https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/03/boycott-threats-after-afd-fascist-stands-for-thuringia-premier
So, in short, the candidates for leadership of Thuringia are from the "far right" AfD and the "far left" Die Linke. The free market liberal FDP and mainstream right CDP have decided to sit out.
What I find remarkable about this is to put Die Linke and the AfD on the same footing. AfD is borderline far right. Bjorne Hocke of the AfD, as the article points out, can be legally called a fascist: a court decided it was factually accurate. That gives us some idea of the AfD and the justification behind calling it "far right". One might note also that the AfD has done things like openly state Germany should stop feeling bad about the Nazis and WW2, and maintains open links with far right groups.
But what of Die Linke? Die Linke does have in its predecessor parties a link to the East German communist regime, and represents a coalition of leftists which includes communists. However, a quick scan through their program reveals (bar some radically anti-militaristic foreign policy) a fairly unremarkable social democratic program. They certainly aren't supporting xenophobia, homophobia etc. like AfD.
Across much of the Western world, the failure of the mainstream right has been to effectively endorse the far right by triangulating to cover some of the less objectionable areas of its political ground - nationalism, immigrant-bashing, etc. It shares with the mainstream left a failure to deliver social and economic improvements to millions of their own citizens, which have led to record dissatisfaction and the rise of more extremist parties.
But one of the biggest issues for me is the constant boogeyman refrain of the "far left". There barely is a far left. Bernie Sanders is not far left, nor is Jeremy Corbyn, nor is Die Linke; Syriza took power in Greece and turned out to be fairly unremarkable social democrats as well. The intent is to caricature them as Communists, but they are nowhere near: 30 years ago their policies would have been unremarkable Western mainstream left, we've just moved further right since then. It serves their purposes to make a sort of alterative threat out of smoke to justify themselves, and their cosying up to far right positions. What this is really about is that when push comes to shove, the mainstream right would rather enable fascists and quasi-fascists - than it would let moderate leftists have power.
So, in short, the candidates for leadership of Thuringia are from the "far right" AfD and the "far left" Die Linke. The free market liberal FDP and mainstream right CDP have decided to sit out.
What I find remarkable about this is to put Die Linke and the AfD on the same footing. AfD is borderline far right. Bjorne Hocke of the AfD, as the article points out, can be legally called a fascist: a court decided it was factually accurate. That gives us some idea of the AfD and the justification behind calling it "far right". One might note also that the AfD has done things like openly state Germany should stop feeling bad about the Nazis and WW2, and maintains open links with far right groups.
But what of Die Linke? Die Linke does have in its predecessor parties a link to the East German communist regime, and represents a coalition of leftists which includes communists. However, a quick scan through their program reveals (bar some radically anti-militaristic foreign policy) a fairly unremarkable social democratic program. They certainly aren't supporting xenophobia, homophobia etc. like AfD.
Across much of the Western world, the failure of the mainstream right has been to effectively endorse the far right by triangulating to cover some of the less objectionable areas of its political ground - nationalism, immigrant-bashing, etc. It shares with the mainstream left a failure to deliver social and economic improvements to millions of their own citizens, which have led to record dissatisfaction and the rise of more extremist parties.
But one of the biggest issues for me is the constant boogeyman refrain of the "far left". There barely is a far left. Bernie Sanders is not far left, nor is Jeremy Corbyn, nor is Die Linke; Syriza took power in Greece and turned out to be fairly unremarkable social democrats as well. The intent is to caricature them as Communists, but they are nowhere near: 30 years ago their policies would have been unremarkable Western mainstream left, we've just moved further right since then. It serves their purposes to make a sort of alterative threat out of smoke to justify themselves, and their cosying up to far right positions. What this is really about is that when push comes to shove, the mainstream right would rather enable fascists and quasi-fascists - than it would let moderate leftists have power.
