Using Gini coefficients to measure party power in the E.U.

How is political power spread out among political parties in the European Union? To better answer this question, we created Gini coefficients tracking political representation for each European political party holding at least 10 seats in their respective governments.

The Gini coefficient, an invention of the Italian statistician Corrado Gini, provides an index to measure inequality. It’s scale ranges from 0 to 1. For reference, a higher Gini coefficient indicates that one political party controls the majority of the power in government.

Of the qualified countries in the European Union, France owns the highest political Gini coefficient (0.63).[1] The Socialist Party of France controls 280 seats in parliament (48.5%). Their political rival, the Republican Party, controls just 194 seats (33.6%). Political groups on the fringe in France include the Greens, Centrists, and the Radical Party of the Left that are currently battling for a handful of remaining seats in parliament but have little power.

Figure 1: Political Gini coefficients for countries in the European Union. Ukraine is also included in this group.

Greece’s political system (0.53 Gini coefficient) is also heavily stacked towards one political party: Syriza. The radical left Syriza led by prime minister Alexis Tsipras secured 155 seats out of 300 in Greek Parliament during the 2015 legislative elections after renewing a previous coalition agreement with the independents Greeks.

Tsipras built his party’s platform on anti-establishment and left- wing populism to take on the country’s financial bankruptcy. With majority power in parliament, the prime minister is shaping his policies towards reducing poverty, implementing progressive taxation, and mitigating tax evasion. Syriza’s primary challenger, New Democracy, holds 75 seats, and Golden Dawn, a growing right-wing nationalist party, claims 18 seats in parliament.

Syriza has largely failed to break the Troika barrier in debt negotiations. In early April, Greece’s creditors agreed to pay under its $86 billion euro bailout program. But this bailout only serves as a temporary stopgap for debt relief. To avoid further economic collapse, Athens needs a bailout by mid-2018. If not, Greece’s hurting economy will be pulled down further and could potentially lead to greater unemployment (currently 23.5%). The government’s debt stands at 185.2% of the GDP, which constrains Syriza from pouring money into the flagging economy.

Most Greeks are still poor and most income flows to a small group of elites. Several organizations are raising money to covers the immediate needs of Greek citizens in large urban areas like Athens. But much of Greece is still struggling will high levels of unemployment along with cuts in social and welfare programs.

Outside of France and Greece, Romania, Portugal, and Hungary have the next highest Gini coefficients relative to the rest of European Union.[2] Romania’s leading party is a coalition between the left-leaning Social Democrats and Conservatives that control 47% seats in the government among seven parties. Portugal’s Social Democrats (PPD/PSD) and People’s Party hold 105 seats in the government overtaking the Socialist Party (PS) in the 2011 election. Finally, the Hungarian Civic Union (FIDSEZ) led by the authoritarian leaning Viktor Orban (prime minister), owns 67% of the seats in parliament.

Figure 2: Portugal’s parliamentary elections (1991-2011).

Source: Norwegian Centre for Research Data

Breaking political deadlock in Spain

The Spanish Popular Party (PP) broke a 10-month political gridlock by claiming majority in parliament (with 137 seats). Mariano Rajoy, the leader of the PP, held onto his second term as prime minister. The PP coalition is made up of the centrist Ciudadanos (‘Citizens’) and the center-right Canary Islands Coalition.

More importantly, the PP’s political majority allows them to boost Spain’s idle economy. The PP’s main political rival, the Socialist Party (PSOE), refused to form a coalition with the hard-left Unidos Podemos (‘United We Can’) that in part allowed the PP to grab majority in parliament.

Britain’s Gini coefficient is due for a raise

With Britain’s upcoming election (June 8th), prime minister Teresa May is hoping to increase majority for the Conservatives over the Labour Party and bolster her negotiating position in the upcoming Brexit. As it stands, Britain’s Gini coefficient (0.30) falls below Sweden (0.36), Norway (0.34), and Germany (0.34) but lies ahead of other countries including Lithuania (0.29),Croatia (0.28), and Switzerland (0.28).

Fair and balanced governments?

Among the most balanced countries (in terms of political party representation) in the European Union are Iceland (0.18), Belgium (0.18), the Netherlands (0.16), and Slovakia (0.16). This excludes a smaller grouping of countries including Cyprus, Latvia, Malta, and Luxembourg, which possess the lowest Gini coefficient scores in the European Union but function with smaller governments.

Future political representation in the E.U.

This is not to say that the fortunes of the Socialist and Syriza parties won’t change in the near future. In France, president Emmanuel Macron’s upstart Republique En Marche (‘Republic on the Move’) is favored to claim political majority in the upcoming parliamentary elections this June and oust the Socialists from power. The Syriza party’s parliamentary majority is also at stake in the 2019 elections. Syriza’s future likely hinges on how the Greek economy fairs over the next two years. All of this will shake up political Gini coefficients throughout the European Union and mark the rise of new political parties in other elections as well.

Sources:

http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/europpblog/2017/01/26/syriza-two-years-in-power/

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-eurozone-greece-breakingviews-idUSKBN1751HS

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/28/greek-people-wrote-history-how-syriza-rose-to-power

https://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/12/world/europe/greece-debt-crisis-athens-poverty-inequality.html?_r=0

[1] Outside of Belarus and Monaco.

[2] The Gini coefficient average in the European Union is about 0.27. This average does not include smaller countries like Belarus, Monaco, Malta, or Luxembourg.

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