Mighty (or once mighty) political Parties That You Believe Will Die Soon

[Lechasseur]

Eh, PSOE is in danger but PS will muddle on regardless even if it changes its name (would be hilarious if they renamed themselves "Democrats" to mirror the "Republicans"). I don't see Melenchon really as a major threat, because FdG is literally him and a few anonymous aging commies.

I think Mélenchon will be the dominant political figure of the left until he retires but I agree that I don't see the FdG eating up the PS, so I think once Mélenchon retires the PS may make a come back, but it will be a much more left wing party than the Hollande one (the PS's right wing has already left for En Marche).

[Lechasseur]

Volskunie were a mighty party in Flanders that died. The Right of the party re-emerged as the N-VA. The social liberals that dominated it though got vacuumed up in sp.a and Agalev.

Cdh and ecolo in Wallonia (basically could become PS sattelites)

FDF/Défi in Brussels (by virtue of previously being a strong player in Brussels).


The PS(OE) in France and Spain are in far, far more danger than the UK and Dutch Labour party because they have movements that can replace them fairly easily (En Marche and Ciudadanos for the social liberals and democrats, Mélenchon and Podemos for the more left-wing of the party). They are basically being kept alive by traditional voters in certain regions. The UK Labour party will be the only real alternative to the Tories for many, and the Dutch Labour Party still has a high ceiling once D66, GL and 50PLUS will inevitably lose their voters. Only SP is a threat.

I agree for the VolksUnie and the CdH, but why are Défi here? They were never a huge party outside of Brussels and my understanding is they're actually polling pretty well.

[Lechasseur]

Moldova is politically rather odd though; when you could make a legitimate argument that the Communist Party are a centre-right party in a country you know that you are talking about a very odd nation.

Very true, I really like the Moldovans (I personnally know several) but it is their political scene is odd (at the same time it's the poorest country in Europe, which is a real shame). This statement is basically true, but isn't the Moldovan Communist Party called the Party of Socialists now?

[Lechasseur]

The Dutch CDA?

I don't think they'll die out completely, given the very low threshold to be elected to the Dutch Parliament (I believe it's 0,66% of the total national vote or something like that), but I doubt they'll stay a major force much longer. Christianity is on the decline in most of Western Europe, the Netherlands included, so the Christian moderates (the type of people who would have been this type of party's base) are disappearing and Christian conservatives I think are going to vote for more conservative parties like the PVV or FvD from now on, which doesn't leave much space for the CDA.

[Lechasseur]

Pasok of Greece obviously.

[Lechasseur]

The Dutch CDA?

I don't think they'll die out completely, given the very low threshold to be elected to the Dutch Parliament (I believe it's 0,66% of the total national vote or something like that), but I doubt they'll stay a major force much longer. Christianity is on the decline in most of Western Europe, the Netherlands included, so the Christian moderates (the type of people who would have been this type of party's base) are disappearing and Christian conservatives I think are going to vote for more conservative parties like the PVV or FvD from now on, which doesn't leave much space for the CDA.

CU and SGP (more socially conservative Christian parties) actually have quite young voter bases. High birth rates in the Bible belt ad if your parents vote SGP you'll likely end up supporting the SGP too. The CDA's voter base is much older though.

The CDA's collapse with Christian voters has been especially dramatic with Catholics. Catholics don't have another Christian party to vote for (CU and SGP are explicitly Protestant) so the CDA used to have a monopoly on them, but Catholics left the CDA for PVV, VVD and even SP in the 2000s/2010s. Catholics are much less likely to vote for one of the three Christian parties than Protestants, I believe both VVD and PVV are ahead of CDA with Catholics now. The PVV has made some inroads in the Bible belt and other religious Protestant areas (there isn't really a Catholic Bible belt, I guess Oost-Brabant and parts of Limburg are quite religious, but they aren't as extreme as the Protestants in the Bible belt), but their gains are pretty limited.

I think the CDA can remain relevant for quite a while if they position themselves are more culturally conservative than the VVD (while being to the left of the VVD on economic issues), but we're definitely not going to see a CDA PM again in my opinion. I was baffled at Buma being happy with 19 seats. Who could have imagined than a decade ago?

You're probably right. So which parties in the Netherlands do you think can form government in the short-to-mid term? VVD? Who else would be possible?
Because I can't see the VVD leading government forever (well I suppose it wouldn't be impossible because next door in Belgium the CVP/PSC was almost constantly the leading party of government from the late 1950s to the late 1990s; now the CD&V (the CVP changed its name in 2001) will probably never be the country's largest party again but I think the next PM from Flanders will be from that party because the largest party, NVA, while they can enter government coalitions, I think they're too controversial to be able to form government outright, as you need to get the support of several parties on both sides of the linguistic divide;and the CD&V is the largest right of centre party after the NVA).
And where is the Dutch Protestant Bible Belt?
At anyrate I'm happy to hear that the Dutch Bible Belt seems to be doing well and growing.

[Lechasseur]

I wouldn't say "soon," but I have a feeling that LREM will at one point crumble. There seems to be a lot of internal conflict, with many left-leaning/ex-PS members (which seem to make up a plurality of LREM) disagreeing with Macron's direction.

It exists as a movement and wants people of different political registrations to co-affiliate. If the party goes downhill, those people will have no problem switching back to their former parties.

If such a collapse does happen, I could see it being reduced to pre-2017 MoDem levels, or even lower, as a rump state.

Agreed

[Lechasseur]

Danish Conservative party is not what it used to be (era of Poul Schlüter).

Agreed. I don't think they'll have any parliamentary representation in 10 years time.