Close election in Costa Rica

[minionofmidas]

With 64% of ballots counted, Oscar Arias (center-right, president 1986-90, considered the favorite aforehand) has 40.7% of the vote, Otton Solis (center-left) 40.2%.

[minionofmidas]

Checked the Election site... they're at 85% already, but the result's the same. Well, Arias is down to 40.6%.
Interesting regional breakdown, the much more densely populated interior areas voting narrowly for Solis, the coastal areas voting for Arias by wide margins.

[ag]

My hunch is, this is the churchy influence: the bishops have come out against Arias, who is too rightist for them (he is a run-of-the-mill moderate pro-trade liberal, in the international sense of the word). Sad - he was and would be a great president.

[minionofmidas]

Edit to that:
They're both center-left, actually. Arias runs for the PLN, the traditional social-democratic party in Costa Rica. In the House elections (pr ... I think), they're polling 36%. Solis is running for a fairly new party and is running largely on a platform of opposition to CAFTA. His party is taking about 25%. The third placed candidate at about 8% is a Libertarian, by the way, while the traditional centre-right party's (to which the current president belongs) candidate is polling at under 4% - and the party is polling at no more than about twice that.


Ah, interesting, ag. Arias does seem to be winning, just by a tiny margin. (I *think* there's no runoff, might be wrong.)

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Well I'm just happy it's not the right using religion to their advantage there like they do here. I'll take them supporting populist economics over the Robertson/Falwell loons we have here.

[angus]

Costa Rica's nice.  At least away from San Jose it is.  I'm not surprised that Arias won.  Center-rightism is popular there.  Even the US show "American Dad" (dubbed in Spanish) is very popular on the television there.  Here's an excerpt from a story in the Teleguía section of La Nación from July 31, 2006:

La serie pinta la vida familiar de Stan Smith, un agente de la Agencia Central de INteligencia de EU, conservador e intolerante, amigo íntimo de las armas y paranoico en grado superlativo.

I make it roughly:  "the series paints a portratit of the family life of Stan Smith, an agent of the US CIA, conservative and intolerant, an intimate friend of arms, and a grade-A paranoid."  The article goes on to describe the daughter as a "liberal ideologue" 

Now any culture that can truly appreciate Stan Smith is a culture that knows Stan Smith.  He's a Republican's Republican.  If American Dad's playing well in Costa Rica, then it's a safe bet that these guys know conservatism when they see it.  Also, that country has the highest literacy rates and highest PPP among all central american nations.  So, it should come as no surprise that they're a bit to the right of of other states in the region.  Opebo will be happy to learn that prostitution is legal there.  And the diving's not bad either.  Cowboys, known as Vaqueiros in CR, as a big hit with the ladies in Guanacaste, not unlike in Wyoming. 

I think it's important to point out that Arias is liberal in what you might call the PDF sense, Trondheim, although americans might call him a bit centrist.  At least by latin american standards.  I'm digging around to see how US outlets label him:  NYT calls him a "free trade backer" and WaPo calls him "center-left" 

I make it 579 thousand for Arias, 575 thousand for Solis, by the way.  Costa Rican sources are calling it a dead heat, with 84.71% of votes counted.

BRTD will appreciate this shot.  It's Arias at mass (perhaps praying for world peace, or an end to famine, or all that other horrible stuff.)

[minionofmidas]

Costa Rica is of course justly famous for discovering the secret to stability for small-sized poorish countries ... abolish the army. It won't do you any good against any serious threat (against a US-backed invasion, say) and it's a perpetual internal security risk.

And Costa Rica doesn't seem to ever have had the type of hard-right politicos found elsewhere between Mexico (exclusive) and Colombia (inclusive) ... I wouldn't say they're a bit to the right of others in the region, then.

[minionofmidas]

The four provinces where Arias is leading are the four provinces with the highest percentage of outstanding votes.

(EDITED. I claimed "Solis" here before...not sure why)

[angus]

fair assessment Trondheim.  I suppose.  I've been to all the central american countries except Nicaragua.  Been to some of them many times, and the first thing you notice about CR is that it has a different feel than the other.  Not just better roads and sidewalks and services, but a different feel.  I used to think it was merely more "westernized" and thus more rightist.  Then I thought it was the feeling you get when you know that there's no ejercito to stage a coup.  But now I realize it's just la pura vida, quite simply.  "¡Pura vida!" is the standard greeting on the street among ticos.  Literally das reine Leben, but really it means something like what hawaiians mean when they say "aloha"  (which translates variously as love, affection, compassion, mercy, sympathy, kindness, sentiment, grace, charity, good feelings, or good spirits; and really all those things, which is why it's such a nice thing to say upon both salutation and farewell.).  Anyway, the teleguia had been sitting around in my office for six months.  I just thought about it when you posted this thread.  The article to which I referred wasn't plaigarized and translated from an LA times review, by the way, if that's what you're thinking.  It's pure tico.

Did you notice that Oscar Arias made a strong showing among prison inmates?  He apparently made a personal visit during the day at a women's prison, El Buen Pastor, in San José.  Many of the prisoners who voted said they voted for Arias because he was the only candidate to make the visit.  In fact, most pennetentiary inmates decided to vote.  Presumably because inmates who chose to exercise their right to vote got an additinal bonus:  a cigarette.   That's what I'm talking about.

I can't say I have a favorite.  Just glad to know that they're about free trade.

La Pura vida. 

[ag]

Edit to that:
They're both center-left, actually. Arias runs for the PLN, the traditional social-democratic party in Costa Rica. In the House elections (pr ... I think), they're polling 36%. Solis is running for a fairly new party and is running largely on a platform of opposition to CAFTA. His party is taking about 25%. The third placed candidate at about 8% is a Libertarian, by the way, while the traditional centre-right party's (to which the current president belongs) candidate is polling at under 4% - and the party is polling at no more than about twice that.


Ah, interesting, ag. Arias does seem to be winning, just by a tiny margin. (I *think* there's no runoff, might be wrong.)

There is a run-off, as far as I know.

Arias is, of course, not a rightist in the traditional Lat.Am. sense - he is a moderate liberal, and he wants to ratify CAFTA (something that should be a no-brainer for Costa-Ricans, especially given that all the others have, but somehow it has become controversial).  Arias is also not anti-American. I guess, a lot of people in the Church don't like that.

Not ratifying CAFTA, given that the neighbors have, would be ruinous for Costa Rica; trying to renegotiate it would mean to do this from a hugely disadvantageous position (US does not really care if Costa Rica is in or not - this would be dumber than the NYC Transit Union's negotiating tactics).

[Colin]

Ah, interesting, ag. Arias does seem to be winning, just by a tiny margin. (I *think* there's no runoff, might be wrong.)

There is a runoff. In 2002 during the last election they had a runoff which was the first in the last fifty years of Costa Rican history, IIRC. This is basically like in one election having the Democrats and Republicans and in the next election its the Democrats, some populist party, the Libertarians, and then the Republicans getting about 5% of the vote. Its a complete change in the political dynamic of Costa Rica.

[YoMartin]

I think they have an unusual runoff (with 45% you get elected in the first round), only used there and in Argentina.

PLN is socialdemocratic... nominally. Left voters seem to be going to the new PAC party. I don´t think there are 80% of center-left voters out there...

I´m not sure it´s true Costa Rica is to the right than other latinamerican countries. Their welfare state was probably one of the biggest in the region. I´d say politics there is less populist, which is not exactly the same as to say less leftist. Higher income may explain this. Many countries in the region don´t show a strong correlation between lower income and left ideology. Left is more of a middle class ideology in Latin America. Populism is a lower class political identity. Thus, Costa Rica´s higher income may account for a less populist political system.

Great show American Dad. However, I´m not sure that its alleged popularity is a sign that "center rightism is popular there". A country without armed forces doesn´t have a Stan Smith right wing. But they do know what US republicans are like...

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

I think popularity of American Dad would show the exact opposite, center-leftism. After all, that show is making fun of the right wing. Stan is portrayed as a completely out of touch buffoon. They make fun of liberals too o course with Haley, but she is much smarter than Stan.

I'm actually suprised the show is popular at all outside the US since a good amount of the jokes require a somewhat thorough understanding of American politics to understand. For example, how many non-Americans know who Karl Rove is?

[YoMartin]

Not many, that´s why I don´t think the show is actually that popular. FOX keeps re-running the same 5 or 6 episodes every week -including the one where Rove helps Stan Smith win the election at his church. But, despite mentioning Rove (or Walter Mondale!), I think American Dad shows a stereotype that´s widely spread about what conservative americans look like.

[angus]

I'm actually suprised the show is popular at all outside the US since a good amount of the jokes require a somewhat thorough understanding of American politics to understand.

But that's exactly my take.  and, to make it even more broadly, I'd suggest that it ought to be a bigger hit with paranoid nationalists than with socialist types.  And for exactly the same reasons.  anyway, I always make it a point to watch my favorite shows in some other language when I'm in another country.  Especially if it's an episode I've seen, if only to see how they translate impossible-to-translate camp humor written by gringos, about grigos, and for gringo consumption.  For the most part, the liberties taken by spanish translators are useful, and serve to change the jokes entirely when a more literal translation would land flat.  But, I have actually seen American Dad in costa rica, not long after I read that original tico review in fact.  And the well-captured satire and bruising stereotyping, at least in the episode I watched, was very well done.  That, along with many other observations I've made about the country, makes me think that CR is further right ("libertarian" in the US sense, I guess you could say) than most of her neighbors.  But the No Army thing and La Pura Vida are phenomena that shouldn't be underestimated in any analysis of Tico political culture.

Also, Yo Martin may be on to something.  American Dad deals with something that's simply easier to put into spanish for latinamerican audiences.  At least compared to, say, The Simpsons (Los Simpsons), King of the Hill (Los Reyes), or Family Guy (Padre de Familia).  Good point.

[minionofmidas]

I've looked it up, and you need to be ahead and poll at least 40%...so no runoff this year.

The count hasn't progressed much overnight - they're not at 88.4% counted, and Arias' lead is down to 0.22 percentage points, so this is still up in the air.

Solis is a former member of the PLN. Apart from opposition to CAFTA, he seems to oppose any other proposed libertarian-style reform ideas out there too - in a sense this is a Schröder vs Lafontaine election.

Now ... as to where the former Christian Democrat votes went ...

Obviously there's three possible explanations, and the truth is likely somewhere in between:
a) In attempts to become more electable to the right (after a couple of defeats) the PLN has taken over the entire conservative vote base and lost its own vote base entirely. This just don't sound right, though.
b) The PLN gets the same votes as ever. The traditionally conservative voting people voted for the anti-PLN candidate.
c) It's a full realignment, away from social issues (churchgoers voting Christian Democrat, social liberals PLN) over to economic issues (friends of the welfare state voting Citizen Action, libertarians PLN).
I think I'll have a look for the regional breakdown of the last elections...

[minionofmidas]

Hmmm....
Psephos doesn't have regional breakdown for 2002, only for 1998.
Still there's a clue in the 2002 results too: In the first round the Christian Democrat got 38%, the PLN candidate 31% and Solis 26%, while in the runoff the Christian Democrat got 58% of the vote, which implies most of Solis' voters preferred them.

In 1998, C.R. still had its traditional party system. The Christian Democrat won, 46.9%-44.4%

By department - Christian Democrat vs PLN
Alajuela 46.9 - 45.7
Cartago 44.3 - 47.7
Guanacaste 55.6 - 40.6
Heredia 43.4 - 46.3
Limón 59.6 - 32.3
Puntarenas 56.2 - 38.6
San José 42.9 - 46.7

Compare 2006 - PAC vs PLN
Alajuela 44.0 - 40.1
Cartago 39.1 - 39.8
Guanacaste 31.4 - 49.7
Heredia 43.8 - 39.0
Limón 29.6 - 40.6
Puntarenas 29.9 - 47.3
San José 42.6 - 38.7

This would seem to imply that the PLN has indeed switched places, lost its left voters and taken over the right - it held one departments, gained three and lost two while only one eludes it!
I got to find 2002...

[minionofmidas]

2002
First round (Pacheco - PLN - Solis)
Alajuela 37.8 - 34.1 - 24.7
Cartago 35.4 - 31.8 - 28.4
Guanacaste 44.3 - 40.6 - 12.1
Heredia 36.1 - 26.8 - 33.2
Limón 48.6 - 28.4 - 14.9
Puntarenas 45.1 - 33.8 - 15.8
San José 36.6 - 28.5 - 31.1
the link to the second round results appears to be broken.

[WMS]

So are you saying that there's a realignment going on, Lewis?

[angus]

So are you saying that there's a realignment going on, Lewis?

on many levels:



 This was the sentiment during the last couple of days as many cars waved both the PLN and PAC flags, while others had multiple flags from multiple parties.  This began to happen election day.  Historically, Costa Rican families tended to vote together for the same party.  [photo & caption by Bruce Wilson/InsideCostaRica]

Also, FYI, there won't be an official result for another two weeks.

http://insidecostarica.com/dailynews/2006/february/07/nac01.htm

[WMS]

So are you saying that there's a realignment going on, Lewis?

on many levels:



 This was the sentiment during the last couple of days as many cars waved both the PLN and PAC flags, while others had multiple flags from multiple parties.  This began to happen election day.  Historically, Costa Rican families tended to vote together for the same party.  [photo & caption by Bruce Wilson/InsideCostaRica]

Also, FYI, there won't be an official result for another two weeks.

http://insidecostarica.com/dailynews/2006/february/07/nac01.htm

Thanks for the information, angus!

[YoMartin]

Hmmm....
Psephos doesn't have regional breakdown for 2002, only for 1998.
Still there's a clue in the 2002 results too: In the first round the Christian Democrat got 38%, the PLN candidate 31% and Solis 26%, while in the runoff the Christian Democrat got 58% of the vote, which implies most of Solis' voters preferred them.

In 1998, C.R. still had its traditional party system. The Christian Democrat won, 46.9%-44.4%

By department - Christian Democrat vs PLN
Alajuela 46.9 - 45.7
Cartago 44.3 - 47.7
Guanacaste 55.6 - 40.6
Heredia 43.4 - 46.3
Limón 59.6 - 32.3
Puntarenas 56.2 - 38.6
San José 42.9 - 46.7

Compare 2006 - PAC vs PLN
Alajuela 44.0 - 40.1
Cartago 39.1 - 39.8
Guanacaste 31.4 - 49.7
Heredia 43.8 - 39.0
Limón 29.6 - 40.6
Puntarenas 29.9 - 47.3
San José 42.6 - 38.7

This would seem to imply that the PLN has indeed switched places, lost its left voters and taken over the right - it held one departments, gained three and lost two while only one eludes it!
I got to find 2002...

Aggregate data could lead to wrong conclusions, but (assuming turnout is similar in both elections, that PAC retains its previous voters, etc) at least we can say that in certain regions a majority of PUSC voters hasn´t gone to PAC:

02-06 PAC Limón: 14,7% gain   (PUSC 02: 59,6)
02-06 PAC Guanacaste: 19,2% gain  (PUSC 02: 55,6)
0-06 PAC Puntarenas: 14,1% gain  (PUSC 02: 56,2)

At least in those regions, only a small number of PUSC voters (with the data he have, could be any number from 0% to 23% in Limón, 0% to 34% in Guanacaste, 0% to 25% in Puntarenas) has gone to PAC.

Still, I think we´ll have to wait for 2010, or even 2014 to call it a realignment...

[minionofmidas]

Yeah, the data for the coastal departments do indeed point to Arias winning the Conservative vote and Solis the traditional PLN vote ... and the inland departments are of course to close to allow any calls whatsoever.
Notice how badly Solis did on the coasts in 2002.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Any news on this?

[Colin]

Any news on this?

According to Wikipedia they have begun a manual recount of all the ballots since th vote was so close. Currently no new information though.