Guseletov Boris Pavlovich – Sc.D. in Political Sciences, Leading Researcher, IE RAS, Principal Researcher, Head of Political Sciences Department, FNICS RAS
Over the past twenty years, the positions of pan-European institutions have noticeably strengthened in the European Union, including pan-European parties (Europarties), primarily pro-European ones. At the same time, right-wing Eurosceptic Europarties have emerged and strengthened in the political arena of Europe, first moderate, and then radical. These parties regularly participate in the elections of deputies of the European Parliament (European elections), forming their own parliamentary groups based on their results. In the last elections of 2019, the right-wing radical Europarty «Identity and Democracy» (I&D) achieved the best results in all the years of its existence, gaining almost 10% of the votes and forming the fifth largest group in the European Parliament. The moderately Eurosceptic Europarty «European Conservatives and Reformists» (ECR) somewhat worsened its results, due to the fact that representatives of the United Kingdom broke away from it after Brexit. In 2020, the ECR was headed by the leader of the party «Brothers of Italy» G. Meloni, who already in 2022 led her party to victory in the Italian parliamentary elections and headed the country’s government. In 2021, P. Fiala, the leader of the Czech Civic Democratic Party, also a member of the ECR, headed the Czech government. Moreover, the ECR includes the Polish party «Law and Justice», which has been heading the Polish government since 2015. Thus, now the ECR has in its ranks the heads of governments of three countries, and this allows the party to count on improving its results in the European elections in 2024. At the same time, the I&D party in the upcoming European elections is likely to slightly worsen its results, since some of its leading parties – the Bulgarian «Volya», the Italian «League», the Dutch «Party for Freedom» – have somewhat weakened their positions at the national level. The article analyzes the process of formation of these parties and gives a forecast of their results in the next European elections in 2024.
European Union, European parties, European elections, right-wing radicals, European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR), Identity and Democracy (I&D).
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