As one the supporters of the Alternative for Germany (AfD), founded only
last year, cheered into the echoing vault they had rented for their
election-night party next to the river Elbe in Dresden. The evening's
first projection on August 31st had just put the AfD near 10% of the
vote in Saxony, clearly above the 5% threshold to enter that state's
parliament. Moments later, Frauke Petry (pictured), the party's boss in
Saxony, entered and was mobbed as though she were a rockstar. Great
work, she beamed back at her fans, but the real effort only starts now:
In two weeks, the Alternative also wants to enter the state parliaments
of Brandenburg and Thuringia.
The AfD began as a single-issue party, calling for an orderly unravelling of the euro. In the past year, it has added piecemeal other positions, from an increase in direct democracy to a return to conservative economics. At times--as in Saxony, where it is strongest--it has also mixed xenophobic innuendo into its messages. Although it pulls voters from all the other parties, it is most successful on the right.
The Alternative's newest success, coming hard on the heels of its entry into the European Parliament earlier this year and representing its first participation in a state parliament, had a contrast in the failure of the liberal party, called the FDP. It was ejected from Saxony's parliament, just as it was thrown out of Bavaria's and the federal Bundestag last September. The FDP thus appears dead, perhaps gone for good from German politics. In effect, it has been replaced by the Alternative.
Read more: Saxony's election: Another little piece of Europe shifts right | The Economist
The AfD began as a single-issue party, calling for an orderly unravelling of the euro. In the past year, it has added piecemeal other positions, from an increase in direct democracy to a return to conservative economics. At times--as in Saxony, where it is strongest--it has also mixed xenophobic innuendo into its messages. Although it pulls voters from all the other parties, it is most successful on the right.
The Alternative's newest success, coming hard on the heels of its entry into the European Parliament earlier this year and representing its first participation in a state parliament, had a contrast in the failure of the liberal party, called the FDP. It was ejected from Saxony's parliament, just as it was thrown out of Bavaria's and the federal Bundestag last September. The FDP thus appears dead, perhaps gone for good from German politics. In effect, it has been replaced by the Alternative.
Read more: Saxony's election: Another little piece of Europe shifts right | The Economist
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