Denmark Parliamentary Election - June 18, 2015

[Tetro Kornbluth]

So why isn't a DPP-led government considered possible?

[International Brotherhood of Bernard]

So why isn't a DPP-led government considered possible?

Was about to ask the same thing. It just seems completely nonsensical to me how the third place party that just took an absolute shellacking would get to form government...

[Viewfromthenorth]

So why isn't a DPP-led government considered possible?

Nobody wants it, not even the party themselves. It hasn't happened that a "fringe" (read: non-center) party takes the premiership in a Scandinavian country since the pioneering Social Democratic governments in the 1920s.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Because the whole appeal of the DPP is based on the fact that the DPP will never be part of government but will extract concessions from governments. Which is why today's narrow but clear victory for the Right looks pretty Pyrrhic...

[jaichind]

So in Denmark Proper it is 90-85 Blues.  But TV2 seems to indicate that Reds won all 4 seats in Faroe Islands and Greenland so it is 90-89 for Blues.  Is this true? What happen to the Union Party in Faroe Islands ?

[You kip if you want to...]

So in Denmark Proper it is 90-85 Blues.  But TV2 seems to indicate that Reds won all 4 seats in Faroe Islands and Greenland so it is 90-89 for Blues.  Is this true? What happen to the Union Party in Faroe Islands ?

Would a fair view of this election be that SD lost a fair amount of their base to the DPP, but gained quite a lot from their partners and V (but obviously, not by enough)?

[Viewfromthenorth]

So in Denmark Proper it is 90-85 Blues.  But TV2 seems to indicate that Reds won all 4 seats in Faroe Islands and Greenland so it is 90-89 for Blues.  Is this true? What happen to the Union Party in Faroe Islands ?

All media are reporting this, so it would appear to be true. Been wondering about the same thing, apparently the Republicans picked up a seat out of nowhere in the Faroes. Most of the reports for the past couple days have been about the Social Democrats possibly losing their seat, but they held on to it comfortably.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Electoral churn is even more complicated in Denmark than in most places (ah fragmented party systems, don't you love them), but I'd advise you to look at where the DPP gained the most. Looks to me as if there was a hell of a lot of direct Venstre to DPP switching going on...

[DavidB.]

Electoral churn is even more complicated in Denmark than in most places (ah fragmented party systems, don't you love them), but I'd advise you to look at where the DPP gained the most. Looks to me as if there was a hell of a lot of direct Venstre to DPP switching going on...

This, especially in Jylland.

[Diouf]

Faroe Islands

Tjóðveldi (Republicans, Socialist, Separitist) 24.5%
Javnaðarflokkurin (Social Democrat) 24.3%
Sambandsflokkurin (Liberal) 23.5%
Fólkaflokkurin (Conservative, separitist) 18.7%

So yes, narrowly both seats to the red parties, although the Republicans hadn't committed to HTS. As I wrote before the election, STV would probably be more fair for the Faroese and Greenlandic seats. I'm not completely sure of how the vote transfers would work, left-right or unionist-separitist, but with four parties so close, it seems like a better solution.

[Diouf]

Electoral churn is even more complicated in Denmark than in most places (ah fragmented party systems, don't you love them), but I'd advise you to look at where the DPP gained the most. Looks to me as if there was a hell of a lot of direct Venstre to DPP switching going on...

Indeed, the biggest single shift is clearly V to DF. I would still think that S to DF has been the decisive movement between the blocks; probably a bit of Social Liberal to Liberal Alliance or Liberal as well. Then the Social Democrats will have taken a lot of votes from their coalition partners the Social Liberals and their former coalition partners SPP.

[Diouf]

There were mistakes on the ballots in three of the electoral districts; Vejen, Billund and Haderslev. The top candidates for the Conservatives and the Alternative was placed lower on the list as all candidates were ranked according to name, and not with the top candidate on top as it should have been.
Experts say that there could be a re-vote, but it seems like it is parliament which have to decide on whether to ratify the current results or not. The Conservative top candidate in the area Mike Legarth does not look like coming in, so maybe the Conservatives would want to complain. But if the difference that could swing another seat to the Red Bloc is not very big, then I don't know whether the Right Wing parties will risk a re-vote in some areas for what is a minor mistake. We can see the personal votes tomorrow, and if the distribution of personal votes is not very different from elsewhere in the area, then I guess Mike Legarth might calm down. The Conservative and Alternative vote in the districts does not seem to be different from similar adjacent areas, so I hope/think they won't bother with a re-run, which would delay the (exciting) government formation process further.

[DavidB.]

Thanks for all the info, Diouf!

[Diouf]

A poor result as expected for the Conservatives, but there might be some hope for the party in the 6 candidates it looks like they will get in. The leader Søren Pape Poulsen gets in and managed to improve his party's fortunes in Western Jutland to 4.9%. The former leader Lars Barfoed will not get a seat in Copenhagen, and instead the 27-year old Mette Abildgaard is elected in Northern Zealand. The 55-year old Mike Legarth will not be re-elected in Southern Jutland, while 35-year old Mai Mercado will be elected in Funen. Finally the 38-year old Rasmus Jarlov, who has been the Conservative leader in the Copenhagen City Council, will get into parliament.
So the generational change the party has been longing for, seems to come true. However, with recounts and so on, seats could change again inside the party, but it looks like they will get a completely new start.

[You kip if you want to...]

What voting system do the Danes use? Here's me thinking it was plain-and-simple old closed list PR.

[eric82oslo]

What are the differences between The Alternative and the Red-Greens?

If I'm right and I've understood things the right way, The Alternative is mainly a green party very similar to green parties in the rest of Europe, though probably slightly to the left of most other green parties as they've suggested a 30 hour labour week for instance. The Red-Greens however is to the left of Socialistic Left, which is already very leftish, so it's pretty much the most radical party of all. I hope I'm right though, as I'm far from an expert on Danish politics.

[Diouf]

I'm still not really sure what government will come out of this. Lars Løkke Rasmussen was careful to say that he had "the possibility to form a government", but that it should be a government that took the direction he wanted. The complete opposite of HTS in 2011, when she acted like a rock star and talked only about the win, failing to mention that the Social Liberals' success at that election meant that it would be very difficult for her to get her programme through.

As it has been mentioned in the thread, the DPP has not really wanted to get into government before, and is not at all demanding to be there now. If they enter government, it will be difficult for them to avoid significant losses, and they are probably looking quite a lot at what has happened in Norway. They could lose votes back to the Social Democrats if the investments in the public sector will not be as big as they promised, they could lose votes back to the Liberals who could get a PM boost and might have more competent ministers, and finally, I think there's a big chance that it's right wing could fall to a new party, which can attack it on its too lenient attitudes to the EU and immigration in government. The Danish Unity could do this. Of course, it could be said that these risks are almost equally present if they stay outside the government.

There are a number of good things about being in a government, but Thulelsen Dahl has mentioned the failures of the SPP so many times. He don't want to repeat them, so he's fully aware of the dangers.
I really don't know what to expect. Maybe still a Liberal-only government like in 1973, but it does seem strange to stay out of government after a such a good result. I probably hope for a pure Liberal government, and it still is a relatively likely option, I think.

It looks like the Liberals will only get four seats in Eastern Jutland, so Fatma Øktem will unfortunately, probably have difficulties in getting in.

[Diouf]

What voting system do the Danes use? Here's me thinking it was plain-and-simple old closed list PR.

Only the Red-Green Alliance uses closed lists; the rank of their candidates is decided on at the party conference, not something ordinary voters should spare their minds with. But all other parties uses open lists, so those with the most personal support get in. The personal votes are counted tomorrow. It is not just personal votes that matter; if you have received 35% of the personal votes for a party in a district, you will also get 35% of the party list votes in the district, i.e. those who decided to just vote for the party in stead of for a specific candidate. So the big districts are attractive as the top candidate there will most likely get quite a lot of votes no matter what. Several candidates use the strategy of running as the top candidate in a district other than the district where they are most known, so that they can have two electoral districts where they get a lot of support.

[International Brotherhood of Bernard]

So from the looks of it the seat total is 90-89 blue with the Faroes and Greenland seats, which means if just one seat were to flip from blue to red Helle would stay in office after all. What would be the chance of that happening with any additional tabulation/recounting/personal votes/etc? Sorry if that's a dumb question, I'm not very well versed in the Danish electoral system or their counting process

[Diouf]

What are the differences between The Alternative and the Red-Greens?

If I'm right and I've understood things the right way, The Alternative is mainly a green party very similar to green parties in the rest of Europe, though probably slightly to the left of most other green parties as they've suggested a 30 hour labour week for instance. The Red-Greens however is to the left of Socialistic Left, which is already very leftish, so it's pretty much the most radical party of all. I hope I'm right though, as I'm far from an expert on Danish politics.

Pretty much correct. Basically, you could just say that the emphasis and rhetoric of the parties are very different. The Alternative talks mostly about sustainability, green entrepreneurship and "new politics" and their leader has said that he does not consider himself a socialist. The Red-Green Alliance members do definitely consider themselves socialist, and is basically a classic class struggle party which talks about social dumping, better conditions for the workers and the unemployed etc.
The room for a specific green party has been there for somewhile; we also speculated whether some of the SPP members would create such a party in the chaos when they left the government. In this election, the SPP has focused a lot on unemployent benefits and somewhat less on environment and climate, which has left the field open for the Alternative.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

The Alternative reminds me of those "blues skies thinkers" executives on coke hire when they have too much money, that sit around and occasionally remark something like "BUT WHAT IF BUSES WERE ORANGE!"; but all neatly affiliated in the same party.

The RedGreens are prett much bogstandard Eurosceptic lefties that have moved into the niche left by SPP's attempts to be respectable.

[Diouf]

So from the looks of it the seat total is 90-89 blue with the Faroes and Greenland seats, which means if just one seat were to flip from blue to red Helle would stay in office after all. What would be the chance of that happening with any additional tabulation/recounting/personal votes/etc? Sorry if that's a dumb question, I'm not very well versed in the Danish electoral system or their counting process

The electoral system is straight PR with the biggest remainder system; only the votes of the parties above the threshold is included in the calculation. I'm not a mathematician, but I think it will take some votes to move it to 90-89 Red victory. The TV2 prognosis only changes from 91-88 to 90-89 at the very last second, so it must have been closer to 91 Blue than 89 Blue.
I tried to do a fast calculation, and it seems like the Red Bloc got the last three of the biggest remainders, so I guess it would take some movement for the Blue Bloc to lose an additional seat, but I'm by no means sure. No of the TV channels mentioned the possibility. Normally seats don't change party after the final result, but they can certainly shift inside the parties between different parts of the country. If there's a re-vote in three areas, then I guess there's a real possibility of it changing.

[Hash]

Maps!

[DavidB.]

What are the differences between The Alternative and the Red-Greens?

If I'm right and I've understood things the right way, The Alternative is mainly a green party very similar to green parties in the rest of Europe, though probably slightly to the left of most other green parties as they've suggested a 30 hour labour week for instance. The Red-Greens however is to the left of Socialistic Left, which is already very leftish, so it's pretty much the most radical party of all. I hope I'm right though, as I'm far from an expert on Danish politics.

What are the differences between The Alternative and the Red-Greens?

If I'm right and I've understood things the right way, The Alternative is mainly a green party very similar to green parties in the rest of Europe, though probably slightly to the left of most other green parties as they've suggested a 30 hour labour week for instance. The Red-Greens however is to the left of Socialistic Left, which is already very leftish, so it's pretty much the most radical party of all. I hope I'm right though, as I'm far from an expert on Danish politics.

Pretty much correct. Basically, you could just say that the emphasis and rhetoric of the parties are very different. The Alternative talks mostly about sustainability, green entrepreneurship and "new politics" and their leader has said that he does not consider himself a socialist. The Red-Green Alliance members do definitely consider themselves socialist, and is basically a classic class struggle party which talks about social dumping, better conditions for the workers and the unemployed etc.
The room for a specific green party has been there for somewhile; we also speculated whether some of the SPP members would create such a party in the chaos when they left the government. In this election, the SPP has focused a lot on unemployent benefits and somewhat less on environment and climate, which has left the field open for the Alternative.

Thanks for your answers! This was already what I thought, but what would be the difference in terms of electorate? Alternativet attracting more hipsters and yuppies while Red-Greens targeting immigrants and poorer people? Even for me as a Dutchman, it looks like there are too many parties on the left of the Social Democrats. Which is probably one of the reasons that SF lost this badly.

[DavidB.]

I'm still not really sure what government will come out of this. Lars Løkke Rasmussen was careful to say that he had "the possibility to form a government", but that it should be a government that took the direction he wanted. The complete opposite of HTS in 2011, when she acted like a rock star and talked only about the win, failing to mention that the Social Liberals' success at that election meant that it would be very difficult for her to get her programme through.

As it has been mentioned in the thread, the DPP has not really wanted to get into government before, and is not at all demanding to be there now. If they enter government, it will be difficult for them to avoid significant losses, and they are probably looking quite a lot at what has happened in Norway. They could lose votes back to the Social Democrats if the investments in the public sector will not be as big as they promised, they could lose votes back to the Liberals who could get a PM boost and might have more competent ministers, and finally, I think there's a big chance that it's right wing could fall to a new party, which can attack it on its too lenient attitudes to the EU and immigration in government. The Danish Unity could do this. Of course, it could be said that these risks are almost equally present if they stay outside the government.

There are a number of good things about being in a government, but Thulelsen Dahl has mentioned the failures of the SPP so many times. He don't want to repeat them, so he's fully aware of the dangers.
I really don't know what to expect. Maybe still a Liberal-only government like in 1973, but it does seem strange to stay out of government after a such a good result. I probably hope for a pure Liberal government, and it still is a relatively likely option, I think.

It looks like the Liberals will only get four seats in Eastern Jutland, so Fatma Øktem will unfortunately, probably have difficulties in getting in.

What about a V-I government? I can imagine that C desperately needs some time in opposition, it really needs to reinvent itself (this time without stupid slogans like "nazi islamisme", pretty please?), but isn't I ready to govern?