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Party of European Socialists' (PES) candidate for European Commission president, Martin Schulz, reacts before addressing journalists, on May 26, 2014 at the Social Democratic Party (SPD) headquarters in Berlin, following European Parliament elections. [Xinhua photo]

The BBC and the French Prime Minister have called the European election results a political earthquake. In Britain, France, and Denmark, rightwing nationalist parties trounced the center-right and center-left. In Greece, which has suffered more than most on the rack of Eurozone austerity, the leftist Syriza coalition was the big winner with almost a third of the popular vote.

We may be seeing the crumbling of the implicit center-left center-right bloc that has dominated European politics for almost a generation.

Epitomized by the grand coalition of Christian Democrats and Social Democrats that governs Germany, the political positions of the bloc represent what the Economist magazine calls the extreme center -- a combination of robust pro-business policies with liberal social policies, for example on gay rights. In foreign policy, it means strong backing for Western military interventions in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and elsewhere.

The bloc was not formed by symmetrical moves to the center ground. Rather, the parties of the Left shuffled to the right, renouncing big government, signing up to welfare cuts and privatization. Tony Blair was Margaret Thatcher's star pupil. According to the Iron Lady, there was no better Thatcherite than Blair. Asked about her political legacy, she unhesitatingly said it was New Labour. A decade ago in Germany it was the Social Democrat Gerhard Schroeder who pushed through the Agenda 2010 labor market reforms to reboot the German export "miracle."

For almost a generation it has been difficult to separate the economic policies of the main parties. Socialists outflanked conservatives in their scramble to make markets work better. Trade unions were powerless faced with offshoring and restrictive legislation. Workers who once had secure jobs faced zero hour contracts. Many had to resort to loan sharks -- repackaged in lavish branding campaigns as financial innovators -- to make ends meet. To oppose any of this immediately attracted accusations of "populism" -- the most damning word in the modern political lexicon.

Elections became contests of fund-raisers, strategists and spin doctors. Parties did not want members who turned up to meetings, or heaven forbid, debated policy. They wanted credit card numbers.

But last week's elections show that the ultra-centrist model is showing signs of age. It is no longer just saloon bar cynics, but tens of millions of voters, who believe that politicians are all the same. Eight years of financial crisis compounded by universal austerity policies have strained loyalties to breaking point. Alternating teams of identikit ministers failed to address unemployment and falling living standards, and voters were determined to punish them. While nearly 60 percent stayed at home, those that turned out kicked the mainstream parties in the teeth.

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