Green parties must decide who and what they stand for

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Europe’s green movement is in a strange position. The effects of global warming are becoming more evident every year, the number of people concerned about climate change is increasing, and climate protests are the backdrop to their daily lives. Yet the Greens suffered a sharp setback in the European elections two months ago: they lost a quarter of their seats in the European Parliament and fell from fourth to sixth place.

In Germany, the Greens have lost massive support and are currently polling at just 10 percent, their lowest support rating in seven years and well behind the far-right AfD. In Britain, the Greens achieved a record high in last month’s general election, winning four seats in the House of Commons after holding just one since 2010. But within weeks, the new MPs were battling accusations of hypocrisy over net-zero policies and trying to overcome internal opposition.

The chart shows that the German Greens are at their lowest level in seven years in the polls, far behind the far-right AfD.

Over the past few decades, Green parties have proven to be good at winning votes when they were not in power. However, when they come into government, their support usually dwindles immediately.

And alongside the mixed election results, the political positions can look a little odd. In Germany, carbon emissions from electricity generation rose sharply in 2022 as Green ministers accelerated nuclear shutdowns. In the UK, just days after the election victory, the Greens’ co-leader was criticized by figures from the wind power industry for opposing new clean energy infrastructure. In the US, too, environmental groups are working hard to block dozens of gigawatts of new solar, offshore wind and power lines on conservation grounds.

Diagram showing that Germany's abrupt exit from nuclear power under the Greens drove up emissions

All of these contradictions have the same root cause: the increasingly diverse nature of green voting coalitions, which now draw support from several quite different groups: older and more conservative environmentalists, younger decarbonization advocates, and deeply progressive protest voters. Taken together, these groups add up to a significant number of votes, but not a lasting coalition.

As long as the Greens are not in power, these dividing lines are blurred; all three segments choose their own idea of what the Greens stand for. As soon as the party is a parliamentary grouping that issues statements and/or becomes active in government, one or more segments realize that the real Greens look very different from their imagined ideal.

This was particularly evident in last month’s UK general election, where British Election Study data shows the Greens received a huge influx of the constituency’s left-most voters, most of whom are Corbyn supporters looking for a new home after leaving Keir Starmer’s moderate Labour Party. In 2019, these hyper-progressives made up one in 10 Green voters; now it’s one in four.

Diagram of the new Greens' coalition: The environmentalists are joined by an influx from the progressive left of the electorate

This new faction caused headaches for co-chair Carla Denyer by attacking her for thanking Joe Biden for withdrawing from the US presidential race. A respectful statement, appropriate for a party seeking to move from fringe protest to a mainstream force, was met with calls for a withdrawal from those hostile to Biden’s support for Israel.

In Germany, the decline in support among young voters is partly attributed to the party’s shift from pacifism to supporting the defense of Ukraine against Russian invasion. Moderate voters are put off by poorly implemented heat pump policies and feel the climate movement has become too radical.

But the biggest contradiction is the repeated declaration of a climate emergency and the subsequent attempts to block new clean energies, leading to fierce power struggles on both sides of the Atlantic.

While the Greens have seen an influx of young “yes in my backyard” voters, their NIMBY counterparts are still outnumbered. In the UK, even on renewable energy, Green voters are more likely to oppose onshore wind farms than Labour or Liberal Democrats. Combined with evidence from local decisions, this shows that Green voters and politicians are less concerned with solving the climate crisis than the mainstream centre-left.

Green parties seem to be caught in a self-limiting cycle: increasing popularity and seizing power reveal contradictions and limit further growth. The Greens are right that we are facing a climate crisis, but unless they decide who they want to represent and what they are willing to do to reduce CO2 emissions, they will be left out while the established parties push for decarbonization.

[email protected], @jburnmurdoch