Smer at half-time

UVVM caused a minor stir with this month’s poll which shows Smer support at near-record levels (46.7%, a level higher than any but that of early 2007’s 47.7%). The dominance of the party is remarkable. Meciar’s HZDS on only one occasion–the election of September 1994 and the first poll immediately following–received preferences that were more than three times greater than its nearest opponent. The Smer’s current polling support is 3.5 times that of SDKU, and the average ratio between Smer and next largest party support over the past two years is 3.2.

While there is no questioning the party’s remarkable position, it is necessary to take at least one step back. Pravda‘s headline, for example, reported that “Smer approaches 50% @@@ but there is no evidence whether the current level is a more of a trend or a peak. Since 2007 each peak above 45% has been followed by a drop back near the 40% level, with no clear trend of overall rise or fall in the level of peaks and valleys. Nor is it clear that 45% support in the polls means 45% in elections, as some Smer activists have taken pains to point out to me. This is itself unusual, since party supporters–even those of HZDS at its peak in the mid-1990’s have often argued that polls under-estimated their party’s support. In this case, Smer’s very success has forced a certain amount of caution lest even an unprecedented electoral showing by the party be regarded as a “loss” because it failed to match the polls. The caution seems warranted in light of other surveys.

Averages of the “big three” surveys over the past two years smooth out the hypothesized levels of Smer support. On the one hand, these show a lower level of overall support: closer to 42% than 46%. On the other hand, unlike the UVVM figures, these actually show a steady, if moderate growth in Smer support over the last six months, and the current level of 42.6% for June 2008 is Smer’s highest ever “average” score for months which produced two or more surveys.

Of course it is important to be wary of the “average” figure when looking for short-term trends since this figure depends on which polling firms report in a given month, and as regards Smer, polling firms find quite different results. The following table shows results for the “big three”: whereas in April 2008 these were nearly identical, in June 2008 the difference between UVVM (which has consistently produced the highest results for Smer, about 3 percentage points above the average) and MVK (usually somewhere in the middle, about 1% below the average) was huge: 8.2 percentage points. Put in perspective, this “Gap” in Smer results is larger than the entire electoral support of HZDS or KDH.

Which of these polling firms is closest to the actual number, none can say. UVVM final poll results in both 2002 and 2006 were slightly less inaccurate than those of MVK or FOCUS%20%28t%29% (according to one mode of calculation, 17% versus 24% and 28% in 2002; 23% versus 28% and 33% in 2006), but final results for Smer were nearly identical among the big three. There is a chance that MVK records somewhat lower levels for Smer because the firm is the only one that explicitly includes on its list of choices Slovakia’s small Green Party (ZS) which might draw support away from Smer (with which ZS has signed a strategic cooperation agreement).

It is diffcult, however to translate these polling numbers into actual electoral results. In 2006 the final polls were not too far off, differing from the actual result by an average of 2 percentage points, but election campaigns make a difference and there was considerable motion in these polls in the month before elections.

Toward this end it may be relevant to point out that while Smer’s relative position compared to other parties has remained high and stable, its absolute position compared to the electorate as a whole has actually weakened somewhat since early 2007 because of a slowly rising share of voters who either have no preference or do not intend to vote. According to UVVM, this share has risen from 22.9% shortly after the election to 36.5% in the most recent survey. (UVVM changed its methodology for asking this question in mid-2007 but this does not appear to have changed the overall level by any significant margin). As a result, Smer’s share of the overall electorate has dropped from around 32% in the first half of 2007 to around 29% in the first half of 2008. Since other parties shares have of course dropped by similar percentages, this does not reflect a particular weakness in Smer, but the increasing level of indifference and fatigue opens the possibility of new dangers and new opportunities.

Other parties at half-time

As with Smer, the overall positions of other parties are relatively unchanged, not only from the previous month but from two years ago. The most recent data confirms the disappearance of the “two-tier” pattern separating SDKU and SNS from HZDS, MK and KDH but otherwise shows little major change.

Nor do these patterns differ from those of the immediate post-election period in 2006. Indeed, as the chart below shows the relative positions of the parties averaged for all polls for the first half of 2008 months are almost exactly the same as those of the last half of 2006. Nor are the absolute positions much different: SDKU varied slightly over time but ended up where it started (moving from 14.0% to 13.8%), SNS rose steadily but slightly (from 12.0% to 12.9%), SMK dropped steadily and slightly more (from 10.6% to 9.2%) as did HZDS (from 9.6% to 8.3%). Of the parliamentary parties other than Smer, only KDH showed any rise and even that was quite small (7.8% to 8.4%). Among the non-parliamentary parties there was also little change. KSS remained almost unchanged (falling slightly from 2.5% to 2.2%), as did HZD (shifting from 1.3% to 1.0%) and ANO (from 1.0% to 0.7%. Only SF dropped significantly (from 2.6% to 1.1%)

It is worth considering briefly the differences among polling firms on these parties. As with Smer, UVVM numbers for SDKU exceed the average on a consistent basis whereas FOCUS and MVK often show lower numbers. The difference between polls is smaller than that of Smer in absolute terms (around 1%-3% for SDKU compared to around 3%-9% for Smer) but this almost identical relative to the size of overall party preferences

For SNS differences are even smaller with no clear tendencies by any particular firm to poll consistently higher or lower than the average.

For the Hungarian Coalition (MK), the most recent 3 months show higher survey numbers from UVVM than from other survey firms, but this follows on several months in which UVVM numbers were systematically lower. Because MK support should be more stable than that of other parties (given it’s close correlation to ethnicity), such shifts call attention to a potential change in survey networks, and suggest, by extension, that other parties may be similarly affected by hidden shifts in methodology or even in the composition of the survey network. Such shifts may actually have a greater effect than changes in actual preference.

As with SNS, HZDS shows relatively small differences among survey firms. The UVVM figure of more than 10% for April 2008 appears by this standard and by the standard of other polls before and after to be artificially high.

As with SDKU and Smer, KDH scores differer significantly according to the polling firm, with differences higher, on a relative basis, than for any other party (over 30% of the party’s average score). Here, however, it is FOCUS scores that are higher and UVVM scores that are lower. The overall averages, however, are remarkably stable.

Among the non-parliamentary parties, the numbers are now so low as to prevent close analysis but it is worth noting that UVVM consistently produces lower scores for KSS than do other polls (UVVM’s numbers average around 1%; for FOCUS and MVK the average is around 3%-4%).

For the other smaller parties, however, there is a far smaller difference, and indeed there is no room for difference since these parties regularly poll around 1%. Below you can find SF as an example, but HZD and ANO are not terribly different.

Government and opposition at half-time

The movements of various parties tend to cancel one another out such that by various reckonings, there has been little change in Slovakia’s overall political balance since late-2006. UVVM polling, in particular, shows an almost flat trendline from October 2006.

As above, average polling shows a slightly lower level for the current coalition but also a slight positive trend.

The composition of some of the tradeoffs is visible in the otherwise somewhat problematic assigning of parties to ‘blocs’. This shows, however, that the recent gains of Smer have been offset by losses among the “Slovak National” parties HZDS and SNS. The “Hungarian National” bloc and the “Right,” consisting of SDKU and KDH, remained stable (despite those parties’ internal struggles).

Dividing the same data in a different way–according to the number of the parliamentary seats that a party might win–shows this tradeoff in an even clearer fashion. The key area of change here is the relative size of Smer’s orange compared to the combined brown of HZDS and dark green of SNS.

Of course it is important not to ignore the absolute levels either, and Smer’s dominance here is so significant that the party would remain well positioned even in the case of significant changes (which there have not been). Indeed, UVVM data shows Smer remarkably close to a one parliamentary majority (Meciar’s HZDS, at its popular height in 1992 obtained 74 seats, but much of that came on the basis of redistribution from the large number of parties fell just short of the parliamentary threshold.

Even average preferences show Smer just 7 seats short of a parliamentary majority. Since the parliamentary threshold means that even the smallest party in Slovakia’s parliament, must have at least 7 seats, current polling numbers would amost guarantee a 2-party government dominated by Smer…

Of course current polling numbers are only obliquely related to electoral results, especially those 2 years away. In a future post I hope to be able to take a look at half-time in previous electoral cycles.

Overall Monthly Report

FOCUS has just released its March and April numbers and as usual, not much has changed. Indeed the sheer absence of change makes me note (and regret) that I mentioned about an absence of change even in months with much bigger jumps. Though the various polls show some change (as this weekend’s post on poll comparisons should show), these average out to almost nothing.

As the bands above and below show, the “4 band” (Smer, SNS/SDKU, HZDS/SMK/KDH, all other parties) model continues. Not since November of 2006–over a year and half–has a party crossed the line from one of these groups to another. With regard to specific parties, (on which more later), it is worth noting only that HZDS has recovered from its dramatic drop earlier in the year and that despite major intra-party struggles and defections, none of the current opposition parties has seen its preferences alter in a meaningful way, suggesting, perhaps, that these parties have are relying only on their core support base, those who will not go anywhere else (except a new and compelling but otherwise programmatically identical party) no matter what happens.

If the current opposition parties have indeed fallen to their core, they can take little solace in the fact that that core gives them only 1/3 of Slovakia’s overall electorate, as the graphs below suggest.

This long-term graph of poll results for coalition and non-coalition parties shows @@@

The party “bloc” story is similar and actually reinforces the fact that among non-Hungarian voters, the support of the current opposition is no larger than support for the current coalition’s more nationally-oriented parties. Even if much of Smer’s currently unprecedent support consists of a large number of relatively passive voters who may change their minds before the next election, it is difficult to imagine any coalition that did not include the “left” or any coalition involving the “right” that did not involve either the “left” or parties from more than two blocs. That is not impossible to imagine–indeed it is a mainstay of Slovakia’s politics: Slovak National+Left (1992-1994, 1994-1998, 2006-) or Right+Hungarian National+Left (1994, 1998-2002)–but it underlines the exceptional nature of the 2002-2006 government (Right+Hungarian National).

Although the results meant a bit of reshuffling within opposition and coalition, the overall proportion of seats has remained highly stable in the last year (with the never-ending caveat that elections are different than polls).

As always, the actual polling numbers are available online at Google Docs:
http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=pdhlCClsiyAMi39bLFpY_Zg

Below I attempt (for the first time) to insert these in tabular format (using “iframe” which may not work on all browsers).

Trends and Comparisons Monthly Report

I offer here, as every month, a general and rather idiosyncratic look at poll numbers for Slovakia from rival political polling firms FOCUS and UVVM. (Toward that end, there will be a debate tonight–March 5 at 17:00–between Pavol Haulik of MVK–another of the big 3–and Ivan Dianiska from FOCUS at the Bratislavsky Institut Humanismu’s Klub BIH at Grosslingova 53). I’ll blog that if I can.

This graph of recent polling results for Smer from multiple sources shows an overall rise for Smer by 3-5 percentage points in both of the major polls. These take it back to the highs that it reached in early 2007 before declining a bit. At present there is a strong inverse correlation between Support for Smer after the 2006 election and average monthly temperature. There is no evidence, however, that /this/ summer will bring a decline in Smer support.

This graph of recent polling results for SDKU shows a decline that is roughly inverse to Smer’s rise, though the average of UVVM and FOCUS did not change over the last 3 months. March should tell us what the sudden visibility of leadership questions in the party have on its overall popularity. I would suspect the effect is small, and may be clouded by the effects of problems within KDH. Next month might show lots of change, or it might show no change at all in a way that hides lots of countervailing shifts in party preference.

This graph of recent results for SNS shows movement without fundamental change. The party floats consistently now between 11% and 14%

This graph of recent results for MK shows why poll averaging is important: individual poll changs tend to combine to reflect the overall stability that MK possesses on the basis of its strong ethnic support.

This graph of recent results for HZDS showsa slight recovery in both FOCUS and UVVM for February but not enough to counteract the significant decline from Nov.-Jan. in the wake of the SPF scandals.

This graph of recent results for KDH shows gentle decline. We shall see whether the departure by Palko and Miklosoko affects the overall party performance. Loss of 2 of the 4 most popular individuals might hurt it somewhat, but it will be stabilized by the preservation of the party’s organizational base and by the fact that Palko et al did not immediately create a new party (which seems like a major tactical error, but perhaps one they could not avoid without prematurely reveailing their intentions). Supporters of Palko and Miklosko as of yet do not have anywhere else to go. It is interesting that in his recent interviews Palko has talked about a “party of patriotism” that would seek voters as much from SNS as from KDH. Whether this is realistic is an open question, though the potential erratic ebbs and flows of SNS leadership suggest that there is a tradeoff: a new party has a small change to make big gains at the expense of SNS, and a big chance to make small gains at the expense of KDH. As always, much will depend on timing.

For reasons that are not entirely clear to me, both UVVM and FOCUS show a significant and similar 2-point decline for KSS over the last 4 months. I hope at some point to write a brief note about the usefulness of maintaining party brand names because of their potential to re-emerge (KSS in 2002, SNS in 2006 in Slovakia; SZ in the Czech Republic) but I’m not sure they can successfully re-emerge twice.

This graph of recent results for SF shows a flat line, as do results for ANO. It will take a lot for these to re-emerge.