How the AfD wants to consolidate its power through institutions

This has happened before in Thuringia: the Nazis bring in administration, education and culture. Years before Hitler came to power, Thuringia had become a playground for the right-wing scene throughout the Reich. On January 23, 1930, the NSDAP became serious. She successfully sent her Wilhelm Frick cadre into the race as minister for the key departments of the interior and public education. The first National Socialist minister could move into a state government.

Volker Ullrich wrote “Without a fire wall” in the weekly newspaper The hour in July a history page about the events of that time. He told how the Social Democrats had warned in vain of a “high traitor as a constitutional minister”: With the election of Frick in the Weimar state parliament session, today would be “a day of shame political and cultural for Thuringia,” they said. warning But the claim was rejected by the bourgeois parties. Hitler, then, was not interested in getting involved in the government of a state, “but in showing how one could gain influence over a high official from within.” ” The NSDAP Gauleiter in Berlin, Joseph Goebbels, said: “We will give the first example. “

And so should history repeat itself? In Thuringia, one of the AfD’s most important strongholds led by far-right extremist Björn Höcke, where a new state parliament will be elected in September?

History repeats itself
Lawyer Maximilian Steinbeis says this is simply absurd Constitution blog in his book published at the end of July The vulnerable democracy. Strategies against populist takeovers. He says it’s not about “content” that could be used to engage right-wing radicals, or the “wishes” of “concerned citizens” or anyone else: “It’s about a strategy aimed at creating an authoritarian. To establish a regime. ”Nobody fighting for authoritarian rule today needs to risk a military coup or a coup. “It is much more effective and less risky to use the institutions of liberal democracy themselves for this purpose. That is what the authoritarian populists are doing, all over the world and with tremendous success in Germany as well. “

How resilient is democracy to such a takeover? In June, political scientist Wolfgang Merkel wrote an essay for the magazine published by the Federal Agency for Civic Education From contemporary politics and history a question of the effectiveness of governments and the strengthening of parliaments. For future emergency policy, political decisions must remain more closely connected to basic rights and basic democratic norms – unlike the Corona crisis, for example. And: It is not just because of the superiority of democracy that it opposes authoritarian forms of government, “but, in the near future, it will largely depend on the performance of governments.” “

Better government, strengthened parliaments – but won’t much more be needed? The Steinbeis constitutional blog did this almost a year ago Thuringia project they began to study what happens when authoritarian-populist parties get hold of state power. This could be a mayor, a district administrator, a state government accepted by the AfD or one in which right-wing extremists hold offices or even represent the prime minister.

What will happen if the AfD gains power?
Steinbeis says that even when they are opposed, authoritarian populists can use their minority and participation rights to advance their strategy. Local administration, ministerial bureaucracy, security apparatus and judiciary could use them for their own purposes. Awareness of these dangers must begin now at the latest so that the Democrats are not taken by surprise and face a fait accompli: “As soon as they have found out what ‘go here, perhaps alone, it is often too late. And the federal government will not always be able to intervene in a country that is bordering on authoritarianism.

How authoritarian-populist governments move their march through the institutions is clearly visible in Poland and Hungary, for example. The examples there impressively show that the judges are often their first attack, says Jannik Jaschinski, research assistant at the Thuringia Project. Measures that the AfD-led Ministry of Justice could use to legally undermine the independent judiciary and often even without changing the law were often still under the radar. “He decides, for example, who will be appointed as a trial judge. Top ratings can help judges close to the party get promotions.” In addition, a right-wing government could also take advantage of an impending wave of retirements in the judiciary. “Even if members of the judiciary are fundamentally aware of the importance of their independence, it is important to identify and anticipate these legal gates,” says Jaschinski.

Attack the democratic media
The attacks on public broadcasting (ÖRR) that the AfD threatens are almost as dangerous. The party sees it as an instrument of “indoctrination and propaganda”, the broadcasting tax as a “compulsory contribution”, and puts the programs under constant fire – although opposition politicians are offered a platform their right-hand men again in television talk shows. , For example.

AfD Thuringia leader Höcke has already announced that he will end the state media contract. That would be legally possible. However, it would not be the end of the MDR just yet. The heart of Höcke’s plan is that he had to find a legally binding alternative for Thuringia that meets the requirements of more than 60 years of broadcast jurisprudence by the Federal Constitutional Court. A type of state radio controlled by the AfD would not be possible without further ado. AfD’s goal remains: “many unnecessary programs” should be canceled and in the end some form of “basic radio” should remain.

Claudia Maicher, a media politician for the Green Party in the English state parliament, sees similar attacks from the right on the ÖRR in Saxony and Thuringia. In their state as well, the AfD is selling the fight against the MDR as a key issue in the state election campaign. “Even if its goals of abolishing the broadcasting tax and the dual broadcasting system cannot be implemented due to constitutional safeguards, any participation by the AfD in political power would be fatal.” Because even smaller steps would be enough to permanently weaken the ÖRR. She urgently advises that democratic parties do not participate in the propaganda against public broadcasting or even collaborate with the AfD in parliament. The Constitution Blog also emphasizes: “Anti-democratic currents work cunningly and try to remove democratic institutions from within using democratic methods.”

In his book published in February The longer we remain silent, the more courage we need. Just how dangerous the AfD is Hendrik Cremer from the German Institute for Human Rights encourages to be vigilant in the institutions themselves. “AfD- Politicians call Muslim women’s scarf girls or call the Nazis a “shit bird in thousands of years of history.”

The AfD accused the chief executive of breaching the duty of neutrality. Cremer defends the police chief against attempts at intimidation: indeed there is a legal requirement for political moderation and party-political independence for civil servants. “However: These commandments are by no means to be understood in absolute terms.” Cremer even sees representatives of state institutions as having a constitutional duty to stand up for the basic free, democratic order.

Nevertheless: Although the AfD is growing and, according to all surveys, it will come first in the elections in Brandenburg, Saxony and Thuringia, it seems that the state institutions in defect when it comes to dealing with the party.

A difficult balancing act
Another example of this: In the spring, the Federal Employment Agency (BA) sent the internal brochure to their managers Dealing professionally with hostile positions in the workplace. The paper may have been created in the face of AfD’s electoral success. There is also mention of “individual regional associations” of the AfD, which are identified by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution as decidedly right-wing extremists, but only among many of other groups, together with left-wing extremists, Islamists, partisans. conspiracy thinkers and ideologues. And BA CEO Andrea Nahles acknowledges the balancing act right in the introduction: On the one hand, the Federal Agency, as “a supporting pillar of the German welfare state,” is responsible for standing up for democracy strong However, he is also “committed to state neutrality”.

Regarding lessons from the Nazi attack on education policy in Thuringia in 1930: Former history teacher Hessian Höcke announced months ago that his party wanted to free schools from the “ideology” of inclusion and mainstreaming. gender streaming. He accused the Conference of Ministers of Education and Cultural Affairs (KMK) of trying to “harmonize state education policies”.

It is now not unrealistic that Höcke’s AfD will influence education policy throughout the country through a division of power. Until now, the principle of unanimity has applied to all important issues in the KMK, meaning that a culture minister at the mercy of the AfD could block key projects.

When the KMK met for its plenary session in Völklingen, Saarland, in June, the response was still muted. The assembled ministers did not want “Lex AfD”. And although there were strong proposals to move away from the principle of unanimity on the table, they did not get a majority in the end. The majority voted for a compromise formula, according to which a structural commission should “make recommendations for planning possible majority decisions or other procedural paths”. At least the abolition of the rule according to which a federal state would withdraw from the KMK ended. But just one person close to the AfD at the head of the culture ministry would still be enough to cancel votes. In the end, the Höcke AfD could keep the brown traditions of the Minister of Education of the NSDAP, who was appointed in 1930, again in Thuringia.