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Over a year after the vote that delivered Donald Trump a decisive comeback victory, the Democratic party has still not issued its postmortem analysis. However, recently, an prominent progressive lobby group published its own. The Harris campaign, its writers contended, did not resonate with key voter blocs because it failed to concentrate enough on addressing basic economic anxieties. In focusing on the threat to democracy that Trumpist populism represented, progressives neglected the bread-and-butter issues that were foremost in many people’s minds.

A Lesson for European Capitals

As the EU braces for a tumultuous period of politics between now and the end of the decade, that is a message that needs to be fully absorbed in European capitals. The White House, as its recently published national security strategy makes clear, is optimistic that “patriotic” parties in Europe will soon replicate Mr Trump’s success. In the EU’s Franco-German engine room, Marine Le Pen’s National Rally (RN) and Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) lead the polls, supported by significant segments of blue-collar voters. But among establishment politicians and parties, it is difficult to see a strategy that is sufficient to challenging times.

Major Challenges and Expensive Solutions

The issues Europe faces are expensive and historic. They encompass the war in Ukraine, sustaining the momentum of the green transition, dealing with demographic change and developing economies that are more resilient to bullying by Mr Trump and China. According to a Brussels-based research institute, the new age of geopolitical insecurity could require an additional €250bn in yearly EU defence spending. A major study last year on European economic competitiveness called for massive investment in public goods, to be partly funded by collective EU debt.

Such a fiscal paradigm shift would stimulate growth figures that have flatlined for years.

However, at both the EU-wide and national levels, there remains a lack of boldness when it comes to generating funds. The EU’s so-called “budget hawks oppose the idea of collective borrowing, and Brussels’ budget proposals for the next seven years are deeply timid. In France, the idea of a tax on the super-rich is overwhelmingly popular with voters. But the embattled centrist government – though desperate to cut its budget deficit – will not consider such a move.

The Price of Inaction

The reality is that in the absence of such measures, the less well-off will bear the brunt of financial adjustment through austerity budgets and greater inequality. Acrimonious recent conflicts over retirement reforms in both France and Germany highlight a growing battle over the future of the European social model – a phenomenon that the RN and the AfD have eagerly leveraged to promote a politics of welfare chauvinism. Ms Le Pen’s party, for example, has opposed moves to raise the retirement age and has stated that it would focus any benefit cuts at foreign residents.

Avoiding a Political Gift for Populists

In the US, Mr Trump’s pledges to protect blue‑collar interests were largely insincere, as subsequent healthcare reductions and tax breaks for the wealthy demonstrated. But in the absence of a convincing progressive alternative from the Harris campaign, they proved effective on the election circuit. Absent a radical shift in economic approach, social contracts across the continent risk being torn apart. Governments must avoid giving this political gift to the Trumpian forces already on the rise in Europe.