Compass Elections: March Roundup
The Strengthening of Center Progressivism
Netherlands, Parliament - Mar 15-17
By Graham Hillmann & Juan Pablo Espinosa
Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte in 2017 (Wikimedia Commons)
“I have the energy for another 10 years,” said Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte on the eve of the March 17 general election. The Netherlands has almost always had to form coalition governments that give different parties a seat at the executive table with King Willem-Alexander, and these last elections were no exception. Rutte’s People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD) is set to keep its relative majority in the House of Representatives and give him a fourth term as government leader. It is presumed that the big winner of these elections has been the social-liberal Democrats 66 (D66), putting the spotlight on the political strength that progressives are gaining across the country. The controversy was not absent in this electoral process as the entire cabinet decided to resign from their posts two months before the election following the revelation of a scandal concerning the false accusation of fraud by the Tax and Customs Administration to more than 26,000 parents receiving child care benefits. Likely, most of them will shortly regain their cabinet positions.
The 2012 elections resulted in the formation of a coalition between the two top-performing parties: the center-right People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD), led by Prime Minister Mark Rutte, and the center-left Labour Party (PvdA), then led by Diederik Samsom. Rutte stayed on as Prime Minister, while the PvdA’s Lodewijk Asscher served as Deputy Prime Minister. Rutte’s second cabinet was in power from 2012 to 2017 and reckoned with the fallout of the Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 disaster, with a heavy focus on climate policy.
2017 saw a great deal of movement in the Dutch House of Representatives’ balance of power. The VVD lost a large number of seats but remained the largest party in the chamber by a wide margin. The PvdA completely cratered, slipping from the second largest party to the seventh. These losses came at the hands of the far-right nationalist Party for Freedom (PVV), led by Geert Wilders, Sybrand van Haersma Buma’s centrist Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA), the liberal progressive Democrats 66 (D66), led by Alexander Pechtold, and GroenLinks (GL), the Dutch green party led by Jesse Klaver. The more fractured party landscape rendered the formation of a stable governing coalition more complex—in fact, the formation of Rutte’s third cabinet took longer than the formation of any other coalition in Dutch history. At least four parties would be needed to constitute a majority, and balancing the interests of said parties was a tall order. The first coalition to undergo negotiations was between VVD, CDA, D66, and GL, but talks to implement this coalition fell through due to irreconcilable differences in immigration and climate policy. Another coalition, between VVD, CDA, D66, and Gert-Jan Segers’s conservative Christian Union succeeded, forming Rutte’s third cabinet. This cabinet was in power for a series of farmers’ protests lasting from 2019 to 2020, as well as the entire duration of the COVID-19 pandemic and the childcare benefits scandal, which led to the cabinet’s collapse and new elections from March 15 to 17.
The Four Leading Candidates
The Top Brass: Mark Rutte, People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD) - The VVD is a conservative-liberal party that generally supports free-market economics. It has been led by Mark Rutte since 2006; in 2010, Rutte became Prime Minister, marking a first for a VVD leader. The party, which had never led the government before then, has not relinquished power since. Rutte’s first cabinet, supported by the CDA and PVV, grappled with the effects of the 2008 financial crisis, the European debt crisis, and the War in Afghanistan, while simultaneously promoting several robust social reforms. It collapsed relatively quickly, however, as the PVV withdrew after a dispute over austerity measures, leading to the 2012 elections. Rutte and the VVD have been the biggest constant in Dutch politics since then—if his coalition manages to last until 2022, he will become the longest-serving prime minister in Dutch history.
Despite Rutte’s decade-long tenure as prime minister, though, he has crafted an “everyman style” that comes across as both relatable and experienced—described by Politico as “an old-fashioned Dutchman, without frills.” Known for his unpretentious and modest demeanor, he has been noted for his ability to evade scandal and personal criticism, even managing to largely escape personal scrutiny following the childcare benefits scandal. As such, the VVD’s campaign has in many ways been built around the brand of its leader. A pragmatic figure who has demonstrated a willingness to work across ideological lines, Rutte and the VVD engineered a shift toward the center in advance of this year’s election—as noted by former Speaker Gerdi Verbeet, “He is more interested in the solution than the way there.” Other than the benefits scandal, his largest challenge may be his fiscal policy, which some have claimed has limited the country’s COVID-19 response.
The Pioneer: Sigrid Kaag, Democrats 66 (D66) - After spending more than 20 years working for the United Nations system and having been the first female UN Special Coordinator for Lebanon, it was presumed that Kaag could be nominated by Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to head the United Nations Development Program (UNDP). Although this bid failed, she was invited by Rutte to serve in his cabinet as Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation in 2017. A year later, she went down in history by becoming the first female Minister of Foreign Affairs. Shortly after, she returned to her original cabinet position and by June 2020, she was chosen as the party leader for Democrats 66, the largest left-leaning party in the Netherlands, and thus became its candidate for prime minister. Her campaign has detached itself from Rutte’s reluctance to accept the EU’s COVID-19 crisis fund, advocating in turn for greater spending and the strengthening of the Netherlands position within the European Union. Her main challenge has been making herself known to the Dutch electorate, especially because her best-known coverage has been centered on her heated exchange with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the online sexism that has surrounded her and other women´s campaigns this cycle. Democrats 66 have deployed a strong campaign apparatus to get the first female prime minister elected and pass an ambitious education and climate reform.
The Contentious Nationalist: Geert Wilders, Party for Freedom (PVV) - One of the first things you’ll see when you look up the name of Geert Wilders, leader of the far-right and nationalist PVV, is a tweet sent on April 12: “Stop islam. Stop #Ramadan. Freedom. No islam [sic].” Accompanying this message is a short video that ends in a rallying cry: “Islam does not belong in the Netherlands.” This is a fitting introduction to the PVV and Wilders, one of the most controversial far-right leaders active in Europe today. Initially a member of the VVD, he founded the PVV in 2006. The PVV is quite literally a one-man party: legally, Wilders is the organization’s only official member. Though Rutte’s first cabinet officially relied on the PVV for support, the party has since been ostracized, and almost all major Dutch parties have ruled out forming a coalition with it. Neither Wilders nor his party are subtle with their views: they’re intensely Islamophobic, going as far as to advocate for banning the Quran and shutting down all mosques in the country, and they are equally hostile toward the EU, from which they have long advocated withdrawal.
Cafeteria Catholic: Wopke Hoekstra, Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA) - A former partner of McKinsey and Shell, Wopke Hoekstra was the youngest senator in the 2011 legislature. Ever since he moved from the private sector to the public sphere, Hoekstra has escalated into the leadership of the CDA, becoming its leader in 2020. Rutte nominated him to the Ministry of Finance after his experience with money laundering policy, tax oversight, and pension reform. He is known for his independence from the party's religious line, often favoring legislation on adoption and marriage rights for the LGBTQ + community and welcoming a multi-religious membership to the CDA. As Minister of Finance, Hoekstra has supported PM Rutte’s call for a financial behavior reform in the European Union, receiving strong criticism from southern European countries such as Portugal. He arrives at the election with a controversial judicial investigation into child benefits fraud that has brought the spotlight on the former CDA leader and current Minister of Health, close to Hoekstra, Hugo de Jonge.
The Election
The Netherlands organizes national elections every four years. They have an open list proportional representation system where people can vote for any candidate that a political party has included in its list. Usually, since a hierarchical order is followed, the winning candidates are those who are listed in the top positions. Therefore, the number of seats for a party normally depends on the national vote rather than on candidate-specific votes. Nevertheless, there have been representatives who have been elected to the House despite being at the bottom part of their parties’ lists, like Hillbrand Nawjin, former Minister for Integration and Asylum Affairs, in the 2003 election.
Using the D'Hondt method, which assigns seats in direct proportion to the ratio of a party’s total vote to the national vote, the People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD) obtained a simple majority of 34 seats. Its leader, Rutte, was re-elected for a fourth term with almost 22 percent of the national vote. Surprisingly, Democrats 66 (D66) rose from fourth to second place, winning 24 seats. The Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation, Sigrid Kaag, was 6 percentage points away from the prime minister seat. Most polls reported a preference for VVD before and during the election process. Between March and May of 2019, several polls reported a surge in preference for the Forum for Democracy (FvD) which positioned them above VVD. By November of that same year, 44 members of the FvD split from the party and formed the JA21 or Nanninga Group, effectively ending its chances to outnumber the preferences for Rutte’s party. Remarkably, most polling accurately predicted the outcome of the March 17th election.
The big loss was for the right-wing parties. The Party for Freedom (PVV), with its candidate Geert Wilders, and the Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA), with its candidate Wopke Hoekstra, lost 4 and 5 seats, respectively. Nonetheless, they both stayed as the third and fourth congressional forces with a combined representation of 32 seats. It is said that Rutte will recede from these parties which had previously been represented in his cabinet.
Four other parties will be key for the government-formation process. The Socialist (SP) and Labor (PvdA) parties both gained 9 members in the House of Representatives. With 5.16 percent of the election, the green, university-based GroenLinks party (GL) will likely uphold the opposition stance they declared during the administration of the Third Rutte cabinet. Lastly, the Forum for Democracy, with 8 gained seats, has been ruled out by Rutte as a potential member of his fourth cabinet, presumably for their Euroscepticism and the recent scandal that surrounded their youth ranks, who allegedly made racist and anti-Semitic comments.
After a parliamentary note was photographed by the press during the government-formation negotiations, prime minister-elect Rutte was questioned for trying to sideline representative Pieter Omtzigt, a member of the opposition CDA party and a key author of the public denouncement of the childcare fraud that brought Rutte’s third term to an end, by offering him a ministerial position. All parties but his voted in favor of a censure motion for him, further complicating the coming together of parties to form a majority cabinet.
What’s next for the Netherlands? While Rutte is headed for a record-breaking fourth term in office, it’s clear that this election will shift the balance of power in the country. Within the governing coalition, the surge of the progressive D66 party and the slump seen by the center-right CDA party will likely result in a coalition tilting slightly further to the left than it did previously. Change appeared on both sides of the political spectrum: the right saw an internal shift in power as the PVV lost ground to the FvD and JA21 parties, while the left saw an ominous decline in support. However, the VVD remains dominant as trust in Rutte and a desire for stability remain high. If nothing else, it would appear that stability is king in times of COVID-19.
The Endless Cycle Continues
Israel, Parliament - Mar 23
By Graham Hillmann
Israel held elections on March 23 to select the 120 members of the Knesset, the country’s unicameral legislature. Regular followers of international politics may experience some sense of déjà vu or fatigue upon hearing that—understandably so, as this is Israel’s fourth election in just two years. In that time, the country has been unable to form and maintain a stable governing coalition, resulting in a seemingly endless cycle of elections, gridlock, and collapse. While longtime Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been given the chance to form a government first, the odds that he will be able to do so are slim. At this critical juncture, it seems unlikely that the endless cycle will come to an end anytime soon.
The full story of how Israel got to this point is a long one, but the current predicament began with the elections of April 2019. The governing coalition, headed by Netanyahu, had been in power since 2015 and consisted of several right-wing parties. This coalition began to fall apart due to issues raised by Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman, leader of the right-wing but firmly secular Yisrael Beiteinu party, over a bill that would allow draft exemptions for Orthodox religious students. Further internal tensions led to the coalition’s complete collapse and early elections in April 2019. Netanyahu’s Likud party tied with the centrist and anti-Netanyahu Blue and White alliance, led by Benny Gantz, for the largest number of seats in the Knesset after the latter saw huge gains. Based on the balance of power among the parties that held the remaining seats, President Reuven Rivlin saw Netanyahu as having the greatest chance to form a stable governing coalition and gave him the mandate to do so. However, Netanyahu failed to form a majority coalition for the first time in Israeli history, largely as a result of the aforementioned draft bill and growing controversy around Netanyahu’s corruption allegations. Rather than allow Gantz to form his own coalition, Netanyahu’s faction elected to dissolve the Knesset in favor of a new round of elections.
These new elections, held in September 2019, resulted in only marginal changes from the previous round; it quickly became apparent that no coalition would be possible unless some parties were to radically compromise their positions. Protracted negotiations took place, with proposals ranging from a unity government between Likud and Blue and White, broad coalitions on the left or the right, and coalitions that cut across the traditional secular-religious and Zionist-Arab cleavages. In the end, Rivlin again granted Netanyahu the mandate to form a new governing coalition, but unlike the last time, Rivlin reserved the right to nominate another candidate if Netanyahu was unsuccessful. Netanyahu’s best chance of creating a viable coalition was to once again secure the support of Lieberman, but the long-simmering tensions between Lieberman’s secular faction and Netanyahu’s religious allies proved too strong an obstacle. He was unable to form a unity government with Gantz for similar reasons, as well as his steadily mounting corruption charges. With Netanyahu unable to form a coalition, Rivlin granted the mandate to Gantz, who was also incapable of coming up with a majority. Despite widespread desire to avoid a third election, no coalition ended up being formed, resulting in the Knesset once again dissolving itself and leading to yet another round of elections.
Once again, the March 2020 elections barely changed the state of play. Gantz was able to secure Lieberman’s support, as well as the support of the Joint List, an alliance of several Arab-majority parties. With the support of the left-wing Labor and Meretz parties, it finally appeared that Gantz would be able to form a governing coalition. Indeed, Rivlin granted Gantz the mandate to form a new government—just in time for the COVID-19 pandemic to spread to Israel. Faced with this new crisis, Gantz proposed an emergency coalition with Netanyahu, which Netanyahu accepted.
Amid all of this, Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein created a constitutional crisis by refusing to leave his post and shutting down the Knesset. The courts forced him to reopen the Knesset and recommended that he hold a vote to replace him as speaker, which Edelstein refused to do, instead choosing to resign without holding a vote to select his replacement. When elections for a new speaker were announced, Gantz announced that he would stand as a candidate and serve as speaker, revealing the coalition’s plan. This new coalition government would have a rotating prime minister, with Netanyahu continuing to serve before handing power over to Gantz after a year and a half. Gantz would serve as speaker until Netanyahu formed a government, at which point Gantz would become defense minister under Netanyahu until becoming prime minister himself. Gantz was elected speaker, but his willingness to join forces with Netanyahu would prove fatal to Blue and White’s stability and his political career.
Netanyahu and Gantz could not quickly come to terms on the coalition, leading Rivlin to give the mandate to the Knesset at large once again. If no suitable coalition was formed, an almost comical fourth round of elections would be held. However, Netanyahu and Gantz finally managed to agree on terms for the coalition, including the aforementioned rotating prime ministership and a strict division of cabinet spots between the two major parties. This deal finally managed to stick, and the unity government began operation in May 2020, with the support of all parties except the Joint List, Meretz, Yisrael Beiteinu, and the right-wing Yamina alliance.
It may come as no surprise that this government did not endure. In December 2020, the government was unable to agree on the budget, automatically triggering the dissolution of the Knesset and another round of elections. Those elections were to be held on March 23, 2021.
Meet the Parties
Likud, led by Benjamin Netanyahu, is the largest party on the Israeli right. Officially secular and firmly nationalist, it was founded by Menachem Begin in 1973 as an alliance of several right-wing parties. It gained success quickly, sweeping the 1977 elections and vaulting Begin to the office of prime minister. This was a watershed moment in Israeli history—before 1977, the right had never held power in Israel, whereas after 1977, Likud has been in power more often than not. In the 2021 campaign, Likud ran primarily on Israel’s highly successful vaccination campaign, as well as a promise to prioritize economic recovery as the COVID-19 pandemic ends.
As for Netanyahu himself, It’s difficult to overstate just how large of an impact he’s had on modern Israeli politics. The first prime minister to be born in Israel after the country became independent, Netanyahu enjoyed a distinguished career in the Israeli Defense Forces before being elected to the Knesset in 1988. Within five years he was elected chairman of Likud, and he became Israel’s youngest prime minister in 1996. Likud suffered a massive defeat just three years later, leading Netanyahu to step away from politics, before returning to serve in the cabinet of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, his successor as Likud chairman. Netanyahu was again elected chairman in 2005, and he was able to return to the prime minister’s office in 2009. He has served continuously since then, becoming Israel’s longest-serving prime minister.
Netanyahu is a transformational yet divisive figure. A hardliner on the issue of security, he has been credited by some with improving the Israeli economy, but he has come under significant scrutiny for alleged corruption. In any case, he’s essentially the focal point of Israeli politics—many people in the Israeli opposition are united primarily by their disapproval of him.
Yesh Atid has taken Blue and White’s place as Netanyahu’s primary opposition. Founded and led by Yair Lapid since 2012, it can be described as broadly centrist, secular, and liberal. It hasn’t always been opposed to Netanyahu, though—in 2013, it placed second in the Knesset and joined Netanyahu’s coalition. It refused to do so in 2015, suffering losses that forced it into the opposition. In 2019, it joined with Benny Gantz’s Israel Resilience Party in forming the Blue and White alliance, and it formed much of the alliance’s foundation over several election cycles. After Gantz joined forces with Netanyahu, Yesh Atid split from the alliance and decided to contest the 2021 elections on its own. As for Lapid, he’s a journalist by profession and served as Minister of Finance when Yesh Atid was in coalition with Likud.
Shas is one of Israel’s many Orthodox religious parties. Founded by Rabbi Ovadia Yosef in 1984, it is currently led by Aryeh Deri. A conservative party, Shas represents the strictly Orthodox Haredi population, particularly the Sephardi and Mizrahi communities. The party has been part of coalitions on both the left and the right, and in recent years it has served as a central member of Netanyahu’s coalition.
Blue and White is no longer the powerhouse that it once was, but it still wields a significant number of seats. Founded by Benny Gantz in advance of the April 2019 elections, it is a centrist and liberal alliance that was essentially formed to defeat Netanyahu. Of course, when Gantz decided to work with Netanyahu anyway, the alliance collapsed. Initially composed of three parties—Yesh Atid, Telem, and the Israel Resilience Party—all but the Israel Resilience Party left when the unity government was formed. Gantz himself is a retired general who served as Chief of the General Staff of the Israel Defense Forces from 2011 to 2015.
Yamina, currently led by Naftali Bennett, is a right-wing alliance that has existed in several configurations since 2019. Its platform has focused on economic relief as Israel recovers from the COVID pandemic. Though it supported Netanyahu through many of the most recent election cycles, it did not join Likud’s unity government and has thus far avoided endorsing Netanyahu for prime minister. Bennett led a previous career as a businessman and, at one point, served as Netanyahu’s chief of staff.
Though the Israeli Labor Party has fallen from once soaring heights, it is still the largest force on the Israeli left. Tracing its roots back to Israel’s first Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, it and its direct predecessors dominated Israeli politics until 1977 and counted among its members prime ministers including Golda Meir, Yitzhak Rabin, and Shimon Peres. Today, it’s a social democratic party led by former journalist Merav Michaeli, and it has placed a particular focus on issues affecting women.
United Torah Judaism, like Shas, is a conservative Haredi party. Unlike Shas, it primarily represents the Ashkenazi population and is explicitly non-Zionist. Its primary concerns at the moment surround the government-mandated closure of synagogues and upholding strict Orthodox law. Founded in 1992, it is currently led by Moshe Gafni and has been part of Netanyahu’s recent coalitions.
Yisrael Beiteinu, despite being a right-wing party, has been a thorn in Netanyahu’s side for many years. It is militantly secular and tensions between it and Netanyahu’s Haredi allies led to the collapse of the most recent stable coalition. The party committed to supporting Gantz in March 2020 and has committed to supporting Lapid when coalitions form this cycle. Don’t be fooled, though—the party is fiercely nationalistic and takes a hard line when it comes to the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, including support of a plan that would include the exchange of territory between Israel and Palestine. Founded in 1999 by the powerful Avigdor Lieberman, Yisrael Beiteinu’s base was, interestingly, originally primarily Russian-speaking people.
The Religious Zionist Party is a religious, deeply conservative, and far-right party currently led by the controversial Bezalel Smotrich, who has called for segregation between Jews and Arabs as well as the transformation of Israel into a theocratic state. Previously part of Yamina, it stood independently for the first time in the 2021 election.
The Joint List is the largest alliance of parties that represent Israel’s Arab minority. Currently led by Ayman Odeh, it includes four constituent member parties: Hadash, Ta’al, Balad, and the Arab Democratic Party. The alliance is secular, generally non-Zionist if not anti-Zionist, and generally left-wing. Its top priorities include issues of interest to Israeli Arabs, including curbing recent trends in violence against Arab communities. It rarely joins governing coalitions, though it mostly elected to back Gantz in the previous two elections.
New Hope is a new center-right party formed in 2020 by Gideon Sa’ar, a former Likud legislator who challenged Netanyahu for party leadership in 2019. While broadly overlapping with much of the Israeli right, what sets New Hope apart is Sa’ar’s refusal to sit in a coalition with Netanyahu. It has also earned the support of a small handful of former Blue and White members who have objected to Gantz’s coalition-building techniques.
Meretz, currently led by journalist Nitzan Horowitz, is a left-wing party that likely ranks as Israel’s most progressive. It emphasizes social justice, human rights, and environmentalism. It calls for drastically higher health and education budgets, as well as the immediate recognition of a Palestinian state, a rare position in Israel. In 2020, it ran on a slate with the Labor Party, though it ran independently once again in 2021.
While most of Israel’s Arab-majority parties lean to the left, the United Arab List (often known as Ra’am) decidedly does not. Founded in 1996 by Mansour Abbas, it is a largely conservative and Islamist party that is affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood. While it has been affiliated with the Joint List for many of the past few election cycles, it ran independently in 2021.
The Fourth Election
The Knesset is composed of 120 seats. There are no regional constituencies; all voters vote on the same nationwide ballot. Israeli elections use closed party-list proportional representation, where voters only have the option of voting for parties—not specific candidates—and members are selected by taking a proportion of candidates off the top of a ranked list drawn up by the party. A party must get at least 3.25 percent of the vote to win seats.
Polls generally pointed to the same conclusion: Likud was favored to secure a comfortable plurality of around 30 seats, while Yesh Atid could expect to take second place with around 18. All other parties could expect to win seats, though likely no more than single digits. This polling was largely borne out by the results. Likud won 30 seats, while Yesh Atid won 17. Shas and Blue and White won nine and eight, respectively. Several parties won seven (Yamina, Labor, United Torah Judaism, and Yisrael Beiteinu) and six (Religious Zionist, Joint List, New Hope, Meretz) seats. Ra’am brought up the rear, winning only four seats. Despite winning a plurality of the seats, Likud saw the biggest losses of any party, losing seven seats from 2020. The Joint List lost five seats, while Blue and White lost four. The biggest gains were seen by Labor, which gained five seats. Yamina, the Religious Zionist Party, and New Hope gained four apiece, while Meretz gained two and Yesh Atid gained one. Shas, United Torah Judaism, Yisrael Beiteinu, and Ra’am saw no change in their number of seats.
Rivlin has now charged Netanyahu, once again, with forming a new governing coalition. He has until May 4 to assemble a working majority of the Knesset, but it may still be a challenge. Currently, Netanyahu has the support of 52 Knesset members, just short of the 61 needed for a majority. Thus far, he has secured the support of Shas, United Torah Judaism, and the Religious Zionist Party, in addition to his own Likud. If he is unable to form a coalition, the mandate will go to Lapid, who has secured the support of Blue and White, Labor, Yisrael Beiteinu, and Meretz, in addition to his own Yesh Atid, for a total of 45 seats. Of the remaining parties, Yamina has decided to advance Bennett—the first time in Israeli history a party has decided to advance a third candidate, rather than back one of the two major ones—and the Joint List, New Hope, and Ra’am have made no endorsement.
Netanyahu does have a few conceivable paths to a governing coalition. His preferred option would likely be to win over Bennett and Sa’ar, which would result in a solidly right-wing government without having to rely on Arab-majority parties (Netanyahu earlier stressed the need for a “homogenous” government.) But while talks have been underway between Bennett and Netanyahu, the former is keeping his cards close to his chest, and Sa’ar is steadfastly refusing to join in with Netanyahu. If Sa’ar stays true to his word, Netanyahu could seek the support of Abbas instead, but Smotrich strongly objected to the idea. Those are essentially Netanyahu’s only options.
Not all options need to involve Netanyahu. There’s a slim possibility that Netanyahu’s current trial could preclude him from forming a new government. If Netanyahu were to step down as leader of Likud, then the party’s new leader could easily win over Bennett, Sa’ar, and even Gantz. And if Likud is unable to work out a coalition, Lapid could conceivably win over Bennett, Sa’ar, and Abbas to form his own coalition.
Of course, any of the above options don’t seem particularly likely at the moment, and Israeli voters could be heading back to the polls sooner rather than later. As the Harvard Political Review puts it, “With so many political fault lines, the possibility of a fifth election looms large. While the billboards may come down now, they may not have time to gather dust.”
Minor Updates
Switzerland, Referendums - Mar 7
By Sophia George and Kyle Wang
On March 7, Swiss citizens voted on three referendums of diverse topics. Switzerland is one of the few countries with direct democracy at the local, cantonal (state), and national levels, holding referendums about four times a year. The Swiss political system consists of several types of referendums: mandatory referendums, a vote on modification of the constitution made by the federal legislature; optional referendums, a vote on a law passed by the legislature; and popular initiatives, a vote on modification of the constitution made by the citizens. Optional referendums require 50,000 signatures from opponents of the law, and federal popular initiatives require 100,000 signatures from supporters of the constitutional modification. All the referendums require a popular majority, but some also require canton majorities depending on the scope of the referendum.
The federal government of Switzerland is governed by a seven-member Federal Council, which is composed of members from the largest parties in the legislature. The parties represented in the current Federal Council are the right-wing Swiss People’s Party (25.6 percent of the vote in the last elections in 2019), the left-wing Social Democratic Party (16.8 percent), the classical-liberal FDP.The Liberals (15.1 percent), and the Christian Democratic People’s Party (11.4 percent), while the left-wing Green Party (13.2 percent) and the centrist Green Liberal Party (7.8 percent) are the largest parties outside of government.
Ban on Full-Face Coverings:
The issue of face coverings, especially those worn by some Muslim women, has long been a source of debate in Switzerland, as it has been in many other European countries. With a slim majority of 51.2 percent and majorities in 18 out of 23 cantons (Switzerland has 26 cantons, but six of them are “half-cantons” for the purposes of referendums), Swiss voters passed a federal popular initiative banning full facial coverings in public places. Proponents of the referendum argued in support of the referendum with three main points: that fully concealing one’s face in public harms attempts at a socially integrated society, that full-face coverings are a symbol of the subordination of women, and that banning coverings helps increase public security. Opponents of the referendum, including the Federal Council and the Parliament, argued that the ban contradicts Swiss citizens’ constitutional rights and going too far over an exaggerated issue—of the 400,000 Muslims residing in Switzerland, only fewer than 100 women wear full-face coverings. The Swiss People’s Party supported the initiative, while the opponents included the Social Democratic Party, the Centre, the FDP.The Liberals, the Green Party, and the Green Liberal Party.
Electronic Identification:
In a decisive victory for the opposition, Swiss citizens voted to reject the referendum on governmentally regulated electronic identification, by a vote of 64.4 percent against. The referendum aimed to establish a Federal E-ID Commission that would oversee and regulate the methods electronic companies use to acquire their consumers’ personal data, attempting to make the process more safe and reliable. The referendum would enable anyone in Switzerland to apply for a digital identity card that would then be transmitted to federal authorities, with personal data being transferred only if one chooses to give his or her consent. The Centre, FDP.The Liberals, and the Swiss People’s Party supported the referendum, while the opponents, who mainly objected due to concerns over the potential misuse of personal data, included the Green Party, the Green-Liberal Party, and the Social Democratic Party.
Trade Agreement with Indonesia:
With a slim majority of 51.6 percent, Swiss voters voted to accept the free-trade agreement with Indonesia. The 2018 deal aims to help further facilitate trade between the two countries, removing custom duties on Swiss exports and allowing Indonesia to sell its industrial products on the Swiss market duty-free. The deal also establishes tariff reductions for certain agricultural products, the most prominent being palm oil. Opponents of the trade agreement, however, mainly cited concern for the negative environmental effects created by palm oil production. Regarding political parties, proponents of this trade agreement include the Centre, FDP.The Liberals, the Swiss People’s Party, and the Green Liberal Party, while the Green Party and the Social Democratic Party were opposed.
Germany, Regional Elections - Mar 14
By Sophia George and Kyle Wang
On March 14, Germany held regional elections in two of its states: the southwestern economic powerhouse of Baden-Württemberg and the neighboring Rhineland-Palatinate. In both states, German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s party, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), had its worst performance in post-World War II history.
The regional elections took place six months ahead of the national general election on September 26, when German citizens will vote to select Merkel’s successor after 16 years of her leadership. These two elections were the first in a year that will select new legislators in four other German states. Due to an increase in COVID-19 cases in days leading up to the elections, including a third national lockdown, there was a fall in voter turnout in both states compared to 2016, with at least half the ballots in each state being submitted via mail.
In Germany, regional elections are conducted under the rules and jurisdiction of each state. Much like the federal elections, they generally consist of mixed-member proportional representation and occur every four or five years. In both Baden-Württemberg and Rhineland-Palatinate, the state governments carry out elections via mixed-member proportional representation every five years. In Baden-Württemberg, voters elect 70 members in single-member constituencies first-past-the-post while another 50 members are elected by proportional representation to each of Baden-Wurttemberg’s four districts. In Rhineland-Palatinate, voters elect 52 members in single-member constituencies first-past-the-post while they elect another 49 members via proportional representation in four districts.
In both states, support for Merkel’s party, the Christian Democratic Union, suffered significantly. This decrease in support may be attributed to Germany’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic and its slow vaccine rollout—while the party enjoyed an approval rating in June 2020 of 40 percent, as of mid-March 2021, that rating has dropped down to 33 percent. Recently, the reputations of the Christian Democratic Union and its regional sister party in Bavaria, the Christian Social Union, have come under fire after three lawmakers from the governing coalition resigned as news emerged that they had profited off the selling of medical face masks to municipalities to prevent COVID-19, receiving tens of thousands of euros in compensation.
In Baden-Württemberg, the only state led by a member of the left-wing Green Party, the Green Party came in first with 32.6 percent of the vote, up from 30.3 percent in 2016 and giving the 72-year-old Winfried Kretschmann a third term as governor. Kretschmann’s coalition partner, the Christian Democrats, saw its support slide to 24.1 percent, down from 27 percent in 2016. The right-wing populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) however was the biggest loser, with its support falling to 9.7 percent from 15.1 percent, being surpassed by the 11 percent received by the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and the 10.5 percent received by the Free Democratic Party (FDP).
In Rhineland-Palatinate—the SPD’s Malu Dreyer being the first woman to lead the state—the Social Democrats came in first again with a plurality of 32.2 percent, while the CDU followed closely behind with 31.4 percent of the vote. The two largest parties saw their share of the vote decline since 2016 when the SPD received 36.1 percent and the CDU 34.8 percent. While the Greens, in coalition with the SPD, saw their support increase with 10.9 percent of the vote, up from 6.4 percent in 2016. However, The FDP, also in the “traffic-light coalition,” (from SPD’s red, FDP’s yellow, and Green’s green), saw their support slightly decline to 6.0 percent from 6.8 percent. The AfD meanwhile increased their support somewhat from 7.0 percent to 7.6 percent.
These two regional election results have demonstrated the possibility of other coalition governments forming a leading majority in the national elections. With the Greens making gains in both states, Germany could bear witness to its first Greens chancellor. Potential regional alliances of the Greens, SPD, and the liberal FDP could arise, given the recent unpopularity of Merkel’s party. Regarding the succession of Merkel in September, chief Armin Laschet is the perceived candidate for chancellor for the CDU, but he lacks needed national broad support from German citizens. Instead, opinion polls demonstrate broad support for the Bavarian premier and CSU leader Markus Soeder, but he has not yet declared his decision to run.
Curaçao, Parliament - Mar 19
By Juan Pablo Espinosa
Curaçao, one of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, held its general election on March 19, shortly after the Netherlands reshaped its parliament and re-elected Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte for the fourth consecutive time. The Caribbean island country gained partial autonomy after the Dutch Antilles was dissolved in 2010, resulting in the formation of a parliament and various political parties.
The Christian Democratic Party for the Restructured Antilles (PAR) started as the leading party in Curaçao following the dissolution process. Its lead though, vanished shortly after the country adopted a proportional electoral system and fixed its parliamentary seat number to 21. Since then, coalition governments have been the norm and no party has ever held an absolute majority.
The 2021 election had a particularly unexpected outcome. The party that in 2010 started as the country's second-largest political force, the centrist-populist Movement for the Future of Curaçao (MFK), re-emerged from the political scandal it was mired in after the trial and imprisonment for bribery and money laundering of Curaçao´s first Prime Minister Gerrit Schotte, winning nine seats in parliament, the highest number for a party since 2010. The basis of its political platform since 2017 has been the nation's independence from the Netherlands.
Before the general election, Curaçaoans put eight parties with no parliamentary representation on the ballot. A primary process was conducted during which political organizations had to get a one percent threshold (789 votes) to enter the race. In addition, two new parties, Curaçao is the Best (KEM) and Work for Curaçao (TPK), won one seat each. The final alignment is yet to be determined since a coalition government will likely be formed in the coming months.
Gilmar Pisas of the MFK is set to become Prime Minister for a second time after his interim nomination in 2017. Eugene Rhuggenaath of the PAR, famous for giving a historic “speech of acceptance” during the 2017 Gay Pride Parade in the capital city of Willemstad, is expected to step down from the executive leadership soon. Nonetheless, as the second political force in Curaçao, he and other PAR members will acquire cabinet membership in the new coalition government. Overall, the center-right parties have seen a significant increase in popular support while the center-left parties suffered, losing 5 seats in this election.
United States, Special Elections - Mar 20
By Graham Hillmann
Louisiana hosted two special elections on March 20 to fill vacancies in the state’s congressional delegation. The two vacancies arose in the state’s second congressional district, which encompasses much of New Orleans and stretches to Baton Rouge, and the fifth congressional district, which occupies most of the state’s northeastern corner. The second district became vacant upon the departure of incumbent Democratic Representative Cedric Richmond, who joined the Biden administration, while the fifth district became vacant when Republican Representative-elect Luke Letlow died of COVID-19 complications shortly before taking office.
Neither the second district nor the fifth district is regularly competitive—the second district is safely Democratic, while the fifth is safely Republican. The Democratic frontrunners in the second district were moderate State Senator Troy Carter, State Senator Karen Carter Peterson, and progressive activist Gary Chambers. Republican university administrator Julia Letlow, widow of the late Representative-elect, faced little opposition in the fifth district.
Louisiana elections take the form of a nonpartisan “jungle primary,” where candidates from all parties appear on the same primary ballot. A runoff is only employed if no candidate wins a majority. In the second district, it was assumed that no candidate would win outright and that a runoff would take place between Carter and Peterson. In the fifth district, Letlow was widely expected to win in the first round.
Although Chambers outperformed his polling numbers dramatically, he was unable to surpass Peterson, who is now headed to an April 24 runoff with Carter. As expected, Letlow won a comfortable majority in her race; she is scheduled to take office on April 13, becoming the first Republican woman to represent Louisiana in Congress.
Japan, Regional Election - Mar 21
By Graham Hillmann
The Japanese prefecture of Chiba held an election on March 21 to pick the prefecture’s next governor. Located in the Greater Tokyo Area, Chiba Prefecture is among the most populous in Japan. Incumbent governor Kensaku Morita, affiliated with Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), chose to retire after serving three terms, leaving the office up for grabs.
The frontrunner to succeed him was Toshihito Kumagai, who had served as mayor of the city of Chiba itself until stepping down to run for governor. Kumagai secured the support of a diverse range of opposition parties and largely ran on improving the prefecture’s COVID-19 response. Seven other candidates with varying degrees of notability also ran for the office. Most prominent among these candidates were Masayuki Seki, a former member of Chiba’s prefectural assembly who won the support of the LDP and pledged to continue Morita’s policies, and Rie Kanamitsu, a former teacher backed by the Japanese Communist Party (JCP). Kumagai won in a landslide, garnering about 70 percent of the vote. Seki finished in a distant second, with Kanamitsu placing third.
The left-leaning Asahi Shimbun characterized the result as “a clear rejection by voters of long-standing practices of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party.” It accuses the LDP of having botched the election when Daichi Suzuki, an Olympic gold medalist who served as commissioner of the Japan Sports Agency, was forced out of the race after facing opposition from LDP kingmaker (and recent subject of controversy) Yoshiro Mori. Seki proved to be an inadequate replacement, and several local LDP figures broke with their party to support Kumagai. The LDP has also been rocked by several recent scandals, including that of an LDP Chiba lawmaker who was revealed to have visited a Tokyo club in violation of COVID restrictions.
Concurrently with the gubernatorial election, an election was held for Kumagai’s old mayoral post. The office was won by former deputy mayor Shunichi Kamiya, who secured a wide range of support and emphasized his service in Kumagai’s administration.
Republic of the Congo, President - Mar 21
By Juan Pablo Espinosa and Kyle Wang
The Republic of the Congo has continuously re-elected Denis Sassou Nguesso as its president since 1997. Sassou Nguesso first served as President of the Republic of the Congo from 1979 to 1992. After introducing a multi-party system to the country, he finished the 1992 election in third place, ousted by the Pan-African Union for Social Democracy (UPADS) and its leader, then President-Elect Pascal Lissouba. Following serious allegations of fraud in the 1993 legislative elections, the First Republic of the Congo Civil War broke out between supporters of different candidates, lasting until 1994. A second civil war between supporters of Sassou Nguesso and Lissouba occurred after Sassou Nguesso returned from his exile in Paris to contest the 1997 presidential elections, and after winning the civil war with the help of Angolan troops, Sassou Nguesso was sworn in as president in October 1997, a position he has kept ever since. A constitutional referendum in 2002 extended the presidential term from five years to seven but imposed a two-term limit. In 2015, however, this limit was scrapped by another constitutional referendum, allowing Sassou Nguesso to be re-elected indefinitely.
National elections in the Republic of the Congo are organized to elect the president and the national assembly. The executive and lower legislative members are elected for 5-year terms while senators have six-year terms. In March 2021, the only race was the presidential election. Denis Sassou Nguesso became the de facto candidate of his party, the Congolese Party of Labor (PCT), a former Marxist-Leninist party that turned to social democracy after the fall of the Soviet Union.
The country has a second-round electoral system that requires an absolute majority for the winner to be declared president. To date, Sassou Nguesso has always won in the first round. Even though opposition parties are allowed, they never had a realistic shot at the presidency nor the legislative majority. Despite this, the overall share of the vote for second-place candidates saw increases in the past two decades, moving from 2.67 percent in the 2002 general election to 7.5 percent in 2009, and finally 15.04 percent in 2016.
This election would not follow the trend, as opposition candidate Guy Brice Parfait Kolélas, of the Union of Humanist Democrats (UHD-YUKI), died of COVID-19 complications on the eve of the March 21 election. He received almost eight percent of the vote, leaving Sassou Nguesso to win with more than 88 percent of the vote. The day of the election saw the communications system shut down across the country, just as with the 2016 election. The African Union and other international organizations condemned the events and called for peace and tranquility during the processing of results. Sassou Nguesso is expected to continue with his executive agenda for the 2021-2026 period.
Canada, Regional Election - Mar 25
By Kyle Wang
The Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador (NL) held a general election for its House of Assembly on March 25. Provinces of Canada, unlike their United States counterparts (other than Nebraska), all have unicameral legislatures, and NL’s House of Assembly is composed of 40 members, elected in first-past-the-post constituencies. While elections in NL are usually held every four years, with the previous election being in 2019, a provision in the province’s election law mandated the holding of an election within a year of a premier’s resignation—NL’s previous Liberal premier, Dwight Ball, had announced his resignation in February 2020 following a series of scandals and controversies, though he stayed on until August to guide the province through the COVID-19 pandemic. The current premier, Andrew Furey, had originally scheduled the new election for February 13, but following a surge in COVID-19 cases in the provincial capital of St. John’s, in-person voting in nearly half of the districts (all in the vicinity of St. John’s) was canceled just days before election day, forcing a transition to all-mail voting (the first one in Canada) and a postponement of the election to March.
While the Liberal Party under Dwight Ball had won the 2019 election, it held a minority government of exactly half the seats in the House of Assembly, having unexpectedly lost a seat to the social-democratic New Democratic Party (NDP) in the Labrador West district by just two votes. In the 2021 election, most incumbents kept their seats, but the Liberal Party managed to gain a narrow majority in the House of Assembly with a plurality of the popular vote (48.3 percent), expanding its seats from 20 to 22. This was however a huge disappointment for the Liberals, as polling in late January and early February had indicated a massive Liberal landslide, with one poll showing them leading the Progressive Conservative Party (PC) 62 to 26. (While the federal party changed its name to the Conservative Party in 2003, most of its provincial parties retained the old name, in use since 1942.)
The Progressive Conservatives ended up losing two seats to the Liberals, one of them being the seat of its leader Ches Crosbie, and down to 13 seats with 38.8 percent of the popular vote. The NDP, never a huge force in NL politics, also saw its leader Alison Coffin losing her seat by just 53 votes to the Liberal candidate, ending up with two seats in the legislature with 8 percent of the popular vote. The remaining three seats went to independent candidates, one of them a former Liberal incumbent that ran for reelection as an independent.
Turkmenistan, Parliament - Mar 28
By Graham Hillmann
Turkmenistan held an election on March 28 to select 48 of the 56 members of the People’s Council, the upper chamber of the country’s parliament. However, the international community widely considers Turkmenistan to be a highly authoritarian state that has never held a fair election. Saparmurat Niyazov was the country’s first president, ruling from 1990, when it was still a Soviet republic, through independence in 1991, and until his death in 2006, whereupon he was succeeded by Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow, the incumbent president. Both men are considered to be among the most repressive and eccentric dictators of the modern era, with abysmal human rights records to match, and Turkmenistan is rated as one of the world’s least free countries by Freedom House.
The 2021 election is the first to take place with a bicameral legislature following the creation of an upper house by a constitutional amendment in September 2020. Of the 56 members of the People’s Council, 48 are elected by provincial councils and eight are appointed by the president. 112 candidates officially competed, including Berdimuhamedow, who was allegedly elected with 100 percent of the vote. There is no reason to believe the new People’s Council will serve as anything but a rubber stamp for Berdimuhamedow’s eccentricities.