List of political parties in the Netherlands

This article lists political parties in the Netherlands. The country has a multi-party system with numerous political parties, in which any one party has little chance of gaining power alone; parties often work with each other to form coalition governments.

The lower house of the legislature, the House of Representatives, is elected by a national party-list system of proportional representation. There is no threshold for getting a seat, making it possible for a party to get a seat with only two-thirds percent of the vote—roughly one seat for every 67,000 votes.

No party has won a majority of seats since the 1894 general election;^[1] no party has even approached the seats needed for a majority since the current proportional representation system was implemented in the Pacification of 1917. All governments since then have been coalitions between two or more parties. However, there is a broad consensus on the basic principles of the political system, with all parties having to adjust their goals to some extent in order to have a realistic chance at being part of the government.

^ Dieter Nohlen & Philip Stöver (2010) Elections in Europe: A data handbook, p1412 ISBN 978-3-8329-5609-7

[NS-1] Dieter Nohlen & Philip Stöver (2010) Elections in Europe: A data handbook, p1412 ISBN 978-3-8329-5609-7

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