By Emilia Zankina (American University in Bulgaria) Sunday (March 26th) parliamentary elections in Bulgaria mark the third early elections in the country in four years. Three elections and six governments (three of which care-taker) later, Boyko Borissov and his GERB party (Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria, with the symbolic acronym meaning “coat of arms”) [...]
By Simon Otjes (Documentation Centre Dutch Political Parties University of Groningen) For the first time in almost two decades a Dutch cabinet lasted its entire term. Despite the fact that Liberal-Labour coalition lacked a majority in the Senate, it was able to implement an impressive policy agenda oriented at welfare state reform without a cabinet [...]
By Sebastian Wolf (Medical School Berlin, formerly Liechtenstein-Institut, Bendern) The national election in the Principality of Liechtenstein on February 5th, 2017 was a regular election. About 19.800 citizens had to vote a new Landtag, Liechtenstein’s unicameral part-time parliament with only 25 seats. Although it is a duty to vote according to the microstate’s law, only [...]
By Eva H. Önnudóttir (University of Iceland) The 2016 election in Iceland was an early election, held about six months earlier than was originally planned. The election was brought about by the Panama scandal in April 2016. The Panama Papers revealed, among other things, the ownership of the former Prime Minister, Sigmundur Davíð Gunnlaugsson of [...]
By Luciana Alexandra Ghica (University of Bucharest) Rarely present in international news and hardly ever for its achievements, Romania has gained, however, positive international fame during the last decade for two seemingly unrelated success stories. The slightly more entertaining one is its new wave of cinema which often reflects on the country’s recent communist past [...]
By Dario Nikić Čakar (University of Zagreb) Since the beginning of 2016 Croatian politics has faced serious turmoil and unprecedented events which brought into question the established norms of government stability in Croatia. After less than five months in office, the (government of technocratic Prime Minister Tihomir Orešković) was brought-down in the Parliament by vote [...]
By Bruno Marino (Scuola Normale Superiore, Florence) One of the most common catchphrases that have been used to describe Italian politics is taken from the book ‘The Leopard’ (Il Gattopardo), and – slightly paraphrasing it - it states that if we want everything to stay the same, everything has to change. This has probably been [...]
By Raimondas Ibenskas (University of Southampton) On the 13th of December, Lithuanian parliament Seimas approved the programme of the new government formed by the coalition between the Union of Peasants and Greens and the Social Democratic Party. The parliamentary vote completed the government formation process that started after the second round of the Seimas election [...]
By Dane Taleski (University of Graz) The early parliamentary elections, held on 11 December, had a very high turnout. In total, 1,191,521 voters (66.82% of the electorate) cast their ballot. In some electoral units the turnout was over 70%; however, it was lower in electoral unit six, where ethnic Albanians constitute a majority. There were [...]
By Veronica Anghel (University of Bucharest) After 13 months of being led by a technocrat cabinet following the resignation of the socialist PM Victor Ponta, Romania has given once more the social–democrats a firm first chance to form the government. With a 39,49% turnout, the Social Democrat Party (PSD) won an average 46% of the [...]