Far-right parties are on the rise across Europe, and a new generation of young supporters are rising up alongside them.
Surveys on young people’s political preferences show that young voters in Belgium, France, Portugal, Germany and Finland are increasingly turning to parties with anti-immigration, anti-establishment policies.
In both the European and national elections in June, young people showed their support for far-right parties such as Germany’s Alternative for Germany (AfD), France’s Rally for Italy, Spain’s Vox, Portugal’s Brothers of Italy, Belgium’s Vlaams Verão and Finns’ Party.
This is a stark difference from the 2019 EU elections, where young people voted overwhelmingly for the Green Party.
In the 2024 general election, a majority of voters under the age of 30 voted for Reform UK over the Conservative Party.
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England
While the vast majority of young voters supported Labour in the 2024 general election, many young people are thought to have switched to Nigel Farage’s Reform UK Party.
A YouGov poll found that a majority of voters under 30 voted for Reform UK over the Conservatives in July.
The poll of 35,000 voters found that 9.5% of 18-30 year olds supported Nigel Farage’s party, while just 8% voted for the Conservatives.
The survey also suggests that at the time of the election, Reform was the third most popular party among voters under 30, after Labor and the Greens.
Nigel Farage said “something huge” was happening among Gen Z voters who were different to millennials.
“The youth issue is really interesting. There’s something really big going on. Generation Z is totally different to millennials,” Farage said.
“Many members of Gen Z want to be successful. They want to get a good job, buy a house, and do the things their parents and grandparents were able to do.
“In fact, they’re quite frustrated. A lot of the time, it seems like it’s just out of their reach to achieve those things.”
Farage has also garnered support on TikTok, whose mostly Gen Z and millennial users are often seen as a laughing stock.
Mr Farage has 915,500 followers and more than 15.9 million likes on his TikTok account.
During the election campaign, Mr Farage posted a TikTok in which he sang the lyrics to an Eminem rap: “Guess who’s back again?”
The video garnered more than 1 million likes and 17,000 comments, with users praising the candidate’s sense of humor.
Jordan Bardella has made good use of TikTok, garnering over 2 million followers on the platform.
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France
In France, the far-right Rally National party, led by 28-year-old Jordan Bardella, has seen its support grow among Gen Z voters.
An Ifop poll in April found that 32% of 18-25 year-olds would vote for the National Coalition if elections were held the following week.
Much of this support can be attributed to Bardella’s strong presence on TikTok, with polls showing a third of young people relying on the app to follow the campaign.
Le Pen’s successor boasts more than two million followers on the social media platform and has garnered more than 49.2 million “likes.”
However, it is important to note that Bardella is not universally liked: the young MEP emerged as both the second most liked and the second least liked candidate among France’s youngest voters.
Germany
The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party has also used similar social media tactics to gain support among younger voters.
“If you look at TikTok, the AfD’s influence is greater than all other parties combined,” Laura-Christine Krauss, executive director of the German think tank More in Common, said ahead of the European elections.
The “Young Germans” survey also showed a shift in party support among young people aged 14 to 29, with 14.5% saying they would vote for the AfD.
There was also a clear gender divide, with young women leaning more to the left and young men more likely to support right-wing parties.
Finland
The right-wing, anti-immigration Finlands Party came in second in Finland’s 2023 general election with 20% of the vote.
According to an analysis by Åbo Akademi University, the party was the most popular among all age groups except the oldest.
Older voters remained loyal to center parties such as the Social Democrats, the liberal-conservative KOK and the liberal Centre Party.
The researchers noted that, as in Germany, right-wing parties far outnumber other parties among young men, while young women favor left-wing parties and the Greens.
The trend is similar in Belgium, where the anti-immigration, separatist Vlaams Belang party is banking on the young vote.
Alice Weidel (left) and Tino Kruppala, co-chairs of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, react after the European Parliament elections in Berlin.
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So why are young people moving to the right?
Young people around the world are feeling increasingly restless, frustrated and miserable.
According to the 2024 World Happiness Report, a combination of social, economic, technological and environmental pressures is making young people less happy than older generations.
Young people face a tougher path to economic prosperity than previous generations due to rising costs of living and an increasingly competitive job market.
Think Young founder Andrea Gerosa explained that “young people today are less happy than previous generations” due to a “perception that mainstream political parties are failing to solve social problems”.
“Across EU member states, more than seven in 10 are concerned about the cost of living and 82 percent are concerned about the threat of poverty and inequality,” Gerosa said.
This explains “why young people are channelling the same concerns through far-right options,” he said.
Moreover, the policies of some right-wing parties have proven attractive to young voters across Europe.
Marine Le Pen’s 2022 manifesto, for example, promised to abolish tax on under-30s, provide financial support to student workers and increase student housing.
Geert Wilders, leader of the Dutch right-wing Freedom Party, campaigned last year on investment in health care and housing.
Similarly, in Reform UK’s “contract with the people” during the 2024 general election, Farage promised to abolish interest on student loans and raise the income tax threshold to £20,000.
Finally, social media has proven to be an important tool for politicians to communicate directly with younger generations, and many right-wing politicians have made good use of this.
Gerosa explained that the AFG party has managed to “capture the hearts of young voters with its easy-to-understand message” and that the party now “reaches as many young Germans on TikTok as all other political parties combined.”
However, Gerosa stressed that it is too early to label European young people as reactionaries, and that this should instead be seen as “a wake-up call that young people across Europe believe that mainstream parties do not offer enough answers and solutions to their problems”.
