By Simon Otjes (Leiden University) and Léonie de Jonge (University of Groningen) On November 22, the Netherlands elected a new Parliament. The elections saw a major change in the Dutch political landscape. In terms of seats change, the election was the most volatile election since the introduction of the proportional electoral system: 54 seats changed [...]
By Slaven Zivković (DeFacto) In the 2023 Montenegrin parliamentary elections, held on June 11th following the dissolution of the previous parliament, the Europe Now Movement (PES) emerged as the dominant political entity, securing a significant share of the seats (see Table 1). After extensive coalition negotiations, the PES formed a new government, with Milojko Spajić [...]
By Lukas Lauener (Swiss Centre of Expertise in the Social Sciences/University of Lausanne) On 22 October, almost 5.6 million voters were called to elect the new Swiss Parliament for its 52nd legislative period. 46.6 percent of eligible voters participated in the elections, which is a small increase of 1.5 percentage points compared to 2019. It [...]
By Kamil Marcinkiewicz (formerly University of Hamburg) In the parliamentary election on October 15th, 2023, Poles voted for 460 members of the lower house of parliament, the Sejm, and 100 members of the upper house, the Senate. The authoritarian Law and Justice (PiS) is expected to win according to the late polls roughly 36% of [...]
By Marek Rybář (Masaryk University) Robert Fico, the leader of Smer-Slovak Social Democracy (Smer), has made a resurgence. Following the electoral setback in 2020, the popularity of his party plummeted to some 8 percent. His erstwhile protégé, Peter Pellegrini, who assumed the role of Prime Minister in the Smer-led coalition government in 2018 after Fico [...]
By José Javier Olivas Osuna (UNED) Thanks to the high degree of political polarisation, Spain finds itself in a paradoxical situation. Although the electoral results were bad for most populist parties, they have all increased their capacity to influence governance after the last General Elections on 23 July 2023. Far right Vox lost 19 seats [...]
By Iakovos Makropoulos (University of Essex) The results of the May and June 2023 Greek Parliamentary Elections confirmed the dominance of the Conservative Party in Greece, New Democracy, whereas showed the weakness of the radical left and the main opposition, SYRIZA, to re-gain power (Figure 1). A recent major review of the Greek electoral system [...]
By Teodora Yovcheva (University of Sofia) Two months after the elections on 2 April following a cycle of early parliamentary elections, Bulgaria has its first government with rotation of the prime ministers. The government was a result of the tough negotiations between antagonists – GERB-SDS (Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria – Union of Democratic [...]
By Hakan Yavuzyılmaz (Başkent University) On May 28th Turkish voters once again headed to polls to cast their votes for runoff presidential elections. The results of the first round and results of the legislative elections significantly demoralized the opposition camp. Contrary to the expectations, People’s Alliance’s candidate Recep Tayyip Erdoğan received 49.5% of the votes [...]
By Hakan Yavuzyılmaz (Başkent University) On May 14th Turkish citizens headed to the polls to cat their votes both for parliamentary and presidential elections. The elections saw a historic turnout, reaching to 87%. Such an extensive participation was both due to tight race between the main presidential candidates and high level of polarization in the [...]