The Wahl-O-Mat, which was launched in Germany in 2002, has originally been developed in the Netherlands. The "StemWijzer” by the organization "ProDemos - Huis voor democratie en rechtsstaat" already exists since 1989. It had been available as a paper version for nine years before it developed into an online tool in 1998. Today it is an essential part of every election in the Netherlands..
The Federal Agency for civic education (Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung/bpb) acquired the license for using the tool Wahl-O-Mat for the national German elections in 2002. Today, tools similar to the Wahl-O-Mat have been deployed in many countries worldwide. In Europe, the Federal Agency for civic education partners with 14 organizations that use related Voting Advice Applications (VAA) for their national elections.
VoteMatch – A European perspective
That’s how, in the run-up to the European elections 2014, the idea for a European VAA -VoteMatch - was born: Give users additional information about parties in other EU countries and the possibility to compare their own political positions with the position of parties in other EU member states.
For the election of the European Parliament, on 26th May 2019 user of the Wahl-O-Mat in Germany can, along to the normal comparison of their political positions with positions of German parties, compare 16 out of 38 statements with the positions of parties in other EU member states.
Therefore, users play the 38 statements of the Wahl-O-Mat. At the end, they get the usual ranking of political German parties, which are closest to his own political opinion concerning these statements.
With another click on the page of the results, users can match their positons on 16 statements to parties within the European Union. Users get a European wide ranking. This ranking shows one party per country, which is closest to the answers of the 16 VoteMatch statements answered by users.
VoteMatch Europe Network
The European VoteMatch Network develops the statements for the transnational VoteMatch-tool. It is a network of practitioners of Voting Advice Applications in Europe. The members of the Network are independent and non-partisan and either experienced in developing VAAs, or experienced in research on VAAs. The bpb and ProDemos initiated the network.
