What will happen after the election? If there’s a Lib-Lab majority, which seems likely, though not certain, Nick Clegg, among others, have a few unpleasant decisions ahead of him.

One unusual factor is that any coalition agreement or pact has to be voted on through several levels of the party. Exactly what qualifies as an agreement is a bit vague, however.

If the Tories would agree to PR, Clegg would most likely support them. They almost certainly won’t though. They’re an uncompromising lot and FPTP has served them very well.

Clegg will probably let Cameron through without a good deal on PR. I don’t actually think it’s sensible. (CF) I think Clegg may be savvy about election campaigns, but not about these sort of things. He’s not bloody minded enough. Tories getting a shot has become what’s expected, what’s supposed to happen. From a not-losing the-three day news cycle perspective it would make sense, and because people sort of expect a Tory minority, because the immediate reaction to a Labour-liberal deal would be negative. Never underestimate the feeble mindedness of anyone who isn’t actively evil.

If Clegg makes a less attractive deal, he risks getting overruled, so I reckon he’ll tolerate Cameron without any preconditions, to bypass the grassroots.

If there’s a Lib-Lab pact or actual coalition, the Tories will almost certainly get much high poll numbers fairly soon – the Lib Dems won’t be in opposition anymore, and the economy will still be crap. So if the Lib Dems lets them through with only a vague promise of PR, they’ll soon be in the position to say: “we dare you to vote us down”. And there’s a good chance the grass roots will nix it. The Lib Dems will do very badly in the next election then, whether it’s early or in 2015.

But will Labour offer a good deal? Even if a majority of them wants to, will the leadership be unified enough to offer something some figures are strongly against, with no one in charge and election campaigns starting (for both leader and deputy)?

If both larger parties are uncompromising, Clegg will have no less than six, maybe seven shit sandwiches to choose from. A pact with Labour, or with the Tories. Letting either of them in without ANY deal, to bypass the grassroots. Immediate early elections, which doesn’t only risk a Tory majority, but global economic meltdown (or so people will say). Or outside chance, a national unity gov’t. I think he may then choose what may be the shittiest shit sandwich.

Having said all that, I think the combined odds of a Lib-Lab pact or toleration, either now or somewhat later after some unpleasant twists and turns, is slightly higher than a long term Tory gov’t.
Of course, in thinking about the future we should also consider the risk of the economy imploding because of political uncertainty, even if we get the in my opinion lesser evil in the cabinet.

Update: If Clegg lets Cameron through and then the next Labour leader and Clegg wants to do a deal, could they avoid a new election? My understanding is now that Clegg and the next Labour leader could avoid a new election. This would make letting Cameron in more likely and a bit less irrational. If Cameron goes down to no confidence and doesn’t see it coming soon enough to call a new election, the leader of the opposition gets a shot at forming a government.

Thanks to Ajay, Alex and Keir for their input.

Here’s a little map I made a while ago.

It shows the political allegiance of the heads of government from 1989 to 1/1 2009. The lighter the hue the more years the country had a leftleaning head of government.

The most obvious thing you could say is that centre-right parties have been more successful in most countries, even more so than I expected. The supermajority coalition type countries in Benelux and Finland actually exaggerate leftwing performance by some counts, and Tony Blair wasn’t much of a leftwinger. I think most earlier starting points would show even greater rightwing dominance in western Europe. I think I’ll refrain from speculating as to why right now, but feel free to do so in comments.

The correlation between rightwing government, and rightwing policies is obviously weak, (cf Belgium) but I think the dark hue of the Baltics and Ireland seem about right, and Iceland’s less incongruous than you’d have thought a year ago.

On reflection, I think the tendency is to understate the importance of partisan affiliations. Britain and Spain have become tangibly more progressive in some ways in the last 20 years. That can’t be said of too many other countries.

Green means too few easily categorizeable heads of government. Brown means I couldn’t be bothered.

Unfortunately the contrasts can make countries seem darker or lighter than they are.
I could make a less imperfect map, but that’s never gonna happen.

In a similar vein (but less half assed) here’s a chart of the rich-poor gap in conservative vote share in a bunch of countries, courtesy of Andrew Gelman.

…Slightly reworded to be clearer. By rightwing I mean mainstream liberal, conservative and christian democratic parties.