Europe Elections: France, Greece, Serbia, Germany, Italy And Armenia Hold Elections

A man casts his ballot in a polling station in Lille, northern France, on May 6, 2012, as part of the 2012 French presidential election second round vote. (PHILIPPE HUGUEN/AFP/GettyImages)

Six European countries held elections Sunday. Here is a quick look at what was at stake:

_FRANCE: Socialist challenger Francois Hollande defeats incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy for the presidency by capitalizing on anger over austerity measures. As president, Hollande is expected to push for a more stimulus-minded approach to the financial crisis in France and the rest of Europe.

_GREECE: Greeks punish the two main parties in parliamentary elections, with official projections showing both hemorrhaging support and no party gaining enough votes to form a government. The results could affect the country's course as it grapples with a debt crisis that has shaken world markets.

_SERBIA: Polls show pro-European Union candidate Boris Tadic and nationalist opponent Tomislav Nikolic are headed for a presidential runoff, while the ruling pro-Western party is likely to form the next coalition government. The outcomes could affect Serbia's relations with the EU as well as Kosovo.

_GERMANY: Exit polls show voters in Germany's northernmost state have likely ousted a governing center-right government made up of the same parties as the federal coalition, a blow to Chancellor Angela Merkel. About 2.24 million people were eligible to vote in Schleswig-Holstein state.

_ITALY: It's the nation's first election since Premier Mario Monti was tapped to save Italy from its debt crisis. The vote could gauge public anger against parties supporting his austerity measures. Some 9.5 million Italians were eligible to vote Sunday and Monday for 942 city councils and mayorships.

_ARMENIA: Some 2.5 million Armenians are eligible to vote for a new parliament. President Serge Sarkisian's Republican Party was expected to win, but it wants the majority in the 131-seat parliament to avoid having to form a coalition. Results were expected Monday.

Earlier on HuffPost:

Comments

[hapy2day]

11:00 AM on 05/07/2012

The implications for the American economy and our political interests globally in this messy quagmire aen't good. When we see the markets react today,it isn't going to be pretty.

[TKI]

07:28 AM on 05/07/2012

As austerity crashes and burns in Europe, let’s hope that our tea-sipping Congress is taking notes

[Despyria]

02:32 AM on 05/07/2012

Winds of Change?

[Michael Lindley]

01:23 AM on 05/07/2012

GOOD FOR THE GREEKS, Yassou! Finally there are people on earth ready to dump the political apparatus that put all of us int this situation. One could only wish the Democrats and Republicans in the US could BOTH suffer humiliating defeats at the hands of people that won't be bought, don't think having 4 super billionaires is a measure of a great economy and wil stop talking about pointless crap that has about as much ale as arguing over the color of the president's farts! Good luck to Greece and wake-up rest of the world!

[CaptainVideo]

12:16 AM on 05/07/2012

The people of France and Greece have both voted against the Eurozone's austerity lunacy and the unemployment that it has brought on. Hopefully the Italians will also vote the same way. That may finally force the Eurozone to change course.

[formerroadie]

12:12 AM on 05/07/2012

I so hope the socialists win across the board and get things back on track.

[snewell]

09:43 PM on 05/06/2012

"AUSTERITY " AT THIS POINT SEEMS TO BE ANOTHER WAY FOR THE ONE PERCENT TO WEAKEN THE STATE APPARATUS OF NATIONS SO AS TO GAIN GREATER PROFITS AND POWER. AFTER ALL, THIS RECESSION IS THE FAULT OF THE BANKERS AND SPECULATORS.

[CaptainVideo]

12:17 AM on 05/07/2012

RIGHT ON! This is an example of the application of the shock doctrine.

[ThomasPaine1776]

01:43 AM on 05/07/2012

The Shock Doctrine is alive an well, but, hopefully, it just took a torpedo amidships tonight in France.

Private Property needs to be closely monitored by the government, and private properties needs to be taxed heavily and often. No one person or 'corporatoin' should have too much of it. It is a threat to democracy.

Naomi Klein is reason #5 for me to want to go to Canada.

#4: No more American Republicans to deal with.
#3: Canadian Healthcare system is awesome.
#2: Sarah McLachlan
#1: Gordon Lightfoot.

[satyrday]

09:25 PM on 05/06/2012

The world is waking up to the failures of right wing policies.

[formerroadie]

12:13 AM on 05/07/2012

I just hope the US is ready to wake up as well.

[CapSen]

08:44 PM on 05/06/2012

Armenia is in Asia.

Unless anywhere where christians live is somehow 'Europe'.

[Marcus047]

11:27 PM on 05/06/2012

http://www.worldatlas.com/webimage/countrys/eu.htm

[CapSen]

09:39 AM on 05/07/2012

It's funny how on this map Europe somehow extends up to a certain, random point in Russia, as if Boris living east of the border is an 'Asian' and Boris living west of the border is 'European'. Or like Yuri living on Main Street East in some village is some Asian and his cousin Mikhail living down Main Street West in same village is European, hey ho!

Also, funnily enough Turkey is excluded. Would it just be a teeny weeny bit because it is a muslim country?

This is not a geographical map, this is a political statement. A statement I dislike intensely.

There seems to be no such thing as a 'neutral' map. It entails the political and cultural views of the maker. Notions like 'Europe' or 'Asia' carry no fixed, real meaning. The Russians have been at a loss to decide 'what' they are for centuries. I think the consensus is now that it is both, or neither European or / and Asian.

[CapSen]

09:46 AM on 05/07/2012

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Europe_orthographic_Caucasus_Urals_boundary.svg

Armenia and Georgia excluded; border is 'Russia'.

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/cia-maps-publications/maps/803380.jpg

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/cia-maps-publications/maps/803088.jpg

CIA: includes Turkey, seems to exclude Caucasus states.

[KIVPossum]

09:42 AM on 05/07/2012

Armenia is in Europe. Learn some geography

[CapSen]

11:18 AM on 05/07/2012

Geographically speaking it is an Asian state, like Israel is.

Learn some geography and learn some politeness. Behave yourself, esp. when you do not know what you are talking about.

Stating that 'A. is in Europe' is a political statement. Bordering on the racist.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_dependent_territories_in_Asia

[Howard Scott Pearlman 59]

05:31 PM on 05/06/2012

This bodes well for OBAMA and his reelection here in America !

The people have spoken and they overwhelmingly want massive stimulus spending that will put people back to work Rebuilding countries all over the world !

[IndependentRule]

06:16 PM on 05/06/2012

And where with that "stimulus money" come from? Greeks cannot print Euros. No govt will dare to by Greek Bonds now knowing there will be no control over the money. Greece just signed their way into...you are on your own"

[Ngonyama]

07:13 PM on 05/06/2012

You are right: we need Eurobonds and the EU to do the stimulus through the regional funds. With Hollande as French president we may actually get that, because the Germans cannot go on playing this game of: everybody-give-up-sovereignty-except-us any longer.

[DANIELLECLARKE]

08:38 PM on 05/06/2012

we will tax the rich to get the funds needed to run our countries like we did in the past when we were so prposperous 75% taxes to the rich

[Liban CZ]

06:55 PM on 05/06/2012

Sarcasm?

[StarDagger]

04:36 PM on 05/06/2012

Anyone notice that real democracies vote on sunday, when everyone can do so, rather than on a weekday like tuesday!?!?!

-.

.-

-.

[9876543219]

05:26 PM on 05/06/2012

In Holland this would not be a good thing (well maybe for the country, but not democratically), because strong religious dutch reformed people from the rural area's are not allowed to do anything on sunday, not going out of the house nothing. The best would be 2 days or something.

[Ngonyama]

07:15 PM on 05/06/2012

Tha would -perhaps- make a difference for the small SGP party; hardly for anyone else.

[CapSen]

08:47 PM on 05/06/2012

It's a ridiculous fundamentalist relic of the past. How about Saturday? :)

It doesn't really matter if the SGP would lose its two seats, or what is it?

I wonder if these people don't use electricity or water or the bathroom either on Sundays.

[elstewart]

05:39 PM on 05/06/2012

Thank you for pointing this out. Weekday elections serve only to make it more difficult to do so and hold down participation by the working class.

[jrpiquer]

08:51 PM on 05/06/2012

I'm a teacher and a coach, which means I'm at school 8-9 hours a day and I'm not allowed to leave for my 30 minute lunch, and I've never had a problem voting. Occasionally I've had to do an absentee ballot, but not often.

[cornel]

04:35 PM on 05/06/2012

Great day for the 99%, terrible day for the 1%. Now the 1% will have to share or be "severely punished"

[IndependentRule]

06:18 PM on 05/06/2012

No the 1% will LEAVE those countries. Because they can. afford to and there are a lot of countries that would LOVE to hold their money locally.

[DANIELLECLARKE]

08:40 PM on 05/06/2012

good riddence

[Bernique]

11:21 PM on 05/06/2012

"Old, tired"canard, Rule. The rich stay put just as the others. This is trotted out by the Davos crowd as if it was true.

[jrpiquer]

08:53 PM on 05/06/2012

He wants to pay for his policies by taxing the rich 75%. Do you really think they're going to stick around for that to happen? All it will do is increase the occurences of tax evasion in France.

[satyrday]

09:28 PM on 05/06/2012

The modernized countries are all realizing that they need to return to progressive taxes. If enough do it together, it will work out.

[Bernique]

11:26 PM on 05/06/2012

This is an old, tired canard, Rule. The French rich will stay put, no matter what the talking point from the rich says.

[cornel]

04:25 PM on 05/06/2012

I can predict that Italy will go the same way as the French. They still have one more day to vote and they are all watching what happened to the caniche nain Sarko.
Understated is what happened in Schleswig-Holstein, this is a 180 turn to austerity (that profited the only the German economy until now) and a huge slap in the face of Merkel. German have understood that only growth combined with a little austerity can be the response to a recession. If all of Europe goes for austerity, they all will buying less and Germany economy depends on exports to be viable.
The way I see things, Hollande will choose Trichet as finance minister and that guy is known not to play nice with the German. He will make France extremely attractive to foreign investments specially from China by severing some the ties with the ECB and will rely more on Lagarde. Spain Italy and Greece will soon follow new France model !

[Dolores de Cabeza]

06:38 PM on 05/06/2012

Spain recently held general elections (last November) and the right-wing party won over the incumbent socialist party. Still, there is hope that the people will snap out of it and call for early elections at some point.

[cornel]

01:01 PM on 05/07/2012

Spain conservative government will do a 180, just wait ! No need for new elections, the situation is already explosive !

[jrpiquer]

08:57 PM on 05/06/2012

Italy isn't having national elections so not sure what you're talking about. It's not till April 2013 I believe

Spain just had elections in Novermber and the people pushed the socialists out in their worst defeat since Spain returned to Democracy in the 80s.

[RudyHaugeneder]

04:04 PM on 05/06/2012

Change is good.

[Big Horn Man]

05:46 PM on 05/06/2012

You sound eerie.

[ElCojonuo]

04:03 PM on 05/06/2012

Germany might be having a change, how refreshing and important ( since they are the glue that holds everything together in the Euro Zone ).
The Plutocrats are all about limiting and, if possible, eliminating the middle class ( what else is new - it's been like that since the emergence of the middle class, the Pluts like only 2 classes, Rich and Poor, less confussion and hassle that way ).