Editorial: A remarkable election can offer hope and inspiration to progressive parties elsewhere in Europe
Voters queue to cast their ballot in Warsaw, Poland. ‘On Sunday, close to 70% of Poles aged between 18 and 29 went to polling stations.’Voters queue to cast their ballot in Warsaw, Poland. ‘On Sunday, close to 70% of Poles aged between 18 and 29 went to polling stations.’or some time, progressive politics in Europe has looked to be in alarmingly bad shape.
Similar tactics have been a feature of rightwing populist successes across the continent. But this time round they weren’t enough, as Donald Tusk’s Civic Coalition and two allied opposition parties comfortably amassed enough seats to claim victory. Extraordinary levels of, reaching 85% in Warsaw, testified to the power of opposition warnings that Poland’s democracy would be imperilled by a PiS victory.
To a significant extent, this was an election determined not by socially conservative over-60s, but by the effective mass mobilisation of more liberal twentysomethings. In Italy a year ago, huge numbers in the same age group failed to vote. On Sunday, close to 70% of Poles aged between 18 and 29 went to polling stations, compared with less than half in 2019.
Those policy differences will now mean a difficult bargaining process, assuming PiS is indeed finally ousted from power in the coming weeks. But whatever the immediate future holds, Mr Tusk and his allies have given Europe’s mainstream parties fresh hope and inspiration.
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