“BERLIN -- Right-wing populists have a new strategy to woo European voters frustrated with cash-strapped governments: Veer left.
From Sweden to Greece and Austria, parties that for years favored a small state, low taxes, free trade and deregulation are now calling for higher welfare benefits, subsidies and protectionism -- often alongside pro-market positions.
The shape-shifting message has affected the coherence of their agendas but boosted their appeal, pollsters said. It has been a particularly potent strategy when empty state coffers and shaky parliamentary majorities are making it harder for establishment parties to spend more on programs that are popular with voters.
"Many of these parties have drifted over time. They haven't switched to the left, but they have enlarged their economic offering to incorporate left-wing measures," said Gilles Ivaldi, professor of political science at Sciences-Po in Paris.
The right-wing Sweden Democrats party and Austria's Freedom Party have seen their poll ratings rise in recent years as they promised more state spending on citizens. Germany's right-wing Alternative for Germany, or AfD, has maintained many of its pro-market positions but now stresses its welfare credentials too, campaigning this year on raising state pensions.
In France, the right-wing National Rally, long a practitioner of economic eclecticism, has talked about rolling back a recent rise in the retirement age and introducing import controls. President Emmanuel Macron's government will struggle just to pass a budget that narrows a 5.4% deficit.
Reform UK, the populist party led by Nigel Farage, has the support of 28% of voters, well ahead of the Labour and Conservative parties, according to a recent YouGov poll. In its 2024 campaign program, the party pledged to raise state spending by GBP 53 billion a year, $71.7 billion, including GBP 17 billion more on healthcare, while cutting income and business taxes. It said it would pay for the additional money with spending cuts elsewhere.
Facing it is a Labour government that has become boxed in by escalating welfare costs, self-imposed fiscal rules and its failure to pass unpopular spending cuts this year. It is now expected to raise some taxes this fall.
"The populists are making a lot of promises, not all of which can be kept," said Andreas Peichl, director at the Ifo Institute for Economic Research, an independent German economic think tank that promotes free-market views.
The insurgents counter that they are merely rejecting an economic orthodoxy that has led to stagnant growth, an erosion of purchasing power and yawning budget deficits.
While they tend to agree about immigration, sovereignty and cultural issues, right-wing populist parties are a diverse group when it comes to the economy. Some, especially in Eastern Europe, have a tradition of antitrade and pro-welfare positions. Many others, were born as pro-market parties on the traditional right.
What they almost all have in common -- as the word "populist" implies -- is a tendency to modulate and stretch their messages as needed to unlock new constituencies.
The Chapel Hill Expert Survey has tracked political-party messaging in Europe for 25 years. Its latest installment, published in August, found that right-wing populists expanded their economic message in the past four years on regulation, income redistribution and other core economic issues, said Jonathan Polk, professor of political science at Lund University in Sweden and one of the authors.
The diversity of views partly reflects heterogeneity among populist parties. Some groups, including Spain's VOX, created in 2013, retain a relatively coherent pro-market, small-state agenda. Others, from Greek Solution to Cyprus's National Popular Party, stand mostly left on the economy.
Many favor a well-funded public sector, generous welfare benefits and extensive labor rights, Polk added, but think these should benefit citizens, not migrants -- a position he refers to as "welfare chauvinism."
Germany's AfD is a relatively recent convert to economic eclecticism. Created in 2013 by fiscal conservatives opposed to the eurozone's bailout of Greece, the party then moved to the right, adopting strong anti-immigration and anti-European Union views.
The AfD's 2025 program, including tax cuts and benefit increases, would have created a yearly 154.6 billion euro budget deficit, $182.7 billion, making it the second most expensive of all the big parties' spending proposals, according to a February study by the Ifo Institute.
Leif-Erik Holm, a lawmaker and the AfD's leading economic policy expert in parliament, said the AfD remains pro-market. On trade in particular, some parties are pointing to President Trump's tariffs as a reason to adopt similar measures. "I'd be concerned personally if right-wing parties wanted to go back to complete isolationism," he said. "That wouldn't be the right path."” [1]
Recent reporting and analysis support the notion that Europe's coming right-wing populists are reluctant to spend on militaristic adventures. Most populist parties have been historically skeptical of military interventions, warmongering is not popular, takes away the butter.
Shift in policy for some populist leaders: Some populist leaders, like Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, have shown more deceiving, pro-military stances while in power, despite campaigning more cautiously.
Differing stances: The biggest and most important Germany's populist Alternative for Germany (AfD), for example, has opposed both domestic and EU military buildups. Tiny fish, like Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia don’t have populists, only some politicians pretend being nationalist, in reality they don’t care about their countries, angling to get money from EU.
1. Europe's Right-Wing Populists Are Swerving Left on the Economy --- A high-spending, pro-welfare stance is used to win over blue-collar workers. Bertrand, Benoit. Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y.. 26 Sep 2025: A7.
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