CNN
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Because the presidential race in america heats up, many different international locations around the globe are additionally conducting pivotal elections in 2024. Greater than 70 nations – dwelling to just about half the world’s individuals – have already or will quickly choose their very own leaders on the polls, in accordance with information from NGO the Worldwide Basis for Electoral Programs.
Right here’s a more in-depth take a look at the international locations holding elections, in maps and charts.
India, the world’s most populous nation, has already held the most important election this 12 months. The South Asian nation has extra residents than the European Union and the international locations of North America mixed. The election took 44 days, with multiple million polling stations, and its voters represented about 12% of the world’s inhabitants.
Voters in Mexico, the second most populous nation in Latin America, chosen the nation’s first feminine president — one in every of simply 26 feminine leaders worldwide. About 54% of Mexicans voted in what was the largest election within the nation’s historical past, with greater than 98 million eligible voters, some 70,000 candidates and greater than 20,000 public places of work on the ballots.
Elsewhere on this planet, over 30% of elections in 2024 are being held in undemocratic regimes — locations the place the contests aren’t truthful or equal, and the place leaders at instances cease opposition or arrest protesters, amongst different undemocratic practices like election fraud.
Vladamir Putin, for instance, confronted no actual opposition within the Russian election in March this 12 months. With most of his potential challengers useless, imprisoned or exiled, Putin received in a landslide with 87.3% of the vote. The Russian chief is presently serving his fifth time period as president, and in 2020, he succeeded in amending the structure for time period limits, enabling him to doubtlessly keep in energy till 2036.
Iran held an election final week that noticed the bottom voter turnout for a presidential contest for the reason that Islamic Republic was established in 1979. With no candidate receiving greater than 50% of votes, a runoff election occurred June 5 between the 2 main candidates: Reformist lawmaker Masoud Pezeshkian and ultraconservative former nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili.
Scores of different main international locations are voting this 12 months, together with Pakistan, Bangladesh and France. Within the first spherical of French elections final week, Marine Le Pen’s far-right Nationwide Rally (RN) occasion led within the parliamentary votes, and President Emmanuel Macron’s Ensemble alliance got here in third. Whereas the RN slumped to 3rd place within the decisive second spherical, after centrist and leftist events united to forestall it from taking energy, it nonetheless received extra seats within the French parliament than ever earlier than, making it the most important single occasion, and seems more likely to be a potent pressure within the years forward.
In current European Parliament elections, far-right events carried out nicely — with the Nationwide Rally gaining seven seats — and have been notably standard with younger individuals.
Voter turnout amongst younger individuals has traditionally been fairly low. As an illustration, within the 2019 UK election, solely 47% of voters aged 18 to 24 participated, in comparison with 75% of these over 65, in accordance with Ipsos Mori estimates. The pattern was much more pronounced within the US, the place solely 28% of voters aged 18 to 29 turned out for the 2018 election, as estimated by CIRCLE.
One side which may affect younger individuals’s votes is that the median age of present nationwide leaders around the globe is 62, in accordance with the Pew Analysis Heart. In 2023, 76% of Individuals aged 18 to 29 stated that Biden, 81, is just too previous to run for president, in accordance with an Related Press-NORC Heart for Public Affairs Analysis ballot.
To this point this 12 months we’ve already seen many elections, however the season is way from over, with many international locations nonetheless ready to go to the polls.
