Progressives shouldn’t dismiss the ‘left-conservative’ leader – her popularity is driven by her powerful critique of runaway capitalism

On a chilly autumnal evening last month, the Berliner Platz in the eastern German city of Cottbus was buzzing by the time Sahra Wagenknecht appeared. One activist, busy handing out leaflets promoting the latest maverick force to disrupt European politics, said she was there because Wagenknecht “understands people like us”. Anti-war banners were dotted around the square. One elderly woman proudly displayed a badge reading Omas für Frieden (grandmothers for peace).

Formed only last January, the eponymous Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW) has been collecting voters from across the political spectrum, although mainly from the left. An unscientific straw poll suggested much of the Cottbus audience had previously voted for the Social Democrats, or the Left party to which Wagenknecht used to belong, or not at all. Her stump speech checklisted blue-collar anxieties: the cost of living crisis, declining healthcare provision, a lack of access to good jobs and affordable housing, and meagre pensions. Mainstream political and cultural elites, Wagenkecht told many nodding heads, suffered from an abject lack of empathy with these “ordinary realities”.

Julian Coman is a Guardian associate editor