The Ballot Box: Elections Around the World

Angola elected its President and National Assembly on 24th August. Although the ruling People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) won again, this was the closest election since Angola’s independence from Portugal in 1975. Previous elections had seen a landslide victory for the MPLA and long term president José Eduardo dos Santos, who had been in power since 1979. He was succeeded mid-te...

Kenya held general elections on 9th August to a plethora of positions including its presidency. This contest was won narrowly by William Ruto of the United Democratic Alliance, in a victory which is now being tested. We're joined by Dr. Fred Ajwang of Kings College London to dive into the world of Kenyan politics, a world of clientelism, ethnic voting and big personalities that makes for a competi...

What is a green party? Where do they do best and who supports them? We look at this ever more relevant party family and break down their ideology, origins and supporters. From the Nordics to Mexico to New Zealand, this is a truly global guide to the greens! Please do rate and subscribe wherever you're listening and follow us on twitter @ballotworld.

On July 26th Tunisian’s voted in favour of a Constitutional Referendum that many suggest is largely a power grab by current president Kais Saied. This referendum was marked by very low turnout (a little over 30%), but a very high percentage of “Yes” votes among those who participated (94%). The opposition boycotted the referendum. Was this constitutional referendum really as bad as the media pundi...

We're concluding our countdown of the world's electoral systems, this week looking at the top three. Who will come out on top? Which electoral system will be known for all time as the incontrovertible best? Tune in to find out.  Follow us on twitter @ballotworld and please rate and subscribe wherever you're listening.

This week we're embarking on an epic mission to settle once and for all what the best electoral system is. We survey a wide range of the systems in use and discuss their pros and cons, working our way up from worst to best. This week we get from the block vote all the way up to the single transferable vote, before leaving you in suspense for our top three. Tune back next week for the thrilling con...

This week we're catching up on two second rounds from elections we've looked at in the past few weeks. First, we return to Colombia, where Andres has been reporting on the ground, to hear about Petro's narrow victory. Then we go back to France where Macron's bloc looses its parliamentary majority, throwing the 5th republic into uncharted waters. We round it off by covering the recent regional elec...

Bonjour! We're back in France taking a look at the first round of the French legislative elections that are following hot on the heels of Macron's reelection as President. We're unpacking where NUPE came from and why its posed such a danger to Macron, as well as the behaviour of the other parties and alliances in this contest. Because it's the Ballot Box, we're also making an appraisal of the doub...

Ontario held provincial elections last week, which saw the incumbent Progressive Conservatives win in a landslide. Their leader, Doug Ford, has been a populist figure with a controversial record. Also this week, the UK Conservatives held a vote of confidence in PM Boris Johnson, who survived, but by a fairly narrow margin. We break down what the results mean for the future of Ontario and Johnson's...

Colombia held its first round of voting for president last Sunday (May 29th) which culled the field of contenders to two candidates: Gustavo Petro who everyone expected would go on to the second round and Rodolfo Hernández whose victory is quite shocking. The fact that Gustavo Petro emerged as the highest voted candidate is already a sort of political earthquake in Colombia. He is a leftist and he...

Australia's federal elections saw the ouster of Scott Morrison's Coalition government and major successes for third parties and independents. It also saw the return of the Labor Party under leader Anthony Albanese after 9 years in opposition. We're joined by Australian elections analyst Ben Raue to break down the collapse in coalition support and the decline of the two-party duopoly, as well as th...

Filipinos went to the polls on May 9th 2022 for an important general election, to elect president, vice-president, renew the House of Representatives, some Senate seats, and elect governors, and several local officials. The main headline is that a majority of voters in the Philippines elected Ferdinand Marcos, also referred to as Bongbong Marcos, the son of infamous dictator Ferdinand Marcos, as p...

On 5th May Northern Ireland elected a new Assembly in a momentous contest which saw Sinn Féin become the largest party for the first time and the hardline unionist DUP loose a significant share of the votes. The elections come at a turbulent moment for Northern Ireland, with breakdowns in power-sharing and the fallout form Brexit. We're joined by Professor Jonathan Tonge from the University of Liv...

This week Welsh Labour and Plaid Cymru announced plans to dramatically reform the Welsh Parliament- the Senedd. These much needed changes, which would increased the Parliament from 60 to 96 and change the electoral system, have been met with change and controversy. We break down what these changes mean for Welsh politics.

We’re discussing local elections held across England, Scotland and Wales last week, which saw heavy losses for the governing Conservatives and gains for the centre-left opposition parties. In Scotland, the SNP remained dominant and Labour returned to second place, and in Wales Labour scored a major victory as Plaid Cymru strengthened its hold over its heartlands.

Slovenia has been ruled in recent years by a rickety coalition headed by Janez Janša, who has been a mainstay of Slovenian political life its entire democratic history. Janša is an incredibly controversial figure, who has cuddled up to Viktor Orban and moved towards the radical right. He has a long history of personal corruption and abuse of power. Slovenia has a habit of producing electoral succe...

We break down the second round of France's presidential elections, which saw a wider than expected victory for President Macron over far-right candidate Marine Le Pen. We discuss why this happened and what might be in store for Macron's second term and the upcoming legislative elections.  Follow us on twitter @ballotworld and please rate and subscribe wherever you're listening. 

On April 10th, Mexico held its first presidential recall vote to see whether Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) would remain in office or not. The turnout threshold of 40% was not reached, as only 17.8% of the voter’s roll turned out, which means that the results were not legally binding- in any case, 92% of voters who turned out voted for AMLO to remain president. As with many things about AMLO a...

With all eyes on the French presidential election we decided to dive deep into the nature of this unusual executive, which has a reputation for being extremely powerful but doesn't operate along the lines spelled out in the constitution. We discuss the origins of the position, the sources of its power and analyse the results of the first round of the 2022 election. Follow us on twitter @ballotworl...

Don't listen to this episode if you're feeling down! It's not going to be easy listening as we delve into the results of Hungary and Serbia's elections on 3rd April. In both countries the authoritarian incumbents Viktor Orban and Aleksandar Vučić scored new victories, despite unprecedented opposition unity and an ongoing cost of living crisis. We explore how these 21st century European autocrats h...

Malta held general elections on 26th March, which were won by the incumbent Labour Party of PM Robert Abela in another landslide victory. This outcome was never really in doubt, given all polls pointed towards it. The Labour government has been constantly dogged with corruption allegations, most famously the murder of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia who had exposed two Labour politicians. This l...

Hungary will go to the polls on 3rd April for an incredibly significant election where opposition parties have united to challenge the 12 year-long and increasingly autocratic rule of Viktor Orban. Ahead of Election Day, we’re looking back at the 3 decades of Hungarian history since the fall of communism, exploring how the country’s democracy came to be in such a perilous state.

Don't know much about South Korean democracy? Well neither did we, which is why we spoke to Dr. Myungji Yang of the University of Hawai’i, Manoa, who took us through the main features of Korean politics and the key debates and personalities of this election. The election ended up a nail-bitter between two fairly inexperienced and unpopular candidates, with the conservative Yoon Suk-yeol, of the op...

Last week Russia began a baleful and unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, which has been fiercely resisted. While none of us feel qualified to discuss the war or offer analysis of it, we have recorded this to share some thoughts on Ukrainian democracy- particularly Chris' memories of being an election observer in Dnipro in 2012- and explain some of the background to the conflict by telling Ukraine's po...

On February 13th early elections were held to the parliament of the Spanish region of Castile and León, resulting in a bit of a backfire for regional centre-right President Alfonso Fernández Mañueco. Why should we care so much about these elections in a lesser known Spanish region? Well aside from some interesting local parties and issues of rural depopulation, these elections told us a lot about...