This article analyzes the trajectory of the Pirate Party of Luxembourg from its founding in 2009 and its electoral breakthrough in a traditionally stable system, up to the internal crisis that occurred in 2024. Using a supply-and-demand theoretical framework, the study integrates the analysis of supply factors (organization, programme, modes of action) and demand factors (voter motivations). On the demand side, the party’s support is primarily driven by protest voting, linked to political alienation and low internal efficacy perceived by voters. Issue voting, conversely, is strongly connected to positive attitudes toward participatory democratic reforms rather than the traditional digital priorities of pirate parties. On the supply side, the combination of highly personalized leadership, non-conventional and institutionalized activism, increasingly populist communication and even ideological heterogeneity contributed to the party’s electoral rise. This model, however, led to growing tensions between the two leading figures and a mismatch between participatory ideals and actual centralized organization. The 2024 party crisis, triggered by financial irregularities and leadership conflicts, exposed Luxembourg’s Pirate Party’s chronic organizational fragility. The article contributes to debates on new party institutionalization and the dynamics between protest and issue voting for new party support.

Despite scientific consensus on anthropogenic climate change, political orientation is often associated with climate beliefs, and such polarization may hinder mitigation efforts. Yet, few studies directly compare politicians' climate beliefs with those of citizens. Here, we used a large cross-national sample of politicians (N = 714) and citizens (N = 18,281) to explore how political orientation predicts climate beliefs and policy support in Australia, Belgium (Flanders and Wallonia), the Czech Republic, Germany, Israel, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and Norway. Our results show that right-leaning politicians and citizens express weaker beliefs in anthropogenic climate change than left-leaning individuals. Ideological polarization is substantially stronger among politicians. Notably, right-leaning politicians are even less convinced about climate change than their own voters. These ideological divides are reflected in policy preferences: in both groups, belief in anthropogenic climate change statistically mediates the association between political orientation and support for mitigation policies, with markedly stronger mediation among politicians. Together, the results suggest that ideological gaps in climate beliefs, especially among politicians, may contribute to polarization in support for mitigation measures.

This paper compares the “mental maps” of redistribution among politicians and citizens across seven parliaments, using original in-person surveys of sitting MPs and nationally representative citizen samples. Fairness beliefs and ideology are the strongest correlates of support for redistribution in both groups, while misperceptions of wealth concentration matter for citizens but much less for politicians. A central finding is that politicians hold markedly more polarized views on redistribution than citizens, including within the same party families. We also find systematic elite-voter gaps: left MPs are more supportive than their voters (notably on inheritance taxation), whereas right/liberal MPs are less supportive than theirs. These patterns point to a representation concern and to a narrower bargaining space among elites than in the electorate.

At the June 2024 European election, the soft Eurosceptic party that comes closest to the definition of right-wing populist in Luxembourg, the Alternative Democratic Reform Party, won one of the six seats for the first time in its history and joined the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) group in the European Parliament. Despite suffering limited losses in its vote share, the Liberal party (Democratic Party/ Demokratesch Partei) only came out third in the election, behind the Christian Socials (Christian-Social People's Party/ Chrëschtlech-Sozial Vollekspartei ) and the Socialists (Luxembourg Socialist People's Party/ Lëtzebuerger Sozialistesch Aarbechterpartei ), and lost its second seat in the European Parliament. The DP had received the largest electoral support in the 2019 European election and remained a coalition partner in government after the 2023 national election.

The similarity of parties' policy preferences has long been considered an important determinant of whether they form a government coalition. That similarity has typically been assessed based on parties' respective locations in a policy space. The degree to which parties care about different issues may, however, also vary. Parties that care about different issues may actually be the most compatible partners, as their tangential preferences would allow them to engage in policy logrolling and enable them to preserve their distinctiveness in the eyes of voters. This analysis tests arguments regarding the role of tangentiality and its interaction with policy proximity on the party composition of governments formed in Western Europe from 1945 to 2019. The findings show that parties that emphasise the same issues are more natural coalition partners provided the ideological differences between the parties are sufficiently similar.

AbstractLuxembourg politics in 2023 was dominated by the local election in June followed by the national election in October. Local elections were characterized by a limited participation of foreigners and a certain stability of the political forces. Christian‐Social People's Party/Chrëschtlech‐Sozial Vollekspartei (CSV) remained by far the first party despite a slight drop in seats, and The Greens/Déi Gréng experienced proportionally the most significant drop in seats. As for the local elections, the national elections have been marked by the maintaining of the CSV as the first party, and the massive loss of the Green party. The significant drop of the Green party made the existing three coalition parties (DP‐LSAP‐Gréng) arithmetically impossible, positioning the leader of the CSV and new Prime Minister, Luc Frieden, in an ideal position to lead a coalition government. As expected, Luc Frieden and his party formed a coalition with the DP, which is closer to its political program and guarantees a comfortable majority in the Parliament.

While political scientists regularly engage in spirited theoretical debates about elections and voting behavior, few have noticed that elected politicians also have theories of elections and voting. Here, we investigate politicians’ positions on eight central theoretical debates in the area of elections and voting behavior and compare politicians’ theories to those held by ordinary citizens. Using data from face-to-face interviews with nearly one thousand politicians in 11 countries, together with corresponding surveys of more than twelve thousand citizens, we show that politicians overwhelmingly hold thin, minimalist, “democratic realist” theories of voting, while citizens’ theories are more optimistic and policy oriented. Politicians’ theoretical tendencies—along with their theoretical misalignment from citizens—are remarkably consistent across countries. These theories are likely to have important consequences for how politicians campaign, communicate with the public, think about public policy, and represent their constituents.

AbstractLuxembourg politics in 2022 was marked by the economic consequences of Russia's war against Ukraine. The government responded through policy packages negotiated with social partners. The decade‐long process of revamping the Constitution finally came to an end, and new measures were taken to allow for greater participation of foreign residents in local politics. The year 2022 was indeed a pre‐electoral year, as both local and national elections are scheduled for 2023. Parties started to prepare for these important deadlines through personnel movements.

Political parties are crucial collective actors for the establishment, functioning and maintenance of modern democracy. In Europe and North America, from the 19th century onwards they have populated and organized the work of emerging representative institutions. In recent decades, much of the debate over the crisis of democracy in the West has been fuelled by the sentiment that political parties’ performance in linking society with government has faltered. The normative democratic potential of small polities is rooted in ancient political philosophy and the organization of Greek city states. The virtues of small political units have long been articulated, from Plato to Rousseau and Montesquieu, and beyond. In terms of geographical and geopolitical characteristics, Andorra, Cyprus, Malta, Monaco and San Marino are situated in the South of Europe, Iceland in the North, Liechtenstein and Luxembourg are more centrally located and Montenegro is the sole representative of the East.

AbstractLuxembourg politics in 2021 was again largely determined by the evolution of the Covid‐19 pandemic and its response by public authorities, with an easing of restrictions which was followed by the adoption of stricter measures due to the emergence of the Omicron variant. This sequence caused an outcry in the population, with protests that sometimes became violent. The three‐party coalition government was also shaken, at the end of the year, by the decision of three of its ministers to resign from their position. After changes of ministerial personnel within The Greens/Déi Gréng delegation in previous years, this time the turnover (set to become official in 2022) concerned the Socialists/Lëtzebuerger Sozialistesch Aarbechterpartei and the Democratic Pary/Demokratesch Partei. But 2021 was also a particularly difficult year for the historically dominant party of the Grand Duchy, the Christian‐Social People's Party/Chrëschtlech‐Sozial Vollekspartei, in opposition since 2013, but still the largest party in Parliament, as it saw its leader forced out of office.

The conventional view of the Commission is that it is above the fray of national politics, and that Commissioners have allegiance to pan-European interests. However, research indicates that the Commission is in many ways imbued with national interests, despite being the engine of integration. This study examines the national Commissioner dividend, which is the tendency for the Commission’s policies on any given issue to agree more with the policy positions of the primarily responsible Commissioner’s home state than with other positions. We examine the conditions under which this national Commissioner dividend may be larger, including Commissioners’ partisanship and personal characteristics. The findings provide clear evidence of a national Commissioner dividend, notwithstanding the Commission’s general pro-integration and pan-European preferences. Moreover, the Commissioner dividend occurs in a broad range of circumstances. The study considers the implications of the findings for the Commission’s role in transmuting national interests into European-level policies.

While Belgium undoubtedly had the most complex coalition bargaining system in Western Europe during the period 1946–1999, it has become much more difficult for parties to form federal governments ever since. Contrary to a number of European countries, government formation complexity did not peak due the emergence of brand-new parties, nor of any new cleavage. Rather, in Belgium the main ingredients pre-existed: party system fragmentation—which was already high since unitary parties had split along linguistic lines—skyrocketed as the mainstream parties around which post-war coalitions were formed further declined in size, confronting some (in)formateurs with up to ten coalitionable parties. Their task has been further complicated by the growing saliency and Flemish radicalization of the community cleavage which led to the rise of the independentist N-VA, whose positions remain unacceptable for any French-speaking party. As a result, Belgium has often been left without a fully empowered government, the partisan composition of coalitions broke away from previous patterns, and the coalition compromise model, which was already solidly entrenched in the consociational norms and practices since the 1960s, was further elaborated. Coalition partners keep tabs on each other through compromise mechanisms and policy-monitoring devices such as long and detailed coalition agreements, the enhanced role of the inner cabinet composed of the PM and the vice-PMs of each coalition party, and strictly enforced coalition discipline in legislative matters. But, given the increasingly unbridgeable divides between Flemish- and French-speaking parties, the deadlock observed could well lead to the demise of Belgium.

European Journal of Political Research Political Data YearbookVolume 60, Issue 1 p. 256-263 Original Article Luxembourg: Political Developments and Data in 2020 DAN SCHMIT, DAN SCHMIT University of Luxembourg, Esch-sur-Alzette, LuxembourgSearch for more papers by this authorRAPHAEL KIES, RAPHAEL KIES University of Luxembourg, Esch-sur-Alzette, LuxembourgSearch for more papers by this authorPATRICK DUMONT, PATRICK DUMONT University of Luxembourg, Esch-sur-Alzette, Luxembourg Australian National University, AustraliaSearch for more papers by this author DAN SCHMIT, DAN SCHMIT University of Luxembourg, Esch-sur-Alzette, LuxembourgSearch for more papers by this authorRAPHAEL KIES, RAPHAEL KIES University of Luxembourg, Esch-sur-Alzette, LuxembourgSearch for more papers by this authorPATRICK DUMONT, PATRICK DUMONT University of Luxembourg, Esch-sur-Alzette, Luxembourg Australian National University, AustraliaSearch for more papers by this author First published: 10 August 2021 https://doi.org/10.1111/2047-8852.12331Read the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditWechat Volume60, Issue1December 2021Pages 256-263 RelatedInformation

In West European comparative perspective, Belgium is indeed an exceptional case in terms of coalition formation: high or even record values are reached regarding the classic determinants of government formation complexity, the structure and features of the cabinet formation process and its outcomes. These core features of the bargaining process affect the life of coalitions, in terms of government duration, intra-cabinet conflictuality, policy inertia and ineffectiveness. Most of the independent and dependent variables of the chain of coalition formation, Belgium scores record-breaking values, or at least is one of the top three "performers". A new prolonged formation impasse may show that the centrifugal Belgian federal system does not function anymore as a regime capable of legitimately governing "two separate democracies", and should be dumped all together. In fact, the difficulties of forming and maintaining Belgian coalition governments have affected the effectiveness of their policy outputs and outcomes.

European Journal of Political Research Political Data YearbookVolume 59, Issue 1 p. 245-253 Original Article Luxembourg: Political Developments and Data in 2019 DAN SCHMIT, DAN SCHMIT University of Luxembourg, LuxembourgSearch for more papers by this authorPATRICK DUMONT, PATRICK DUMONT University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, AustraliaSearch for more papers by this authorRAPHAËL KIES, RAPHAËL KIES University of Luxembourg, LuxembourgSearch for more papers by this author DAN SCHMIT, DAN SCHMIT University of Luxembourg, LuxembourgSearch for more papers by this authorPATRICK DUMONT, PATRICK DUMONT University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, AustraliaSearch for more papers by this authorRAPHAËL KIES, RAPHAËL KIES University of Luxembourg, LuxembourgSearch for more papers by this author First published: 07 September 2020 https://doi.org/10.1111/2047-8852.12290Citations: 2Read the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat Citing Literature Volume59, Issue1December 2020Pages 245-253 RelatedInformation