🔗 Share this article

More than a year after the election that delivered Donald Trump a decisive comeback victory, the Democratic Party has yet to released its postmortem analysis. But, last week, an prominent progressive lobby group released its own. Kamala Harris's campaign, its writers argued, did not resonate with key voter blocs because it failed to concentrate enough on tackling basic economic anxieties. By prioritising the menace to democracy that Maga authoritarianism represented, liberals neglected the kitchen-table concerns that were uppermost in many people’s minds.

A Warning for European Capitals

While Europe prepares for a turbulent era of politics from now until the end of the decade, that is a message that must be fully absorbed in European capitals. The White House, as its newly released national security strategy indicates, is optimistic that “patriotic” parties in Europe will quickly replicate Mr Trump’s success. In the EU’s core nations, Marine Le Pen’s National Rally (RN) and Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) lead the polls, supported by large swaths of blue-collar voters. Yet among mainstream leaders and parties, it is difficult to see a strategy that is sufficient to challenging times.

Major Problems and Expensive Solutions

The issues Europe faces are expensive and historic. They encompass the war in Ukraine, maintaining the momentum of the green transition, dealing with demographic change and developing economies that are more resilient to pressure by Mr Trump and China. According to a European thinktank, the new age of geopolitical insecurity could require an additional €250bn in yearly EU defence spending. A major report last year on European economic competitiveness called for substantial investment in shared infrastructure, to be financed in part by jointly held EU debt.

Such a fiscal paradigm shift would stimulate growth figures that have stagnated for years.

But, at both the pan-European and national levels, there continues to be a deficit of courage when it comes to revenue raising. The EU’s so-called “frugal” nations oppose the idea of collective borrowing, and Brussels’ budget proposals for the next seven years are deeply unambitious. In France, the idea of a tax on the super-rich is widely supported with voters. Yet the beleaguered centrist government – though desperate to cut its budget deficit – refuses to contemplate such a move.

The Price of Inaction

The truth is that in the absence of such measures, the less well-off will bear the brunt of fiscal tightening through austerity budgets and greater inequality. Acrimonious recent conflicts over pension cutbacks in both France and Germany testify to a developing struggle over the future of the European social model – a phenomenon that the RN and the AfD have happily exploited to promote a politics of welfare chauvinism. Ms Le Pen’s party, for example, has resisted moves to raise the retirement age and has stated that it would target any benefit cuts at foreign residents.

Avoiding a Strategic Advantage for Populists

Across the Atlantic, Mr Trump’s promises to protect working-class interests were largely insincere, as subsequent healthcare reductions and tax breaks for the wealthy underlined. Yet without a compelling progressive alternative from the Harris campaign, they worked on the campaign trail. Without a fundamental change in fiscal policy, social contracts across the continent risk being ripped up. Policymakers must steer clear of handing this political gift to the populist movements already on the march in Europe.