“Proportional Representation Is Breaking Dutch Democracy: As coalition formation grows ever more tortuous, the Netherlands must confront whether proportional representation itself is the problem”

From Tarunabh Khaitan and Mike Winterwerp at Social Europe: The Netherlands has entered a new phase of political fragmentation. Forming the Rutte IV cabinet in 2022 required 299 days — the longest government formation in Dutch history. The 2023 election then delivered Geert Wilders’ electoral breakthrough, after which another 223 days of negotiations were needed to form the Schoof I cabinet. At the time of writing, the new Jetten I cabinet governs without a parliamentary majority, again exposing how difficult it has become to translate votes into stable governing authority. No party comes close to governing alone and coalition-building has become slow and increasingly fragile. At some point the question becomes unavoidable: whether the Dutch electoral system itself is helping produce the instability it is meant to contain — and whether it is time to consider alternatives. These outcomes are not accidental. They are shaped by the rules that convert votes into political power. Most democracies rely on two broad models. In Proportional Representation (PR) systems, parties win seats roughly in proportion to their vote share, provided they cross a minimum threshold. In First Past the Post (FPTP) systems, by contrast, each district elects a single representative and the candidate with the most votes wins, even without majority support. A third model exists that receives less attention in European debates: Single-Member Ranked Choice Voting (RCV), as used in Australia, where each constituency elects one representative who must ultimately secure near-majority support through voter preferences rather than simply finishing first…. In the Netherlands, where political fragmentation and polarisation have become persistent and coalition formation increasingly difficult, reconsidering electoral design should no longer be postponed. The challenge is institutional rather than ideological: how should votes be translated into governing authority? A first step could be a parliamentary inquiry or independent commission to examine how alternative electoral systems would shape political incentives and democratic stability in the Dutch context. Single-member ranked choice voting offers one possible model that may better balance pluralism with durable governance. While PR’s propensity to produce fragmented parliaments is well documented, its role in incentivising political extremism is less well understood. Under PR, the most effective way for a political entrepreneur to stand out in a crowded field is often to adopt sharper, more polarising positions than all existing parties. A vote share of 10 to 20 per cent can, in a fragmented parliament, be sufficient to make such a party pivotal in coalition formation… Even when a small polarising party does not join a government, its views can still shape public discourse. Other parties are forced to respond or differentiate themselves. Positions that were once marginal gradually become normalised. The result is not only fragmentation in parliament but a gradual acceptance of exclusionary or anti-system views as politically legitimate. PR encourages smaller parties to demonstrate distinctiveness by moving to the extremes.