Election of the Day: Iceland
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This one almost slipped under my radar. As we speak, the good people of Iceland are electing a new Althing. Fifty four members of parliament will be selected through a PR vote in 6 multimember constituencies, and 9 more “levelling” seats will be assigned from the party national lists, to achieve proportionality in party representation in line with the national popular vote. This is a snap election, called by current Prime Minister Bjarni Benediktsson in mid-October. Bjarni, PM since only April, had been trying to hold together an unwieldy coalition of the conservative Independence party, the Centrist Progressive party, and the Left-Green movement, and it apparently wasn’t going particularly well. Icelandic politics has been in flux since the 2008 financial crisis that dramatically remade the political landscape.
Polling suggests Iceland is unlikely to buck the anti-incumbent trend. A number of issues that have placed the current government in a difficult electoral position: inflation has been a fair bit worse in Iceland than most Western countries, and has not come fully down to earth (currently 5% after peaking at 10% in early 2023). A series of volcanic eruptions in the Southeast have displaced thousands, placing a considerable strain on the already-low housing supply. The number of asylum seekers in the country has been well above average over the last 3 years, contributing further to that strain.
Despite these issues, polling doesn’t see a right-populist surge as likely. The two parties leading in the polls (both hovering around 20%) are out of Government at the moment: As the election begins, the Social Democratic Alliance, holds a tenuous and shrinking lead over Vioreisn, aka the “Liberal Reform Party.” The SDA seems like a pretty standard center-left party, borne of a 1999 alliance between four smaller left parties. They’ve been in the wilderness for over a decade, out of government holding seats in the single digits (currently 6) since the 2013 election. Vioreisn is a center/center-right party that split off from Independence in 2016, and currently holds 5 seats in the Althing. Their primary issue with Independence, and the core of their policy agenda, is a push for EU membership. One potential result of this election, should the polls prove correct, is a renewed push to join the EU, a process that formally began in 2010, but was put on hold by a new anti-EU government in 2015.
Other parties in contention include the Independence party, leader of the current coalition, polling in the mid-teens, the Centre party, and Agrarian populist conservative anti-EU party, polling in low double digits as is the People’s party, a left-populist party focused on, among other things, increasing old-age pensions and the rights of the disabled, hoping to improve on their strong inaugural performance (9%, 6 seats) in 2021.
Voting is underway, we should know pretty soon what the next iteration of the world’s oldest national parliamentary body will look like.
No updates of note on recent elections covered here; exit polls show a tight 3 way race as expected for first choice votes in Ireland but it takes a while to count there. Namibia’s election was besot with difficulties and challenges, including a shortage of paper ballots at many polling stations, that led to a controversial extension of voting into a second day. It’s unclear when results will be announced.