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Yup it's bad. From TFA: > They could prevent him from becoming prime minister, but in almost any conceivable circumstance, his party would have to be a part of

Yup it's bad. From TFA: > They could prevent him from becoming prime minister, but in almost any conceivable circumstance, his party would have to be a part of the government. There is almost no getting around it. It's the same issue in many other european countries, like Belgium or France. The "regular" political parties (and their mainstream media, which they basically own and which they use for propaganda) try to demonize the far-right but there's a reason so many people are voting for the far-right european parties. I'm not saying these are good reasons, but it is what people vote for. And mainstream politicians, instead of addressing the issues that make people vote for the far-right, try to do what politicians do best: dodge the issues, demonize the far-right, and collude to prevent those who won the election from putting in place what they promised their voters they'd do. If you remove the 5% (approximative) of muslim in the Netherlands (who obviously didn't vote for a party that is anti-islam), there are 26% of voters in the Netherlands who voted for Geert Wilders. Why? Why is more than one person out of every four in a country voting for a far-right party? How shitty have things become for that to happen? (they won 37 out of 150 seats). I do believe that, at some point, politicians have to address that question. P.S: FWIW I'm originally from one the rare (european) country where voting is mandatory but I don't give a crap and still don't go voting. Never had any fine (even though technically I could get one).

bondarchuk 3y ago
>collude to prevent those who won the election from putting in place what they promised their voters they'd do. A prime feature of the multi-party system is that this is well within their rights, and even the spirit of democracy (if there is such a thing), to do. That the holders of 113 seats can collude against the holders of 37 seats is quite logical. All this coalition building and alliance forming, and even the political parties themselves to an extent, ultimately rest on 150 individual elected persons holding a seat who can in theory do and vote whatever they want.
- TacticalCoder 3y ago
  > That the holders of 113 seats can collude against the holders of 37 seats is quite logical Well... Yes and no. Because it's precisely that kind of behavior that make it that more and more people keep voting for the far-right (or far-left FWIW): their voices are never taken into account. With three quarters of the seats left, they can form unholy alliances (involving rightwing parties, leftwing parties, ecological parties, etc.: allianes which are looking more and more unlikely) to make sure the status quo persists... But is this what people want? I mean: they didn't just have one person out of every four vote for them: there's also no single party who got more vote than that. If it was a "winner takes all", they'd have won already. What are mainstream parties going to do? Ignore the issue until more than one in every two voter votes for Geert Wilders? Is this what it'd take for mainstream politicians to wake up and realize that maybe, just maybe, they did act in a way that pushed one people out of every four to vote for a far-right party? Or put it this way: if all the parties are going to collude anyway to govern (because so few of them are getting seats), what's even the point of going to vote?
  - aebtebeten 3y ago
    > more and more people keep voting for the far-right (or far-left FWIW) There are obvious problems with that tactic. (Do they not have civics classes in any of these countries anymore?) The mechanism described above is exactly what happened in the 1932 German Federal elections: "The Nazis and KPD [communists] held over half of the seats in the Reichstag. This made it impossible to form a government composed of moderates." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_1932_German_federal_election#Results https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_1932_German_federal_elect... It didn't end well for the Germans.
- 082349872349872 3y ago
  I understand Wilders is exploring forming a minority government (which, to me as a non-Dutchie, seems ripe for a no confidence vote). In the alternative, is there anything that seriously prevents forming a majority coalition consisting of the VVD (+CDA/BBB?) through the PvdA? Also, as I understand it, the current Rutte IV cabinet is in caretaker mode, which in theory would prevent them from addressing worker and farmer compensation as well as the housing crisis, but in practice I'd bet the VVD would rather see market solutions to all of these things, so they aren't that motivated to form a new government. Is this correct?
  - bondarchuk 3y ago
    >In the alternative, is there anything that seriously prevents forming a majority coalition consisting of the VVD (+CDA/BBB?) through the PvdA? A bit of historical context is that PvdA formed a coalition with VVD in 2012-2017, were then perceived to have not done so well (being overpowered by the VVD despite similar number of seats), and scored a historic loss going from 38 to only 9 seats in the following elections. So PvdA might be a bit hesitant to form a coalition with VVD again. >Also, as I understand it, the current Rutte IV cabinet is in caretaker mode, which in theory would prevent them from addressing worker and farmer compensation as well as the housing crisis, but in practice I'd bet the VVD would rather see market solutions to all of these things, so they aren't that motivated to form a new government. Is this correct? The dynamics and edge cases surrounding the cabinet formation and the demissionary cabinet are always a bit unclear to me, can't really answer this one except to say that the rule is that the demissionary cabinet can't decide on controversial issues. I don't know who gets to decide what issues are controversial, or how this rule would be enforced, I get the impression a lot of this is just parliamentary procedure formed through tradition, and maybe laid down in the meeting regulations but not in any laws..
    - aebtebeten 3y ago
      Looks like they found a solution: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-68557036 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-68557036 (to my eye it looks like "since you didn't give us any guarantees that you wouldn't pursue the anti-constitutional bits of your platform, we'll support a right-wing government in general but reserve the right to vote down anything stupid your ministers may try in particular"; is that generally what happened?)
aebtebeten 3y ago
I think the VVD (and now NSC) remember what happened in their neighbour when the DZP thought they could cut a deal with the NSDAP. As far as I am aware, all that the other right wing parties have asked is that Wilders clarify which of his far-right planks he's willing to drop, but he (as is traditional for far-anything parties) has thus far refused to budge. In reasonable jurisdictions, politicians don't have to address anyone that isn't willing enough to make sausage to put together a majority coalition.

bondarchuk 3y ago

>collude to prevent those who won the election from putting in place what they promised their voters they'd do. A prime feature of the multi-party system is that this is well within their rights, and even the spirit of democracy (if there is such a thing), to do. That the holders of 113 seats can collude against the holders of 37 seats is quite logical. All this coalition building and alliance forming, and even the political parties themselves to an extent, ultimately rest on 150 individual elected persons holding a seat who can in theory do and vote whatever they want.

TacticalCoder 3y ago
> That the holders of 113 seats can collude against the holders of 37 seats is quite logical Well... Yes and no. Because it's precisely that kind of behavior that make it that more and more people keep voting for the far-right (or far-left FWIW): their voices are never taken into account. With three quarters of the seats left, they can form unholy alliances (involving rightwing parties, leftwing parties, ecological parties, etc.: allianes which are looking more and more unlikely) to make sure the status quo persists... But is this what people want? I mean: they didn't just have one person out of every four vote for them: there's also no single party who got more vote than that. If it was a "winner takes all", they'd have won already. What are mainstream parties going to do? Ignore the issue until more than one in every two voter votes for Geert Wilders? Is this what it'd take for mainstream politicians to wake up and realize that maybe, just maybe, they did act in a way that pushed one people out of every four to vote for a far-right party? Or put it this way: if all the parties are going to collude anyway to govern (because so few of them are getting seats), what's even the point of going to vote?
- aebtebeten 3y ago
  > more and more people keep voting for the far-right (or far-left FWIW) There are obvious problems with that tactic. (Do they not have civics classes in any of these countries anymore?) The mechanism described above is exactly what happened in the 1932 German Federal elections: "The Nazis and KPD [communists] held over half of the seats in the Reichstag. This made it impossible to form a government composed of moderates." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_1932_German_federal_election#Results https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_1932_German_federal_elect... It didn't end well for the Germans.
082349872349872 3y ago
I understand Wilders is exploring forming a minority government (which, to me as a non-Dutchie, seems ripe for a no confidence vote). In the alternative, is there anything that seriously prevents forming a majority coalition consisting of the VVD (+CDA/BBB?) through the PvdA? Also, as I understand it, the current Rutte IV cabinet is in caretaker mode, which in theory would prevent them from addressing worker and farmer compensation as well as the housing crisis, but in practice I'd bet the VVD would rather see market solutions to all of these things, so they aren't that motivated to form a new government. Is this correct?
- bondarchuk 3y ago
  >In the alternative, is there anything that seriously prevents forming a majority coalition consisting of the VVD (+CDA/BBB?) through the PvdA? A bit of historical context is that PvdA formed a coalition with VVD in 2012-2017, were then perceived to have not done so well (being overpowered by the VVD despite similar number of seats), and scored a historic loss going from 38 to only 9 seats in the following elections. So PvdA might be a bit hesitant to form a coalition with VVD again. >Also, as I understand it, the current Rutte IV cabinet is in caretaker mode, which in theory would prevent them from addressing worker and farmer compensation as well as the housing crisis, but in practice I'd bet the VVD would rather see market solutions to all of these things, so they aren't that motivated to form a new government. Is this correct? The dynamics and edge cases surrounding the cabinet formation and the demissionary cabinet are always a bit unclear to me, can't really answer this one except to say that the rule is that the demissionary cabinet can't decide on controversial issues. I don't know who gets to decide what issues are controversial, or how this rule would be enforced, I get the impression a lot of this is just parliamentary procedure formed through tradition, and maybe laid down in the meeting regulations but not in any laws..
  - aebtebeten 3y ago
    Looks like they found a solution: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-68557036 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-68557036 (to my eye it looks like "since you didn't give us any guarantees that you wouldn't pursue the anti-constitutional bits of your platform, we'll support a right-wing government in general but reserve the right to vote down anything stupid your ministers may try in particular"; is that generally what happened?)

aebtebeten 3y ago

I think the VVD (and now NSC) remember what happened in their neighbour when the DZP thought they could cut a deal with the NSDAP. As far as I am aware, all that the other right wing parties have asked is that Wilders clarify which of his far-right planks he's willing to drop, but he (as is traditional for far-anything parties) has thus far refused to budge. In reasonable jurisdictions, politicians don't have to address anyone that isn't willing enough to make sausage to put together a majority coalition.