Are S&D parties becoming unelectable?

[mileslunn]

5 years ago things looked bleak for S&D but then won in many areas looked bleak like Spain and Germany.  Yeah in trouble in both now but I think Europe is now in state where winning re-election tough although parties on right seem to have better record.  I do think as has been case since 2000, parties on right will win more than parties on left but parties on left still win occasionally. 

[mileslunn]

I think problem with left is shifting coalitions.  The past working class seems to heavily skew older and is harder to maintain without alienating younger urban progressive voters.  Many blue collar are shifting to right wing populists as don't like policies on immigration and fact some but not all parties on right are centre-leftish on economics makes that switch easier while others focus more on cultural issues.  Main problem for social democrats in Europe is unlike US, all parties support their social programs and threat of social safety net being dismantled just isn't there so they have more or less achieved their goal.  For some they have outlived usefulness.  While not to extreme as US, unionization rates also have outside Nordic Countries fallen a lot. 

Today the left is more about strong action on climate change, LGBT rights, minority rights and yes some wealth redistribution and those are appealing to your urban progressives but in Europe that cohort is much smaller than in North America.  Despite high population density, percentage of Europeans living in large metro areas is much smaller than in US or Canada so social democratic parties need to stay relevant in smaller communities to win and do so without alienating their vote in larger urban areas.  As European countries become more diverse, a problem to is many of their white supporters want less immigration as they feel it suppresses their wages, but non-whites are an important part of their electorate.  The white population that is pro-immigration tends to be more your upper middle class types who economically are liberal (that is liberal in classical liberal sense, not tax and spend liberal like used in US) so won't vote for social democratic parties over economic reasons. 

Still I think they shouldn't be written off for good despite going through tough time.  Big problem in European politics, is things just getting more fragmented in general as with few exceptions, usually winning party got over 30% in past (often over 40%) whereas nowadays more often than not winner only gets in 20s and in some cases like Belgium & Netherlands only teens.