A new study shows that right-wing populists have little interest in the climate. You don’t stop to vote in the EU Parliament against the protection. At the front of it, the AfD and Ukip are.
Different courses in terms of climate protection: The Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán (Fidesz), the Italian held the Minister Matteo Salvini (Lega Nord) and the AfD’s lead candidate for the European election, Jörg Meuthen
In the next Europe more right-wing populists are Parliament after the election in may, according to surveys, sit currently. This could not only influence the debate to the issues of Migration and border control in Brussels, but also to climate protection. A new study by the Berlin-based think tank adelphi. This takes a closer look at how the strongest right-wing parties in Europe, in fact, on the question of climate and environmental protection. The scientists have the election programs of the parties, the public Utterances of the party leadership, press releases, and the behavior of the most important votes on climate and energy policy in the European Parliament, examined.
The takeaway: For the most right-wing populists, climate change is either not a major issue – or they do not believe that he exists or is man-made. Two of the three deputies in the EU Parliament from the right-wing populist spectrum of voices, the authors of the study, Alexander Carius, and Stella Schaller, regularly against climate and energy policies. The right-wing populists make up 48 percent is a significant percentage of votes against and votes on the topics of climate and energy. Currently, they hold 15 percent of seats in the EU Parliament.
AfD and UKIP deny climate change
Carius and Schaller have identified with a view to climate protection, three categories of right-wing parties. Seven of the 21 analyzed parties belong to the group of “deniers and skeptics”. They deny scientific findings about the influence of human activities on the climate, or drag them at least in doubt. Including the Austrian government party, the freedom party and the Sweden Democrats. The German AfD and British UKIP deny according to the study, climate change is particularly vehemently by both parties, the Denial of climate change is “a key feature of your profile”. So, the AfD maintains, among other things, close relations to the climate skeptics of the “European Institute for climate & energy”, as the daily mirror reported. A “heresy” called the AfD Deputy Karsten Hilse man-made climate change, at the beginning of the year 2018.
Fidesz is the exception
A second group, the “Cautious”. Eleven parties have, according to the study, either it is not an explicit position on climate change, or measure the issue of little importance. These include the government parties in Poland and Italy, the Lega Nord and the PiS, as well as the Rassemblement National from France.
An exception is the third group, the “Consenting”. Only three parties recognise the danger that climate change poses for the world.In addition to the Finnish nationalists and the National Association of Latvia the authors of the study include the Fidesz, the party of the controversial Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. This has been argued, for example, explicitly for the Paris climate agreement.
Viktor Orbán has signed the Paris climate agreement
The authors of the study make it clear: “Fidesz emphasizes the global nature of the problem, but a national Act for the protection of the climate is weak.”
The arguments against climate protection
Right-wing populists climate protection measures in the EU rejected-Parliament is often, according to the authors, because these are typically multi-way lateral in nature – that is, international cooperation to provide, beyond national borders. Many right-wing populists are set in the face of possible climate protection measures also skeptical because they were worried about the damage to the economy: both the PiS in Poland, as well as the AfD for a continuation of the coal to fight removal. “Brown coal will continue to be for the foreseeable future, indispensable,” wrote the AfD, for example, in your programme for the state election in North Rhine-Westphalia – the home of the hambach forest. The fear that one could be suspended from countries with laxer environmental regulations – such as the USA or China was always part of the election campaign rhetoric of the right wing.
Both in Poland and in Germany, the right-wing populists of PiS and AfD for the brown coal-mining very
In addition, argument by the parties referenced often that climate protection measures constituted an unjustified burden on consumers and workers. Keywords: Higher electricity and gasoline prices, the elimination of Jobs in coal mining. So Marine Le Pen from the extreme right-wing Rassemblement National courts currently have the votes of the so-called yellow the West, in France against the higher taxation of fossil fuels left on the road.
Not all right-wing populists are the protection for all climate measures have always been skeptical, stress the authors of the adelphi study.
Not only black and white
On some issues the opinions of right-wing diverge the most, however, is far. So, when it comes to Renewable energy: The Lega Nord in Italy focuses on the Expansion of renewable energy production. Similarly, the FPÖ holds it in Austria. And France, the chief-right nationalist Marine Le Pen calls to reduce the use of fossil fuels – in order for France “is less dependent on the Gulf States such as Saudi Arabia, which will send us not only your Oil, but also their ideology”. The AfD, however, is against wind farms and mobilised against the Renewable energies law. Criticism of a renewable and sustainable supply of energy based, according to the study on the flawed assumption that they are significantly more expensive than conventional sources.