How far-right parties seduced young voters across Europe |

Young people abandoned mainstream parties in last weekend’s European elections – a sign that their anxieties are not being heard

That far-right parties fared well in the European elections came as no surprise – surveys had consistently foretold their triumph. The populist right has been on the rise in Europe – through democratic elections – for the past two decades. Thus, 2024’s vote is a natural culmination of a long trend. The combined vote for far-right parties secured them a fourth of the seats in the European parliament – on par with the largest group, the centre-right European People’s party.

But we are nonetheless witnessing something new: the first signs of a populist insurrection of the young. In both European and national elections, voters under 30 have given their support to far-right parties such as Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) in Germany, Rassemblement National (National Rally) in France, Vox in Spain, the Brothers of Italy, Chega (Enough) in Portugal, Vlaams Belang (Flemish Interest) in Belgium and the Finns party in Finland.

Albena Azmanova is author of Capitalism on Edge: How Fighting Precarity Can Achieve Radical Change Without Crisis or Utopia