Polish Elections Constitute a Setback to European Conservatives

On 15 October, Poland became the second—after Spain—large European country to hold parliamentary elections this year. As in the Spanish case, conservatives found reason for disappointment. The results certainly spelled the end of the eight-year rule of the Law and Justice (PiS) party and eliminated, for the moment, Hungary’s key European alliance.

Unlike in Spain, polls proved largely accurate.  PiS won the highest vote total at 35.38 per cent,[1] thereby becoming the first post-communist party to do so in three consecutive elections. The primary opposition force, Civic Coalition (KO), finished second at 30.7 per cent.  These results tracked very closely with months of polling. The composition of Poland’s next government always promised to hinge on the performance of smaller parties, and that was indeed the case. The biggest overperformer, relative to polls, and ultimate kingmaker was the centrist-agrarian Third Way (TD) coalition, an amalgam of two parties. Many analysts asserted that the question of whether or not TD could cross the eight-per-cent threshold required for participation in a coalition government would decide the electoral outcome. In fact, TD secured 14.4 per cent. ‘Without the Third Way, there would not have been such a victory,’ said TD co-leader Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz.[2]  ‘We said it from the beginning, [but] not everyone believed it.’