From Rome’s governing pragmatism to Paris’s succession plan, a transnational right is testing the EU’s centre—country by country, council by council, vote by vote.

By Christmas week, Europe’s capitals are slowing down: parliaments empty, ministerial cars thin out, and the continent’s political class posts carefully framed holiday messages. But in the background, the campaign machinery never really stops. Across the European Union’s largest member states—and in the bloc’s most strategically pivotal democracies—right‑wing forces are entering the run‑up to the 2027 cycle with more money, more media oxygen, and, in several cases, something they long lacked: administrative experience.

The lesson of the past few years is not simply that the right has grown. It is that it has diversified. The old caricature of a single “populist wave” has fractured into a set of national projects that share an instinct—sovereignty first, borders tighter, culture wars louder—while disagreeing about economics, Russia, and what to do with the EU itself.

What makes the coming cycle combustible is timing. The European Parliament has already drifted to the right, offering new parliamentary arithmetic and new leverage over appointments and legislation. Meanwhile, in national capitals, right‑leaning parties are pressing for control of security, migration and budget policy—areas where the EU is weakest when member states pull apart.

PARLIAMENT SHIFT, COUNCIL STRAIN

The European elections reshaped the institutional mood. Pro‑European forces still hold a broad majority, but conservative and far‑right blocs expanded, giving them greater influence and more credible “issue majorities” on migration, climate rollbacks and industrial policy. In Berlin and Brussels, analysts describe the change as a steady normalisation: less a shock takeover than a creeping integration of hard‑right actors into the everyday mechanics of EU decision‑making—through councils, committees and coalition bargaining.

This matters because most of the EU’s hard choices now run through two bottlenecks: money and migration. The first is about fiscal discipline, defence spending and industrial subsidies; the second is about external borders, asylum rules and deals with third countries. Both are arenas where right‑wing parties can extract concessions without ever “owning” Brussels—by influencing their national governments, their commissioners, and their negotiating lines.

ITALY: MELONI’S TWO‑TRACK STRATEGY

Giorgia Meloni arrived in office as the leader of a party with post‑fascist roots and has governed with a studied mix of ideological signalling and technocratic restraint. In Rome, her government has been emphasising fiscal credibility—seeking to meet EU budget expectations while keeping its domestic coalition together. A recent confidence vote on the state budget underscored a larger fact: the Italian right is no longer only a protest movement; it is a government that can survive tough parliamentary tests and still claim it is fighting “Brussels” when it suits.

On migration, Meloni’s model is outward‑facing. She has pushed for tougher external border controls and partnerships with North African states, framing the approach as both humanitarian and strategic: fewer deaths at sea, more control onshore, and more leverage over a policy area that can fracture European solidarity overnight. Her supporters sell this as pragmatic realism. Critics call it outsourcing responsibility. Either way, it is a playbook that other right‑leaning leaders now cite as proof that the EU can be pressed into harder lines without treaty change.

On trade, Italy is also signalling that national producers come first. Rome’s reluctance to back a major EU‑South America trade accord without stronger safeguards for farmers is not unique—France has raised parallel concerns—but it illustrates the wider trend: economic nationalism is being repackaged as “fairness,” and the right is positioning itself as the guardian of local sectors against global competition.

Meloni’s bet is that she can keep the brand of “national conservatism” while behaving, often, like a mainstream leader inside EU rooms. It is a bet that could pay off electorally: the image of competence is the most valuable asset a right‑populist leader can acquire. It is also the source of friction within the broader European right, where some parties want to bargain with the EU and others still want to break it.

FRANCE: LE PEN’S SUCCESSION PLAN AND THE NORMALISATION TEST

In France, the far right’s project looks less like governing pragmatism and more like strategic patience. Marine Le Pen has spent years sanding down the sharpest edges of her movement’s image. Now her party is building a second lane: a younger, more media‑ready standard‑bearer in Jordan Bardella. Recent polling has sent a clear signal to Paris: for the first time, models are showing Bardella as a plausible winner of the next presidential contest, regardless of which mainstream rivals face him.

The key question is not whether National Rally can reach the run‑off. The question is whether the reflex of the “republican front”—the cross‑party mobilisation to block the far right—still functions in a political environment where the centre is weakened, the left is fragmented, and the mainstream right is increasingly tempted to fight on the far right’s terrain.

Two changes are visible. First, National Rally is adopting the managerial vocabulary of the state: public order, efficiency, administrative “reset.” Second, parts of the mainstream right are less willing to treat the far right as untouchable. Even when formal coalitions remain taboo, the rhetorical distance is shrinking. If the “front” collapses, it will not happen with a dramatic announcement; it will happen through fatigue and incremental accommodation.

GERMANY: A STRONGER AfD, A TOUGHER FIREWALL

Germany remains the EU’s economic anchor—and the most consequential test of whether the centre can resist normalising a hard right challenger. The federal election earlier this year produced a sharp surge for the Alternative for Germany (AfD), which became a major national force and dominated large parts of the east, even as the traditional conservatives emerged first.

The immediate effect has been political hardening. More parties reaffirm the so‑called “firewall” against cooperating with the AfD, while simultaneously adopting tougher language on migration and internal security. That tension—rejecting the party but echoing some of its themes—has become familiar across Europe. It can stabilise a system in the short term. Over time, it may also legitimise the far right’s agenda as “common sense,” especially if economic anxiety and social distrust deepen.

Germany’s importance for the European story is institutional as much as electoral. A Berlin that is more cautious, more security‑focused and more migration‑restrictive gives cover to similar policies elsewhere. It also changes coalition dynamics in Brussels, where Germany’s negotiating lines often define the boundaries of what is possible.

POLAND: A NATIONALIST PRESIDENT, A DIVIDED EXECUTIVE

Poland shows another route by which right‑wing influence persists: through the presidency. This year’s presidential race delivered victory to Karol Nawrocki, backed by the nationalist Law and Justice party (PiS), over the pro‑EU candidate aligned with the governing camp.

The presidency carries a veto, shaping the pace—and sometimes the feasibility—of reforms. In Brussels, the broader significance is that Poland’s voice on rule‑of‑law disputes, judicial reforms and migration can become less predictable even when the prime minister’s office remains committed to a pro‑European stance. A divided executive is fertile ground for culture‑war campaigning, and for the argument that national sovereignty is under siege from both domestic opponents and European institutions.

For the European right, Poland offers proof that you do not need to win every institution to wield power. You need veto points. You need courts. You need media ecosystems. And you need a narrative that frames compromise as surrender.

SPAIN: VOX’S GAINS AND THE COALITION DILEMMA

Spain, too, is becoming a proving ground for coalition politics on the right. In a recent snap regional election in Extremadura, Vox doubled its representation, turning itself into the key that can lock or unlock conservative rule—while the governing socialists suffered a heavy loss in a traditional stronghold.

The pattern is familiar across the continent: a mainstream conservative party wins the most seats but falls short of a majority; the far right grows; the left fragments; and the question becomes whether the right governs with far‑right support, risking reputational costs, or stays in limbo, risking paralysis and voter anger.

At the national level, Spain’s politics remain fluid, but the direction is clear. Scandals and polarisation are eroding old loyalties, and Vox has learned how to weaponise immigration, identity and “law and order” while presenting itself as the only party untainted by establishment compromise.

A TRANSNATIONAL TOOLKIT—AND ITS LIMITS

What links these cases is less a shared doctrine than a shared toolkit.

• Migration as the master issue. Even when economies improve, immigration remains the emotional accelerant that turns discontent into mobilisation. The right does not need to “solve” the problem; it needs to keep it politically salient.
• Sovereignty in technical clothing. Trade deals, budget rules and court reforms may sound dry, but they can be framed as battles over who decides—Brussels, judges, “elites,” or “the people.”
• Institutional footholds. From Italy’s executive stability to Poland’s veto points and Germany’s parliamentary prominence, the right is learning the power of procedure.

Yet Europe’s right is not one camp. On Russia and Ukraine, on fiscal policy, and on the future of the euro, the fractures are real. Some leaders want to tame Brussels and use it; others still dream of paralysing it. Some pitch themselves as guardians of welfare; others as champions of tax cuts and deregulation. That diversity makes coordination difficult—but it also broadens the right’s appeal, letting it fit multiple national temperaments.

WHAT THE CENTRE MISSES—AND WHAT IT CAN STILL DO

Centrist parties often respond to the right in two ways: moral condemnation or rhetorical imitation. Neither is enough.

Condemnation, without policy delivery, can look like arrogance. Imitation, without credibility, can look like panic. The centre’s strongest counter is competence married to narrative: showing that borders can be managed without scapegoats, that the green transition can be redesigned without surrender, and that security can be strengthened without eroding liberal rights.

The next cycle will test whether Europe’s political mainstream can modernise fast enough to compete on the terrain the right has chosen: identity, safety, and the feeling that the state has lost control. The far right is no longer simply knocking at the door. In some capitals it already holds the keys. In others, it stands one election away.

As the continent reaches for the calm of the holiday break, one fact remains: the battle for Europe’s future is already underway—and it will be fought not only in grand summits, but in local assemblies, coalition talks, and the mundane legislative votes that decide who governs, and who sets the terms of debate.