Why do working class people vote for the far right?

[Mufflon]

In more recent times the margins are absurdly tight. For the last 40 years Presidents only get single digit margins.

These small margins are indicative of a divided nation.

This is indeed a problem and an interesting development at the same time.

In Germany there's a different problem: I can't even remember when one party had over 50% of all voter's votes. It's all coalitions and then you have parties in there with less than 20% or even less than 15% of voter's votes.

Just imagine this: the party with the highest vote count has less than one third of all votes and the two parties building the government with that party have each less than 1/5 of all votes?? Bonus points when the parties in the coalition have colliding agendas in more than one important point, e. g. the social security system.

How could that possibly go wrong? /s

Divided nation? Definitely.

 

[Second Summer]

In Germany there's a different problem: I can't even remember when one party had over 50% of all voter's votes. It's all coalitions and then you have parties in there with less than 20% or even less than 15% of voter's votes.

I dunno, isn't this a good thing? Because, how could one single set of policies really truly be favoured by a majority of voters? That could really only happen if a majority of voters had the same needs and concerns, which I think is an unlikely scenario. Or if one party controlled the media, which is not something a democratic society should allow.

 

[Mufflon]

I dunno, isn't this a good thing?

Well, it can be. In theory.

However, it depends on who goes into a coalition with whom. When looking at the last government ("Ampel") you clearly saw that e. g. many FDP-voters felt duped (tbh, me included) - and the results of the latest election shows that. The FDP is no longer part of the government because their results didn't make the 5% that would be necessary for that. FDP, SPD and the Green party should have never made a coalition. The FDP simply didn't match with SPD and Green.

Also even the coalitions are maybe representing even barely over 50% of the voters. The last election the "Ampel" only had 52% after coalition (FDP 11,5%, Grüne 14,8%, SPD 25,7%). I can't see how that is really representing any real majority.
On the contrary, it seems like almost all voters seem to feel duped more or less because all of the Ample-parties lost a significant amount of voters to other parties.

Or if one party controlled the media, which is not something a democratic society should allow.

Now that is a different problem in Germany. Don't get me started on the media summarized under ÖRR.

 

[Second Summer]

When looking at the last government ("Ampel") you clearly saw that e. g. many FDP-voters felt duped (tbh, me included) - and the results of the latest election shows that. The FDP is no longer part of the government because their results didn't make the 5% that would be necessary for that. FDP, SPD and the Green party should have never made a coalition. The FDP simply didn't match with SPD and Green.

I've read a little about this, actually. Ampel, or traffic light in English, because of the colours commonly associated with each of the parties in the coalition match those of a traffic light. Very clever. Anyway, in what way did you feel duped? You expected the FDP to have more influence of the government's policies? Keep in mind the FDP only had 91 seats in the Bundestag versus 206 and 118 for SDP and the Greens, respectively. Perhaps some FDP voters also felt duped by the bad-faith actions of the FDP surrounding their exit from the coalition and the so-called D-day paper:

2024 German government crisis - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

You may be correct that the FDP was just too different to be in a coalition with SDP and the Greens. However, if I understand correctly, this was still the most realistic majority government coalition given the election result and promises not to form a coalition with the AfD. Also, would you not say the SPD and CDU/CSU are even more politically distant? And yet they managed to be in multiple coalition governments together.

Apologies for sounding like a complete besserwisser

 

[Mufflon]

Also, would you not say the SPD and CDU/CSU are even more politically distant?

They are as far apart as the the Ampel, yes. That's why I'm convinced this coalition won't work out.

And yet they managed to be in multiple coalition governments together.

And the so-called GroKo (that was in 2005 when SPD had way more voters) already didn't work out very well in the past. As for the present: CDU voters already feel duped after 100 days of Merz.

Anyway, in what way did you feel duped? You expected the FDP to have more influence of the government's policies?

Of course - so did other voters of FDP. After all they were in the government and should have had their say as well. No?

Perhaps some FDP voters also felt duped by the bad-faith actions of the FDP surrounding their exit from the coalition

Indeed. Many said "He should've had the balls to do that earlier! He did it too late!"

 

[Jamie in Chile]

Why do working class people vote for the far right?​

I don't think working class people want a strong military, at least not adventuring abroad. The US's massive military budget could be partly redirected to say health care, deficit reduction and tax cuts and I think that might be popular with the working class, not immediately, but after debate.

This would mean a policy of no longer defending South Korea, Japan, Europe and Taiwan, but still even with very deep cuts exceeding China's spend. In the UK, Tony Blair was a popular prime minister from 1997 to about 2002 or 2003 but saw his popularity decline in later years. Instead of focusing on domestic crime, health care and education as he did more in the early years he increasingly got the UK involved in various international wars and incidents, most infamously Iraq, which was a key reason his support declined including with the working class I think.

Yes on patriotism though. The right is more aligned with the people on patriotism so that is one of the reasons that working class vote for the right. I suspect the middle class and educated people are more international.

However I think that poorer people also vote right because they want tough justice for illegal immigrants and criminal and the right is perceived at doing better on these issues: although in practice they only do better on the rhetoric a lot of the time, not on the actual delivery.

The working class are also less bought into the woke social justice agenda and vote against that.

 

[Andy_T]

Now that is a different problem in Germany. Don't get me started on the media summarized under ÖRR.

To put that into context for people not familiar with the term, “ÖRR” (“öffentlich rechtlicher Rundfunk”) means public broadcasting, which is referring to the TV and radio programs that are produced by public broadcasting organisations that are financed by the TV “taxes” everybody who owns a TV set or radio in most European countries has to pay.