The new president of Science Europe has issued a warning over the rise of the far right across the continent, warning that it “undermines the values” that “science relies on”.
Mari Sundli Tveit, who was elected to lead the group representing research funders across the continent, told Times Higher Education that the far right “stokes anti-expert, anti-science views”, among them climate change denial, and “promotes closing borders and hostilities”.
Her comments come ahead of June’s European Parliament elections, which forecasters predict will see significant gains for the populist right.
A recent report by the European Council on Foreign Relations anticipates a “sharp right turn” in the elections, listing “Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, France, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, and Slovakia” as countries where “anti-European populists are likely to top the polls”.
