Al Webb
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Published 4/30/2002
LONDON — Fear of crime and Third World
immigration, combined with voter apathy, are sapping the power of the leftist
parties that have dominated European politics for the past half-century.
The rise of Jean-Marie Le Pen in France is only
one manifestation of a major shift to the right in a string of European nations
including Austria, the Netherlands, Italy, Denmark, Switzerland and, to a lesser
extent, Britain, that has accelerated since the start of the 21st century.
Regardless of how Mr. Le Pen fares in his two-man
race for the presidency May 5, there is likely more to come from the rightist
movement.
In Austria, for instance, Joerg Haider, who once
described Adolf Hitler's employment policies as "orderly," now says he
intends to run for leadership of his nation next year. And in Germany, the
"Third Way" administration of Gerhardt Schroeder is facing a tough
challenge from the center-right in national elections later this year.
Leftist, socialist-oriented governments have held
sway over much of Europe since the end of World War II. Of the forces now
gathering to erode their strength, not the least is immigration — legal and
illegal, including thousands of asylum seekers — and a rise in crime that many
believe is its consequence.
Much of Mr. Le Pen's success in the first round of
the French vote was attributed to his pledge to immediately halt emigration to
France, whose population of 59 million includes 700,000 Jews and 4 million
Muslims.
Mr. Haider's populist Freedom Party, which already
is a coalition partner with Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel's ruling
conservatives, has said it would stop all immigration, regardless of country of
origin. Mr. Schuessel's government faces an election by October 2003, and Mr.
Haider wants to be Austria's next chancellor.
In Denmark, the free-market Venstre (Liberal)
Party gained power in November elections on a platform described by one
political analyst as "proposing the most draconian curbs on immigration and
asylum abuse practiced anywhere in the European Union."
In Switzerland, Christophe Blocher of the
right-wing People's Party won 23 percent of the vote on a similar platform.
In the Netherlands, long noted for its liberal
tendencies on issues from drugs to sex, the colorful — and controversial —
Pim Fortuyn is basing his campaign on an anti-immigration platform, and
pollsters forecast he will score well with voters in upcoming elections.
A closely related issue centers on the Continent's
Muslim population, which has risen to 16 million from 8 million over the past
decade, and hundreds of thousands of immigrants from Eastern Europe.
Roman Catholic Cardinal Giacomo Biffi of Bologna,
Italy, said recently that Europe was degenerating into a "culture of
nothing, that would be unable to drive back the ideological assault of
Islam."
Fury over what is seen as the British government's
failure to halt illegal immigration from the Continent through the rail tunnel
under the English Channel, plus growing conflicts between white and Asian youths
in several cities and towns, is seen as bolstering the hopes of the hard-line
British National Party in local elections May 2.
The BNP, which strongly opposes immigration and
whose leaders have demanded that blacks and others "be sent back to where
they came from," is fielding 68 candidates, many of them in hotbeds of
racial tension including the cities of Bradford, Burnley and Oldham. If it wins
one seat, it will be considered in many quarters a victory for extremism.
Many analysts also see voter apathy as a factor in
the measured decline in the influence of the largely leftist ruling elite of
Europe. That apathy helped catapult Mr. Le Pen into the second round of the
French election. It could similarly help Mr. Haider and may even give Britain's
BNP a taste of power.
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