Police launch tear gas at right-wing and far-right protesters rallying against the Global Compact for Migration in front of EU headquarters in Brussels, Belgium, Dec. 16, 2018. Ye Pingfan/ Press Association. All rights reserved.
The Estonian Conservative People’s Party (EKRE) polled as the third most popular party throughout 2017 and 2018. Chairman Mart Helme and his son and Vice-Chairman Martin Helme have been reiterating that EKRE is a party with a purely civic profile in its political engagement, without links to militant grass-roots groupings. How close are these allegations to the truth?
Radical right-wing parties and militant groupings: three types of connection
There is a sub-category of radical right-wing parties that represent the consolidation of bottom-up formation processes; spearheaded by a political (frequently semi-paramilitary) nucleus. These parties maintain an identitarian profile, opt for militant patterns of political engagement, and have often been accused of displaying anti-democratic tendencies. This sub-category has been successful in augmenting popularity along the eastern part of the continent and comprises parties such as: Bulgaria’s Ataka, Greece’s Golden Dawn, Slovakia’s ‘Our Slovakia’/Naše Slovensko and Hungary’s Jobbik (at least prior to its recent ‘de-radicalization’ process).
