🇳🇱 Politics and Elections in the Netherlands: General Election (Nov 22)

[adma]

There are less posters in most countries these days. I suppose it reflects that there's less absolute loyalty towards particular political parties now.

But also, in our polarized times, more concern over the consequences of displaying one's allegiances out in the open.

[adma]

Its interesting that people would consider the VVD to be "holding up well" compared to the Tories in the UK when most polls show them getting 27 or 28 seats out of 150 - meaning about 18% of the national popular vote.

Imagine if the UK Tories got 18% of the national popular vote - that would be considered an extinction event! Now of course it goes without saying that the UK and the Netherlands have radically different electoral systems and in Dutch politics there are huge incentives to vote for smaller parties that simply do not exist in the UK 

Well, to put the "different electoral systems" shoe on the other foot, Tony Blair managed a 412-166 landslide over the Tories in '01 w/virtually the same percentage that Walter Mondale got in his all-but-home-state-and-DC landslide loss to Ronald Reagan in '84.

[adma]

Amsterdam:

28.8% GL-PvdA (+11.2)
10.2% VVD (-2.8 )
  8.5% D66 (-14.2)
  8.2% PVV (+3.1)
  6.2% DENK (-0.4)
  5.6% NSC (new)
  4.0% PVdD (-3.0)
  3.4% Volt (-2.5)
  2.7% SP (-2.2)
  2.2% FvD (-0.5)

Those who speak of a leftish Netherlandish stereotype: I believe this is what you have in mind.  (To many, Amsterdam might as well = the whole country.)

[adma]

Amsterdam:

28.8% GL-PvdA (+11.2)
10.2% VVD (-2.8 )
  8.5% D66 (-14.2)
  8.2% PVV (+3.1)
  6.2% DENK (-0.4)
  5.6% NSC (new)
  4.0% PVdD (-3.0)
  3.4% Volt (-2.5)
  2.7% SP (-2.2)
  2.2% FvD (-0.5)

Those who speak of a leftish Netherlandish stereotype: I believe this is what you have in mind.  (To many, Amsterdam might as well = the whole country.)

Although even this is far more right-wing than almost any major American city.

That's because the GOP's gonna GOP.  But at times, an analogous id can shine through, especially on a municipal level (cf Ford Nation in Toronto)

[adma]

These are absolutely wild numbers. There were only 140,000 total votes countrywide, which seems very low. Did a lot of schools just not participate?

At least one of these three things is true:
1. only some schools participated
2. it was an opt-in thing for students and only a small fraction who actually care about politics bothered to participate
3. the young folks in the Netherlands are insanely right-wing compared to what you normally see from the youngs

Now this is truly getting a little bit too detailed for me (not a school mock election psephologist) and it's also the last question I'm answering on this, but I'm sure the first one is true, not all schools participated; as for the second one it's probably not true that only those really interested in politics voted but voting was obviously also not mandatory; and as for the third one: could be, I guess? I have no idea, I'm not young anymore

My feeling is, young people have much less natural engagement to the civic sphere than their elders, having been conditioned in an environment where gaming and electronic social media have been far more dominant.  And that kind of environment breeds a greater tendency t/w the "identitarian", with little room for grey area or nuance.  And unfortunately, the far right does good "identitarian"--perhaps in part because at lot of the time, that realm itself operates on a stunted, juvenile level that younger people can identify with (which is a key to their "get 'em while they're young" outreach)