Preview: A Values Driven, Landslide Victory in Estonia
A sneak peak at forthcoming analysis: How values-driven campaigns win against extremists
ClearPath Strategies congratulates Prime Minister Kaja Kallas and the Estonian Reform Party on their landslide election victory on 5 March. By every measure, the election was a success including many new records:
A record 31.2% of the vote (+2.3 from 2019, which was at the time also a record)
A record 190,659 votes (+28,296 votes from 2019)
A record 37 seats (+3 from 2019, also a record at the time)
Record individual votes ever by a candidate (Kaja Kallas, 31,816, ~10k more than previous record by former Reform PM Andrus Ansip).
The lessons in this campaign are not limited to Estonia. Or even Europe. Pro-Democratic forces, campaigners, and candidates around the world can look to the Reform strategy in Estonia as the playbook for victory against far-right extremists.
This election was in many ways a clash of visions for the future of Estonia. Reform and PM Kallas offered voters a vision of an open, friendly, and fair Estonia, surrounded with its allies in the EU and NATO. Its chief opponent and runner-up, the Conservative People's Party (EKRE), offered an all-too-familiar nationalist-populist vision of a closed-off and unwelcoming Estonia, abandoning Ukraine, Ukrainian refugees, and Estonia's European allies, at times even using rhetoric uncomfortably close to pro-Kremlin voices.
As a small country on Russia's border, with less than 1/100th of the population, Estonia's situation is particular, but not unique. And neither is the way PM Kallas has led the country. Her unapologetic, values-driven leadership is a lesson to other liberal parties in Europe and pro-Democratic forces throughout the world. You can be strong and deeply values-driven. Nationalist-populists do not have a monopoly on the idea of freedom. PM Kallas has been one of the leading voices in the world in support of Ukraine in its fight for freedom. The war in Ukraine and the threat from Putin is not an ideological debate, but a familiar one, and PM Kallas speaks about it in a relatable, personal, and authentic way.
Winning candidates are authentic and clear about who they are fighting for.
Throughout her campaign, Estonian people knew what PM Kallas stood for. They know who she is fighting for. And they trust her.
This doesn't just happen by accident.
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In the coming days, we will dive more deeply into how Kallas found and built her voice, how she articulated and maintained a values-driven vision, and how she took on the nationalist-populist right-wing to become the most popular politician in Estonia's history.