The outcome of the recent election is not particularly favourable to any of the parties in the Czech Republic. With no clear programme-based majority in the parliament the participants will be forced either to find something more than an old-fashioned compromise or to give up and set themselves and the citizens on the road to another election.
The new parliament is much more fragmented than usual. Not only that, but the number of parties which got their MP´s rose to seven. The main issue is that there are no clear blocks to be formed. The only way to make a government is a deal between two major factions, the social democrats and the ANO movement which is led by a freakish billionaire. While the social democrats want to press their usual values such as taxation and investments, the billionaire bunch emphasizes the exact opposite.
The rest of the factions are that variegated that any of the major ones is not able to outplay the other one. There will be no majority and even no minority to gain the parliament´s support. The only way is that the two main factions work together regardless of the fact that they do not have any common goals other than the installation of a government.
Whenever an Eastern European person, especially a Czech, has to discuss 20th century history and politics with a westerner, specifically a French or a socialist, the easterner has to listen to a familiar form of complaint. It is about the East or the Czech who has had the unique opportunity to find out something new after the Soviet break-up but who decided instead to repeat western errors.
It is true that Czech politicians have been largely following the path of repeating known mistakes. However, as for the political system one has to pay attention to the system of development instead of single signs. In western democracy the political parties embody the public interests. The voter is then restricted to voting and that is exactly how the Czech voters finally achieved something new.
By creating a new political equilibrium in which there is no compromise ahead they offered their politicians the chance to form a minimum coalition. Such a coalition would be radically democratic. Its only shared value would be the continuation of the democratic state. It would not have any majority and each of the parties would have to find and construct majorities each time for making each of the interests it represents into a law. It would allow the parties to be radical and strive for their programmes and for being re-elected without compromise. It would represent a political singularity, an expression of a multiplicity of clashing interests instead of the old-fashioned, practically medieval and morally demotivating body of promises and compromises.
Frankly, that is the message from the voter. The election deconstruction of the Czech Republic has to lead to the invention of post-structuralist policies: the minimum coalition.
published: 4. 11. 2013