The decline of social democracy in Europe

The most notable result of the European elections...is the dramatic decline of social democracy...

On average across Europe, social democratic parties received only 22 percent of the vote, six percent less than in...2004.

Average European figures distort the real extent of the decline.

In the major industrial countries of Western Europe, where social democratic parties have led governments for decades or functioned as the main opposition party, their losses were huge —irrespective of whether the parties are currently in government or opposition:


- Great Britain: Labour’s support plummeted to a record low of 16 percent—lower than the vote received by the extreme right-wing UK Independence Party.

- Spain: the ruling Socialist Party lost five percentage points and trailed the right-wing Peoples Party.

- Germany: the Social Democratic Party (SPD), which has been in government for eleven years, recorded an historic low of 21 percent.

- Portugal: support for the ruling Socialist Party fell from 45 to 27 percent.

- France: where the Socialist Party has been in opposition for the past seven years, the party received just 17 percent—a decline of 12 percentage points compared to five years ago.

- Italy: support for the Democratic Party, which is a successor organisation to the Italian Communist Party and other “left” parties, plunged from 31 percent to 26 percent.

- Denmark: the opposition Social Democrats lost 12 percentage points and finished with a total of 21 percent.

- Netherlands: The vote for the Dutch Labour Party was halved to 12 percent.

- Austria: from 33 percent to 24 percent.


The cause for this shift is to be found in the politics and character of the social democratic parties... In the past two decades, they have used their influence...to carry out the sort of social attacks that had provoked massive resistance when attempted by conservative governments:


In Britain, the Labour Party led by Tony Blair adopted the program of the Conservative Party’s “iron lady,” Margaret Thatcher...

German SPD led by Gerhard Schröder passed the anti-welfare Hartz laws and carried out more attacks on social rights than all previous conservative governments put together...

The British Financial Times in an editorial... correctly noted that, in fact, there are no serious differences in economic and social policy between the social democratic and conservative parties.


The election result also expressed a broad rejection of the European parliament...Vast numbers of voters, especially from the working class, refrained from casting ballots. The biggest party in the election was the party of non-voters...

The resulting political vacuum was exploited by conservative and right-wing parties.

This has led many commentators to speak of a “turn to the right” in Europe.

Such a conclusion is unwarranted and superficial. Right-wing parties were able to exploit the collapse in support for social democracy and the low turnout. In most cases, however, they failed to increase their vote and in some cases saw their support decline significantly...

Even extreme right, xenophobic parties that gained significantly—such as Geert Wilders’ Freedom Party in Holland (17 percent), the UK Independence Party (17 percent), and the British National Party (6 percent)—have, based on the low voter turnout of 35 percent in the two countries, less support than their results suggest.

What is evident in the European election is a sharp social polarisation...

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2009/jun2009/pers-j10.shtml