Denmark held a general election yesterday, and the expectation was that Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen's Social Democrats would handily win. As it turned out, her party did win the most votes although it was still the party's worst showing in over a century. Luckily, the main right-wing party, Venstre (Danish Liberal Party), also had its worst showing in a century.
But individual parties are not the be-all-and-end-all of Danish politics, it's all about the "blocs": the "red bloc" of left-wing parties, and the "blue bloc" of right-wing parties. Joining the Social Democrats (with its 38 seats) are the Green Left (20 seats), the Red-Green Alliance (11 seats), the Danish Social Liberal Party (10 seats), and the Alternative (5 seats), giving the red bloc a total of 84 seats. The blue bloc, consisting of Venstre and a rag-tag bunch of other parties, total 77 seats. So, neither bloc achieved the 90 seats needed for a majority, leaving the Moderates party (14 seats) as potential kingmakers in the ensuing negotiations.
That's a lot of different parties, all with some level of influence on the national political scene. It's fascinating stuff, for an outsider like me, used to two (maybe three or four) main political parties. But I guess the Danes are used to all the argy-bargy and bargaining that their politics entails.
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