The Rise of the AfD in Germany: a threat to democracy?

Germany’s far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) has made significant electoral gains, and Saxony-Anhalt could become the first German state to be governed by the party.

In this talk, Dr Michael Kranert will trace the AfD’s development since its foundation in 2013 from a right-wing, national-conservative party to one increasingly shaped by ethnic nationalism. He will explore the party’s links with the wider, non-parliamentary “New Right” and explain how its thinkers developed strategies for building support and winning political power. The talk will also examine the debate in Germany over whether the AfD should be banned as unconstitutional, together with the legal and political obstacles to such a step.

This talk will be in English.

Dr Michael Kranert is an Associate Professor at Southampton University. Department of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics. He is a linguist interested in comparative discourse analysis in English and German speaking countries. He has published on the discourses of New Labour and the German SPD at the turn of the twenty-first century.