Voting Behaviour

With the war in Ukraine raging on, most Russians find themselves on uneasy middle ground. Holding on to what they have is the most important thing.

Anti-racist parties are drawing strong turnout from voters with a migration background. Here’s why.

After its success at the 2019 European elections, can the French Greens break their pattern of constantly rising and falling green waves?

Despite high hopes for Croatia’s multifarious small parties, and disappointment for the centre-left Social Democrats, Croatia’s September elections have revealed a relative return to stability with the two main established parties retaining most of the seats and leverage in the parliament.

To what extent were the outcomes of the recent plebiscites held in the UK determined by the formulation of the question and the method of counting votes? If these are significant factors, this points to some puzzling quirks in the country’s voting system, as well as some far-reaching flaws in its democracy.

No-one has the right to rule by force of arms, violence; and no one has the right to dominate others by force of numbers: majority voting. So how should the Greens in particular, and society in general, make democratic decisions?

The state of the French Greens, Europe Écologie Les Verts, is in disarray, and the paradoxical gap between a shrinking Green electorate and ecologically conscious citizens and movements grows. However, the grass is always greener on the other side, especially in the case of Italy, where Green prospects in comparison are bleak. A book review of “Manifeste des écologistes atterrés”.

Almost three months after the 2015 General Election, a feeling of disbelief at the Conservative majority result remains afresh in the UK. The results, which were a far cry from the outcome predicted by the polls in the run-up to the vote, have given rise to a heated debate about the system of voting in the UK, and calls for a more proportional system, though this transition remains an uphill struggle.

Greens are now in government in Sweden for the first time in the party’s 33-year-long history, yet the electoral result was regarded as disappointing. In light of the rise of xenophobic populists and a difficult political climate, it remains to be seen how Greens will fare in the new coalition.

There is a certain amount of naivety surrounding the question of democracy. We have arrived at a situation in which a large proportion of the public has turned against democratic institutions, or at least withdrawn from any engagement in them. And therefore it might look as though the public has become apathetic towards the big political issues of our time. But is this really the case?