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I thought the Greens were popular in Finland. Seems like they get lots of votes in the bigger cities. They don't do as well here, but that's mostly because our electoral system is designed to favour two parties. That's FPTP for you.
They are, but their voting base is like you said in university cities. Though the Greens were founded as a protest party and in the beginning harboured elements of even ecofascism and green anarchism, it's today much more mainstream and less radical than in Sweden or Germany.
The Greens in Finland are a bit like the Lib Dems in the UK. A party which you can vote for in protest, but isn't too radical or powerful. I voted for the Greens in the last municipal elections. Why? Because in most Finnish large cities the so-called "brothers in arms" faction (Coalition, ie Tories + SDP, ie Labour) have held the cities as their own playground for mutual benefits since WWII. I just picked a person who was in favor of enhancing public transport and bike roads, so I voted for her!
And just because we have more parties than you have doesn't mean that democracy works better. We don't have bloc voting and after the election it's a free game for all. For example you vote for the radical right, like the True Finns. Well, the Social Democrats and True Finns strike a deal, and SDP will insist that the the Greens will be included in the government to ensure a liberal overload. Well, you don't have a enough majority, so the True Finns invite the Christian Democrats. Fine!
So now you voted for an anti-immigration right-wing party, but you ended up with a leftist pro-immigrant liberal government, and the only good thing is that the lightning rod will be the Christian Democrats.
The system is broken here too, but in another way. A recurring theme is that why don't we have consumer protection when it comes to voting.
They are, but their voting base is like you said in university cities. Though the Greens were founded as a protest party and in the beginning harboured elements of even ecofascism and green anarchism, it's today much more mainstream and less radical than in Sweden or Germany.
The Greens in Finland are a bit like the Lib Dems in the UK. A party which you can vote for in protest, but isn't too radical or powerful. I voted for the Greens in the last municipal elections. Why? Because in most Finnish large cities the so-called "brothers in arms" faction (Coalition, ie Tories + SDP, ie Labour) have held the cities as their own playground for mutual benefits since WWII. I just picked a person who was in favor of enhancing public transport and bike roads, so I voted for her!
And just because we have more parties than you have doesn't mean that democracy workes better. We don't have bloc voting and after the election it's a free game for all. For example you vote for the radical right, like the True Finns. Well, the Social Democrats and True Finns strike a deal, and SDP will insist that the the Greens will be included in the government to ensure a liberal overload. Well, you don't have a enough majority, so the True Finns invite the Christian Democrats. Fine!
So now you voted for an anti-immigration right-wing party, but you ended up with a leftist pro-immigrant liberal government, and the only good thing is that the lightning rod will be the Christian Democrats.
The system is broken here too, but in another way. A recurring theme is that why don't we have consumer protection when it comes to voting.
Oh, right. Yeah, multi-party systems can often result in stalemate - though I think that's better than one party thinking it can do whatever it wants for 5 years because 25% of the population voted for them.
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