*[Enwl-eng] Far-right poised to score big at next European elections

[ENWL]

      How far will the hard right go?
      In April 2002, France’s far-right Jean-Marie Le Pen won enough votes to reach the second round of the general election, sending shockwaves across France. I was 12 at the time and remember the grave faces in my Breton schoolyard the next day and the anti-Le Pen graffiti in the weeks that followed. For the first time in the history of the presidential televised debate, France's head of state, the conservative Jacques Chirac, refused to debate his opponent so as not to “normalise” his ideas.

      How times have changed – not only in France, but also throughout Europe. Yes, Pedro Sánchez in Spain managed to outsmart Vox through ingenuous electoral manoeuvres in July, and more than 1 million people demonstrated against Poland's PiS party on Sunday. Nevertheless, the picture that political scientists Gilles Ivaldi and Andreu Torner paint in their article shows the far right is on the rise almost everywhere on the continent, as the cordons sanitaires – the agreement that centre-right forces wouldn't make alliances with far-right parties – snap one by one. The latest data, they reveal, carries worrying implications for the next European elections in June.

      The arrival three weeks ago of some 7,000 migrants on the Italian island of Lampedusa is unlikely to help reverse that trend. Who are they? What is driving them to risk their lives on such a perilous journey? And how is the European Commission organising to respond? In her briefing, human rights expert Cristina Churruca Muguruza gives you the lowdown, and more.

      In another poignant exodus, more than 100,000 Armenians have fled Nagorno-Karakabakh to escape what they fear will be ethnic cleansing by Azeibaijani forces. Many in Brussels are wringing their hands over whether they could have done more, while some commentators at the New York Times say this situation was impossible to foresee. Lund University's Svante Lundgren thinks otherwise.

      With climate change, one doesn’t even need to move these days to experience different landscapes – sometimes, this can provoke "solastalgia", the distress brought on by a changing environment. Other times it can be a joyous opportunity to rethink the places closest to us – shopping malls, for example. Once the appendage of suburban life, complete with the family-friendly Renault and the labrador, France's sprawling commercial zones have fallen out of favour for their questionable aesthetics and the high-consumption lifestyle that they represent. The country's articles, however, are calling for modernisation plans to be thought through more carefully.

      And while we’re in a nostalgic mood, this article by a team of psychologists and philologists explores the myriad cognitive benefits of writing by hand.  

      Finally, a British microbiologist gives you her top tips for navigating the buffet and salad bar, and stay healthy.

      - Natalie Sauer, English head of The Conversation France 

       
      From France to Italy, Hungary to Sweden, voting intentions track the rise of the far-right in Europe
      More than a spectre, the latest data shows the far-right is a reality set to bear heavily onto the June 2024 European elections. 

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      Recap What’s happening on Lampedusa – and what Europe needs to do now to manage migration
       Nagorno-Karabakh: the world should have seen this crisis coming – and it's not over yet
       ‘La France moche’: French artists rally to celebrate the country’s much-snubbed commercial zones


      For the curious
        a.. The case for continuing to write by hand
        b.. I’m a microbiologist and here’s what (and where) I never eat

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      From: Natalie at The Conversation 
      Sent: Thursday, October 05, 2023 2:02 PM
      Subject: Far-right poised to score big at next European elections
     
 
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