Tero Lundstedt // 5 August 2024

Until ten years ago, European populist parties, regardless of their domestic politics, were united by a strong opposition to the EU and a desire to either dismantle or exit the EU. At the same time, even after Russia’s invasion of Crimea, many of them viewed Russia as either a useful partner or a neutral country that was unnecessarily demonised. Both of these policies are in a state of flux in the 2020s due to Brexit and Russia's war of aggression.

Nostalgia was better before Brexit

European populists, particularly right-wing populists, have had a robust EU-critical agenda since the 1990s. One logical explanation for this is that EU legislation and agreements can often conflict with the radical objectives pursued by some populists. Moreover, from an ideological perspective, for nationalists, the nation-state is the only acceptable supreme level of power and must not be constrained by supranationalism.

Predictably or not, it took one real example of a state leaving the EU to diminish the populists' enthusiasm for '-xit'. Even after the UK's Brexit referendum in 2016, Timo Soini, chairman of the Finns Party, was still beating the drum, repeating his slogan, ‘Where there's an EU, there's a problem.’ Brexit was supposed to ‘return control’ to the UK on issues such as immigration and nostalgically bring back a past era of success.

However, Brexit wasn’t fully implemented until 2020. Before then, Marine Le Pen, the leader of the French National Front (now the National Rally), advocated for France's withdrawal from the EU in her 2017 presidential campaign, and the 2019 European election manifesto of the Finns Party sought the same for Finland in the long term. Together, opposition to the EU and opposition to immigration formed a winning political recipe across Europe.

But then Brexit happened, and it worked out economically just as miserably as most pundits predicted.

By the end of 2018, following two years of negotiations between the UK and the EU, the emptiness of populist promises had already become apparent to voters, with just over a third in favour of leaving the EU. By this point, however, it was too late, and a succession of Conservative prime ministers pushed Brexit to the bitter finish line.

Since then, things have gone badly wrong in the UK. Polls show that support for leaving the EU has steadily declined, and a clear majority consider Brexit a mistake.

The UK has struggled economically since its departure from the EU, which is to some extent expected given the country’s voluntary exit from the world's second-largest free trade area.

Many in the UK voted for Brexit due to concerns about immigration, and it has only doubled since the country left the EU. However, the newcomers are no longer EU citizens. The ruling party, grappling with rising immigration, has proposed the 'Rwanda Card', which involves sending asylum-seekers to Central Africa to await the processing of their asylum claims. This policy is not only absurd but has also been ruled illegal by the UK Supreme Court.

Given that the UK is the world's sixth-largest economy, with a large Commonwealth network and a strong currency, it is a perfect example of what a successful EU withdrawal looks like. For all other countries, leaving would be much more difficult.

If success looks like Brexit, what would a French Frexit or a Finnish Fixit look like?

The populist parties drew their conclusions: Le Pen stopped talking about leaving the EU, and the Finns' latest European election manifesto predictably removed the pursuit of separation from the agenda. Germany's AfD has continued to push for Germany's withdrawal from the EU, and it is probably no coincidence that the party faces serious allegations of receiving Russian funding. Where there is modern EU criticism, there is Russia.

Populists' views on the EU have also been in a state of flux since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in the spring of 2022. Previously, the drive to leave was motivated by concerns that Brussels was threatening national identities. Now, however, the EU, as an alliance of nation-states, is seen as a powerful counterforce to other powers.

For many populist parties, the 'other' to be resisted is Islam and, in some cases, Russia. In this existential cultural struggle, the union of European nation-states is viewed as a secure bastion in a frightening world.

Combine this with the growing influence of right-wing populism in the EU, and it is not difficult to see why the EU is becoming an important policy-making tool for populists rather than merely an object of opposition. What is happening now is an attempt to steer this potentially beneficial entity in a desired direction, such as in immigration policy and the principles of subsidiarity and proximity.

Russia: From partner to adversary

In the past, Russia provided generous support to right-wing populists. In addition to the AfD in Germany, which has already been mentioned, the French National Rally and the Austrian Freedom Party, among others, have been found to have dubious economic links with Russia. In 2019, the True Finns joined the newly formed Identity and Democracy (ID) group in the European Parliament, which included many of the parties notorious for their Russian connections.

Naturally, attitudes towards Russia have changed following the war in Ukraine. There are still variations in the positions taken by different populist parties, although most of them have, of course, chosen to sever visible links with the Kremlin. Indeed, Russian toxicity is contagious.

Even at the end of 2016, a bewildering 44% of True Finns voters said they trusted Vladimir Putin in a poll (the average trust level among all Finnish respondents was 7%). By this time, Russia had accumulated quite a long list of transgressions.

However, while supporters of the True Finns were initially slow to see through Putin's masks, the party has been fully committed to its new position since the change began.

The Finns moved quickly after the start of the Ukraine war in 2022 to support North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) membership. In 2023, they split from the ID group and rejoined their former European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) group, which consists of more moderate populist parties. Given the solid support for Ukraine among Finns, it must have been embarrassing to watch the ID group, including parties like the AfD and the Dutch Freedom Party, oppose support for Ukraine so stridently.

Very strong statements in favour of Ukraine – and against Russia – began emerging from the True Finns. For example, immediately after the war began, the chairman of the parliamentary foreign affairs committee, Jussi Halla-aho, made a controversial statement suggesting that the West must directly intervene to stop the ‘Russian hordes’. The party's European election manifesto (2024) also takes a firm stance on Ukraine, including a proposal to use funds frozen from Russia to support Ukraine in the short term.

According to the Timbro Populism Index (2024), a comparative analysis of populist parties shows that the Finns Party can now be classified as a relatively low Eurosceptic party and, notably, one of the most anti-Russian populist parties in Europe.

At the same time, however, the Finns are witnessing a significant evolution in European right-wing populism, where Euroscepticism is being diluted and transformed and where attitudes towards Russia have shifted to criticism or outright opposition.

The only populist parties that truly stand by Russia are those 'outside the system’, such as Germany's AfD, which have never been part of coalition governments that require political compromises and which may also benefit economically from Russia.

This blog was originally published on Libera's blog in Finnish.