A Retreat from Congruence? Regional Coalition Politics in the Aftermath of Poland’s 2024 Elections

The article analyses regional coalition formation in 2024. Initial observations suggest that coalition building at that time diverged from the previous three terms, in which the aim was to extend cooperation between the national coalition partners in the largest number of regions, even if it meant building oversized coalitions. The opportunity of forming fully congruent coalitions in 2024 was limited by the fact that in four regions one-party rule of the opposition PiS party was established. Among the parties in the national coalition, two dominant patterns of coalition building were distinguished, that is PO-PSL or PO-PSL-SLD, and only one fully congruent coalition. The PO regional elite (according to the heads of regional boards) were often advocates of incumbent two-party coalitions. The small size of the regional boards was also not convenient for full congruence in the case of the four-party national coalition. However, as the third partner, SLD was invited much more often than Polska 2050, which could not be explained by the election results. To solve this puzzle, the calculation of congruence was extended to also include voivode-ship offices, with the number of what was called regional congruence then increasing, as seven regions followed full four-party congruence.