SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
The Pirate Party looks set for a successful outing in the coming weekend's Icelandic elections.
A poll by local newspaper Morgunblaðið and the Icelandic Social Science Research Institute of the University of Iceland reports support for the Pirate Party is running at about 22.6 per cent, a point-and-a-half ahead of the ruling Independence Party and four points clear of the Left-Greens. That's impressive support, although the party's support has fallen a couple of points since March 2015.
Iceland uses s proportional representation system so the party's current level of support will likely translate into about 15 seats in the 63-member Althingi.
That won't be not enough for Píratar, the party's Icelandic name, to take government. It's also ruled out a coalition with the Independence Party.
But earlier this year Independence split and the recently-formed splinter group Viðreisn (tr. "Regeneration") is polling at 8.8 per cent and has ruled out joining a government with any of the current coalition parties. If the Pirates can align with Viðreisn and other like-minded parties it may therefore become part of a governing coalition and win some ministries.
Four years for a party founded by geeks to take over the government is not bad.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Thursday October 27 2016, @01:35PM
Part of the reason things are different in most European democracies is that their governments' system is different: In a parliamentary system, if neither of the largest parties have a majority, then the smaller parties get to decide who is in charge and thus have a significant influence on their government. In a presidential system, if neither of the largest parties have a majority, then the smaller parties still have no actual policy influence and any votes they get are more likely to help the major party they least agree with.
So the effect is that parliaments encourage having a bunch of parties that have to make deals with each other, while presidential systems encourage 2 parties locked in mortal combat.
"Think of how stupid the average person is. Then realize half of 'em are stupider than that." - George Carlin
(Score: 3, Insightful) by fritsd on Thursday October 27 2016, @03:09PM
100% agreed.
And that what you said also happens in reality is proved today 27 Oct. in this article about the Icies:
Opposition parties find common ground [icelandtourist.is]
In fact, politics is sometimes described as the art to make compromises. Not the art to cage-fight each other to death.
Also, multiple parties that try to convince the voter: "vote for our party! we're fantastic! we might form a coalition with party Y or Z, but it's better if you vote for us instead of them, because ..."
is more soothing to the voter's psyche than: "vote for our party! otherwise you support a crazy criminal who wants to destroy our country. You're not a traitor, are you?"
Because, in the first case, a picture is drawn in the voter's head that there are multiple viable choices, ranked from best to worst, and in the second case, a picture is drawn that it's a disaster to make the wrong choice.
I saw a picture on the Internet somewhere about the USA elections: "vote for Giant Meteor 2016! just end it already!".
From the sounds of it, the Icies are going to need less anti-depressiva this coming winter than the Americans..
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 27 2016, @04:08PM
So why are some of the more extreme right-wing governments around these days are the ones that have come out of the parliamentary systems? Is that more representative of the people, or is that something inherent in the system?
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Thursday October 27 2016, @04:45PM
That is in fact more representative of the people's actual opinion. For example, look at Greece: The Golden Dawn Party is gaining strength, and is quite openly nationalistic and racist. The reason they have a lot of public support has a lot to do with the fact that (A) the Greek economy sucks, (B) the less extreme parties weren't able to fix it, (C) the extreme left-wing party Syriza wasn't able to fix it, and (D) a lot of the people affected by all of that know they didn't do anything wrong. When that all is happening, it's relatively easy to convince people that the problem is immigrants, foreigners, dangerous backstabbers who talk funny, and so forth.
And that's exactly what led to that little dust-up in the late 1930's and early 1940's.
"Think of how stupid the average person is. Then realize half of 'em are stupider than that." - George Carlin
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 27 2016, @08:50PM
That would almost seem to be a knock against your argument for parliamentary systems. Perhaps the built-in inertia of the two-party system helps dampen out the reactionary response you're talking about.
(Score: 2) by t-3 on Friday October 28 2016, @12:52AM
Representative democracy is simply oligarchy by another name. Someone who stands to gain power and influence will tell any lie to get elected, and exploit the "us vs. them" mob mentality that rules human social behavior. It only works when there is a high level of political awareness and involvement beyond the superficial in the population, and this cannot last for any long period of time. Direct democracy is the only way to have a truly representative system, because in direct democracy, the people represent themselves.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Friday October 28 2016, @01:45AM
That's the problem right there. Sure, direct democracy can be fantastic, as I know from growing up in an area where Town Meeting is a long-standing tradition, but as the scale of the thing being managed becomes larger, direct democracy becomes less and less practical.
"Think of how stupid the average person is. Then realize half of 'em are stupider than that." - George Carlin
(Score: 2) by fritsd on Friday October 28 2016, @10:08AM
Yes, I have heard that exact argument used in the UK. The UKIP has such a large proportion of the popular vote, that Nigel "you're not laughing now!!1!" Farage [wp.com] [WARNING super unpleasant website, maybe NSFW] basically represents 1/3 of the UK in the Europarliament (21 / 72 MEPs; MEP=Member of the European Parliament).
(You can guess that that does wonders for the coming Brexit negotiations!)
Yet UKIP has only 1 MP (Member of Parliament) in the Westminster parliament. That's VERY skewed.
But sometimes countries tumble into situations that cannot be solved by the two halves of the Party of Power.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 27 2016, @11:39PM
SYRIZA (it's an initialism) isn't "extreme left".
Hell, they aren't Left at all.
Their -rhetoric- during the campaign was Left.
As soon as they took office, they immediately showed that THEY ARE ACTUALLY PRO-AUSTERITY.[1]
They took out *new* loans which went right into the hands of their creditors; none of it went into the actual economy.
If you want to see how to do this stuff right, check out what Iceland has done.
First they told their banksters to pound sand when it came to bailing them out.
Next, they started jailing those crooks.
The Golden Dawn Party is gaining strength
...if you count the digits -behind- the decimal point.
Even during bad times, most folks don't become assholes.
it's relatively easy to convince people that the problem is immigrants, foreigners, dangerous backstabbers who talk funny, and so forth
...when the media doesn't do its job properly.
Big props to Edward R. Murrow here.
...and a big raspberry for essentially all of Lamestream Media of the last 4 decades (at least).
...and schools could not possibly teach anything that is -more- important than the History of the 1930s (the economic crash and the rise of Fascism).
...but many US History classes never get that far in the book.
...and when they do, they gloss over it.
[1] There has never been a single example where austerity has pulled a country out of the shitter.
It only makes things WORSE.
Stop paying on debts that you can NEVER repay; take your lumps and move on.
If you need advice, ask the folks in Iceland how they did it.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 27 2016, @07:15PM
That is due to history. The countries/cultures that did not have strong right-wing tendencies in their DNA were wiped off the map. The remaining one are what history has made them. They only pretend to tolerate other cultures so long as it lines their pockets and doesn't endanger their future. Should people lose the belief that it is in their interest, shit will hit the fan really really fast and in an ugly way.
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Thursday October 27 2016, @11:59PM
You are largely correct.
I live in a Western democracy which had first past the post voting and two dominant parties until the 1970's when two (completely different) potential third parties arose and gained (at times) up to 20% of the vote, but no seats in parliament.
While this was fundamentally unfair, the two dominant parties ignored or downplayed the issue, as you would imagine until in the early 1990's, one of the two made the mistake of promising a referendum on Proportional Representation if they won the next election.
They were not given the option of backing out of the deal and had to go through with it. Even though the two big parties put huge amounts of money into the "No" campaign, they still lost and now we have 7 parties in Parliament, some of whom are complete loonies, but that represents our society.