Norway had a general election on Monday 13th September and Germany yesterday, on Sunday 26th September. Similar and rather positive trends seem to be emerging in both countries, with Conservative governments falling and probably being replaced with more left leaning and Greener coalition governments.
In Germany the SPD (Labour) emerged as the largest party, winning 206 seats in the Bundestag, a gain of 53 seats. The Greens won 118 seats, a gain of 51 seats. The only other party to gain more than a single one were the FDP (Liberal) who gained 12 seats to bring their total to 92.
The big losers were the CDU/CSU who together lost 50 seats bringing their combined total down to 196 seats. The far left Die Linke party lost 30 seats, reducing their total to 39, and the far right AfD lost 11 seats, reducing their total to 83 seats.
I think a new government will be dominated by the SPD and Greens, but to form a majority government they will need the support of the FDP, or the FDP plus Die Linke. Other possibilities do exist, but seem unlikely to me.
Meanwhile in Norway a very similar pattern is emerging with the incumbent Conservatives losing power to a broad left coalition, which again is likely to be made up of at least three parties, and probably more. The Labour party has 48 seats, the Centre party 28 seats and the Socialist Left party 13 seats, which would create a government with a 9 seat majority in the 169 seat parliament. The Norwegian Green Party increased their seats from 1 to 3, a gain of 2. They would be natural partners in such a coalition.
Chloe Farand, writing on the Climate Home News website points out how this new Norwegian government might be good news in terms of reducing emissions by curbing new oil exploration and extraction. The new government in Germany is also likely to be bolder on reducing carbon emissions than was Chancellor Merkel and her CDU/CSU government.
So, expect small steps forward in terms of the climate-ecological-social crises in these two countries. Still action on the streets will be needed to urge greater speed and boldness, but these two election results are certainly cause for a small celebration.