Dutch Polls: Major Parties and Main Issues in Snap Vote
Citizens in the Netherlands are set to potentially replace the most conservative administration in recent memory with a more centrist and commonsense alliance during early general elections scheduled for October 29.
What's Happening and Why It Matters
Snap general elections were triggered after the breakdown of the outgoing government in June, when rightwing politician Geert Wilders pulled his PVV from an increasingly fractious and highly ineffectual governing alliance.
Wilders' party had achieved a surprising first place in the 2023 election, and after prolonged talks established a fragile four-party conservative alliance with the populist Farmer-Citizen Movement, NSC party and center-right VVD.
Nevertheless, Wilders' government allies deemed him too controversial for the prime minister position, which was given to a former intelligence chief. Wilders, an immigration-skeptic polemicist who has required security detail for twenty years, began criticizing from the sidelines.
Wilders finally caused the government collapse on June 3 after his allies declined to implement a radical comprehensive immigration restriction proposal that included deploying the army to patrol borders, rejecting all asylum seekers, closing most refugee hostels and repatriating all Syria nationals.
While backing of the PVV has decreased, polls indicate the rightwing, anti-Islam party is again likely to win the most seats in parliament. However, main Dutch political parties have all ruled out entering a formal coalition with Wilders.
No fewer than 16 parties are predicted to enter parliament, but no single party is projected to win more than approximately 20% of the vote. Typically, the future Netherlands administration, typically an influential player on the European and global scene, will emerge only after coalition negotiations that could last months.
Electoral Mechanics and Political Landscape
There are 150 representatives in the Dutch parliament, meaning a government needs 76 seats to form a majority. No single party ever manages this, and the Holland has been ruled by coalitions for more than a century.
Parliament is elected quadrennially – sooner when administrations fail – through party-list system, based on an certified roster of candidates in a country-wide district: any party that secures less than 1% of the vote is assured of a seat.
As in much of Europe, Dutch politics have been characterized in modern times by a sharp decline in backing of the traditional governing groups from the centre-right and left, whose electoral support has decreased from over four-fifths in the eighties to barely two-fifths now.
Domestically, this process has been paralleled by a remarkable multiplication of minor political groups: 27 are running this time, including a senior citizens' party, a party for youth, a party for animals, a party for universal basic income, and a party for sport.
Key Players and Main Issues
Currently leading is Wilders' PVV, forecast to drop as many as eight of the thirty-seven mandates it won in 2023. It advocates, among other policies, a total moratorium on asylum, male Ukrainian refugees to be sent home, the army to combat "urban violence", and an termination to "progressive education" in schools.
Two political groups, of the moderate right and left, are closely competing behind the PVV. The Christian Democrats (CDA) dominated Dutch politics from the end of the seventies to the beginning of the nineties, and once more in the early 2000s, but slumped to just five seats in the last election.
Nevertheless, under its young leader, its promising new figure, who joined political life just recently, the party has recovered strongly with a campaign emphasizing the severe Netherlands housing shortage and a commitment of "normal, civilised politics". It is projected for up to twenty-six mandates.
GreenLeft/Labour (GL/PvdA), an electoral alliance between the environmentalist party and the 80-year-old Dutch Labour party that is anticipated to become a full-blown merger, is on track to secure comparable seats, according to polling averages.
Headed by the seasoned former European commissioner its leader, it has made constructing additional housing its primary focus, and has controversially included a immigration limit of between forty to sixty thousand people annually in its manifesto.
Three additional groups appear set to be significant forces in the new parliament.
The center-left D66 is projected to gain seats – securing as many as seventeen, from its current nine – under its straight-talking youthful head, with a campaign centred on housing (it proposes to build 10 new cities) and an "individual basic benefit" for recipients.
The liberal-conservative VVD, the political group of the ex-premier (now Nato chief), is forecast to slump to at most 16 seats from its present twenty-four, with its leader, accused of taking the party too far to the right, held responsible for its decline. It is promising corporate tax reductions and less welfare.
The populist, strictly rightwing JA21 is a breakaway group from a different rightwing formation – the previously successful, now controversy-plagued Forum for Democracy – and seems to be benefiting from an departure of voters from the three major rightwing parties. It could secure fourteen mandates.
In addition to the VVD and PVV, both other partners in the unsuccessful previous government, the BBB and NSC, are projected to lose out, with the NSC not even sure of representation in parliament.
The top issues currently have been migration policy, with multiple – occasionally aggressive – protests against proposed asylum facilities for refugee applicants, the cost of living, and the chronic Netherlands issue of housing (the nation is short of 400,000 homes).
Potential New Government
Considering the deeply divided state of Dutch politics, what alliances are feasible is just as important as who wins the election (or in this case, probably runner-up, since no significant group will govern with Wilders, who maintains he intends to lead a minority government).
Following the vote, MPs first designate an informateur, who seeks out potential partnerships. Once a viable coalition has been found, a formateur, typically the head of the biggest prospective member, begins discussing the formal coalition agreement. This can take months.
Multiple options look possible, typically including a mix of parties from moderate left and center right. The most likely, according to political analysts, include CDA and GL/PvdA, plus Democrats 66 and several minor groups possibly incorporating the conservative party.
