Anti-pluralist Reactions to an Anti-pluralist Party: The 'Alternative for Germany' and the German Party System

Treib, Oliver; Schäfer, Constantin; Schlipphak, Bernd

Abstract

In this chapter, we analyze the case of the German populist radical right party ‘Alternative for Germany’ (AfD) and the reactions of the other German parties and public security authorities towards it. Based on a conceptualization of anti-pluralism that encompasses four sub-dimensions, we conduct a systematic content analysis of the AfD’s 2017 federal election manifesto and AfD MP speeches in the 2019 budget debate in the Bundestag. This analysis shows that the AfD displays a noticeable amount of anti-pluralism in its political communication, predominantly targeting the institutions of pluralist democracy, in particular by calling into question fundamental rights of religious and other minorities. The rest of the German party system reacted to the rise of the AfD with a strategy of isolation, and security authorities targeted the most extremist branches of the party with a strategy of repression. Inadvertently, this has helped the radical forces within the party to assert themselves, moving the AfD further into the direction of a clear threat to democracy. The anti-pluralist reactions thus appear normatively defensible, but it remains questionable how long the isolation strategy towards the AfD can be sustained.