Bernd Lucke (born 19 August 1962) is a German economist, professor, author and former politician. He was a co-founder of the Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) in 2013 and served as the party's federal chairman until July 2015 when he was displaced and left the party soon after. He had been elected a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for AfD in 2014 and served the five year full term, as member of various other new parties, similar to some other former AfD MEPs.
Lucke was a professor of economics at the University of Hamburg before helping to found Wahlalternative 2013 ("Electoral Alternative 2013") which would become the AfD. Lucke served as the party's spokesman until he lost a leadership election to Frauke Petry in July 2015. Petry's election was considered a shift of the party to extremist positions; Lucke subsequently left the party. In July 2015 he and other former AfD members founded the political party Liberal-Konservative Reformer[1][2][3] (formerly Allianz für Fortschritt und Aufbruch,[4] "Alliance for progress and renewal", abbreviated ALFA). He failed to win reelection in 2019 and has since returned to an academic career.[5]
Lucke joined the Junge Union, the youth wing of the Christian Democratic Union of Germany as a teenager in response to the conditions of his relatives living in East Germany under communism. He was a member of the CDU for thirty years until 2011 when he cancelled his membership in opposition to the party's eurozone rescue policies.[11] He first contested an election as a member of the Free Voters in the 2013 Lower Saxony state election but was not elected.[12]
In 2013, he founded Wahlalternative 2013 ("Electoral Alternative 2013") with Alexander Gauland, Frauke Petry and Konrad Adam to oppose the German government's handling of the eurozone crisis. The group was later founded as Alternative for Germany in April 2013 with Lucke as one of the party's three spokespeople. During his speech at the party's founding rally, he described the Euro currency as a "historic mistake."[13]
During a campaign speech in Bremen on 24 August 2013, Lucke was attacked with pepper spray by two members of Anti-fascist Action. Several people in the audience were treated for irritation of the eyes and throat.[14]
Following the rise of the Pegida protests in Germany which were welcomed by some AfD state branches, Lucke stated that most of the arguments voiced by Pegida were legitimate and that the movement was a sign that politicians had not listened to concerns felt by ordinary people.[17][18]
On 4 July 2015, Lucke was displaced as leader of the party Alternative for Germany (AfD) by his former deputy, Frauke Petry in a leadership election after several months of infighting.[19] On 9 July 2015, Lucke left the Alternative for Germany, saying that the party had "fallen irretrievably into the wrong hands" after Petry's election and moved too far to the right by adopting what he termed as anti-foreigner positions. On 19 July, he and other former members of the AfD founded a new party, the Alliance for Progress and Renewal (ALFA).[20] ALFA has since been renamed Liberal-Konservative Reformer ("Liberal-conservative reformers," LKR) and later Wir Bürger ("Us Citizens").[4]
In 2015, Lucke was announced as the LKR's top candidate for the Bundestag ahead of the 2017 German federal election, however the LKR decided not to contest the election. The party stood in the 2019 European parliament elections but all of its MEPs including Lucke lost their seats.
Post-AfD leadership
Lucke continued to work as a public commentator on economic and political affairs after his career as an MEP. In 2017, he argued that the German media should not "demonize" the AfD, arguing that voters for the party were concerned about legitimate issues but that the leadership of the AfD had become too extreme.[21] However, in 2019 Lucke supported a proposal by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution to monitor the AfD and claimed the party now contained right-wing extremist elements that went against the German constitution.[22]
In October 2019, Lucke left politics and returned to academic work at the University of Hamburg as an economics teacher. He was unable to deliver two lectures after being assaulted by an Antifa activist. At the same time, the student union AStA called for Lucke's removal from the university due to his past association with the AfD and for what they argued was his role in helping the rise of the far-right in Germany.[23] Lucke also turned down an offer by the university to host online classes and later that month was able to resume lectures under police protection. Lucke has also worked as an opinion columnist for Welt am Sonntag since 2019.[24]
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