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The cordon sanitaire strategy is however becoming increasingly rare in Europe.

In European politics, one specific strategy for dealing with a political party that appears a danger to the wider democratic system is to look to isolate it to make sure it does not advance politically. This process is known as the cordon sanitaire. It’s a strategy that has been applied at local levels, at national levels and across borders within the European Parliament.

In general, it has been applied to right-wing parties that appear to threaten the fabric of liberal democracy. In recent years, the sheer number of populist parties emerging from the right has arguably made such a process redundant.

Yet the recent French election has shown us that the overriding principle behind the cordon sanitaire can still work. The Rassemblement National (NR) topped the poll in the first round of voting but was effectively bumped down to third by tactical voting in the final round.

By strategically forming unlikely voting alliances, a reactionary party can effectively be isolated from power. However, the case of the French election might just be an isolated example of a strategy that is increasingly rare in the current environment.

Cordon sanitaire

Initially, the concept of the cordon sanitaire was used in international relations to understand how a specific balance of power could be applied to keep certain states down. It was especially popularised by the French in the interwar years as a means of containing Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union.

Politically, it was also used after the second world war as a strategy of containing communist parties within western Europe. With the Marshall plan drawn up by the United States to offer economic support to rebuild war-torn economies, the need to isolate communist parties from office was seen as paramount.

As far-right parties began to emerge again by the 1980s, it was seen as apt to isolate them in a similar way to restrict them from gaining a potential footing within political society. As such, it was used in Belgium against the Flemish Vlaams Blok (as it was then) in the early 1990s, when parties signed a pact to exclude it from further coalitions.

Informally, it has been employed in Germany, against Alternative für Deutschland at state levels, against the Swedish Democrats in the national parliament in Sweden and within local councils in England, during the brief success of the British National Party in the first decade of the 21st century. In 2010, the Party of European Socialists in the European Parliament confirmed an agreement among all its members to distance themselves from working with far-right parties

Yet there were also places where the cordon sanitaire was never really taken seriously once a radical-right party gained prominence. The Freedom Party and the Pym Fortuyn List, in Austria and the Netherlands respectively, entered government as soon as they achieved electoral success. In both cases, their ineffective presence within governmental coalitions led to a drop in their support and ultimately provided other parties with an alternative way of dealing with them.

But practically, the sheer numbers of right-wing populist parties on the political scene means that they can no longer be contained. Indeed, it remains increasingly difficult to find a country in Europe where a radical right-wing party of some form does not exist. Even in Ireland—which has often been thought of as the exception—populist independent politicians, such as Mattie McGrath and the Healy-Rae brothers have emerged, alongside an unprecedented number of anti-immigration movements.

Mainstreaming of right-wing ideas

What we have seen instead has been the mainstreaming of not only far-right parties within political society but also of their core beliefs. Ideas around immigration, multiculturalism and on international ‘conspiracies’ that were considered extreme and nonsensical a couple of decades ago are now aired daily within political discourse.

Many right-of-centre parties across Europe have felt compelled to engage with such rhetoric, with powerful elements within some, including Les Républicains in France and the Conservative Party in Britain, looking actively to endorse it. At the same time, the definitions of such parties are constantly altering.

While political scientists have long sought to classify parties into extreme-right, far-right, radical-right, populist-right and right-wing, parties have been quick to distance themselves from such tags. This was seen prominently this year with Richard Tice, chair of Reform UK, who threatened to sue the BBC if it repeated the far-right tag—and won an apology.

The cordon sanitaire is no longer seen in most cases as being a reliable mechanism for isolating far-right parties. But in the case of France, which has long held a tradition of using it against the old Front National, it seems to have worked again against its modern reincarnation, the RN. This is despite the fact that the RN forged a partial alliance with Les Républicains.

On the other hand, it may just be that electorates are getting better at using tactical voting against a particular political party which has blotted its copybook in some way. In the same week that the UK Conservatives were electorally destroyed by tactical voting, the RN was also frozen out of power.

Owen Worth is professor of international politics and head of the Department of Politics and Public Administration at the University of Limerick.

This article was originally published on Social Europe.
Views in this article are author’s own and do not necessarily reflect CGS policy.