The EU has financed various organisations to create a voice match; after all, this may facilitate a better turnout. Therefore, EU Vox competes in the Netherlands with e.g. the Stemwijzer by ProDemos.
Surely, EU Vox will win that battle. At least if it is up to Kostas Gemenis, associate professor at the UT and member of the EU Vox steering group. Particularly the way in which the answers of the political parties have been determined, make EU Vox more reliable than other vote matches.
Gemesis says: ‘Other vote matches leave it up to one person to collect the positions of the various political parties. We have worked with at least five different experts, including political scientists, to judge the various propositions. In a first round, these experts have described the position per political party. Subsequently, they have engaged in an on-line debate with one another – anonymously, so without regard to persons. In all this, they had to provide an argumentation based on the various propositions, reports etc. In the second round, they lay down their revised positions.’
This means that the political parties themselves did not have any influence on the answers in the EU Vox. ‘The latter only works in the Netherlands; in other countries, hardly any party will come up with any answers.’
Various editions
Each country has its own edition of the EU Vox, containing the political parties active in that country and in their own language (sometimes even regional languages, such as Catalan for the Spanish EU Vox). Furthermore, each country's edition is also available in English.
Yesterday, EU Vox has been launched in appr. two thirds of the EU member states, including the Netherlands. The other countries will join them on Monday.
