The process of democratisation since the collapse of communism has not been uniform across eastern Europe, but some countries, such as the Baltic states, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, are now drawing level with established democracies in western Europe in democratic league tables. Slovenia is another strong performer who happens to be going to the polls this Sunday 24th April, so here’s a guide to their voting system and parties.

The Voting System

There are 90 members of the Slovenian National Assembly in total, with 88 of them elected by List PR in eight constituencies that elect 11 MPs each. Unusually for a list system, voters don’t vote directly for a party list or for candidates on a list. Each constituency is subdivided into eleven electoral districts within which each party stands a single candidate.

While this might seem a bit like First Past the Post, voters are actually determining the order of the party list – with each candidate’s position depending on their vote in their electoral district. While this does give voters greater control over who is elected than a closed list system, voters are ultimately left with a take-it-or-leave-it situation for the candidate their preferred party nominates in their district. This is unlike an election under STV or other open list systems where voters can choose between candidates from the same party. It is also not uncommon for multiple candidates to be elected from one district, but none from others.

Seats are distributed to the parties across each constituency by adding up all the votes for each party’s candidates. Parties win a seat for each time they exceed a set quota of votes (roughly equivalent to 8.33%). As it is very unlikely for all eleven seats to be filled this way, remaining seats are allocated at the national level using the D’Hondt method with a 4% threshold. Ultimately the result in terms of parties is practically the same as a straight national List PR election with a 4% threshold.

The remaining two members are representatives of the Italian and Hungarian national minorities and are elected using a rarely used single-member voting system called the Borda Count. Voters rank candidates (1, 2, 3, etc.) with those rankings then being converted to points. If there are six candidates, a ranking of 1 gets 6 points, 2 gets 5 points, and so on. The candidate with the most points wins.

Parties and Government

Like in many relatively new democracies, the party system in Slovenia isn’t particularly stable and few parties have been able to sustain a significant level of support over multiple elections. The party system is also quite fragmented – nine parties crossed the 4% threshold in 2018, with the largest two parties only winning 38% of the vote between them.

The largest and probably most stable party is the right-wing Slovenian Democratic Party (SDS). It has won between 20 and 30% of the vote at each of the last five elections and has consistently been one of the two largest parties during that period. Though founded as a social democratic party during the dying days of communism, the party has moved towards conservatism and, more recently, right-wing populism under the leadership of Janez Janša, who has led the party for nearly 30 years.

Of the other ‘older’ parties, the Social Democrats are probably the next most stable – hovering around 10% since the mid-90s. Unlike some other reformed communist ‘social democratic’ parties, the Social Democrats are socially liberal and would fit in with many western European counterparts. The Christian democratic New Slovenia (NSI), ‘grey’ Democratic Party of Pensioners (DeSUS) and far-right Slovenian National Party (SNS) have also won steady and small numbers of seats at most recent elections.

Where the churn has really been is with liberal parties. Liberal Democracy (LDS) were the dominant political force in the early years of post-independence Slovenia, but the party disintegrated in the mid-2000s due to infighting. Since then, a number of start-up, often personality-led parties have attempted to fill this gap.

Zoran Janković’s Positive Slovenia (PS) was formed just weeks before the 2011 election that it won with 29% of the vote, it fell below the threshold in 2014. The Party of Miro Cerar (SMC) did almost exactly the same in that election, winning more seats than any party in any previous election. Unlike PS, they did enter government with Cerar as Prime Minister, but then fell to just 10% last time. Though not as dramatic or as sudden, the List of Marjan Šarec (LMŠ) entered parliament in second place in 2018.

Janša is currently on his third stint as Prime Minister, with the SDS leading the government since early 2020. They are in government with ‘Concretely’ (a rebranded SMC) and the NSI. This followed a Šarec-led five-party minority coalition that had been formed after the last election but resigned over disagreements in healthcare policy.

This election is shaping up to be a battle between the SDS and the newly formed green-liberal Freedom Movement (GS), with alternative governments likely being a continuation of the incumbent coalition or a new centre-left GS-led government. There is also a possibility that this vote might lead to a reduction of the number of parties in parliament, with polls projecting as few as six could reach the 4% threshold.

“Slovenian nationalist party wins parliamentary election” declares the Guardian. “Anti-immigration party wins Slovenia elections” says CNBC. “Anti-immigrant party wins divisive Slovenian election as coalition talks set to begin” says the Telegraph.

The Slovenian Democratic Party (SDS) has indeed clearly won the most votes and seats. With 99.89% of the vote counted though, it is on just 25% of the vote and has won 25 seats out of the 90-seat National Assembly. So, when one considers the rest of the Assembly it is unclear if it will lead the next government. Let us consider the result in full.

As we can see, the SDS won the most votes and seats, but to form a government they need to have the support of at least half the assembly. When you look at who they could go into coalition with, there aren’t enough obvious partners to get them across the line.

[bctt tweet=”Unlike in the UK, the Slovenian Parliament matches how Slovenes vote. As most people in Slovenia voted for centre or centre-left parties there is a centre / centre-left majority in parliament.” username=”electoralreform”]

They comprise of the three parties of the outgoing government, the Modern Centre Party, the Social Democrats and the Pensioners Party (25 seats together), along with The Left, The List of Marjan Šarec and the Party of Alenka Bratušek.

Slovenia, in common with many European states, uses an open party-list proportional electoral system. The country is divided into eight regions, each represented by eleven MPs (plus two for the Hungarian and Italian minorities). Voters can choose which party they support and which candidates they want to take up the seats.

[bctt tweet=”Were these exact election results to play out under the system used in Westminster elections it is likely that the SDS would win far more seats than they would deserve. Instead, the centre-left was not punished for supporting multiple parties.” username=”electoralreform”]

With a proportional system, vote splitting is not the issue that it is in the UK. Parties under Westminster’s broken voting system are often said to be broad coalitions. It is just that they are coalitions that the voters have no say in their composition. A voter in Slovenia who wanted a more left-wing government could vote for The Left in the knowledge that every extra MP they have would strengthen their position in the coalition.

The SDS is a controversial party. Since the European migrants crisis, it has employed increasingly anti-migrant rhetoric, with its leader, Janez Janša utilising “drain the swamp” style rhetoric and allying with the nationalist leader of Hungary, Viktor Orban. Accusations of corruption around Janša have also led to controversy, nonetheless the party’s status as largest party speaks to its enduring popularity amongst a section of Slovene society.

It is possible, therefore, that despite SDS getting the most seats, the centre-left parties could work to lock Janša out of power. For Janša to reach power he would need the support of at least 10 MPs from centre-left parties – even the addition of the largely single-issue Pensioners’ Party would still leave Janša’s party five seats short of a majority.

For journalists versed in British or American politics, it’s easy to see why they would hail the SDS’s seat haul as a victory. Elections to Westminster and Washington aren’t designed to produce government that represents the country. Only with a proportional voting system can we ensure that we get the government we voted for.