Elections 2024

In democratic countries across the world, a common conceptualisation has developed as regards elections: they are critically important, and one ought to exercise their right to vote, a right – a privilege, even – which has been fought for over centuries and which previous generations did not enjoy. This adage has become sacrosanct; the exercise of electing representatives by vote and ensuring a peaceful and smooth resolution of political issues is now part of the social fabric of democratic states both within Europe and outside. 

Indeed, this exercise has been a major source of conflict in the recent history of the world. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Francis Fukuyama infamously hypothesised “The End of History”: the world would hereto evolve toward an end-state of peaceful political and economic liberalism. In 2024, such a thesis is plainly “intellectually embarrassing”, as articulated by Noam Chomsky. 

In recent years, elections have taken on a renewed importance. Each forthcoming election – be that within Europe or in the US, Britain, Canada, India, Brazil, or South Africa – is seemingly the most important in that nation or its region’s democratic history. This is a relatively new phenomenon that illuminates a pervasive global issue: the world is facing a multitude of political, economic, environmental and diplomatic crises that are, in many ways, unprecedented. 

These crises thus inform the importance of contemporary elections. The forthcoming elections in 2024 in both Europe and the countries mentioned above connect the past, the present and the future into a series of political decisions in which all three are critically influential: the recent past of a global pandemic and the concomitant implications for global health and economic downturn, as well as the rise of authoritarian populists with tepid regard for democratic norms; the present context of the war in Ukraine and an unprecedented cost of living crisis; and the future of constructing a post-COVID world and avoiding an impending ecological catastrophe. These issues constitute the critical importance of elections in 2024, an importance that Europe is not immune from. 

The current EU Parliament (2019-2024) witnessed the aforementioned issues unfold across both the continent and the world alike. The next Parliament (2024-2029) will face the challenge of remedying these. The EU elections of 6-9 June will therefore be crucial to how the remainder of the decade play out and ultimately the position Europe finds itself in for the 2030s. Given the issues before the continent and indeed the world, the stakes could hardly be – and have arguably never been previously – higher. It is thus critical that Europeans exercise their democratic right to vote and educate themselves on the choices available to them. While we encourage the former, the purpose of this publication is to aid the latter by providing a comprehensive and informative source of knowledge and understanding of the political groups that are seeking the votes of Europeans in this election.