In a few days, the Czech Republic will hold parliamentary elections. The most likely outcome is that right-wing populist Andrej Babiš will return to power after nearly four years in opposition. Polls suggest that Babiš, the leader of the ANO (“Yes”) party, will need at least two partners to form a majority. These could be any of the following: the xenophobic far-right Freedom and Direct Democracy party (Svoboda a přímá demokracie – SPD), the leftist pro-Russian protest party Stačilo (“Enough!”), or the newly formed far-right Motorists party, whose policies combine opposition to the European Green Deal (and everything else climate-related) with extreme neoliberal policies.

The opposition is trying to mobilise in the fight against the high cost of living, for which the Green Deal is largely blamed, and security issues related to the war in Ukraine. The ruling parties, on the other hand, point to the risks of oligarch Babiš returning to power, along with smaller extremist parties. Both the main government and opposition parties more or less agree on rejecting climate policies and share conservative views on many issues.

While the overall picture is grim, there are some positive developments on the progressive front: for the first time, the Greens and the Pirate Party are collaborating in parliamentary elections. Will this bring back a Green MP after a more than 15-year absence?

The long road to cooperation

Cooperation between the Czech Greens and the Pirate Party was first experimented with for the 2014 European elections. However, the two parties fell short of the 5 per cent threshold required to enter parliament.

The Pirate Party, however, continued to grow in the following years. In 2017, it entered the Czech parliament for the first time; in 2019, it won three seats at the European Parliament and joined the Greens-European Free Alliance parliamentary group; after the 2021 elections, it became part of the centre-right coalition government led by Petr Fiala. Conversely, the Greens suffered a series of electoral defeats at the national level. Most of their electorate switched to the Pirates, who also managed to appeal to more centrist and pro-market voters.

Efforts initiated by the Greens for greater cooperation between the two parties never materialised in national elections. Instead, cooperation peaked with joint projects at the local and regional levels, though relations between the parties were far from ideal. From their position as a much stronger party, the Pirates viewed the Greens with contempt and showed no interest in collaboration. Their tactic was simply to win the support of all Green voters. They even chose the campaign slogan “ecology without ideology”, which indirectly labelled the Greens’ policies as ideological and not based on reality.

Although the political programmes of the Pirates and the Greens were not significantly different overall, the parties differed in their emphasis on individual issues. The Pirates did not focus so much on environmental or climate policy, concentrating instead on digitisation and the fight against corruption. Even after entering the government, they did not seek the ministries of the environment or education, which had previously been the main goals of the Greens.

Another difference was that the Pirates eventually came to represent a broader spectrum of political views, ranging from the standard Western European green Left, through advocates of evidence-based centrist politics, to techno-optimists with libertarian tendencies. Former chairman Ivan Bartoš then managed to skillfully unify these political currents.

From power to crisis

Before the 2021 elections, the Pirates ran in a coalition with the centrist Mayors and Independents (STAN/EPP) party. Although opinion polls predicted a strong result for them, with Ivan Bartoš being touted by some as a potential world-first Pirate prime minister, and the coalition ultimately winning a respectable 15 per cent of the vote, the result was a disaster for the Pirates themselves.

Thanks to preferential votes (where voters can rank up to four individual candidates on the ballot), 33 STAN representatives from the joint coalition lists made it into parliament, while the Pirates won only four seats. Even though their votes were not necessary for a parliamentary majority, they still chose to participate in the centre-right government coalition led by Prime Minister Petr Fiala (ODS/ECR), which also included ministers from STAN, KDU-ČSL, and TOP09 (all EPP). Pirate candidates secured a range of posts: minister of foreign affairs, minister for legislation, and minister for regional development. Party leader Ivan Bartoš was appointed both minister for regional development and deputy prime minister for digitalisation.

After three years in government, during which they had to deal with issues such as the energy crisis following the invasion of Ukraine, the Pirates were ironically brought down by their flagship issue: digitalisation. Bartoš was dismissed from his post by the prime minister on the grounds that he had failed to manage the complex project of introducing digitalisation into the system by which building permits are issued.

The remaining Pirate ministers subsequently announced their resignations. However, Foreign Minister Jan Lipavský resigned from the Pirates the day after Bartoš’ dismissal, and remained in his ministerial post as a non-partisan appointee. Lipavský subsequently became close to the conservative ODS, for which he is even running in this year’s elections. He has long been criticised for his unconditional support for Israel’s actions in its aggression in Gaza.

In September 2024, the Pirates became an opposition party, and in voter intention polls, they began to fall dangerously close to the 5 per cent threshold needed to enter parliament. Bartoš, visibly tired and frustrated, resigned as chairman, and the party elected Zdeněk Hřib, former mayor of Prague and now deputy mayor for transport, as its new chairman.

Originally a medical expert, Hřib was the party’s most recognisable face in the media alongside the outgoing Bartoš, and the party quite logically bet on him. However, his election led to the departure from the party of several prominent members, especially from its left wing. They criticised, in particular, efforts to reduce democratic processes within the party that many Pirates valued highly. Prominent figures who left the party included former MEPs Mikuláš Peksa, who subsequently joined Volt, and Marcel Kolaja. At the beginning of the 2025 election year, the internal situation and public support for the Pirates did not look promising.

An unusual agreement

The Pirates’ internal struggles brought them closer to the Greens, who were also looking for new momentum after winning just 1.55 per cent of the vote in the 2024 European elections. The party’s new co-chairs, former diplomat and human rights advocate Gabriela Svárovská and agriculture expert Matěj Pomahač, worked towards securing cooperation with the Pirates to increase the likelihood of a Green candidate being elected, and therefore to resolve the long-standing dilemma faced by environmentally-minded voters. Before each recent election, these voters have had to choose between supporting the Greens as the party closest to their values, knowing that their vote would be wasted if the party failed to reach the threshold, or voting for the Pirates, who are more politically liberal and less environmentally conscious, but who are more likely to exceed the 5 per cent threshold.

Before each recent election, voters have had to choose between supporting the Greens as the party closest to their values, or voting for the Pirates, who are more likely to exceed the 5 per cent threshold.

After months of negotiations, cooperation was approved by both parties. However, as part of their internal party democracy, the Pirates let each of their regional organisations decide whether Green representatives would be included on the Pirates’ candidate lists in each of the country’s 14 regions.

The result is an unusual situation where voters will find Green Party members on the ballots in only 8 of the 14 Czech regions, with a total of 31 Green candidates running for office. Understandably, this arrangement did not sit well with part of the Green Party’s membership, who considered it undignified. Nevertheless, the agreement gained majority support in an internal party vote, and Green candidates – or “Green experts”, as the Pirates call them – began appearing in the election campaign.

Will this step lead to Czechia having a Green MP again after 15 years? There is a chance, but it is not a big one. Green candidates have never ranked higher than fifth on the list of candidates, so they would have to obtain a sufficient number of preferential votes to be successful. This possibility cannot be ruled out, but in some regions they are competing with very well-known former Pirate MPs or ministers, so this task is very difficult.

The effort could, however, be aided by women’s non-profit organisations, which – as in 2021 – are campaigning for preferential votes for female candidates. Women’s representation in the Czech parliament remains shamefully low. Progressive-minded Pirate and Green voters are likely to heed this call, and since the Greens have placed a considerable number of women on their candidate lists, the push for gender parity could benefit Green candidates. This is particularly significant given that the Pirates have no internal gender quotas, unlike the Greens, making external advocacy for women candidates all the more important.

The benefits of cooperation

Cooperation between parties is part of a broader trend in Czechia’s fragmented politics. The right-wing parties in the current Fiala-led government have already been cooperating under the SPOLU (“Together”) coalition since 2021. More recently, the xenophobic far-right Freedom and Direct Democracy (SPD) joined forces with smaller like-minded parties, and the pro-Russian radical left (which includes the Communists and the formerly pro-European Social Democracy) came together under the Stačilo! (“Enough!”) brand.

Formal coalitions face a higher electoral threshold (8 per cent in the case of two-party coalitions, 11 per cent for three or more parties). Therefore, the Greens placed their candidates on the Pirates’ lists. So far, this cooperation has been beneficial to both forces. The Pirates have risen to over 10 per cent in the polls, which could take them up to 20 seats in the Chamber of Deputies, compared to the current four. The more seats the candidate list wins, the more likely it is that one of the Greens will be elected.

Experts and the public also appreciate the Pirates’ effective election campaign, which projects a renewed energy that few believed possible after the party’s recent crisis. For the first time, the Pirates are also seeking advice from foreign experts for their campaign. Among others, they have hired British strategist Paul Hilder, who has experience working for Bernie Sanders and Britain’s Liberal Democrats. Until now, the Pirates have always managed and devised their campaigns themselves.

The party has placed a focus on housing affordability and other economic issues, such as improving the tax system to benefit families. Classic Pirate issues such as the fight against corruption and digitisation are also present. Environmental and climate issues, on the other hand, have been pushed into the background to some extent, but Green candidates in particular are trying to make the oligarchisation of society a point of public debate, given that many Czech oligarchs have close ties to the fossil fuel industry.

If no Green candidates win seats in the Chamber of Deputies, the party will struggle to chart its future course.

An uncertain future

Now, a few weeks before the elections, the option of voting for the Greens on the Pirate Party’s candidate lists seems like a clear choice for progressive and green-minded voters – at least for those who live in regions where the Greens are running. Those that don’t can obtain a voter card and travel to another region to vote, but it is likely that only a small number of the most loyal Green supporters will do so, with the rest choosing from among the Pirate candidates.

What is much less clear is the future – both that of the Greens and of the Czech Republic as a whole. The most likely alternative to a far-right alliance led by Andrej Babiš is a continuation of the status quo. However, Petr Fiala’s current centre-right government is extremely unpopular, particularly for its incompetent handling of the economy and inflation, which has led to a decline in the standard of living for a significant part of the population. Fiala and his finance minister Zbyněk Stanjura focused too much on stabilising public budgets, but mainly on the expenditure side; as for the other side – revenue – they helped high-income earners and did not dare to tackle the poverty that afflicts a significant proportion of the working population. Only a broad mobilisation against the far right could grant Fiala a second chance.

An uncertain future also awaits the Czech Greens. By running in these elections, they have demonstrated their “country before party” approach – that is, they have prioritised the interests of progressive voters over their own visibility.

However, if no Green candidates win seats in the Chamber of Deputies, the party will struggle to chart its future course. The attention – whether in opposition or in government – will once again be on the re-elected Pirates. A good election result for the entire list will bring the Greens some financial resources and perhaps even opportunities for closer expert cooperation with the elected Pirate MPs, but that is not enough to secure the party’s future.

So even if their record is one of successful contributions to progressive politics, they will once again be back to square one when it comes to their own future.