From Bucharest’s corporate high-rise districts to its crumbling housing blocks, from sleepy suburbs in the flatlands to misty Transylvanian villages where the sheep outnumber voters, and others holding NATO bases and absorbing European Union funds, I crisscrossed my home country of Romania ahead of its May presidential election to speak to voters about the choices they were about to make. What I found was a country gripped by anxiety, suspicion, fear and a growing sense that democracy might be broken — or worse, rigged beyond repair.
“The deep state decided for us.”
“My vote doesn’t matter.”
“Democracy is dead.”
“The vote was stolen.”
“The system doesn’t want change.”
These weren’t fringe conspiracy theorists. These were ordinary voters — bakers, police officers, pensioners, teachers — voicing something between outrage and resignation. And while their words may sound dramatic, the context wasn’t exactly reassuring either.
The first round of elections, held last December, was annulled after then-President Klaus Iohannis dropped a political bomb: classified intelligence files alleging foreign interference in favor of a previously obscure, pro-Russian ultranationalist named Călin Georgescu, who won the first round even though he was polling in single digits.
The Constitutional Court annulled the results based on those documents. What followed was a cascade of accusations from Romanian prosecutors: shady, undeclared campaign financing; antisemitic rants; the glorification of fascist symbols and interwar fascist leaders; and even alleged ties to a failed insurrection attempt (allegedly organized days after the initial election was overturned) involving a mercenary warlord who also financed his campaign.
Before the dust had settled, Georgescu was banned from advancing to the runoff, but not without gaining martyr status among disenfranchised voters.
Authorities said the disqualification was constitutional, a necessary step to safeguard the democratic order. But for many, it felt like confirmation that the game was fixed from the start. First the annulment, now this? A propped-up villain removed just in time for the system’s preferred candidate to win? The plot wrote itself.
And yet, in May, something unexpected happened. Voter turnout surged to a historic 65%, unheard-of in Romania in recent decades. In the end, the centrist Nicușor Dan defeated his extremist rival George Simion, who had taken over as leader of the ultranationalist camp after Georgescu’s disqualification, even though Dan had trailed far behind in the first round. If democracy was dead, I thought, the funeral was very well attended.
So, did Romania’s institutions just save the country from tipping into authoritarianism? Or did they bend democratic principles in order to defend them, undermining trust in the process and paving the way for a bigger extremist surge in the next election cycle?
That debate is still raging in the absence of explanations from the establishment. Over breakfast on election day, Dan told me he was committed to rebuilding trust in Romania’s democracy, starting, he said, by explaining more transparently than his predecessors why the original election was annulled. He added that he was prepared to release additional documents to back it up.
But the issue isn’t particular to Romania. Across Europe, democracies seem to be under pressure from antidemocratic forces on the extreme right. In response to that, governments and courts are increasingly resorting to bans, disqualifications and legal designations in an effort to hold the line and protect democracy.
In Germany, the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) has soared to second place in the country’s polls. But last month, the federal domestic intelligence service officially labeled it a right-wing extremist organization, citing its “ethnicity- and ancestry-based” ideology as incompatible with Germany’s democratic order. In a country still scarred by the legacy of Nazism and the Holocaust, one might think few would consider banning a party that echoes those ideologies an overreaction, yet it seems that may not be the case.
In France, the leader of the far-right National Rally party, Marine Le Pen, was recently convicted of embezzling EU funds and banned from holding public office for five years. Yet her party remains formidable, and its once-toxic ideas are now part of the mainstream conversation.
These events have brought to the surface a central question Europeans have to wrestle with, one that is easy to pose but dangerously hard to answer: Can a democracy exclude antidemocratic actors without becoming less democratic itself? Or, put differently, can a democracy fight fire with fire without burning down the house?
It’s a question that kept circling in my mind after December, as I zigzagged across Romania, notebook in hand, talking to people who’d stopped believing in the very system in which they were still participating. It’s a question that matters, not just here, but across a continent where democracy no longer feels like a given.
The theoretical roots of this debate stretch back to the 1930s, when thinkers like Karl Loewenstein — a German Jewish political scientist who fled the Nazis and coined the term “militant democracy” — were interrogating the political systems that were crumbling across the continent. Liberal regimes, Loewenstein argued, had failed to resist fascism because they were too tolerant of those who sought to destroy them. His solution was a democracy willing to defend itself, even through undemocratic means if necessary.
Loewenstein’s ideas helped shape the postwar democratic order, especially in Germany. The country’s constitution, known as the Basic Law, explicitly allows for political parties to be banned and individual rights to be revoked if they threaten the constitutional system.
In recent years, the concept has been revived by scholars like Jan-Werner Müller, who has said that democracies must not become “complicit in their own destruction.” If a political actor aims to dismantle democracy from within, then excluding them at the gate may be a constitutional duty, not an authoritarian reflex, such scholars say.
But who gets to decide when the threat is serious enough? And can such decisions ever be made without reinforcing the very narratives on which extremist groups thrive?
The European Court of Human Rights has set a high threshold: Bans are only justified when there is an “imminent threat” to the democratic order. The scarcity of successful bans across Europe reflects both moral unease and legal restraint.
Germany remains the model case for militant democracy in practice. In the 1950s, it banned both the Communist Party and a neo-Nazi group. But in 2017, the Constitutional Court declined to outlaw the far-right National Democratic Party (NPD), ruling that while its views were clearly antidemocratic, it posed no actual danger to the state.
That precedent continues to shape the debate around the AfD, a party whose radical turn in recent years is hard to ignore. Once a euroskeptic outfit on the fringes, the AfD now traffics in ethnonationalist rhetoric, conspiracy theories and anti-immigrant agitation. Still, until recently, courts and lawmakers had hesitated to act.
That changed when the Office for the Protection of the Constitution officially designated the AfD a “right-wing extremist” movement. The move enabled state surveillance of the party’s leadership and opened the door to banning specific factions or individuals. Among them is Björn Höcke, a firebrand regional figure known for praising Nazi-era language and aesthetics, who is seen as the “real boss” of Germany’s far right and helped the AfD make important gains in the 2024 elections.
Yet banning the AfD outright remains a “nuclear” option, fraught with risk. Critics warn it could backfire. Past attempts to strip individuals of political rights under Article 18 of the Basic Law have largely failed. Within hours of the designation, AfD leaders began spinning it as confirmation of state repression.
Meanwhile, the party’s ideology continues to seep into the mainstream. It has started forging ties with conservative groups at the local level, steadily eroding the once-firm cordon sanitaire that kept the far right isolated.
France has taken a different approach. Rather than banning Marine Le Pen or her party over potentially unconstitutional views, authorities have focused on prosecuting illegal conduct. Le Pen herself has faced multiple legal challenges, including a conviction for misusing public funds, but, so far, none of them has dented her party’s momentum.
If anything, the National Rally party has only grown stronger, fueling a sense of victimization and outrage among supporters, which the party is leveraging politically.
It is now leading in the polls as France’s most popular political force ahead of the 2027 presidential election, with Le Pen’s successor Jordan Bardella as the likely candidate. Much like in Romania, mistrust of the legal system and the martyrization of the two candidates have only bolstered their support.
The French state’s approach has been to isolate the far right symbolically while allowing it to operate within the democratic system. But this strategy has not prevented the normalization of its rhetoric. From immigration to national identity, far-right talking points have crept into the language of mainstream parties, especially under President Emmanuel Macron’s government.
In Romania, where democratic institutions are younger and more fragile, the response to extremism has been arguably more dangerous. The disqualification of Georgescu, justified by the state as a measure to protect constitutional values, has instead struck many as a power grab.
Georgeta, a 38-year-old mother I met at a playground in a quiet Transylvanian town, told me ahead of the second round of Romania’s repeat election that she planned to vote for Simion solely because he had promised to make Georgescu prime minister.
“He’s the real chosen one,” she said. For many like her, the May vote felt like a final chance to propel a man who had openly espoused fascist and antisemitic rhetoric into a position of power in a new Romania.
The far-right Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR) moved quickly to seize the moment. Its leader, Simion, ran for president and came close to winning, campaigning because of that promise, one that confirmed to people that his future premier was the president the people wanted but the system wouldn’t allow to run.
Simion exploited this frustration, turning the repeat election into a referendum on the system itself, as well as the political establishment that has, for over 35 years, failed Romanians through incompetence and shifting alliances between right and left, breeding a pervasive distrust of a political class and traditional parties that have consistently governed poorly and fallen short on delivery.
The impact has been immediate and stark. AUR has surged to become Romania’s second-largest political force. Institutions like the intelligence services and the Constitutional Court, tasked with defending democracy, are now viewed with deep suspicion.
Once hailed as a model of democratic transition thanks to its economic growth, and as an example for Balkan countries in fighting corruption, Romania has slipped in international democratic rankings, recently downgraded to a “hybrid regime” by the Economist Intelligence Unit’s 2024 Democracy Index.
Unlike Germany or France, Romania lacks clear legal frameworks for excluding antidemocratic actors. Its judiciary is widely seen as politicized and decisions like Georgescu’s ban are often made behind closed doors, with little transparency or public explanation. Measures meant to defend democracy are, increasingly, perceived as attacks on it.
Yet even when democratic exclusion is legally justified and carefully explained, it doesn’t always land as legitimate in the eyes of the public. In France, Le Pen’s recent conviction for embezzling 3 million euros of EU funds was backed by a thorough investigation and a detailed judicial explanation. The judge took care to lay out the reasoning, point by point.
And yet, for many of Le Pen’s supporters, the decision only confirmed a long-held belief that the French state is rigged against political outsiders. The fact that the ban was handed down before Le Pen’s appeal process was exhausted only fed the narrative that France is slipping into authoritarianism. What was meant as a legitimate conviction for a serious abuse of public funds became, for a sizable part of the electorate, further evidence of a conspiracy.
Germany’s legal framework for banning extremist parties is arguably the most sophisticated in Europe, rooted in postwar constitutional design. But while the law permits exclusion, it demands hard proof that a party is actively working to dismantle the democratic state. That evidentiary threshold is high and, in practice, has so far proven insurmountable.
Even now, with the AfD officially labeled a right-wing extremist group by Germany’s domestic intelligence agency, the path to banning the party remains murky. State authorities may surveil or sanction individuals, but the party as a whole continues to thrive in polls, gaining ground even in regions with strong democratic traditions.
In both cases, what emerges is a deeper problem: Exclusion may only work if it is not just procedurally sound but also perceived as legitimate by the public. That perception hinges on trust in judges, institutions and the rules of the democratic game. In Romania, the judiciary failed to explain clearly why it struck down Georgescu’s candidacy, leaving voters to fill in the gaps with speculation and suspicion. Years of elite impunity, pandemic mismanagement and political polarization have chipped away at public faith. The deeper issue is not just who gets excluded but how exclusion is communicated and whether democratic institutions still have the moral authority to draw the line.
The urge to sideline extremists is understandable and, in some cases, necessary. But the line between safeguarding democracy and undermining it is perilously thin. Germany’s cautious approach has preserved institutional legitimacy but may have allowed the far right to grow unchecked. France has contained the fringes but not the ideas. Romania’s hard-line tactics have only inflamed rage against the system.
Each country offers a different answer to the same unsettling question: Can a democracy neutralize its enemies without playing into their narrative?
The far right does not rise in a vacuum. Its appeal is fed by inequality, corruption, mistrust and the somewhat true belief that elites govern only for themselves. In the end, European voters broadly want decent wages, an economy that works for all and political representation. Any strategy of exclusion must go hand in hand with democratic renewal.
That is why President Dan in Romania and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz face some of the toughest jobs in Europe right now. Both carry the heavy mandate not only to reform and steer their economies back on course but also to restore voters’ faith in their states, to convince citizens that democracy serves them, not just a privileged few, and prevent voters from being seduced by the extremes.
These moments may be among the last real chances for centrists to turn things around. And those chances are growing slimmer by the day, as far-right parties hold government positions in Italy, Finland, Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia and the Czech Republic.
In Sweden, the government depends on the nationalist Sweden Democrats, who also make up the country’s second party. Meanwhile, in the Netherlands, Geert Wilders, known for his anti-Islam stance, struck a deal in May to form the most right-wing government in the country’s recent history, but has now walked away after disagreements on immigration policy, stating his intention to win more seats and return as prime minister.
To protect democracies, Europe’s new leaders will have to root out corruption while making institutions more transparent and taking on the role of civic educators who explain controversial decisions and, most importantly, address the root causes of people’s frustrations — the cost of living, wages, public services. The task will also mean ensuring that when courts ban candidates, they do so publicly, clearly and in line with the rule of law. Finally, it will mean engaging voters directly, not dismissing them as dupes or “deplorables,” but listening to the grievances that drive them to the political fringe.
European democracies have been trying to defend themselves, but in doing so they might become what they claim to resist. The real test is not to stop extremism, but to prove that democracy still works.
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