TORONTO – Throw a dart at a map of Europe and it takes expert aim to hit a country run by a left-of-centre government, especially after Spain’s Socialists were emphatically drubbed out of power over the weekend.
Although the shift to the right began years ago in such heavyweights as France and Germany, it is now all but complete three years into the continent’s grinding debt and economic crisis. Why? When times get tough – when “the cows get thin” as the Spanish say – political experts say edgy voters seek comfort with conservatives.
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There is no doubt the European left faces an uphill battle in re-establishing itself with an appealing message and the means to enact it, despite widespread disillusionment with go-go capitalism as seen in the Occupy Wall Street protests and Europe’s widespread anti-austerity marches.
View Fall of the Left in Europe in a larger map
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With files from The Associated Press
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