[Interview] ‘The AfD knows how to sell emotions’, German economist warns far-right voters will be the first to suffer in Saxony-Anhalt

“Those who vote for populists are often precisely the people who will ultimately suffer the most under a populist government,” Reint Gropp, an economist at the Halle Institute for Economic Research, said, explaining what the rise of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) could bring to Germany.

In Saxony-Anhalt state elections will take place on Sunday (6 September). And they are likely to be unprecedented. The far-right AfD, which Saxony-Anhalt’s domestic intelligence service has classified as demonstrably far-right extremist, could govern in a German federal state for the first time since World War II.

At demonstrations both for and against AfD, we met many people concerned about the cost of living. How would you assess it in Germany, and particularly in Saxony-Anhalt?

The German economy has been stagnating for some time. Some data were recently revised and the situation is slightly better than previously thought, but the economy is still stagnating.

There are several reasons. One is simply the broader economic environment … Tariffs are not helping either.

But there are also domestic reasons. The biggest is a certain inability to implement reforms. Germany has undertaken virtually no truly significant economic reform for 20 years.

No pension reform, no income-tax reform. Climate policy has been highly chaotic. Germany’s economy is structurally under-reformed, which means it cannot respond as effectively to shocks as they arise, nor adopt new technologies quickly enough.

There is a lack of new companies entering the market. And when it comes to breakthrough technologies.

Germany essentially improved its products a little each year. It did this better than other countries, and then sold those products to China, so that Chinese people could sit in traffic jams in BMWs with 500-horsepower engines.

But Chinese consumers no longer want 500-horsepower BMWs, because they are buying their own electric cars. The German economy has therefore lost its business model. As it is so rigid, it is taking a long time to adapt to these new developments.

Is Saxony-Anhalt in any way distinctive compared with the rest of Germany?

When you look at its economic development, it is not all that different. It remains much poorer than, for example, Baden-Württemberg or Bavaria, but it has not developed any more poorly than other parts of the country.

One of them is that Saxony-Anhalt’s main industry is chemicals, which has been hit particularly hard by the current shocks. It is highly energy-intensive, so carbon costs have a major impact on it. It is also a highly interconnected industry, one company produces a chemical, another chemical is then created as a by-product, which is used by another company, and so on. It is like dominoes.

The government is therefore very concerned that if one domino falls, the entire sector will collapse.

Saxony-Anhalt’s second specific problem is its geography. Brandenburg has Berlin at its centre, which has an enormous influence on it. Saxony has two relatively large cities, Dresden and Leipzig. They are developing very well and generating many new jobs. But Saxony-Anhalt does not have that.

It is not, but people think so, especially in other parts of Germany. They would rather go to Leipzig than Halle.

People in virtually no country are ever entirely satisfied with their salaries or pensions, which is also a major issue among AfD voters. As an expert on the subject, could you assess what the situation is really like? What is life like for people here?

One of the surprising and interesting aspects of this populist vote for AfD is that, if you look at Saxony-Anhalt’s economic development, it has been very positive.

Twenty-five years ago, unemployment stood at 20 percent or even higher. Today, we effectively have full employment.

If you look at the cities, their reputation may not be good, but life here is actually pleasant. Yet as the economic situation has improved, the share of votes for populist parties has also risen.

No. We examined it systematically and found that people’s own economic situation can explain only a very small part of their voting behaviour.

Of the roughly 40 percent that AfD currently has in the polls, we can explain only two percentage points through economic circumstances.

An important factor is that people here vote for populists. You have the same problem in the Czech Republic, in Poland, Hungary, France and Italy. Look at Trump, too. This is not an East German phenomenon.

We need to consider why people in industrialised countries are suddenly voting for populist parties everywhere. One explanation has to do with where people get their information.

If you get information exclusively from social media and do not use traditional media at all, the likelihood that you will vote for a populist party is dramatically higher.

It explains much more than your own economic circumstances. People have this outlook: “I am actually doing well, but the world around me is going to hell.”

That, in turn, is linked to algorithms, polarisation and [filter] bubbles. Once you watch a video claiming that the earth is actually flat, you will start being shown more and more videos claiming that the earth is flat. At some point, you genuinely come to believe that everyone believes it.

It is the same with politics, you receive videos saying that refugees are treated far better than Germans, and this then becomes the basis for your decision to vote for AfD.

Reint Gropp is a German economist, president of the Halle Institute for Economic Research and professor of economics at Otto-von-Guericke University Magdeburg .

Anastasiia Furman is a reporter for Deník N based in Prague. She covers developments in the European Union, its member states, and EU enlargement. She also writes about the United States and the Western Balkans, a region that has captivated her, likely once and for all. She studied law in Kyiv, Ukraine, and journalism and international relations in Brno, Czech republic.

Tomáš Linhart is a journalist at Deník N since 2020, who got his start as an editor for the O2 Sport website, completed the trainee program at Czech Radio. He has lived in England, Austria, and Germany, and studied North American Studies and Journalism at the Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University in Prague.