Opinion of the Greens being eliminated from parliament by the Austrian voter ?

[Tender Branson]

The Greens dropped from 12.4% in 2013 to 3.8-3.9% in the election on Sunday, thus being eliminated from parliament (4% threshold).

Your thoughts ?

---

IMO, a good and necessary development. They can now restructure like the FDP after 2013 and become less smug and more in touch with real people, instead of living in their Bobo bubble.

Thankfully, an alternative to the Greens (Pilz's List) made it into parliament instead, who are not as naive as the remnant-Greens.

[MAINEiac4434]

Maybe they shouldn't have expelled their youth wing.

[Tender Branson]

Maybe they shouldn't have expelled their youth wing.

That's only one ingredient that led to their defeat ...

[Lechasseur]

Approve

[Middle-aged Europe]

Disapprove... but the party was indeed a Class A clusterf**k (Young Greens, Glawischnig, Pilz...) this year and it was not entirely surprising what happened to them in the end.

[JonHawk]

FF move. Hopefully other green parties also end up the same way especially in Sweden

[Lechasseur]

FF move. Hopefully other green parties also end up the same way especially in Sweden

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

[nicholas.slaydon]

FF move. Hopefully other green parties also end up the same way especially in Sweden

[SNJ1985]

Strongly approve. The same thing should happen to the Greens in Germany.

[wxtransit]

FF move. Hopefully other green parties also end up the same way especially in Sweden

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Disapprove on balance

[Lechasseur]

Strongly approve. The same thing should happen to the Greens in Germany.

This too

[vanguard96]

Can the socialists here tell me why you disapprove of the Green parties? I thought they were mostly 'watermelons' i.e. red on the inside and in the very least 'fellow travellers' in socialism due to common inspiration?

Are they corporatists in Europe? Or too statist?

How different are they from the US Green party?

Once a couple of Greens came to our monthly meeting - but did not say anything and left early after the procedural stuff concluded. Maybe they observing to see how local meetings are run.

Our party allows socialists - left libertarians (in the spirit of the European meaning of libertarian) - however a few outspoken ones have been deliberately provocative attacking the Non-Aggression Principle, trolling, threatening to black block our convention, etc and thus are hurting building any common ground we can find on areas like reducing police burden on the community, the anti-war effort, and corporate welfare.

I am curious thus about the opinion of the Green party was it something internal? Did they smear socialists in your neck of the woods? Did they try to eliminate radical voices? Have they gone down a road too far?

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Green Parties have taken very odd tacks, especially in countries where they haven't been rendered an irrelevant force by FPTP. Typically (especially in the case of the oldest and most entrenched Green parties) you have an odd issue emerging, with an increasingly "pro-status quo" middle-class voter base, but a leftist (or at least strongly SJW) cadre with the leadership normally tacking towards the wing stressing government participation and, well, centrism. Let's look at the recent machinations of some prominent Greens:

- New Zealand: has this year been content to be a sort of annex of Labour, subject to the same "fiscal responsibility" rules as them. So they will "challenge neoliberalism" as much as Ardern's Labour, which is to say probably not.

- Australia: has been caught in a huge internal schism with its centrist environmental wing and the leftists based around NSW, which the former seem to have won. Di Natale seem to be aping the centrism of the late Democrats.

- Germany: is being absorbed into the Merkel machine, in what will probably be a very economically right government. (In fact, just as the SPD is the textbook case study for how the original social democrats coped with compromise; the German Greens are a good study in how the New Left and the Establishment found common ground)

- France: imploded into a hundred pieces during the Hollande Presidency, and prominent members were in Melenchon, Hamon and Macron camps during the election. (The previously dicused leftist cadre with a middle class base come into play here, and is a key part of why the Greens under performed in 2012 with Joly).

There are several big problems. The biggest is that environmentalism (and other New Left causes) are no longer a unique selling point. Almost all parties of the left and centre have started to invade that niche, and left the Greens fighting for a place that will satigy their voters and cadre alike. Here the Austrian Greens seemed to make a bet that, well, "SJW" issues would be a good way to solve the dilemma, but it didn't fundamentally work.

Regardless, I am saddened by the loss of the Greens because I never think it is good to lose a voice from the centre left, and even if they were "naive" in parliament, it is very rarely a good idea for everybody in parliament to speak from the same voice.

[parochial boy]

Green Parties have taken very odd tacks, especially in countries where they haven't been rendered an irrelevant force by FPTP. Typically (especially in the case of the oldest and most entrenched Green parties) you have an odd issue emerging, with an increasingly "pro-status quo" middle-class voter base, but a leftist (or at least strongly SJW) cadre with the leadership normally tacking towards the wing stressing government participation and, well, centrism. Let's look at the recent machinations of some prominent Greens:

- New Zealand: has this year been content to be a sort of annex of Labour, subject to the same "fiscal responsibility" rules as them. So they will "challenge neoliberalism" as much as Ardern's Labour, which is to say probably not.

- Australia: has been caught in a huge internal schism with its centrist environmental wing and the leftists based around NSW, which the former seem to have won. Di Natale seem to be aping the centrism of the late Democrats.

- Germany: is being absorbed into the Merkel machine, in what will probably be a very economically right government. (In fact, just as the SPD is the textbook case study for how the original social democrats coped with compromise; the German Greens are a good study in how the New Left and the Establishment found common ground)

- France: imploded into a hundred pieces during the Hollande Presidency, and prominent members were in Melenchon, Hamon and Macron camps during the election. (The previously dicused leftist cadre with a middle class base come into play here, and is a key part of why the Greens under performed in 2012 with Joly).

There are several big problems. The biggest is that environmentalism (and other New Left causes) are no longer a unique selling point. Almost all parties of the left and centre have started to invade that niche, and left the Greens fighting for a place that will satigy their voters and cadre alike. Here the Austrian Greens seemed to make a bet that, well, "SJW" issues would be a good way to solve the dilemma, but it didn't fundamentally work.

Regardless, I am saddened by the loss of the Greens because I never think it is good to lose a voice from the centre left, and even if they were "naive" in parliament, it is very rarely a good idea for everybody in parliament to speak from the same voice.

There are plenty of examples of Green Parties still doing well though, even if you want to discount the success of GroenLinks in Holland and the fact that Left-Green might very well lead the next government in Iceland.

The two Belgian Green parties seem to be holding up fairly well; and the Swiss ones have had their best year since the split with the GreenLiberals.

In all those cases though, I think the Greens have done well at least in part by way of staying in very much as opposition parties, and generally not approaching the establishment too closely.

Looking at where Greens have stalled or fallen - France being the stand out example here - but all the others apply as well - there has always been an element of the Greens being co-opted into the establishment and diluting their credentials.

[Hydera]

The Greens dropped from 12.4% in 2013 to 3.8-3.9% in the election on Sunday, thus being eliminated from parliament (4% threshold).

Your thoughts ?

---

IMO, a good and necessary development. They can now restructure like the FDP after 2013 and become less smug and more in touch with real people, instead of living in their Bobo bubble.

Thankfully, an alternative to the Greens (Pilz's List) made it into parliament instead, who are not as naive as the remnant-Greens.

If the US had a Pilz list tier party id definitely vote for it. Leftwing on economics, liberal on most social issues but doesnt give an sjw vibe and is not laissez-faire on immigration.

[vanguard96]

Green Parties have taken very odd tacks, especially in countries where they haven't been rendered an irrelevant force by FPTP. Typically (especially in the case of the oldest and most entrenched Green parties) you have an odd issue emerging, with an increasingly "pro-status quo" middle-class voter base, but a leftist (or at least strongly SJW) cadre with the leadership normally tacking towards the wing stressing government participation and, well, centrism. Let's look at the recent machinations of some prominent Greens:

- New Zealand: has this year been content to be a sort of annex of Labour, subject to the same "fiscal responsibility" rules as them. So they will "challenge neoliberalism" as much as Ardern's Labour, which is to say probably not.

- Australia: has been caught in a huge internal schism with its centrist environmental wing and the leftists based around NSW, which the former seem to have won. Di Natale seem to be aping the centrism of the late Democrats.

- Germany: is being absorbed into the Merkel machine, in what will probably be a very economically right government. (In fact, just as the SPD is the textbook case study for how the original social democrats coped with compromise; the German Greens are a good study in how the New Left and the Establishment found common ground)

- France: imploded into a hundred pieces during the Hollande Presidency, and prominent members were in Melenchon, Hamon and Macron camps during the election. (The previously dicused leftist cadre with a middle class base come into play here, and is a key part of why the Greens under performed in 2012 with Joly).

There are several big problems. The biggest is that environmentalism (and other New Left causes) are no longer a unique selling point. Almost all parties of the left and centre have started to invade that niche, and left the Greens fighting for a place that will satigy their voters and cadre alike. Here the Austrian Greens seemed to make a bet that, well, "SJW" issues would be a good way to solve the dilemma, but it didn't fundamentally work.

Regardless, I am saddened by the loss of the Greens because I never think it is good to lose a voice from the centre left, and even if they were "naive" in parliament, it is very rarely a good idea for everybody in parliament to speak from the same voice.

Thanks for the breakdown. I am not up on the international parties particularly on the left aside from a little bit in Japan (since I used to live there and watch Japanese news sometimes) - and even less for the UK, Canada, France, and Australia.

[vanguard96]

Green Parties have taken very odd tacks, especially in countries where they haven't been rendered an irrelevant force by FPTP. Typically (especially in the case of the oldest and most entrenched Green parties) you have an odd issue emerging, with an increasingly "pro-status quo" middle-class voter base, but a leftist (or at least strongly SJW) cadre with the leadership normally tacking towards the wing stressing government participation and, well, centrism. Let's look at the recent machinations of some prominent Greens:

- New Zealand: has this year been content to be a sort of annex of Labour, subject to the same "fiscal responsibility" rules as them. So they will "challenge neoliberalism" as much as Ardern's Labour, which is to say probably not.

- Australia: has been caught in a huge internal schism with its centrist environmental wing and the leftists based around NSW, which the former seem to have won. Di Natale seem to be aping the centrism of the late Democrats.

- Germany: is being absorbed into the Merkel machine, in what will probably be a very economically right government. (In fact, just as the SPD is the textbook case study for how the original social democrats coped with compromise; the German Greens are a good study in how the New Left and the Establishment found common ground)

- France: imploded into a hundred pieces during the Hollande Presidency, and prominent members were in Melenchon, Hamon and Macron camps during the election. (The previously dicused leftist cadre with a middle class base come into play here, and is a key part of why the Greens under performed in 2012 with Joly).

There are several big problems. The biggest is that environmentalism (and other New Left causes) are no longer a unique selling point. Almost all parties of the left and centre have started to invade that niche, and left the Greens fighting for a place that will satigy their voters and cadre alike. Here the Austrian Greens seemed to make a bet that, well, "SJW" issues would be a good way to solve the dilemma, but it didn't fundamentally work.

Regardless, I am saddened by the loss of the Greens because I never think it is good to lose a voice from the centre left, and even if they were "naive" in parliament, it is very rarely a good idea for everybody in parliament to speak from the same voice.

There are plenty of examples of Green Parties still doing well though, even if you want to discount the success of GroenLinks in Holland and the fact that Left-Green might very well lead the next government in Iceland.

The two Belgian Green parties seem to be holding up fairly well; and the Swiss ones have had their best year since the split with the GreenLiberals.

In all those cases though, I think the Greens have done well at least in part by way of staying in very much as opposition parties, and generally not approaching the establishment too closely.

Looking at where Greens have stalled or fallen - France being the stand out example here - but all the others apply as well - there has always been an element of the Greens being co-opted into the establishment and diluting their credentials.

Melting back into the establishment is a common thing here for the Greens and Libertarian parties both by giving up to join a bigger group with electability in a FPTP system and within the party by appealing as a pragmatic candidate who works with the establishment and is willing to ignore even the core platform ideas of the party to appeal to others.

[DavidB.]

After the refugees welcome bullsh**t in Vienna, this was exactly what they deserved, and it tastes so good.