Dutch Political Parties

Dutch Political Parties

This article lists political parties in the Netherlands. The Netherlands has a multi-party system with numerous political parties, in which any one party has little chance of gaining power alone, and parties often work with each other to form coalition governments.

The lower house of the legislature, the House of Representatives, is elected by a national party-list system of proportional representation. There is no threshold for getting a seat, making it possible for a party to get a seat with only two-thirds percent of the vote—roughly one seat for every 50,000 votes. Since this system was implemented in 1918, no party has even approached the seats needed for an outright majority. However, there is a broad consensus on the basic principles of the political system, and all parties must adjust their goals to some extent in order to have a realistic chance at being part of the government.

Read more about Dutch Political Parties:  Defunct Parties

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