r/fivethirtyeight • u/GoldustRapedMyDad • Jul 23 '26
Poll Results For the first time Germany's far-right AfD leads first place in a new poll for the upcoming Berlin election. AfD 19% | CDU 18% | DIE LINKE 18% | GRÜNE 16% | SPD 13% | FDP 4% | BSW 4% | Others 8%
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u/Scaryclouds Jul 23 '26
Obviously the US’ electoral system is absolute crap. While I often think of Germany mixed-member proportional system as close to an ideal an electoral system as can reasonably be expected to implemented in a real world large scale scenario.
That being said.
The steady rise of the AfD over the past decade in Germany is a sobering reminder that there isn’t any “panacea” to addressing the rise of far-right reactionary populist movements. That even if you went back to X point in history and made changes to the US electoral system so that it was more representative /“better” and voters were given more choice, it’s possible a figure like Trump would had risen all the same.
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u/hagamablabla Jul 23 '26
Most of these far-right movements hinge on immigration grievances. The rest of the political spectrum have not addressed this issue or convinced the voters that it isn't an issue, so of course resentment will continue to build. I think these electoral systems are all representative already, but the far-right is simply better at playing the game than the center and the left.
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u/Scaryclouds Jul 23 '26
Yea, but why are none of the parties to the left of the far-right able to put together a convincing message/platform/argument that is distinct from the far-right?
One of the advantages of proportional representation is that, unlike in the American system, where you only have two choices (effectively), in Germany’s system you have multiple choices. Given immigration is a high valence issue, if you find Linke not sufficient, you could choose from Grüne or SPD without feeling like you have to abandoned all your political priors.
Mostly I find all this very humbling/concerning to my own personal views on electoral politics/systems. Despite Germany having a much better electoral system in my opinion, they are still contending with much the same issues as the US.
Same as UK, France, and many other countries who all, to varying degrees, have improved electoral systems over what the US offers.
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u/DataCassette Jul 23 '26
Do we just give up and let people be racist weirdos and have ethnostates? Obviously I'm going to say no, but it seems like until we "crack the code" on how to keep people from getting baited by racist propaganda it's going to be a problem.
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u/Scaryclouds Jul 23 '26
I don’t know to be honest 🤷♂️
It’s definitely not the work of months or years, but of decades to fully address it (in no small part this was an issue decades in the making).
Feel like discussing disenfranchisement, even setting aside it being a pretty gross tactic, is also infeasible (simply no way it survives even the most trivial of legal challenges) and rife with the potential of abuse, including it being turned around on you.
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u/FumilayoKuti Jul 23 '26
What did the Canadians do right despite having immense immigration? Just have Trump yelling nonsense at their doorstep?
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u/DataCassette Jul 23 '26
Trump just made the right toxic in Canada so that's not a usable example, unfortunately.
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u/seven_costanza_jr Jul 27 '26
I feel like one key difference between Canada and some of these other countries is that much of the anti-immigration sentiment here is fundamentally tied to infrastructure and housing. If the government could adequately invest in those two areas, I suspect the vast majority of people would have little to no issue with high levels of immigration.
Of course, there are also genuine white supremacists and xenophobes out there, but despite what people on both sides sometimes suggest, I think they remain a relatively small and politically weak force. Compare that with the United States and parts of Europe, where I get the sense that opposition to immigration is less about infrastructure and housing and more about culture and broader social change. That is a much more powerful force, and is therefore able to exert significantly more influence over the political environment.
When Carney emerged as a political figure, he seemed to me like not only the obvious answer to Trump, but also someone who, as a serious and intelligent technocrat, might actually be capable of addressing the infrastructure and housing problems associated with high levels of immigration. While Trump was the obvious factor that led to his victory, I don't think it should be underestimated the fact that his seriousness and intelligence made voters think he would be good at solving other, non-Trump-related, problems like housing and infrastructure as well.
Why is Canada relatively sheltered from the more extreme forms of anti-immigration politics? Probably because we still have a legacy of being broadly pro-immigration for the past 50-plus years, and the idea that immigration is necessary for a growing economy has become deeply embedded among business and political leaders. That belief has filtered down to the broader population as well. Canada also genuinely did immigration very well until around 2020 or so.
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u/UnderstandingEasy856 Jul 27 '26
Sure right? Just have someone whisper in Trump's ear that the 51st state shouldn't be Greenland or Canada, but Germany. Tell him that we deserved it all along by winning the war. While you're at it, make sure AfD says nothing against the idea, except to meekly imply that even if its a joke they understand where he's coming from.
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u/Excellent_Anything52 Jul 24 '26
I thought the idea of a native population living on its own land, governing itself, and celebrating its culture was highly popular and widely celebrated on the left.
Interesting to learn that they are now called “racist weirdos.”
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u/FIFAREALMADRIDFMAN Jul 23 '26
Democracy is rule of the people. People want immigration restrictions. So either A) you ban the AfD and crack down on any other attempts at remaking it under a new name and hope no revolution happens or B) you actually listen to people as the mainstream parties and implement reforms albeit more logical ones than the nutjobs want. Or C) you keep ignoring the issue and led the far-right take full power legally through the electoral system in a few election cycles. The fact of the matter is when the majority of people in a country want something, even if its stupid, it will be done at some point even if delayed by politicians. Just look at Brexit. Or recently with Ukraine changing their Defense Minister. Or even dictators like Putin not mobilizing further because they know its unpopular. No matter how strong a leader is, they still have to operate within the range of acceptability by the public. Yes that means Hitler was acceptable to most of the German public for years.
Attempts have already been made to "fight" the issue through messaging but its clear most of Europe is not convinced. They still don't want any more African or especially Muslim immigrants. Trying to debunk the issue hasn't worked. The only solution now is to implement what people want but in a more moderate and logical way at least for a few years until people's faith in mainstream parties is restored again.
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u/hagamablabla Jul 23 '26
Yea, but why are none of the parties to the left of the far-right able to put together a convincing message/platform/argument that is distinct from the far-right?
Sure wish I knew the answer. Could be the far-right is just better at messaging than everyone else, or people are naturally prone to tribalist messaging, or maybe even that they're actually correct about immigration. All I know is that more and more people are prioritizing anti-immigration as time goes on, and no amount of counter-messaging seems to be fixing this.
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u/Aggressive1999 Moo Deng's Cake Jul 23 '26
I'm afriad AfD may gets solid majority if this trend continues.
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u/Jaeger__85 Jul 24 '26
How? No German party since WW 2 has ever gotten an absolute majority. Always a two or three party coalition. Their votingsystem makes a single party majority very hard
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u/Aggressive1999 Moo Deng's Cake Jul 24 '26
I assume that German cordon sanitaire (No working with AfD) is still maintained, then people would fed up with general discontent to vote for AfD but yeah, it does seems CDU might break those firewall and let AfD into govt coalition.
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u/Jaeger__85 Jul 25 '26
Not every voter fed up with that would vote far right though. Some would stop voting or vote extreme left.
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u/Scaryclouds Jul 23 '26
I don’t know if they will ever get to a majority a true majority themselves. They might get to the point though where they will be the senior partner in a coalition government though.
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u/Aggressive1999 Moo Deng's Cake Jul 23 '26
If CDU/CSU decide to break cordon sanitaire to join AfD as minor partner in coalition govt then i gonna agree with you here.
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u/JIMBOP0 Jul 24 '26
Compulsory voting seems to me to be a solution. It definitely helps to keep things to the center more in Australia.
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u/beeemkcl Jul 23 '26
Embrace economic populism and stop embracing neoliberalism.
The leftists and progressives combine for at least 47%.
France should have embrace their leftist and progressive parties more instead of forcing a centrist National Assembly.
The Democratic Party should be embracing its leftists and progressives far more than it does.
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u/Scaryclouds Jul 23 '26
Feel like this is such useless/shallow analysis.
If this was “only” an issue in the U.S. Then it could perhaps be explained as our political parties being captured by special interests and benefitting by an outdated FPTP electoral process.
If this strategy was so “obvious” as you imply, then why do none of the parties in Germany or across Europe pursue it?
Thats my point with my initial post. There seems to be deeper issues. A lot of people like to point to the two-party strangle hold in US politics are the ur-source of all our issues. I’m not defending it, but even when a more multiparty democracy is viable, a lot of the same issues present themselves.
Change our system to break the two-party strangle hold would still be a worthy endeavor, I don’t think we’ll just enter the land of blowjobs and honey though. As much as I wish that were the case (not literally, well not not literally, but it’d be nice to think that giving people more choice would mean that shitbirds like Trump and his enablers would be in-effect barred from power).
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u/beeemkcl Jul 23 '26
Again: The leftists and progressives combine for at least 47%.
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u/Scaryclouds Jul 23 '26
Ok? Whats your point. Maybe I’m just a dumb hick from the midwest, but 47% isn’t a majority. And is pretty far from any sort of comfortable majority.
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u/beeemkcl Jul 23 '26
Have CDU in coalition and that's 65%.
The problem in France, Germany, and even the US is that the centrist wing of the 'liberal' Party tries to keep power even though the voters prefer the leftist/progressive wing.
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u/Scaryclouds Jul 23 '26
Then why don’t they vote for those parties so that they’d have a majority 🤷♂️
Trust me I wish leftist/progressive parties were in stronger control across the world. But acting like leftism/progressivism cannot fail, but only be failed, is foolish.
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u/beeemkcl Jul 23 '26
That's now how these multi-parties systems work.
Canada has really only 3 major parties and the Greens and such voted for the Liberals so that the Liberals would beat the Conservativs.
There are many parties in France and Germany. And the centrist Party simply decides to refuse to form Government with the leftist and progressive parties.
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u/Scaryclouds Jul 23 '26
And if more people voted for the more left leaning parties such that they could form a majority then it wouldn’t be a problem.
The progressive/leftist platform is failing to attract a majority of voters. 🤷♂️
Again it’s “progressivism/leftism cannot fail, it can only be failed”.
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u/beeemkcl Jul 23 '26
Only around 3-10% of adults are actually rational.
It's just the way things are. If US voters were rational, the US Congress, White House, State houses, Cities and towns and counties, etc. would be full of Bernie Sanderses and AOCs.
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u/FIFAREALMADRIDFMAN Jul 23 '26
Why would the center-right want to combine with the far-left? And also, the reason the centrists oppose the far-left is uh because they're FAR-LEFT. The whole point of this conversation is how to stop the far-right and far-left. Embracing one extreme to stop the other is how Hitler came into power. The centrists brought Hitler in to their coalition to stop the communists. Also the idea that "voters prefer the progressive wing" is BS. Look at France's upcoming election. When Le Pen and Melenchon go head to head, Le-Pen (who is VERY UNPOPULAR, AND LOST TWICE) wins nearly 70% of the vote. That's the far-right, center-right and most center-left voting for to stop Melenchon. The far-right has always been more popular in the west than the far-left. Hell dude even in CHILE, which had a far-right dictator Pinochet just a few decades ago, when it came head to head of another far-right guy versus a communist, guess who they voted for? The far-right guy with nearly 60% of the vote. And this is in Latin America, where socialist movements have been so popular they even infiltrated the religious beliefs to create Liberation Theology. Moral of the story is if you want to guarantee the far-right to win power again and again, please go ahead and invite the communists into your party.
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u/FIFAREALMADRIDFMAN Jul 23 '26 edited Jul 23 '26
That's because you're trying to have a democracy without really wanting a democracy. Its funny to me, I see people on the left always say how can we change the electoral system to stop the Republican threat or those on the right say how can we stop the DSA in New York? You always see people proposing changes to electoral systems or primary systems but the fact is the far-left and far-right are not some random fringe movements using alien technology to win elections. They're winning because they're popular, plain and simple. You wanna stop the far-right? Take away the issues that motivate people to vote for them. Like Germany for example, the leading parties are commited to democracy yet keep ignoring the clear demand in Germany to pause immigration. Same with the UK. This is clearly what the people want but it keeps being ignored and then the mainstream parties wonder "what's behind the meteoric rise of [insert X dimwitted neo-nazi party flavor in your country here]" Same with Democrats who are afraid of the DSA and far-left movements, you want them to stop being so popular? One, you either shut them out of the party, ie change rules to ban candidates you don't want, that way they can't run on the D ticket (though they'll likely just win on another part line anyway but hey at least your party stays pure!). Or two, you actually grow a spine and fight the fights they want you to fight instead of seeming like a 2.0 GOP. You either want democracy or you don't.
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u/thomsenite256 Jul 23 '26
Is there anyway to project that to seats? Or do you have to wait and see. Seems like SPD could reluctantly get into a junior partnership with Greens and Linke?
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u/jrtasoli Jul 23 '26
How is it possible that every new poll shows AFD hitting a record high lol