Twenty-First Century Populism: The Spectre of Western European ...

134 Twenty-First Century Populism
leader. Significantly, no such charismatic figures had emerged until very
recently.
The prospects for left-wing populism seem rosier by comparison, since it
possesses at least three advantages over its counterpart on the Right. First, it
benefits from the charismatic qualities and talents of its two chief matadors,
Gregor Gysi and Oskar Lafontaine. Second, through the PDS, which is firmly
rooted in eastern German society and has an excellent organizational network,
it possesses the resources needed to compete successfully with other
parties and to cope with the probable imminent retirement of Gysi and
Lafontaine. Third, it does not suffer to the same extent from the problem of
stigmatization. Although the PDS is still burdened by its GDR past and the
suspicion of extremism, these factors are no longer powerful enough to do
lasting damage to the legitimacy of a party that has the support of almost a
third of all voters in eastern Germany. This hypothesis is made all the more
valid by the fact that the PDS seems to be second to none in its ideological
opposition to right-wing extremism. Because it is immune in every respect
to any suspicion of fascism, The Left Party can afford, at little risk to itself,
to engage in vote-catching by addressing issues and resorting to methods
that are normally associated with right-wing populism.
As the PDS has demonstrated in the Länder of eastern Germany, a pragmatic
policy of power-sharing can indeed be pursued without the need to
sacrifice populist appeal. Such a tightrope walk presupposes, however, that
the party remains in opposition in the Bundestag. If it were to become part
of a national governing coalition, it would no longer be able to adhere to its
present line and would probably then have to back down from the positions
to which it owes much of its populist magnetism. In that scenario, along
with the Social Democrats, the parties of the Right that have hitherto been
marginalized could then reap a rich harvest.