Mr Kailitz, as extremism researchers observe the AfD for years. Has responded to the protection of the Constitution at the right time?
It is much too late. This was also due to his former boss, Hans-Georg Maaßen. The decision of the AfD is to be classified overall as a “test case”, was long overdue. It is important that the AfD youth and Höckes “wings” are now classified as suspected cases, and intelligence resources can be observed. But that’s not enough.
this Wednesday, the new chief of the Constitution protection Thomas Haldenwang meets with representatives of the offices for the protection of the Constitution. What do you expect?
From my point of view, have to be classified, the AfD-state associations Thuringia, Saxony-Anhalt, Brandenburg and Saxony, necessarily also as suspected cases. It is a mistake when the state office for the protection of the Constitution in Saxony classify the AfD as the “test case”.
daily mirror tomorrow location
Free
Why order?
The provincial associations in Saxony as well as Thuringia, Saxony-Anhalt and Brandenburg are clearly from the “wings” dominated. These associations aim is not just government’s responsibility, but what Björn Höcke, the “power of the people” – in fact, in the form of the AfD – has called. The “time of the wolf” is supposed to be the mastermind of the “wing”. Full open is played here with national socialist symbolism. In Saxony, the AfD has such a Vice-chief, Mr Droese, who was on a visit to Hitler’s wolf’s lair with the Hand on the heart pictures. In Saxony, is now thinking about that Pegida representatives on the AfD country list at the state election. In the case of the so-called funeral March of the AfD in Chemnitz right-wing extremists of all shades gathered under your leadership.
What do you attribute the dominance of the “wing” in the East?
this Wednesday, the first “Saxony meeting” of the wing, for example. There, Björn Höcke, Andreas Kalbitz, Martin Reichardt, and Jörg Urban, set to occur – the national Chairman of Thuringia, Brandenburg, Saxony-Anhalt and Saxony. From this Meeting a Signal: These regional associations are led by wing-men. This is a huge success for the “wings”.
What would have changed if the protection of the Constitution, for example, in Saxony would be the same steps?
we can only speculate. But by the beginning of 2017, the documents were so dense that the protection of the Constitution would have to be able to intervene. For Frauke Petry, the led, the total AfD, and the state Association of Saxony, 2017, would be able to make a difference. It was, in particular, the radicalisation in the free state of undoing, you got caught in the insulation. The protection of the Constitution would be in force at the time the Plan would have given the Petry arguments at Hand, in order to keep the Radicals in check.
How do you estimate the importance of the decision of the constitutional protection for AfD as a whole?
here we have to distinguish. In the West, the AfD, and rightly feared, that the classification results as a test case to slumps in the polls. There, she has a large following in the public service. If the state observed in the party’s anti-constitutional tendencies, impressed these people. For the Eastern States, I do not expect this effect. In Saxony, such as the NPD, which was clearly a right-wing extremist has moved several times in the Parliament. In the AfD top officials from the East are, accordingly, even the protection of the Constitution funny. The Thuringian AfD advertises with the Slogan “suspiciously good”. She plays with the observation, satirises them.
How big could be the intra-party tensions in the AfD in the end?
It can be quite emergence agitation. The “wing” is influential, but he will have to close anyway compromise with the non-extremist Parts of the party. Of party leader Alexander Gauland is now to be expected that he makes Kalbitz and Höcke not just exercise. One must not forget that there is not, especially in the West German regional associations, a significant part of AfD members and officials of the extreme right.
More about
AfD-politician Björn Höcke looking for his way out of the cover
Maria Fiedler
Steffen Kailitz policy is a scientist at the TU Dresden. He is a collaborator at the Hannah-Arendt-Institute and, among others, deals with extremism and totalitarianism research.
