Tuesday, October 22, 2013

EU Political Parties

Arun posted this a few days ago and I'm passing it along because I think it's of interest to non-EU Flophouse readers.

The political landscape in the EU is very different from that of North America.  Lots of different parties and a very wide spectrum of opinions and positions represented.  Like many things, direct translation is not easy and may not even be possible.

If you were a Democrat in the US, what party would you most likely want to belong to in France?  If you were PRI in Mexico, what party would interest you in Greece?  If you were NDP in Canada in which UK parties would you find the most common ground?

One way to try and figure it out would be to take each EU country and all the major political parties,  look at each party's positions carefully, and then try to map them to whatever political party you belong to in your home country.

Too much work?

I agree.

As Arun points out there is an easier way.  It's called the EU Profiler and here is how it works.  The wizard asks you a series of questions and, based on your responses, gives you the parties within each EU state and shows you which ones are closest to your opinions.  Pretty nifty.

To my astonishment I ended up in the center left.

Amazing.

Here is the direct link:  EU Profiler.

Amusez-vous bien....

Oh and if you have a moment, drop a comment with your results - home country party affiliation and what the EU profiler told you was a close match.






7 comments:

  1. Hello Victoria.
    I'm a LibDem with slight leanings into Labour based on this survey. I'm most closely associated to the Scottish National Party when I click the 'Parties in Europe' button.

    Go Scotland! :-)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hi Victoria,

    Thanks for posting that link. I took the survey twice -- once for France and once for Denmark, the two European countries where I have lived. I consider myself center-left and the results somewhat reflected that.

    I am no longer hopeful about the European Union, thinking that it ultimately fail and we should get prepared for that collapse. My responses to the survey put me close to two obscure political parties, neither of which I know anything about.

    In France, the survey says I'm close to Chasse Pêche Nature et Traditions. But, I don't hunt or fish and my idea of nature is a leisurely walk through a city park. But, CPNT is an agrarianist political party which aims to defend the traditional values of rural France -- and I can support that.

    In Denmark, I am closest to Junibevægelsen, which translates as the June Movement, described as eurosceptic political organization, not affiliated with the left or right. The movement's logo is a strawberry. I like that.

    I would like to see a similar survey for Mexico, where I have lived for the past six years.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Well, I don't have a party affiliation here in Canada. Sometimes I consider supporting Liberals and sometimes the Conservatives...probably Liberals more often. I ran the profiler, however and it suggests I am very much in the centre, but very, very slightly to the right. I suspect if I altered one answer, it would have landed me on the left side of the line.

    ReplyDelete
  4. What a weird result, quite different from the Wahl-o-mat that I used before the recent German election. This thing puts me closer to the SPD than FDP. That is simply not true.

    But what is true is that I have trouble with all the parties. They all say things I don't like and this survey comes out that way.

    And I sure as well hope the EU will survive. It's far, far better than all the wars we used to have. ("We" because I now belong to the club.)

    ReplyDelete
  5. What a weird result, quite different from the Wahl-o-mat that I used before the recent German election. This thing puts me closer to the SPD than FDP. That is simply not true.

    But what is true is that I have trouble with all the parties. They all say things I don't like and this survey comes out that way.

    And I sure as well hope the EU will survive. It's far, far better than all the wars we used to have. ("We" because I now belong to the club.)

    I suppose I ought to move to the Netherlands. There's a party there where I'm right on target.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Apparently I'm an "Alternative Liberale", a party I'm totally unfamiliar with. I'm just to the left of the center line, but lower than the Modem. Interesting test.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Wow, very interesting responses. Thank you all for sharing them.

    I'm still a bit in shock at testing out a a closet left-winger. Guess I really am a RINO. :-)

    ReplyDelete

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