Electoral tendencies of the Czech public

January 2025 – weekly election model – week 01

We describe the research methodology in detail on our website: The 2025 weekly election model for CNN Prima News – STEM

If the elections to the Chamber of Deputies were held now, Andrej Babiš’s ANO movement would win by a wide margin. In recent surveys, it stably reaches a high gain of about 33 % of the vote. The SPOLU coalition would have come on a clear second place with 18%. The situation of the other three electoral groupings continues to develop. The STAN movement has weakened slightly but remains close to its long-term highs. In fourth position, SPD remains comfortably above its weaker gains seen in the previous six months. The Pirates have managed to stop their preferences from decline after having left the government and remain hopeful not to drop out from the Chamber of Deputies with some 7% of support. The contest is very tight around the 5% threshold required to enter the Czech lower chamber, with the main hopefuls to cross the threshold being the Stačilo! movement and the Motoristé sobě party, whose hypothetical results lie around 5%. However, given the still unclear inter-party developments among these groupings, especially regarding future coalitions (Motoristé sobě only announced that they would not form any coalition after the survey data had been collected), it is premature to make deeper judgements based on the present data.

The research sample is representative of the Czech adult (18+) population and was created using quota sampling; the quotas regard the participants’ sex, age, education, region of residence, and the population size of their place of residence. We further strengthen the representativeness of the sample by weighting for deviations from the main quota characteristics, as well as weighting for past voting behaviour in the October 2021 Chamber of Deputies election, the January 2023 second round of the presidential election, and for social/employment status. Data collection using online interviewing (CAWI method) of participants registered with the Czech National Panel is provided by the STEM/MARK agency, which, like STEM and the Czech National Panel, is a member of the SIMAR association of research agencies and follow its industry standards.

The first election model of the series was based on the responses of 1,533 participants.  For the best possible results, we check the attention of respondents when filling out the survey, check the logical link between the answers to questions, and we exclude survey answers that were completed suspiciously quickly. The statistical error of the sample is around ±1 percentage point for the smallest parties, and around ±3 percentage points for the larger parties.

The reported preferences and model are part of a unique research series, The Weekly Model, produced by STEM for CNN Prima News.

SUMMARY

The STEM Research Institute, in cooperation with CNN Prima NEWS, is now offering the public a unique insight into the development of political sentiments throughout the election year. We will be publishing the election model once a week, making it possible to capture even small changes, as well as track trends.

The election model, which STEM calculated based on data collected in the beginning of the year, is clearly dominated by the ANO movement, which has neither lost nor gained since the previous survey. The strongest of the government parties is the SPOLU coalition (ODS, TOP09, and KDU-ČSL). Motoristé sobě (“Motorists for themselves”) and STAČILO! would also narrowly make it into the lower house this time, narrowly surpassing the five percent threshold. However, given the still unclear inter-party developments among these groupings, especially regarding future coalitions (Motoristé sobě only announced that they would not form any coalition after the survey data had been collected), it is premature to make deeper judgements based on the present data. 

If the STAČILO! movement and the Motoristé sobě party actually surpassed the five percent threshold based on the results attributed to them in the current model, they would have won nine seats each. The supporters of STAČILO! are mainly found in older age groups and among people without a university degree.

Motoristé sobě maintains a higher relevance in the parliamentary race compared to Přísaha, their coalition partner from last year’s elections for the European Parliament. “However, support for both Přísaha and the Motorists has so far been volatile. Only further development will show whether it will stabilise,” STEM analyst Martin Kratochvíl adds, adding that the Motorists enjoy higher support among the youngest age group, among people with a high school Maturita exam, and also among men.

The SPD continues to dominate the protest vote. It currently has around 8% support, which is a slightly weaker result than what the SPD was used to, but at the same time, it appears to have managed to overcome the downward trajectory of its preferences as seen in the middle of last year. As traditionally, the movement is strong among people without a high school Maturita education.

The SPOLU coalition would have reached 18.4% in early January, which would have meant a possible gain of 44 seats. A slight increase was recorded by the STAN movement, which with a gain of 9.4% would reach 22 seats. Support for the SPOLU coalition is evenly spread by gender and across age groups, while STAN’s main voter base is among younger voters.

The Pirates, who had been the fifth coalition partner in the current government before departing in 2024, appear to have halted their decline, but their support is still below its previous levels. Their losses among young voters are still the most problematic for the party, and a significant part of their former voters seem to have switched to STAN or have become undecided voters.

The parties of the governing coalition and the Pirates, once again, slightly lost compared to the previous survey. Even at the beginning of the new year, however, we are not seeing a systematic shift of voters from the original “five-coalition” to other groupings. A certain alternative could be the Green Party, which has long been the party of second or third choice for supporters of the government and the Pirates. However, it has only low actual support, and although it is currently growing slightly in the model, the question remains whether it could surpass its 2021 result in the actual election.

PARTY PREFERENCES

The party preferences show the distribution of political preferences among the entire population of respondents, i.e. including undecideds and people who are unable or unwilling to name a party preference or openly say they will not vote for any party. STEM asks for political preferences using an open-ended question and records the participants’ answers verbatim. Thus, we list groupings mentioned by the participants alongside undecideds and negative responses.

The preferences for each party are lower than would be expected from the actual election result, which is decided only by the voters who actually turn out.

“If you voted, which party would you vote for next week in an election for the Chamber of Deputies of the Parliament of the Czech Republic?”

(data for the beginning of January 2025;
open question – no selection from a list of parties or coalitions)

ATTENTION: PARTY PREFERENCES DO NOT REFLECT THE ELECTION RESULT!
 THE TOTAL MAY NOT ADD UP TO 100% DUE TO ROUNDING.

VOTER MOTIVATION

At the latest since the 2013 Czech general elections, we have seen significant changes in the electoral strategy of various voter groups. The number of sworn party voters has declined, the spectrum of political parties and movements has grown, and there are more frequent changes of party preference. The fluctuation between voters and non-voters is intensifying and the proportion of those who decide whether and whom to vote for only shortly before the elections is increasing. The peak of these phenomena so far was the 2021 parliamentary election – six months before the elections, a third of potential voters had been unsure about their participating in the election or who they might vote for.

Thus, uncertainty is becoming increasingly important in estimating political preferences and the fluctuations of electoral sentiment, and it makes sense to look at this phenomenon more closely and analyse its role. We have therefore prepared an overview of the groups of the Czech adult population according to their motivation to vote.

We thus find that the Czech public can be divided into three groups in terms of voting motivation:

1. Less than half (40–50%) of people go to the polls regularly, their participation in the parliamentary elections is very likely and they are mostly clear about whom they want to vote for.
2. One third of the population (around 35%) is either unsure about their participation in the elections, hesitates about their participation or is unclear about their choice of party.
3. A fifth to a quarter of the population is made out of people who do not vote and their motivation to vote is negligible.

People eligible to vote
grouped by motivation to vote in the first week of January 2025 [%]

The sum of the share of Stable voters and Undecided voters (82% in the first week of January) can be considered the theoretical maximum turnout that could be achieved in the Czech Republic currently. The overview of the motivation to vote further serves as a starting point for the construction of the turnout and voting model.

WILLINGNESS TO VOTE FOR INDIVIDUAL PARTIES/MOVEMENTS

In addition to stating direct support for a party or movement in an open-ended question, the research also inquires about willingness to vote for the main Czech political groupings. On a seven-point scale, participants can express the degree of “acceptability” for each of the parties, movements or coalitions.

Willingness to vote for respective political parties and movements
– first week of January 2025
“If the election for the Chamber of Deputies were held today, would you…”

The maximum hypothetical amount of support, the so-called potential for a given grouping, is calculated as the sum of the weights of the votes of those who chose one of the top three answers (Would definitely vote, Would rather vote and Would maybe vote) for this grouping and who also belong to the groups of Stable and Undecided voters.

ELECTION MODEL

It is not easy to build an election model because it is difficult to estimate various parameters: which survey participants will actually participate in the election, whether the voters’ turnout motivation will be similar to the previous election or not, how last-minute emotions will be reflected in the election result and so on.

In surveys, members of the public like to present themselves as responsible citizens: when we pose a direct question, we find that up to 70% of voters want to participate in elections, but the actual turnout does not usually reach that level. Thus, the key to model electoral outcomes and voting patterns is to estimate the behaviour of hesitant and undecided citizens.

We follow a three-step process while calculating the STEM election model.

First, we identify the main groups within the public based on their motivation to vote, as described above. We do not take into account the answers of survey participants identified as Non-voters, and for the remaining two groups (Stable voters and Undecided) we estimate their probability of participation in a hypothetical parliamentary election.

The turnout probability values are used to recalculate the data for the Stable voters group. This yields a new data set, which we refer to as Loyal voters. We treat these as the bottom threshold for the hypothetical support for the respective electoral groupings (parties and movements). In other words, these are the supporters that an electoral grouping is very unlikely to lose in the medium term, and whose support would likely only be shaken by some major scandal. Loyal voters form the basis of the STEM electoral model, as they represent about two-thirds of the votes in the model. With a modelled turnout of 64%, they make up about 42 percentage points.

Undecided voters contribute the remaining third of the votes in the model (in the beginning of January 2025, this is about 22 percentage points). These votes are weighed not only based on the participant’s probability of turnout but also based on the probability of them voting for the parties they are seriously considering.

Figure of the process of selecting participants for the model

STEM Election Model
– simulated election outcome under a modelled turnout of 64%
first week of January 2025 (results in %)

Election model, loyal voters, maximal hypothetical vote share
first week of January 2025 (results in %)

SEAT PROJECTION BASED ON THE STEM ELECTION MODEL

We can estimate the number of seats for each political grouping if we apply the legal rules for converting vote shares (as given by the STEM model) into seats in the Chamber of Deputies and estimate voter behaviour patterns in the respective electoral constituencies and the national turnout level.

Judging from the predicted outcome, it now seems very likely that the Prime Minister will be a member of the ANO movement. However, with the current predicted results, ANO would need one, perhaps even two junior coalition partners. Leaving aside various media declarations, in such a situation, ANO would have a very wide range of possibilities to attract coalition partners. Given the current statements by politicians, options involving some form of support from the SPD, STAČILO! and/or the Motorists seem likely.

Seat projection in case the STEM election model matched the actual results

– for the first week of January 2025 (200 seats in total)

TRENDS IN THE STEM ELECTION MODEL

STEM election model results since the last (2021) general election [%]

Note: For parties that were ran as members of electoral coalitions in 2021, we calculated the individual parties’ vote share based on a STEM study undertaken shortly after the 2021 election.
**Measured as KSČM until November 2024.

***Until October 2024, the result of the SPOLU coalition was measured as the sum of the coalition’s three constituent parties.

ELECTION MODEL RESULTS BY SELECTED INDICATORS

We can examine voter behaviour in the election model grouped by generic socio-demographics. It is good to keep in mind that when splitting the election model into demographics, the statistical error also increases, and thus these sub-models should be interpreted with caution.

Election model split by sociodemographic categories
First week of January 2025 [%]

OVERLAPS BETWEEN THE POTENTIAL VOTER BASES OF THE SELECTED PARTIES AND MOVEMENTS

The model shows the current support for the parties, which is made out of, to varying degrees, by loyal and undecided voters. To better understand what is happening in politics, it is useful to assess the relative proximity of the parties, i.e. where each party can potentially gain additional support from.

Note: The number under the party name given in the column represents the party’s electoral potential. The numbers in the cells are the shares of participants who belong to the potential of both the party given in the row and the party given in the column.

MAIN FINDINGS

1. STEM is publishing a weekly election model constructed using a methodology that takes into account the increased level of uncertainty and people’s hesitancy to vote.
2. Around one-fifth of the public are non-voters, while two-fifths to one-half usually vote and are usually clear about whom they will support. The remaining third are unsure about coming to the polls or unclear about their choice of party. It is this group and the estimation of their voting behaviour that is crucial for voting patterns and the electoral outcome.
3. The model captures the current sentiments among voters and the possible distribution of power that would result from a hypothetical election to the Chamber of Deputies if it were held in the first week of January. The SPOLU coalition was announced in October 2024, the Pirates have had a new leadership since November, and KSČM and several smaller parties will run together under the brand of the STAČILO! movement, which has already proved its electoral potential. Other parties are also specifying their plans for the elections, and there may be further mergers or coalitions.
4. The model shows the current support of the parties, which is made out of, to varying degrees by, loyal and undecided voters.
5. Take note: the election model does not predict how the actual election will turn out but rather captures the current sentiments and estimates how the election might turn out if it were held now. The election year has always been a dynamic one, and there have been large changes in party preferences in the run-up to all recent general elections.
6. The Czech political scene continues to be dominated by the ANO movement, which is the only electoral grouping to stably achieve results above 30% in the election models, including the current one. The movement remains as the clear leader of the opposition vote with a broadly spread voter base. ANO finds significant support among citizens without a high school Maturita exam and among people over 60, and is slightly more likely to be voted for by women than men. It does not outright fail with any socio-demographic group.
7. The SPOLU coalition makes an aggregate gain of over 18% in January, which would imply a slight weakening of support compared to earlier STEM models. Support for the SPOLU coalition is even across gender and age groups.
8. Support for STAN, the fourth party in the government coalition (the other here parties make up SPOLU), remains higher compared to the long-term average, and the movement is still likely to benefit in part from the weakening of support for the Pirates and its success in the autumn 2024 regional elections. The movement finds its main voter base among young voters.
9. Government parties do well with people with university degrees or Maturita-level high school education. Their position is weaker among people with elementary or vocational education.
10. In the aggregate, the parties of the ruling coalition and the Pirates lost slightly again. Even at the beginning of the new year, however, we do not observe a systematic shift of voters from the original “five-coalition” to other groupings.
11. The Pirates have partially consolidated their support in the January STEM model compared to last autumn, but the decline of their support due to previous crises persists. Their weakening among young voters is still the most problematic for the party.
12. SPD continues to play the role of the main representative of the protest vote. In the current STEM model, it has around 8% support, which would be a slightly weaker result than where the SPD was previously, but at the same time, it seems to have managed to overcome the downward trajectory seen in the middle of last year. The movement has traditionally been strong among people without a Maturita-level high school education.
13. The STAČILO! movement, especially its main constituent, KSČM (The Communist Party), is building on its good results from last year’s second-grade elections and will retain the STAČILO! (“Enough”) brand for the Chamber of Deputies election. Being measured under this name for the first time in the STEM model, it takes over the former gains of KSČM and hovers just above the five percent mark. Supporters of STAČILO! are found mainly in older age groups and among people with less-than-university education.
14. The Přísaha movement and the Motoristé sobě party have gained relevance in the European elections, in which they were very successful in a joint coalition. The January model suggests that only the Motorists retain relevance for the parliamentary contest, narrowly reaching the 5% threshold for entry into the Chamber of Deputies for the first time in the STEM model. However, support for both groupings has so far been fickle and only further developments will show whether it will stabilise. The Motorists show higher levels of support among the youngest age group, people with a Maturita-level education, and also among men.
15. The Green Party has long been the party of second or third choice for supporters of the government and the Pirates, so it has only low loyal support. Even if it is slightly growing in the model, the question remains whether it can surpass its 2021 result in the actual election.
16. The sampling error is ±1 percentage point for the smaller parties and ±3 percentage points for the largest ones. The results show sentiments at the time of data collection, i.e., at the beginning of January 2025.