30AUG2021 updates

 Things are heating up politically as we approach election season. Jumping right into the numbers, I've done a single-poll mathematical projection for Germany:

175 SPD
140 CDU/CSU
115 GRN
95 FDP
70 AfD
50 LNK

As you can see, in this poll, the SPD had a healthy lead. The existing SPD-CDU coalition would not have a majority, meaning a third party would need to be brought in. Additionally, a SPD-GRN-LNK coalition would have a majority. Note however that this estimates the total number of seats at 650. More on that later.

I've also done an estimation for Japan

310 - LDP
30 - NKP
80 - CDP
15 - JCP
15 - ISH
15 - OTH

Note that Japan is hard to estimate due to their strange attachment to using approval polling instead of vote intention polling. Beyond that, even the vote intent polling that is available often does not come close to the results in the same way they do in most countries. As such, a degree of guesstimation has to be done in order to determine numbers like this. 

Back to Germany, I've managed to find a website that seems to do election predictions; here is their latest prediction for the first-ballot constituency seats: https://www.election.de/cgi-bin/showforecast_btw21.pl

Note that Germany only elects half it's MPs from these seats, with the other half coming from the proportional lists. This is why parties like the Greens, AFD, and Linke are expected to win many times as many seats as shown, and why the FDP can win near 100 seats despite not having a single 'dot' on the map. Note that the map shows the CDU winning 181 seats, but I only have them at 140. Why is this? Simply; Germany provides overhang seats to prevent a party winning more seats than it "deserves". 

Take a look at Bavaria on the map. It is one of the two southernmost states, the one on the right. Munchen (Munich) is its capital city and shown in a small inset. The map currently shows 5 Green victories and 41 seats for the CSU (the Bavarian sister party of the CDU) Polling, however, shows the CSU only at about 35% in the state. By default, Germany assigns the same number of PR, or, List seats to a state, as it assigns geographic seats. This means that of a grand total of 92 seats exist in Bavaria. Of those 92, however, the CSU could win 41. This, however, is 44.565% of the seats, far more than the 35% they would "deserve". As such, the number of list seats gets increases until the CSU is 'only' winning 35% of the total seats. This would require 117 seats, meaning that an additional 25 seats have to be added to the Bavarian list, bringing it's number of list seats up to 71 (remember, it is only "supposed" to have 46 seats). This is a 1.54x increase. As this would unbalance the representation between all the various states, all other states now get a boost to the number of list seats that exist within their states as well, also by a factor of 1.54. This means the grand total of 299 list seats nationwide now becomes 460 seats. This gets added to the 299 geographic seats, for a grand total of 759, far above my estimated total of 650. This would bring the CDU/CSU coalition up to 161 seats for my single-poll projection, and, 'single poll' is exactly why that number does not match the multi-poll german-based election projection; IE, using a single poll can be more inaccurate, but, using a multi-poll system can miss fresh and hot trends. 

I'm bringing up the number of geographic seats, expected to be won by party, for a simple reason: What we are seeing is a massive and radical change from the past. Last election, the AfD won 3 geographic seats, the Left Party (Die Linke) won 4, ad the Greens won 1. In both 2013 and 2009, the AfD won 0, the Left won 4, and the Greens won 1. 2005 saw the Left win 3, and the Greens 1, while 2002 saw the Left win 2, and the Greens just 1, which was their first ever. In 1998 and 1994 the Left won 4, and in 1990, they won 1. 

Continuing back, in West Germany, we see a grand total of 0 geographic seats being won by a party that is not the SPD or CDU/CSU in elections in 1987, 1983, 1980, 1976, 1972, 1969, 1965, and 1961. In fact, you have to go back to 1957 to find a smaller party winning seats; in this case, the FDP won 1, and the AfD-like "German Party" won 6. 

1953 had far more, seeing 14 FDP seats, 10 German Party, and 1 for Zentrum, while 1949 had 12 for the FDP, 5 for the German Party, 11 for the "Bavaria Party" and 3 for Independents. 

Meanwhile, in East Germany, the system provided for 0 geographic seats at any point, and so, there is nothing to look at. Weimar Germany also had no geographic seats, meaning you have to go all the way back to 1912, before the introduction of any form of Proportional Representation, to find more results to look at. If you are interested, you can view such a map on that election's wikipage, but, as it does not relate to my point, I will not be doing so myself. 

Instead, I look back to the current prediction from election.de and see that the Left is expected to win a record 5 seats. The AfD is expected to go from 3 to 13. The Greens are expected to go from 1, to 19. In fact, 19 would be the largest number of geography seats won by a "small party" in the history of Germany, more than the 14 the FDP took in 1953. Additionally, since 1960, not a single geographic seat in West Germany has been won by any 'small' party, yet the Greens look set to take 15 of them. 

Assuming these projections are correct, a total of 37 geographic seats will be won by a "smaller" party in 2021. This would be 37 of 299, or, 12.4%. This beats the 10.3% elected in 1953 (25 of 242) but not the 31 of 242 that won in 1949 (12.8%) 

Regardless, assuming this trend holds, it will certainly be of note in the history of elections in Germany, and may indicate a coming realignment in its political system.

Projections for Germany & Norway

 I must admit I made a mistake when I forgot to add this to yesterday's post:

150 CDU/CSU
150 SPD
120 GRN
85 FDP
70 AfD
45 LNK

A quick and rough mathematical poll average projection for the German election, rounded to the nearest 5. 

To make it up, I also ran the Norwegian polls through a quick 3 poll average:

9 - R (Red Party) [Communist]
17 - SV (Socialist Left) [Socialist]
9 - MDG (Greens) [Green]
44 - Ap (Labour) [Social Democracy]
22 - Sp (Centre) [Nordic Agrarian]
8 - V (Liberal) [Euro Liberal]*
7 - KrF (Christian Democratic) [Christian Democrat]*
35 - H (Conservative) [Conservative]*
18 - FrP (Progressive) [Neo Nationalist]*

* Government (68) [85 for majority] 

The left is clearly going to win the election, but the question is what coalition will come. Currently, R, SV, Ap, and Sp have some sort of alliance, and said alliance has a majority (92) on these numbers. 

23AUG2021 update

 The PC party of Nova Scotia has won a majority government, as, most readers likely already know. 

In Germany, the SPD and CDU/CSU have tied in a recent poll, at 22% each. It will be interesting to see if this will be part of some kind of bump for the party, or, if this is a marker for momentum that can carry through the remainder of the campaign. 

This boost has also helped the party in local elections in Berlin and Mecklenburg, where the party is also up. Again, I'll continue to monitor for the impact.

In Czechia, the governing party appears to be pulling ahead of its two opposition coalitions, but remains below their result in the previous election. Their main coalition partner, the social democrats, are polling below the threshold. They may end up needing a coalition with one of the two main opposition alliances when all is said and done.

Things should heat up, politically, as we enter September. 

16AUG2021 update

 Nova Scotia votes tomorrow. The most likely result seems to be a Liberal victory; but there are some reports that polls say the Tories could win. Frankly, the NDP could even win. Along with the pollster paywalls, we also are simply seeing fewer polls, especially in the smaller provinces. As such, any attempt by me to make a projection would be foolish. 

In Bulgaria, the country looks, potentially, to be headed back to the polls. The situation is unclear at this point, but I will keep you up to date as news develops.

I've poked my head into the Zambian election; but only insomuch as to determine that the result is probably legitimate; though I'm not fully solid on that just yet. 

In Germany, the SDP appears to be surging. Olaf Scholtz is their candidate for Chancellor, he is the current vice chancellor, and finance minister. I will monitor the situation as it develops. Scholtz is a more moderate member of the party, and would be more likely to continue the grand coalition, instead of working with the Greens, should he win and have said option. 

In Czechia, there are three main coalitions vying for seats in the parliament. ANO, the government, is somewhat liberal, while PaS leans a bit to the left and SPOLU leans a bit to the right; all three could, however, be defined as "liberal" though the latter may be more comfortable thinking of itself as conservative. I will dig into this deeper as the election approaches. 

Lastly, in Iceland, polls suggest the following:

14 - D* - Independence (Moderate Conservative) 

8 - V* - Left-Green (Eco-Socialist) 

8 - S - Social Democratic (Social Democratic) 

8 - P - Pirate Party (Pirate) 

7 - B* - Progressive (Nordic Liberal) 

7 - C - Reform (Liberal) 

4 - J - Socialist (Socialist) 

4 - M - Centre (Populist) 

3 - F - People's Party (Pro Disability) 

Current Government* - 29 (32 for majority)

Unsure what this would mean in terms of potential coalitions; but, as always, I continue to follow the situation. 

canada to hold election, sep 20th, 2021

 Canada is going to the polls in September.

My current thought on possible results is as follows:

250-110 LIB
180-70 CPC
160-20 NDP
45-20 BQ
5-0 GRN
5-0 PPC
5-0 MAV

There will be more as the election continues; but, we will not be covering this as close as previous federal elections. Pollsters and their paywalls have left me with no choice but to scale back on all of my coverage of Canadian elections. 

In the future, I may tie in my patreon and other funding to helping to pay to get past those paywalls; but, for this year, that will not happen. 

10AUG2021 updates

 In Bulgaria, the lead party has, again, changed its mind, and is now seeking a minority government. 

Norway has been seeing the Centre party doing well. They are similar to other nordic "Centre" parties; which makes them hard to classify in the canadian context. They are perhaps closest to the Liberals. The party has been polling at around 17%, and, has been polling over 15% for over a year; it's previous best election result was under 11%, meaning they could make history. They are currently part of the governing left-wing coalition; but with a strong enough result, they could decide to change that. 

Germany is having state elections alongside its national elections. I want to look at these.

In Berlin there is a pan-left government (SPD-Lnk-Grn) lead by the SPD. Polls suggest such a government would win a majority; but, with the Greens as the new lead party. 

Mecklenburg has a grand coalition (SPD-CDU) but polls are unclear on if they can be re-elected to a majority; it would be close. A pan-left government would have a majority, however, as would a 'Weimar' coalition of the SPD-CDU-FDP. 

Thuringia was originally going to hold elections at this time, but they've been cancelled. The state held elections just last year, but suffered a crisis, and so snap elections were planned; but such elections were cancelled as it would require a majority vote in the legislature, and no such pro-election majority exists. Polls suggest the current Linke lead pan-left government would have been re-elected. 

General Updates - 06AUG2021

 I may not be able to make an update on the 9th, so, I'll do some updates here.

Bulgaria: 

Since the last update, the lead party has changed their mind, and decided to go it alone in a minority; then, changed their mind, and decided for a coalition again. It looks like they are considering the socialists over the Turkish minority liberal party.

Russia:

No 'prediction' changes since July, Instead, I wanted to look, quickly, at some of the parties not expected to win seats. 

First; there are a number of parties that are overtly anti-administration. They include, but are not limited to, the liberal Yabloko party, the Green Alternative, and the Communists of Russia. All are expected to do very poorly. There are also parties that seem very pro-establishment. One is the New People party, that I will talk about later. Others include the left wing Party of Freedom, green Ecological Party,  Lastly are parties that are only moderately pro-establishment, like the right-wing Party of Growth, moderate Civic Platform, the Pensioner party, and the hard right Rodina party.

New People, which is moderate, but leans slightly right, has been polling well; and by that I mean, at about 3%, where the threshold is 5%. It is possible they could enter the Duma; being a counterpoint to the more progressive Just Russia party. 

Lastly, I want to go over the upcoming elections, and, the other elections I'm still following:

Upcoming:
Norway - Sep 13
Russia - Sep 19
Iceland - Sep 25
Germany - Sep 26
German Lander - Sep 26
Czechia - Oct 9
Iraq - Oct 10
Japan - Oct 22
Montreal - Nov 7
Argentina - Nov 14
Post Election:
Bulgaria - gov formation
Israel - unstable? coalition
Monitoring:
France - spring 2022
Italy - summer 2023

This will make the coming fall quite a "big" year, in terms of elections. Germany, Japan, and Russia are all large, powerful nations voting this year. I will detail more about these upcoming elections in future posts. Note, however, that just because something is on the list here, does not guarantee I will cover it; and, conversely, I may decide to cover things not listed. 

02AUG2021 updates

Let us start with news out of Israel, which enshrines the rotation of office between Bennet and Lapid into law. Bennett still has a way out, as outlined in the article, by joining a government lead by someone else; but simply agreeing to this shows that my assumption may have been wrong that Bennett would stab Lapid and never allow him to come into office. 

In Italy, I continue to monitor the polls. Here is part of the polling shown on Wikipedia, with some columns cut out for clarity. 

We are getting very close to an expected FdI #1, PD #2 poll. FdI is lead by Giorgia Meloni, who, pending on the coalition formed after the next election, could become the first female Prime Minister of Italy. Part of her party's rise is that FdI is based outside the north, while Lega has traditionally been a regionalist, and sometimes separatist party, based in Northern Italy. It would be somewhat (though, not very) like if the Bloc Quebecois here in Canada were reform and were to manage to appeal to voters in other parts of the country. It would be very easy for a national party with similar policies to convince people that they actually do not want to vote for the new Bloc Canada. This is part of why Lega, formerly Lega Nord, is running into difficulties.  

Alongside this is the simple fact that Lega has been sitting in government, off and on, since the last election. FdI, however, has not. As such, 'opposition' voters, who oppose the government, will naturally be more drawn to the party. As well, FdI is a more extreme right than Lega is. 

As always, I'll keep an eye on the situation and keep you all updated.