What happened in the Dutch parliamentary elections (the Netherlands) at the end of the month doesn’t worry anyone in Bucharest, but the message coming from there is a powerful one and will have an impact in the near future and in Romania.
It is paradoxical that no political party in the country promotes an anti-European message, not even AUR, an extremist party manipulated by Russia. The public opinion does not support leaving the EU, although Moscow’s influence networks operating in the country have intensively promoted, in recent years, the idea of a RO-Exit, modeled after Brexit, but it did not catch on.
Despite the public support for EU and NATO membership, it is amazing how little attention politicians in the country pay to what is happening on the continent and in the Western world, the effects of a political movement, a major debate, or prevailing opinions.
In Romania, parties and their leaders practice a delayed mimicry. They adopt one doctrine or another only if it has become dominant in a major political market, such as the USA, the UK, France, and to a lesser extent Germany, Hungary, etc.
Rejection of progressivism
It was comical how, overnight, about a year ago, all political parties in our country, to a greater or lesser extent, became Trumpist, MAGA, conservative, nationalist, following Donald Trump's victory in the American elections.
There were opportunistic politicians, for example - Victor Ponta, who traveled to the USA, to Mar-a-Lago, the private residence of the American president, to show their attachment to the new US leader and to MAGA.
Furthermore, Sorin Grindeanu, the leader of the PSD, a party presenting itself as left-wing, although it has less and less connection to social democracy, proposed removing the word "progressive" from the party's statute, a term that characterized the party's political vision, associated with societal development, and which has been emphasized over time.
"Today, at the National Political Council meeting of the Social Democratic Party, I proposed an essential change to the Party's Statute, which clarifies our identity and doctrinal direction. We have given up the idea of a progressive party, because the definition adopted in the 2000s no longer has any connection to what it represents today," announced Sorin Grindeanu, at the National Political Council, in mid-October.
In other words, because this term has been distorted in political confrontation, becoming a negative label following the campaigns led by Donald Trump, the PSD leadership surrendered and turned progress into regress.
A small change in Europe announcing a bigger one
Action and reaction are observable in politics as well, not just terms of a Newtonian principle. An extreme ideological movement will produce one of equal intensity, but opposite.
In the shadow of the themes proposed in the last decade by extreme left-wing ideologies - from toppling statues, censoring books, rewriting history, films, and to excessive actions around sexual minorities that have intimidated religious individuals - a conservative reaction has emerged sweeping the Western world, causing the proliferation of right-wing political extremism, limiting and banning fundamental rights, corruption, authoritarianism, and bloody military conflicts.
In the Netherlands, D66, a centrist, social-liberal political party, obtained the same number of seats in Parliament, 26, as Wilders' far-right party, the major winner two years ago.
The resurgence of centrist parties, both left and right, indicates a significant change in European voters' preferences.
The failure of far-right policies in countries where they have come to power, either alone or in coalitions, will ultimately lead to a reduction of populism, with increasing pressure from Western voters on governments to solve concrete problems - housing affordability, food price reduction, easier access to healthcare, lower education costs for children, wage increases, job creation.
An unnoticed signal
Over the past decade, leveraging the opportunities offered by social networks, politicians have managed to launch a series of false debates, shift public attention to marginal issues with the potential to create interest and tension, thereby hiding the real problems faced by people - societal polarization, corruption, and declining quality of life.
Slowly but surely, the magic of instant communication, scandalous video clips just a click away, conspiracy theories, and false information have been internalized in society, with more and more people beginning to realize the danger of populism and the toxicity of social networks.
Change will not come overnight. There will still be many extreme positions, but incidents like the one that occurred in the Netherlands will also happen in other European countries.
It would not be surprising if while the PSD struggles with progressivism in its statute, somewhere in Romania, a left-wing party, massively supported by young people who no longer identify with their parents' politics, makes waves in the parliamentary elections of 2028.
What Nicu Ștefănuță achieved in last year's European elections, a rare victory as an independent, besides being a big surprise, also signaled that the center-left part of the political spectrum is completely exposed.
Turning away from MAGA
Donald Trump has reached a public approval rating below 40%, the lowest for an American president within less than 300 days in office.
So, all those who rushed to grovel at his feet and adopt his political ideas in the near future will not know how to distance themselves more quickly from everything related to Trump and MAGA. This phenomenon will also apply in Romania.
It would be an encouraging sign if Romanian political leaders no longer gaped at all the populists in the world, trying to find shortcuts to power and new ways to deceive voters, but instead listened to what people are saying, trying to deliver, to some extent, something useful to society, to solve problems, not to create new ones.