The victory of SMER – a victory for Slovakia?

The March elections ended with a spectacular victory for SMER-SD. The party has managed to collect 44 % of the ballots, giving it 83 seats out of 150. Thus, the party does not need to form a coalition and is able to govern on its own. Such a situation wouldn’t have caused any uproar in Western European countries which are accustomed to the emergence of large majorities; however, in Slovakia the victory of SMER-SD represents an event out of the ordinary in political life.

A revolutionary victory

As a matter of fact, since the end of the communist regime in 1989, no political party has collected an absolute majority of seats in Parliament. It is as though the Slovak electorate has learnt its lesson from decades of single party dominance. Furthermore, the proportional voting system which has been in place in Slovakia since its independence should have avoided the emergence of a single “strong party”. The system has proved to be highly efficient until today: the government has never consisted of a single party but rather of a coalition of several parties; the number of which has varied between three and five. Having a coalition government is an essential trait of the Slovak parliamentarism: numerous agents forced to find compromises is considered to be a highly efficient check and balances system. The expression “coalition partners” has a very positive connotation in Slovakia.

Triumph of populism

Nevertheless, the March 2012 elections changed the situation and Slovakia cedes voluntarily to a single party dominance. However, this abrupt change is not as surprising as it may seem; it has been provoked largely by a decomposition of the electoral offer.

The Gorilla scandal discredited all traditional political parties, right-wing or left-wing ones, including the SMER-SD. The right-wing voters became indignant and they wanted to punish the wrong conduct of the political parties either by abstaining or by casting their ballot to new parties. Herein, they enabled the SMER-SD to multiply their number of seats.

Yet, whereas the right-wing parties suffered a loss (for instance, SDKÚ-DS which is the most implicated party in the Gorila affair lost 9.33 % of ballots), the SMER-SD has been reinforced, and that without any need to reform the party or to make it more transparent. This can only be explained by the strategy of populist discourse, a characteristic trait of SMER-SD. Thus, they managed to convince voters that are uninterested by political events, meaning they are more apt to be seduced by fine words.

Risk of a future « à la hongroise »

In this context, it becomes impossible not to make a parallel with the case of Hungary. In fact, what made the ascent of SMER-SD possible was the undermining of right-wing parties which were sanctioned by the elections. However, in the case of Hungary, despite their declining popularity, the Social Democratic party has remained relatively strong and its score of 19 % cannot be compared to results of oppositional parties in Slovakia, none of which have exceeded 9 %.

Consequently, even though the SMER-SD does not have the two-thirds majority, it will be able to fully benefit of the fact that the opposition is divided between numerous smaller parties that are lacking in solidarity. In fact, considering the disunited character of the opposition, it is quite likely that it will not be able to speak with one voice and will probably have difficulties in making its critiques of the government heard. Even worse, if the SMER-SD makes interesting propositions to the oppositional parties, it will surely lead to a competitive race. In exchange for positions or favours, the smaller parties will accept cooperation without a second thought. Thus, the SMER-SD might exploit conflicts within the opposition and de facto create an ex post two-third majority by damping the opposition.

It is up to the opposition to decide if Slovakia will take on the model of the Orban-government or if it will reform itself and acquire new credibility by refusing four years under an authoritarian government.