Deutschland Wahlergebnisse

Germany had an election; Der Spiegel has a map (under the Wahlkriese tab):



(According to Babel Fish, 'erobert' means 'conquered' (evocative!) and 'gehalten' means 'held,' so you can see where parties made gains, especially the CDU and Linke.)

The link comes from the San Francisco Examiner, which says:

The results are in on Sunday’s elections in Germany, and the big news is that it is a big win for the center-right. In the vote for proportional representation (Zweitstimme), Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats (the Christian Democratic Union and the Bavarian Christian Social Union, CDU/CSU) got 33.8% of the vote and the free-market Free Democrats (FDP), Merkel’s preferred coalition partner, got 14.6%, for a total of 48.4%. The Social Democrrats (SDP) got only 23.0%, their lowest share in history, while the Greens (Grüne) got 10.7% and the Left (Linke, more or less the former Communists) got 11.9%. The SDP has been willing to enter into a coalition with the Greens, as it did in 1998-2005, and with the CDU/CSU, as it has in the so-called Grand Coalition since the 2005 election, but not with the Left.

Both of the two largest parties got smaller percentages than in the last election, in September 2005, but the drop for the CDU/CSU was minimal, while the SDP share dropped from 34.2% to 23.0%--one out of its three voters went elsewhere. The percentages for the three minor parties all rose, with the FDP getting the largest percentage in the 60-year history of the Federal Republic. My sense is that voters in Germany, as in Britain, are engaging here in tactical voting.

If my brain is functioning properly (not certain!) that means right/center-right parties got 48.4% of the vote, and left/center-left parties got 45.6%.

You can click on the Interaktive Grafik to see where each parties had strengths. The Christian Democrats did best in northwestern Germany, but showed strength in the southwest and parts of the east as well. The CSU, which appears to stand in relation to the CDU in Bavaria as the DFL party stands in relation to the Democrats in Minnesota, did well on their home turf. The Free Democrats did best in the south and in Schleswig-Holstein in the north. The opposition Social Democrats, who sort of tanked a little, had their best showing in the west, especially in Hessen, Nordrhein-Westfalen, and Niedersachsen. Linke, a left-wing party, did best in East Germany but poorly pretty much everywhere else. The Green Party, kind of oddly, did best in many of the same regions as the Free Democrats; those areas appear to be amenable to third parties, for whatever reason. They also did wellish in and around Berlin.

Michael Barone, the author of the Examiner article, notes: "What strikes me as uncanny is that the CDU/CSU tends to win in the historically Catholic parts of Germany (the south, much of the Rhineland) while the SDP and, in 2009, the Left tends to win in the historically Protestant parts of Germany." He's got some other observations about the vote (and also a few dubious conclusions about what this says about Europeans' desires for smaller government).

Meanwhile, Matt Yglesias notes that the Pirate Party got a decent 2% of the vote in their first election. Not bad!

Socialists Lose Elections in Europe; Greens, Racists, Pirates Triumphant

Europe had some elections, and the left-of-center parties didn't do so hot. Here's a map from Financial Times:



Click on the map and scroll over countries for details. Losses were mostly absorbed by the center-left, but gains were made not just by the center-right but by parties of the far right and left. Turnout was low, about 43%; it's fallen in every Euro-election since 1979. Says the BBC:

Several governments battling the economic downturn are facing a heavy defeat, says the BBC's Oana Lungescu in Brussels.

However, governing parties in France and Germany appear to have done relatively well despite the crisis.

Angela Merkel described the increase in the vote of her Christian Democrats over the Social Democrats as "sensational" and said it boded well for her chances in the nation's general election in September.

In results so far:

* French President Nicolas Sarkozy's UMP trounced socialist opponents, while greens from the Europe-Ecologie party also made gains
* In Italy, Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's centre-right People of Freedom party won most votes - 35% - although that was well below his prediction. The anti-immigrant Northern League made strong gains
* In the UK, the governing Labour Party suffered a serious defeat, gaining its lowest share of the vote for a century
* Spain's conservative Popular Party beat the ruling Socialists, but the four percentage point margin was lower than they had expected
* Poland's governing centre-right Civic Platform gained ground at the expense of the Eurosceptic Law and Justice Party
* Portugal's conservative Social Democrats secured about 31% of the vote. The ruling Socialists fell a massive 18 percentage points from the last European election, to about 26%
* Austria's far right increased its vote on the last European election but was well down on its percentage in last year's national polls
* Greece's Socialist party, PASOK, bucked the European trend by securing the largest vote percentage, ahead of the ruling conservatives

Voters have been choosing representatives mainly from their own national parties, many of which then join EU-wide groupings with similarly-minded parties from other countries.

Also:

Sweden's Pirate Party, which wants to legalise internet file sharing, won 7% of the national vote and one of the country's 18 seats in the European Parliament.

The composition of the new parliament will be like yea:



And for those who need a primer on what these party labels mean (and bear in mind that these groups are represented at the European parliament level, and generally correspond to other parties with similar ideologies at the national level):

European People's Party (EPP): Major center-right party of Europe
Socialists: Major center-left party of Europe; aligned with the Parti Socialiste in France and the Social Democrats in Germany
Liberals (ALDE): Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe; centrists
Green Party: left-wing party oriented around environmental and social justice issues, among others
Left (EUL-NGL): European United Left-Nordic Green Left; represents far-left and Communist national parties
UEN: Union for Europe of the Nations, a group of far-right nationalists (presumably working together at the Euro-level in a spirit of distrustful self-interest)
Ind/Dem: The Independence/Democracy Group, generally right-wing Euroskeptics, mostly from Northern Europe

UPDATE: And the Netherlands is now orange on the ft.com map, as ALDE takes the lead there. Seems appropriate.

Global Piracy Map

Via the excellent BLDGBLOG, here is a map of pirate incidents from around the world.



The map is published by the International Chamber of Commerce's Commercial Crime Services Agency. It shows all the piracy and armed robbery incidents reported to the International Maritime Bureau during 2009. (Reports for the last four years are also available.) You can click on the thumbtacky marker thingies to get the incident details. Details like this:

12.02.2009: 0448 LT: Posn: 01:18.86N - 104:14.42E, Off Tanjung Bulat, Malaysia.

Five robbers in a wooden boat approached a bulk carrier at anchor. One of the robbers boarded the ship and attempted to steal ship's stores. Duty crew noticed the robber and informed bridge who raised the alarm, sounded ship's horn and informed ships in the vicinity via VHF Ch.16. The robber jumped overboard and escaped empty handed with his accomplices.

Or this:

22.02.2009: 0400 UTC: Posn: 12:33.98N - 047:01.32E, Gulf of Aden.

Armed pirates attacked a bulk carrier underway. They boarded the ship, took hostage crewmembers and hijacked it to an undisclosed location. Further details are awaited.

Or this:

21.02.2009: 1900 UTC: Posn: 14:31.1N - 053:43.1E, Gulf of Aden.

Pirates in an unlit high-speed boat chased a general cargo ship underway. The boat came close to the ship and attempted to board. Master raised alarm, increased speed, took evasive manoeuvres, crew switched on additional lighting and activated fire hoses. The pirates aborted the attempt due to the evasive manoeuvres taken by the ship.

The ICC's CCS's IMB reports do make for some entertaining reading. What you can sort of infer is that there are two classes of pirates: most of these scalliwags and buccaneers are sort of opportunistic or hapless - they're just engaging in glorified muggings-at-sea. And then there are the dudes working the Gulf of Aden. As you can see, this is where the lion's share of incidents have occurred. And it's the only area that's seen actual hijackings in 2009 (and it's had some really high-profile ones over the last few months, too). This situation seems to be quite different from a few years ago. In 2005, the waters off Somalia were a nettlesome area, but by far the most action was in Indonesian waters and the Strait of Malacca. Given the essentially governmentless condition of Somalia, it's not surprising that piracy has skyrocketed there. But I wonder why it has fallen so much in Southeast Asia.

For more, this report summarizes the state of piracy in the world today.