Germany’s SPD is not alone – social democracy is in crisis across Europe. As Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour understands,we need a complete rupture with the neoliberal model‘Some of us are beginning to deem it is the end of the project.” That was how a senior European social democrat spoke to me of the future of mainstream socialism last week. The German SPD’s abject failure in Sunday’s election will have done runt to lift the gloom. After 12 years of playing sidekick to Angela Merkel, it will go into opposition, or bereft of a strategy and rightly worried approximately the breakthrough of the far right Alternative for Germany (AfD).whether the leaders of German social democracy are feeling responsible for their own collapse and the far-right’s gain,they can at least engage consolation that they are not alone. The French socialist party evaporated in the run-up to this year’s presidential election; the Dutch Labour party saw its vote slump to 5.7%; and the Austrian socialist party is facing defeat in next month’s election – which will likely bring to power the first coalition of mainstream conservatives and neo-fascists in the EU.
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Source: theguardian.com