Until Poland’s second-round presidential election results June 1, a particular dynamic was evident in Europe around elections. Far-right parties would surge in the polls ahead of elections, and centrist parties and policymakers across the continent would hold their breath until they had the results, which typically involved centrist parties coming out on top, or the far right not doing quite as well as the polls had suggested. See the sense of palpable relief when now-President Nicusor Dan won in Romania last month, or when Chancellor Friederich Merz triumphed in Germany.
In Poland, though, far-right Law and Justice party-backed candidate Karol Nawrocki won the election by a fraction of the vote over Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s preferred candidate, Rafal Trzaskowski. Domestically, this will have significant implications for Tusk’s judicial reform agenda, much needed to reverse the damage done by eight years of Law and Justice rule and set the country back onto a democratic path.
Internationally, Narwrocki’s victory will also have important implications. He believes that good relations with Brussels, Berlin, and Paris are against Polish interests, and he opposes NATO or European Union membership for Ukraine as long as Russia’s war in Ukraine continues. Given that Russia’s initial invasion started in 2014, this does not bode well for Ukraine’s future.
The global security environment and the continent’s struggles mean that the stakes are high. The EU is wrestling with economic sluggishness and a lack of competitiveness, as well as how to respond adequately to U.S. President Donald Trump’s trade war. The bloc is also divided over how to deal with China during a second Trump term. Various EU countries have unsustainable levels of public debt. This has implications for further borrowing for much-needed joint defense procurement and repayment of NextGenerationEU loans—the European Commission’s economic recovery loans during the COVID-19 pandemic. Meanwhile, climate change is accelerating and has recently devasted communities in Spain, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom.
The increased support for far-right populism adds an additional layer of complexity. Populism’s simplified response to complex challenges may appeal to voters who have faced crisis after crisis with COVID-19 lockdowns, increased energy prices, and high levels of inflation, but it rarely solves the issues. And yet centrist politicians continue to fail to present a viable alternative.
Simply hoping that centrists will do well in an election is kicking the can down the road. It was never a deliberate strategy, of course. But in today’s climate, the absence of a viable plan is dangerous. In Germany, for example, the dangerous moment was not the federal elections held in February. The real danger is what will happen in the next federal elections—due to be held by March 2029—and all the policy decisions made between now and then.
If centrists are serious about keeping the far right out of power, then they need to get much better at actually addressing voters’ concerns. The key issues will differ by country, of course, but there are shared themes across Europe: the cost of living, the economy, and the security situation tend to be among top voter concerns.
One of the biggest challenges for centrist politicians is to make the case for potentially unpopular policies—a difficult thing to do in an increasingly polarized environment. Yet achieving the energy transition and increasing spending for defense are not optional. The real question, then, is how to gain support for policies that may hurt voters’ personal finances. This has to involve a public debate about the trade-offs.
Currently, centrist politicians Europe-wide do the exact opposite. Rather than make the case for ambitious policies, they cherry-pick far-right policy positions in an attempt to tempt voters away from the extremes. Lessons from elections in the United Kingdom—and also Poland—show that this creates more momentum for the far right while centrist parties lose their traditional bases to parties that are further left.
This is how Reform U.K. was galvanized in recent local elections in Britain, and how the far-right Alternative for Germany surged in Germany’s election. It is also an important reminder as the Netherlands likely heads towards a new snap election. (Dutch media is reporting that following the defection of far-right leader Geert Wilders from the ruling coalition, new elections could be held in the fall.) After the conservative-liberal Party for Freedom and Democracy tried to adopt a hard-line anti-immigration rhetoric in the run-up to the last parliamentary election in 2023, it lost voters to far-right Wilders’s Freedom Party.
Beyond specific policy issues, the future of liberal democracy is increasingly being determined at the ballot box. The recent elections in Poland and Romania have presented voters with a stark choice: a vote for rules-based liberalism or a possible descent into MAGA-like quasi-authoritarianism. This has mobilized voters. In both instances, turnout was record high or close to it.
The Trump administration’s interference—U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem made the trans-Atlantic journey to Poland a few days before the second round to stump for Nawrocki—may have had an impact too. While most Polish diaspora voters voted for Trzaskowski, Poles in the United States voted overwhelmingly for Nawrocki.
Elsewhere in Europe, voters are demanding change from their governments, which are seen by many as corrupt and stuck. In Hungary, former Fidesz insider Peter Magyar’s support keeps increasing in polls ahead of the parliamentary election that is scheduled for spring 2026. Magyar is running on a platform to address corruption at a time when inflation remains high and voters feel worse off economically.
In Serbia, protests have been ongoing for months: What started as a student-led movement demanding answers regarding a collapsed train station canopy roof that killed 16 people has turned into a nationwide anti-corruption and rule of law movement against populist nationalist President Aleksandar Vucic’s government; the head of his prime minister has already rolled.
In Slovakia, thousands have protested a so-called foreign agents law, which opponents say is copied straight from the Kremlin and makes it harder for nongovernmental organizations and civil society to operate in the country.
What this suggests is that ultimately, across the spectrum, voters want accountability. There will always be an election somewhere, but currently, too many pressing policy issues hinge on an election going “the right way.” Centrists need to get active and come up with a better plan.
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