Bright Blue, the independent think tank for defending and improving liberal society, and Konrad Adenauer Stiftung, the political foundation closely associated with the Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU), have today published a new report, The right road: The future of the European centre-right, offering new priorities and policies to tackle contemporary challenges that threaten the success of both the centre-right movement and the nations which they wish to govern.
This report examines in detail the principles, history and contemporary challenges of the European centre-right, especially in the UK, Germany, Poland, France and Ireland.
The historical and leading centre-right principles we identified were conservatism, non-cosmopolitanism and economic liberalism. Throughout modern history, different European countries – specifically the UK, Germany, France, Ireland and Poland – have applied particularised versions of these principles, which we described as their core tenets.
Table 8.1 in the report shows the relationship between centre-right governments and GDP/GDP per capita between 1961 and 2023 in France, Ireland, the UK and Germany. As this original statistical analysis shows, centre-right governments in these countries always deliver higher GDP growth and GDP per capita growth relative to non-centre-right governments.
There are leading contemporary challenges to the European centre-right. We identified these as: the ascendancy of right-wing populism; unclear differentiation from a left-wing alternative; poor economic record in recent times; and demographic change. There are also general national challenges that the European centre-right must tackle, especially: Russia’s invasion of Ukraine; the cost of living; immigration; and climate change.
The report proposes 10 new distinctive priorities (the 10 C’s) for the European centre-right to tackle contemporary challenges: country; capitalism; copiousness; competence; contribution; community; civility; care; children; and conservation.
Our recommended priorities and policies are deliberately broad so as to be applicable to different European countries. And our recommended policies are not exhaustive; instead, we highlight policy suggestions for the centre-right that could be most distinctive, effective and salient.
1. Country
Policy suggestions
- Ensure all young adults, not just migrants acquiring citizenship, participate in citizenship ceremonies to celebrate their national identity.
- A voluntary and competitive national service scheme open to all school leavers, similar to the current policy in Norway, where only 17% of school leavers do national service, but where it is a sought-after mark of prestige and a helpful boost to one’s future career prospects.
- European countries should co-operate on defence, including by re-affirming commitments to mutual defence pacts, to better defend each European country. No European country is strong enough to resist a serious extra-European threat alone.
- European countries should co-operate to better manage illegal immigration, including through the processing of asylum seekers in – and deportation of failed asylum seekers to – third countries.
2. Capitalism
Policy suggestions
- The weight of taxation more generally should be shifted away from work and entrepreneurship and towards those who derive income from rent-seeking on their assets.
- Tax benefits for the risk-taking of entrepreneurs should be applied much earlier in the entrepreneurial journey.
- Regulators should be mandated to produce estimates of the costs of the regulation that is introduced on enterprise.
3. Copiousness
Policy suggestions
- Expand all forms of credible homegrown energy infrastructure, including nuclear, renewables and gas.
- Introduce ambitious housebuilding targets and deliver them through zonal planning policies where housing development in designated areas cannot be blocked by local opposition.
4. Competence
Policy suggestions
- In opposition, always conduct formal and expert-led policy commissions – a process which should be mandated through the constitutions of centre-right parties – to be prepared for government on day one.
- Always have fiscal rules that seek to achieve a structural budget surplus in day-to-day spending.
- Establish expert independent bodies that always vet fiscal policy and set monetary policy.
5. Contribution
Policy suggestions
- Introduce supplements to working-age benefits for people with longer working histories such that those people can get better support from the welfare system if they end up needing it.
- Increase the age at which people draw down state and private pensions to incentivise older workers to work and contribute for longer.
- Introduce new time-limited taxes and volunteering requirements on new skilled migrants.
6. Community
Policy suggestions
- Schoolchildren could be mandated to do local volunteering for at least a week during one school year.
- Employees could be given a new right to take at least two extra days a year off in order to do volunteering.
- Permanent settlement or the ability to receive state benefits could be conditional on the ability to demonstrate proficiency in the local language.
7. Civility
Policy suggestions
- Fines should increase on behaviour such as fly-tipping, littering, playing music out loud on public transport, vandalism and other anti-social behaviour.
- All social media algorithms should be made transparent, since social media is a major source of uncivil behaviour in the digital public space. This is because even those who start viewing more moderate content are gradually encouraged to move towards more extreme and less civil items, including political extremism, scams and pornography.
8. Care
Policy suggestions
- Make free early-years education compulsory from the age of three for a minimum number of hours a week.
- Increase funding for elderly social care through increasing taxes not on work but on assets, specifically income derived from housing and pensions.
9. Children
Policy suggestions
- Benefits and tax breaks for parents in the earliest years of their children’s lives should be increased, both to incentivise families to have children and to lower the financial burden on parents in the years when having children is costliest.
- Make parental rights, leave and tax breaks transferable to working grandparents.
- Incentivise or even mandate child- and family-friendly planning design, particularly in residential districts in countries where the relevant zoning laws are present. This would involve, among others, walkable, green spaces, playgrounds, and lower speed limits.
- Employment law could strengthen flexible working rights, allowing parents to better balance having children with employment, and so decreasing the opportunity cost of having children.
- Ban the sale of smartphones and social media use among children under the age of 16.
10. Conservation
Policy suggestions
- Prioritise increasing incentives for and investment in greener technologies to tackle climate change and biodiversity decline, above additional costs and rules for consumers and businesses.
- For countries that have adopted returns agreements with European countries, facilitating the deportation of illegal migrants, European countries should increase green finance for the development of those countries’ green infrastructure.
- Commit to larger areas and stronger protections for particularly beautiful and biodiverse areas, such as national parks and marine protected areas.
Bartek Staniszewski, Head of Research at Bright Blue and lead author of the report, commented:
“It is time for a reboot and reunification of the centre-right across Europe, to defeat both the populist right and statist centre-left. That requires distinctive priorities and effective policies – rooted in clear philosophical principles – so the centre-right can return again to be the engine of peace and prosperity across Europe.”
Dr Canan Atilgan, Head of the United Kingdom and Ireland Office, Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, commented:
“To achieve all these valid priorities for the centre-right parties, we must add one more essential ‘C’ – courage. Without it, we’ll never get close to what truly needs to be done.”
Dr Günter Krings MdB, Deputy Chairman of the CDU/CSU Parliamentary Group in the German Bundestag, commented:
“The future of conservative parties lies in their ability to adapt to current challenges while staying grounded in their core values. Strengthening their role is crucial, not just to counter extreme populism, but to offer a steady, thoughtful approach to governance that prioritizes stability and shared prosperity for all.”
