration has been an issue around Sanchez. I mean, he has looked to naturalize half a million people. There is a housing crisis. You brought in half a million people. People will point to that. You see images like Delta, which shocked many Spaniards. I am half Spanish. And I had family members who were shocked by that, who have supported Sanchez before. And together, those are complicated issues that don't have a solution. And yet you're being forced to find a middle way. And that is going to be played out in this election, I think. Gregoire, failure of the center? It would be easy to say end of the center. I don't think so. We'll see the end of the far right soon enough. But for now, many far right parties have understood and very smartly so, that there's an unoccupied space in the public discussion, which is that of hope. People are looking for hope in a world which is increasingly unstable. And therefore, many have used nostalgia, easy solutions, demagogy, and populism to make people feel that what they propose them will bring back some kind of stability in a world that is depressingly unstable with constant innovation. And in this regard, to go back to President Macron, he has not understood that portraying France as, I quote, the startup nation was met very tepidly by many amongst the population. Many people do not want that to happen. They want a more quiet, calm order, especially people who do not live in the cities. And this is also something that the far right has played with quite smartly, you know, the us versus them. This is a good point to bring in, Chris Sabatini. Who, as I said at the beginning, is program director of our Latin America program, and he's joining us down the line. Chris, we've been talking a lot about Europe, specifically Spain, France, Germany. Just take us into what's happening in Brazil. I've just come back from Geneva, and I was in a deep World Economic Forum, heart of Europe conversation about boardrooms and sustainability and so on. And what people really, really wanted to talk about was Brazil. Yeah, there are two things going on. And I think they're emblematic. They're emblematic of a broader global trend and many of the things that Greg Waugh and Nick talked about. The first is that we saw, much to some people's surprise, that Flavio Bolsonaro, the son of the former president and so-called Trump of the tropics, Jair Bolsonaro, won the first round of the elections. But more importantly, their party, the Partido Liberal, did very well on the down-ballot races. They won a plurality of governorships, a plurality in the Senate, and a plurality in the Chamber of Deputies. And those two houses of Congress now count among them four Bolsonaro family members. So this has become, quote, Sly and the Family Stone, the 70s funk band, a family affair. But it's one that has a certain amount of party cohesion, much to, I think, everyone's surprise, especially after Jair Bolsonaro was convicted of attempting a coup when in January 2023, he tried to mobilize his supporters, very Trump-like, page straight from the Trump book. Storm the Palace of Justice and the legislature to overturn the election results. Trump later then applied sanctions and 50% tariffs on Brazilian goods to try to discourage the independent Supreme Court to try and then later convict Jair Bolsonaro for attempting a coup. He was convicted. He's serving a 27-year term. But many people thought the whole Bolsonaro era was over, especially when Lula was reelected. And that hasn't happened. And it's funny because I think a lot of people, and I think this is indemnified. Also, what we're seeing generally is a lot of people who supported Lula and supported those court trials thought everyone. things like them, and it was assumed Bolsonaroismo was over with. Well, quite frankly, it came back, and despite a number of corruption allegations swirling around the Bolsonaro family, that didn't matter. People are voting with their hearts more than they're voting, well, I won't say with their brains, but they're voting because they feel disenfranchised and angry. Okay, just take us into that a bit more, because it was a surprise to many people, though obviously not so much to the people who voted. What was it driving their anger? I think, first of all, there is a saying in Brazil about the beef, Bible, and bullets constituency. That refers to cowboys, many of whom are responsible for deforestation, the Amazon. It includes a very large evangelical movement that is highly mobilized and very committed to the Bolsonaros. Bolsonaro's wife, in fact, is an evangelical, and it also refers to bullets, the sort of very western cowboy attitude of Brazilians, particularly in the frontier, that are very. very pro-gun. In fact, the NRA, the U.S. National Rifle Association, is very active in Brazil. And that's what he tapped into, and he tapped into it in a very Trumpist way. And that's not a coincidence. Donald Trump Jr. and Steve Bannon, Steve Bannon being Trump's advisor, almost his eminence in 2016, have been advising the Bolsonaro family. So he really tapped into that, and it was a very U.S.-Trump anti-woke agenda. Immigration is less a problem, unlike, say, Spain or France or Germany. So it wasn't a problem. It was a problem, and it was a problem, and it was a problem, it was more about a certain amount of racism, misogyny, and a certain idea that Brazil had become a little too Europeanized in some ways. Europeanized in what way? I was about to ask you something else, but that's a tantalizing point. Why is that a red rag to voters? I think in part it's because, again, the idea of this woke agenda of LGBTQI rights, of environmentalism in particular, you know, in the 20-year-long negotiation of the trade deal between Mercosur and EU, one of the big stumbling blocks was the EU's, and in particular EU member countries, very strident, oftentimes unfair, criticisms of Brazil's environmental policies that really sort of hit a snag. And so I think part of it's that, and I think part of it's also the finger-wagging that occurs from the EU over, in particular for the Bolsonaro government, how Brazil uses one of its natural resources, which is the Amazon. I was coming on to the Amazon and what this means, but just let me ask you this. What do you think? What do you think? What do you think? What do you think? So what happens now? We've had the first round of the election. Supposing Flavio Bolsonaro wins the second round, what happens then? Well, first of all, domestically, and I think it is his election to lose. There are only a handful of third-party candidates. They all skew to the right. So I think he'll scoop up those votes. And I think Lula will have a difficult time turning out his voters in the October 25th second round. I think first of all, what it will mean is front and center is going to be the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court has become a really caught in the crossfire of the polarization with a number of justices appointed by Bolsonaro, supporting Bolsonaro and a number of Bolsonaro candidates who have been disqualified from the election, as well as then this other Supreme Court justice, Alexander de Moraes, who had led the investigation and the trial against Jair Bolsonaro, and who also attempted to ban Elon Musk's ex from Brazil. So that's really going to be, and that's obviously a critical democratic institution. That will shape the way Brazilians feel about the object activity and professionalism of their justice system. Internationally, I think what we'll also see is perhaps a slower walk towards the EU-Mercosur trade deal, which still needs to be ratified, but has been signed. And then we'll see a closer alignment with the Trump administration. He's been a little more subtle in Brazil than in other cases, because he didn't want sort of a, if you will, a Mark Carney effect in Brazil by, you know, basically weighing in too heavily. By a Mark Carney effect, you mean the country rising up and saying, look, we're going to go a middle power way. We're not going to be able to do anything. We're not going to vote for his preferred candidate. That didn't happen here. But there's plenty of allegations made by a number of journalists, as well as the Brazilian government itself, that the Russians were funding some of the pro-Bolsonaro mouthpieces, that the US was doing the same. And what we'll see is a much closer alliance between Brazil and the White House, in particular on issues of crime and insecurity, probably with Brazil joining the new shield of the Americas that the Trump administration has created, which is attempting to get the military much more involved, including in joint operations with the US military, in what they now call kinetic operations to take out what they also now call narco-terrorists. I think that we'll see closer cooperation. And I'll be frank, bringing the military into internal policing in Latin America is never a good idea. It certainly didn't end well in the 60s and 70s with the wave of coups. And there was a lot of effort afterwards to separate them from civilian functions. But I think we'll see the Trump administration bring them back in. I absolutely see that point. But would you say, I think you would say, because you've written it, that fear of crime and fear of lack of order is one of the things that's been driving voters in this rightward direction, right across the continent, not just Brazil? That's exactly right. That is the number one issue for Brazilians. And that's why Lula completely misfired. But it's a general trend around the region, is that the center-left in Latin America has failed to basically provide a credible answer to voters' concerns over violence and insecurity. Where the right wing has, whether in El Salvador, in Colombia, in Ecuador, not all of these are working as well, I mean, well, relatively speaking, with the human rights abuses in El Salvador. But that is what is driving people's votes. And the far right, and these are not garden variety right-wing governments in many cases across Latin America, Honduras, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Peru, Chile, Argentina, Colombia, and probably now Brazil. These are really outside the political mainstream, iron-fisted, get-tough-on-crime right-wing parties. Finally, what about the Amazon if Bolsonaro Jr. wins? Well, first of all, Lula, despite his rhetoric of being pro-environment, they actually untapped huge amounts of oil reserves in the northeast of Brazil. So he did stop deforestation, but Brazil is now, I think, the largest oil producer in Latin America. So there are two sides to that coin. But we'll see, especially given, as I mentioned before, the beef constituency of the Bolsonaro coalition, we'll see a lot more deforestation and trying to ramp up cattle production and other agricultural production at the expense of forests in the Amazon, at the expense of the global environment. Right. Just a few things as we're coming to the end. Nick, have you got any thoughts listening to what Chris has been saying? Absolutely. It shows that these elections matter internationally. Trump cares about what's happening in Brazil. He's one of Trump's biggest naysayers and critics. President Milley of Argentina announced that he was on his way to Spain two days after the election was called. And finally, you know, what happens in Spain will probably make Burnham and Carney really reconsider, like, how close do we want to be to Europe if Europe is swinging towards a way which is not the middle powers way, but is more in the sphere of Trump and the people who Carney is perhaps less reassured by. This is a really important point that Europe isn't staying the same. Chris, how do you respond to that? First of all, I agree entirely with Nick. This is going to change the nature of Europe and its attractiveness. These are internationally very important elections, even in countries that we thought, well, they weren't going to have much of an international impact. But when you have, in the case of Latin America, a solid block of Trump aligned, whether for ideological or transactional reasons, governments, that's also going to affect Europe. I mean, Trump is leading the fight on narcotics in a particularly, I would argue, ineffective way. But Europe and the UK included are large consumers of cocaine. This is going to affect European security. And I think that's going to affect Europe's security. As well, if these policies are implemented, because there are serious questions among experts about whether this sort of so-called kinetic action against so-called narcotic narcoterrorists will really work. And that will have effects also in security in Europe and beyond. And with that, we have to draw it to a close. So a huge thanks to my guests, Nick Lawley, Christopher Sabatini, and Gregoire Ruse. We will see you all next week. Thank you very much for joining us. Do look on Chatham House.org for all our work, which is at a high rate of intensity at the moment. I'm Bronwyn Maddox. Goodbye.