Hungarian protesters show dissatisfaction with the election results, in Brussels. Wiktor Dabkowski/Press Association. All rights reserved.
Having suffered the third election defeat in a row, the losses of the Hungarian left were not simply caused by a lack of competitiveness or a decent manifesto (they did in fact have programmes). It is rather due to a defect in the concept of how to run in elections. Unlike four years ago, when left-wing parties ran the race with joint lists and jointly-endorsed candidates, this year each entered their own lists albeit in a coordinated manner.
It is important to note that this coordinated candidacy only applied to the actual leftist parties, i.e., the Hungarian Socialist Party-Dialogue (MSZP-Dialogue) election alliance and the Democratic Coalition (DK) as these parties did not run their candidates against each other. Meanwhile, the liberal parties (Together, Momentum) and the eco-party (Politics Can Be Different; LMP) were only partially involved in any cooperation while Jobbik, a party wanting to go from radical to mainstream, decided not to withdraw any of its candidates from the race.
