In 2024, hundreds of thousands of Germans took to the streets to protest a meeting by far-right activists, in which they openly discussed a plan to deport migrants from Germany. Many of those who attended the meeting were members of the German far-right party Alternative für Deutschland—“Alternative for Germany,” or AfD—, thus the protest took on an explicitly anti-AfD mood. Protestors called for the investigation or ban of the AfD, chanting anti-fascist slogans, one of which was “Wir sind die Brandmauer,” meaning "we are the firewall.”

It was a call to strengthen the “firewall,” Germany's sociopolitical principle against the far-right that bars political parties from cooperating with far-right parties in any capacity [1]. But is it working? The firewall has weakened immensely, failing to stop the AfD's growth over the past decade. If Germany is serious about fighting this far-right surge, it must look beyond the firewall and toward more proactive and aggressive solutions to stop the AfD.

Background

Since its inception in 2013, the German far-right party AfD has risen to stunning heights. It has become Germany’s second-largest party in the Bundestag, the nation’s parliament, cementing itself as the chief opposition party against Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s grand coalition government. The AfD tripled its seat count in local elections in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, and is aiming to take control of two state governments in this year’s state elections [2]. In preliminary polling for the next German federal election, the AfD is practically tied with the incumbent center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) for first place [3]. The AfD’s rise is primarily linked to anti-immigrant sentiment stemming from the 2015 migrant crisis, though status quo dissatisfaction and poor economic conditions have also contributed to their rise [4].

In May 2025, Germany’s domestic intelligence agency designated the AfD as an “extreme-right” organization, three months after its second-place victory in the federal election that year [5]. Beginning in 2015, the AfD took a hard-right turn from its initial broad-based Eurosceptic origins. The party has faced controversy for its association with Pegida, an Islamophobic and anti-immigration organization, and the party has co-opted Nazi slogans for campaign purposes. In the last federal election, the AfD ran with the slogan “Alice für Deutschland”, a play on the phrase “alles für Deutschland”, associated with the paramilitary organization that contributed to the Nazis’ rise to power, with the party’s leader, Alice Weidel. Other members, such as Thuringia AfD chair Bjorn Höcke, have explicitly professed anti-Semitic, neo-Nazi, and historically negationist ideas. 

The Erosion of the Firewall

The AfD’s rapid ascension has caused great concern for Germany, a nation shaped by the memory of far-right extremism. Vigilant not to repeat the mistakes of the past, German politicians came to an informal consensus after World War II, resulting in the creation of the firewall. In the past, it was successful, with German politicians shunning the far-right National Democratic Party (NDP) and Die Republikaner; neither party was strong enough to reach the 5 percent electoral threshold necessary for federal representation. But the firewall was never put into serious use until the 2017 federal election, when, for the first time, the AfD breached the threshold and became the third largest party and the first far-right party to sit in the Bundestag. 

The vulnerability of the firewall isn't at the federal level, but rather at the local and state level, where the AfD maintains a major presence on a number of East German state assemblies, including Brandenburg and Saxony, and on city councils, such as in Rostock in Mecklenburg. In some instances, the AfD controls a plurality of seats, as is the case in Thuringia. This makes non-cooperation a non-starter below the federal level, and many parties have chosen a path of toleration. A study by Wolfgang Schroeder at WZB identified 300 cases of cooperation between 2019 and 2024; of the 300, nearly 19 percent of AfD government motions received support or strong support from other parties [6]. Cooperation at the local level legitimizes the AfD as a democratic participant despite their anti-democratic impulses, thereby bypassing the firewall and the social ostracism that comes with it. 

The erosion of the firewall at the local level complicates the firewall at the federal level, which, for all intents and purposes, has held up well. The only major breach of the firewall was in January 2025, when Merz, then the opposition leader, managed to pass a non-binding resolution committed to curbing migration with votes from the AfD, only to receive nationwide condemnation and for his later, more formal bill to fail days later [7]. Since then, Merz has opposed cooperation with the AfD at all levels. But even if the firewall holds up at the federal level, the slow acceptance of the AfD at the local level only serves to undermine the principle of non-cooperation. Leaders of the state branches of the CDU in eastern Germany have begun to publicly question the firewall, suggesting "tacit collaboration" with the AfD [8]. As the AfD continues to gain steam and find greater electoral success at the state level, where their voice is recognized and legitimized, mainstream parties at the federal level will find it more difficult to stay united against the AfD, let alone stay united amongst themselves. 

There are two major problems with the firewall. First, excluding a party from the democratic process radicalizes it. It drives the incentive for total control and anti-democratic sentiment among supporters of the excluded party. Second, the firewall produces inchoate politics. When the AfD becomes dominant, coalition formation becomes difficult, leading to unstable coalition governments. Even if you remove a party with a major plurality of seats from coalition negotiations, which in itself presents a hurdle to forming a government, there is far too much ideological variation amongst the non-extremist parties. The previous government, a center-left coalition led by the Social Democratic Party and joined by the Greens and the FDP, collapsed due to irreconcilable differences amongst the parties over fundamental beliefs, especially regarding the size and role of government [9]. The CDU has outright refused to govern with the left-wing Die Linke, and others in the party find the populist left Bündnis Sahra Wageknecht (BSW) similarly unpalatable [10]. A broad, anti-AfD coalition may be unable to govern effectively and, in turn, weaken trust in the democratic process, creating an environment where the AfD’s democracy-skeptic views flourish. 

Other Potential Strategies

Beyond the firewall, what can be done about the AfD? One of the most persistent proposals against the AfD has been to ban it outright. Germany’s constitution allows the state to ban parties that are deemed subversive to the democratic order. As of 2026, two parties, a Nazi revival party and the Communist Party, have been banned. The AfD is already classified as an extreme-right party by the courts, and the matter has been brought to debate in the Bundestag before. The problem with a party ban is that it is difficult to obtain. Banning a party requires the constitutional courts to find that first, the party is professing anti-democratic viewpoints and goals, and that second, the party is able or has the potential to enact those goals. The second point is significantly more difficult to prove, as can be seen in the case of the NDP, which was simply deemed anti-constitutional. Furthermore, critics of banning the AfD, which include those outside of the AfD, view it as an anti-democratic move. Center-right FDP member Konstanin Kuhl expressed concern, recognizing that the AfD contains “right-wing extremists, racists, and anti-Semites”, but also includes those with “legitimate concerns” over migration and economic policy [11]. 

Indeed, AfD supporters have reason to be concerned over these issues. Between 2019 and 2024, Germany's GDP increased by less than 1 percent, whereas the eurozone as a whole increased by nearly 4 percent, Canada and Italy by 5 percent, and the United States by over 10 percent [12]. Germany's main industries—automobiles, chemicals, and machinery—are energy-intensive, and have struggled as the war in Ukraine continues and as China, a major export destination for Germany, expands its industrial capacity in these sectors, decreasing the need for German imports. At the same time, Germany continues to struggle with immigration. On top of the initial migrant crisis in 2015, which brought over 1.2 million migrants to Germany, the war in Ukraine triggered another refugee crisis, putting pressure on welfare programs, state bureaucracies, and housing markets, thereby amplifying the present cost-of-living crisis [13]. Even if the AfD's responses to these crises are extreme, banning the party would effectively paper over all these legitimate concerns, signaling to the 10 million Germans who supported them in the last election that the German government is, at worst, ignoring these issues.

Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt proposes another idea: “govern [the AfD] away” [14]. Like Merz, who has talked about regaining trust through good governance, Dobrindt argues that the CDU should co-opt AfD policies, especially on immigration, the AfD’s pet issue. The idea is that adopting this discourse gives AfD voters who are genuinely concerned about immigration, taxes, and the economy a democratic choice in elections. However, as mentioned previously, this runs the risk of normalizing such discourse in the mainstream. Issues like immigration are the AfD’s strong suit; by co-opting it, it amplifies it and makes the AfD stronger, and conversely, other parties weaker. In one instance, Merz reiterated his commitment to carry out mass migrant repatriation to alleviate urban decay, remarking that, “if you have daughters, ask them what I might have meant by [‘the problem in the cityscape’]” [15]. Merz's comment drew condemnation from a prominent feminist and Greens activist, who led a women's protest outside CDU headquarters in Berlin, and from his own party and their coalition partner, the SPD. Co-opting issues like immigration is a dangerous path, as it exacerbates political division, but also amplifies the AfD's position. Merz ended up backtracking on the extent of his repatriation comments, stating that he was referring to illegal immigrants, and not legal migrants. Merz's attempt to co-opt the immigration issue reflects a profound indecisiveness that makes the CDU appear weak on immigration, and makes plans like the AfD's remigration scheme original, more effective, and appealing to voters concerned about immigration.

Could the firewall be reformed, or be more flexible? Schroeder thinks so: among the four options he lays out in a paper regarding the firewall is an idea he calls “recalibration.” Recalibration is slightly similar to Dobrindt’s adoption idea, in that it involves the partial lifting of the firewall in certain, more minor policy areas, while maintaining it in more contentious areas like immigration [16]. Andreas Rödder, a historian and former chair of the CDU Basic Values Commission, argues for a similar proposal, arguing for a “red line strategy” that was predicated on the AfD straying away from its far-right values [17]. Schroeder, however, recognizes the potential for a slippery slope, writing, “differentiating between basic and contentious topics can be challenging… [and] cooperation in one area could spill into another” [18]. The fear here is that ceding a policy issue to the AfD, like taxation, would continue into welfare reform, which leans closely to the welfare chauvinism against migrants, who receive asylum payments from the state. Recalibration unfortunately falls into the same trap as co-opting, where mainstream parties cede policies to the AfD, and the AfD, in turn, can shape the narrative around these minor issues and relate them to their pet issues. Furthermore, there is no way to guarantee that the AfD will not concede its far-right values. There are instances of radical-right parties becoming more moderate with cooperation, or even incumbency, such as the Swedish Democrats in Sweden, but these parties had far less leverage by virtue of their junior status [19]. The AfD’s status as the chief opposition and its potential to supersede the CDU in the next election provides the CDU with far less leverage than other European mainstream right-wing parties that have offered to cooperate.

A more concrete solution, beyond the idea of a firewall, would be to amend the Basic Law, Germany’s constitution, or introduce reform legislation to strengthen and safeguard political institutions if the AfD comes to power. Part of the far-right playbook has been to subvert the rule of law and weaken it. Out of fear of this strategy, the Scholz government amended the Basic Law to reform Germany’s Federal Constitutional Court, ensuring its autonomy from political influence and obstructionism [20]. Other paths of reform could include constitutional oaths for officeholders or state-level reforms that increase transparency in the electoral process. This path strengthens Germany’s democracy by making it more responsive, without having to take anti-democratic actions that risk radicalizing the AfD and its supporters. At the same time, this action is also extremely difficult without consensus. An amendment to the Basic Law requires not just a two-thirds majority of the Bundestag, but a two-thirds majority of all federal state councils. If the AfD simply obtains a third of the seats in the Bundestag, they would be able to block any proposed amendments. 

Another possible, albeit short-term, path would be to limit the AfD’s political activity through limiting or withdrawing their state funding for a maximum of six years. The AfD will receive over 500 million euros ($573 million USD) in state funding between 2025 and 2029, all from matching state funds for donations and popular vote totals, yearly salaries for federal and state representatives, and other miscellaneous expenses [21]. The AfD has the strongest presence on social media out of any political party in Germany, and it has used these funds to its advantage by investing in its digital infrastructure. Over 2.6 million Germans follow the AfD on social media platforms such as TikTok, YouTube, and Facebook, and the AfD operates its own TV channel, AfDTV, and a news website, AfD Kompakt [22]. Stripping these funds would restrict the AfD’s ability to operate in the digital world and on the campaign trail, and it is a far more viable option than banning the party. Unlike a party ban, a limit on state party funding only requires a party to profess anti-democratic goals, and not the other qualifier of the potential to enact those goals.

In the most extreme circumstance, Germany can also strip constitutionally subversive AfD politicians of their civil rights. The Basic Law allows such an action under Article 18, which holds that these rights can be “forfeited… [if] misused to fight against the free democratic basic order” [21]. As of 2026, the most prominent attempt of this action was against Thuringian AfD leader Björn Höcke, when over 1.7 million Germans signed an online petition supporting Höcke’s removal and barring from public office. Such an action would represent an escalation of anti-AfD forces in Germany and would only further the perception of the AfD as martyrs of the establishment. It is also a long-shot idea, as zero out of four previous proposals to deprive extremists of their rights have succeeded in constitutional courts. However, the public support of such a proposal—the “stop Höcke” petition was the largest online petition in German history—gives this idea some democratic credibility. It would allow the mainstream parties to use the AfD’s weapon of martyrdom against them, as they could point out the large groundswelling of support against extremist forces in civil society to an otherwise ostensibly illiberal act.

All of these aforementioned solutions have significant drawbacks to them. This serves to show that there is no magic silver bullet to completely defeat the AfD, or even the radical right in general. Combating the AfD through legal means, such as a party ban or suspension of federal funding, can be seen as illiberal and anti-democratic, while co-opting and co-operation may be a slippery slope, too reminiscent of Weimar, as it risks normalizing the far-right in government. When these decisions are taken alone, they are weak. When we combine these decisions, however, they can be more potent. Suspending federal funding while co-opting and easing the AfD’s position on immigration, for example, weakens the AfD’s political operation. They may not be able to speak out as loudly if they don’t have the funding to do so, while the mainstream parties adopt a more comprehensive tough-on-immigration image. Reinforcing the firewall by undercutting the AfD’s policy positions and political operations may be the best bet in weakening the threat the AfD poses to Germany, as it creates a far more responsive democracy than dithering behind a firewall. 

Germany is unique in two ways: it is the most prominent post-fascist nation, having taken steps to completely de-Nazify itself, and it is one of the pillars of the European community, having the largest economy, population, and influence of all the EU member states. In Germany, where the post-World War II phrase "never again" dominates the political culture, a scenario where the AfD takes power would further erode the firewall against the far-right all across Europe.

Many of the tools Germany relied on to keep the far-right at bay, including the firewall, can no longer be relied upon on their lonesome. Luckily for Germany, the government styles itself a militant democracy, meaning that state institutions wield the power to defend its very own existence as a democratic society. Germany's model of militant democracy is working, allowing it to hold the line for longer than many of its European peers, but it needs to be stronger. The AfD has already presented itself as not just a threat to German democracy, but against European security. If the far-right continues to grow, Germany must be aggressive, confident, and militant against them. It must stop hiding behind the firewall and fight the AfD head-on.