Czech Republic: Parliamentary Elections Put Populist Party in the Driver's Seat

During its campaign, the Czech Republic's Action of Dissatisfied Citizens (ANO) party vowed to cut taxes, increase public spending and curb immigration, while it criticized the country's traditional political parties. That anti-establishment platform, it appears, resonated strongly with voters during the Czech Republic's Oct. 20-21 parliamentary elections. With 29.65 percent of the vote, ANO beat its contenders by a wide margin and earned 78 of the 200 seats in parliament. And though no party came close to matching ANO's success, the Czech Republic's center-right and center-left parties fared particularly poorly compared to those representing the far right and the far left....