The shift follows a series of bruising defeats for the European liberal family. Spain’s Ciudadanos have effectively vanished from the national stage, while Germany’s Free Democratic Party failed to clear the five-percent threshold in the 2025 federal elections. At the European level, the Renew Europe group shed 21 seats in 2024, as voters migrated toward conservative and populist factions. During the ALDE congress in Vienna this July, speakers argued that the era of taking European openness for granted has ended.
Europe's Liberals Pivot to Security to Stave Off Electoral Decline
“Security and democracy are not separate—nor is democracy sequential to security,” says Carolin Johnson of the European Partnership for Democracy. As centrist parties across the continent face a wave of electoral losses, the liberal establishment is rapidly trading its traditional focus on open markets for a hard-line security agenda.
Austrian foreign minister Beate Meinl-Reisinger, whose NEOS party recently achieved record results, has emerged as a key voice for this repositioning. Her focus on countering foreign interference gained practical urgency this May, when Austria expelled three Russian diplomats following reports of a sophisticated espionage operation involving antenna arrays on diplomatic rooftops. For liberals, this evolution is a response to a multi-layered threat environment. Major General Karol Molenda of Poland notes that the long-held assumption that economic interdependence naturally guarantees democratic stability is now under intense scrutiny. By framing security as the essential precondition for liberal values, these parties hope to regain relevance in an increasingly volatile international landscape.
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