Meanwhile, others around the world are embracing right-wing populism, from the Britons’ stunning decision to leave the European Union to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist agenda to Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte’s authoritarian policies. Trump’s election has appeared at times to inject fresh energy into the right-wing parties of Europe. As some countries there brace for national elections this year, the prospects for these parties look bright. In France, for example, far-right National Front party leader Marine Le Pen is expected to advance to the second round of balloting in April’s presidential elections; recent polls show her beating scandal-ridden conservative candidate Francois Fillon in the first round. [...]
But despite hysterical headlines claiming that the AfD’s presence augurs a “return of the Nazis,” support has remained tepid at best. In recent elections in Lower Saxony, the party garnered only 7.8 percent, below its stated 10 percent goal and far less than the CDU’s 34 percent. In an election last weekend in the Saarland, the CDU won over 40 percent of votes. The AfD won only 6.2 percent, barely clearing the threshold to take seats in the regional parliament. [...]
And there are stark attitudinal differences between Germany and other Western countries, as reactions to recent terrorist attacks highlight. Whereas French President Francois Hollande stated that “We are at war” and declared a state of emergency in the wake of the 2015 Paris attacks, Merkel’s reaction to the 2016 Berlin Christmas market attack was quiet, calm, and comforting. While Trump used the occasion of the Orlando Pulse massacre to congratulate himself on his own doomsday prognostications, the German people have “refused to panic.” [...]
Germany’s commitment to atonement is most obviously and creatively expressed in its passion for monuments. In 1992, for instance, the German artist Gunter Demnig began laying small stones capped with brass in front of buildings where Jews had lived. These stones are engraved with the names of those who had lived there before being deported and murdered by the Nazi regime. In the decades since, tens of thousands of so-called Stolpersteine have been laid; all manufactured by Demnig, but put in place by various people, they are a common sight in most German cities.
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