Greens (Estmere)

Greens Grėnas Les Vèrts
Co-leader	Sara Hall-Brookes
Co-leader	Nathan Coutanche
Founded	December 7, 1972 (1972-12-07)
Merger of	Ecology, ANL, SFS
Headquarters	Green Building, 79 St. David Street, Morwall
Newspaper	Pride & Power
Student wing	Green Students
Youth wing	Young Greens
Women's wing	Green Women
LGBT wing	Greens LGBTQ+
Membership (2021)	16,023
Ideology	Green politics Progressivism Pro-Eucleanism Factions: Green liberalism Eco-socialism Ecofeminism
Political position	Centre to left-wing
Euclean Parliament group	MVE
Colours	Green
Chamber of Commons	40 / 600
Chamber of Peers	4 / 300
Euclean Parliament	6 / 116
State legislatures	40 / 1,500
Website
greens-for-change.es
Political parties

The Greens (Swathish: Grėnas, Flurian: Les Vèrts) is a centre to left-wing green political party in Estmere, which supports the incumbent SDCP minority government in Parliament as per a loose confidence and supply agreement with Prime Minister Zoe Halivar.

Emerging out from the counterculture movements of the 1960s, the Greens were founded in 1972, as a merger of the environmentalist Ecology Party, the anti-nuclear Anti-Nuclear League and the progressive Students for a Free Society. The party embraced green politics as its raison d'etre, but largely operated extra-parliamentarily. This was until the 1982 Shoreham by-election, in which Green candidate Harry Peterson won a surprise victory, in part due to opposition to proposals for nuclear power in the area. Peterson became the first Green MP, but lost his seat to the Reform Party in the subsequent 1984 election, returning the Greens to extra-parliamentary opposition. The party made inroads in the Greater Morwall Council, however, securing representation there in 1989.

The party returned to the Chamber of Commons through the list in the 1999 general election, and the party essentially functioned as crossbenchers to the government of Heidi Reid, supporting the government on certain issues, but opposing it on others. The party withdrew all support for the Reid government in 2005 in opposition to austerity, and secured its second constituency win in the 2007 general election, in which it won the Morwall seat of Tendersea.

The Greens acted in opposition to the Sotirian Democratic Union government which succeeded Reid's, and continued to grow in both vote-share and seat count. The party gained its first mayorality in 2008, with Nathan Coutanche elected as the Mayor of St Avelines. After the 2015 election in Evre, Guy Warenne became the first Green to be appointed as a First Minister, as part of a cordon sanitaire against Estmere First. After the 2021 election, the party again increased its vote-share and seat count, and entered negotiations with the victorious SDCP to support a progressive government. Along with the Estmerish Section of the Workers' International, Vox Estmere and future.es, the party signed up to a confidence and supply deal in exchange for SDCP support for a number of Green policies.

The Greens have long been considered one of the smaller parties in Estmerish politics, but the party's vote share has steadily increased in recent elections, with pundits suggesting that the party could overtake Reform. The party has a green platform, as is seen as strongly progressive and pro-Euclean. It is led by two co-leaders, at least one of whom must be a woman or non-binary. Sara Hall-Brookes and Nathan Coutanche were elected as co-leaders in 2015 on a unity ticket.

Ideology

Factions

Despite the unifying raison d'etre of green politics, the Greens contain a number of factions. This is partially due to the party's history, having been formed as a merger of the Ecology Party, the Anti-Nuclear League and the Students for a Free Society. Factions in the party tend to be ideological rather than personality-driven, ranging from eco-socialism to green conservatism. The factions are largely informal and unorganised, due to the nature of the Greens as a party which values participatory democracy, though they often have notable figureheads.

• One of the two influential factions is the Watermelon wing, who espouse eco-socialism, hailing from the left to centre-left of the party, generally believing in redistributive economics and a just transition. Their name is derived from an attack that they were green on the outside, but red (socialist) on the inside. Co-leader Nathan Coutanche is considered the figurehead of this faction.
• The other major tendency within the party is that of the Bright Greens. Their name derives from bright green environmentalism, but the platform of the tendency can be better described as green liberalism with an emphasis on ecofeminism. Co-leader and candidate for PM Sara Hall-Brookes is one of the major thought-leaders from this faction. The tendency tends to push for green policies in addition to widespread social reform, and tend to favour centre-left economic policies, but are not as wary of market systems as the Watermelons.
• One of the smaller factions is the Deep Greens, who adhere to the ideology of deep ecology, and tend to campaign for degrowth in order to combat climate change.
• To the left of the Watermelons is the Green Left, who are also eco-socialist, but are additionally anti-capitalist and softly Euclosceptic.
• The tendency most often found in non-metropolitan counties, the Shire Greens are broadly green conservatives, combining an ecological outlook with conservative social views. The Shire Greens also tend to be more open to market solutions to climate change than other factions, and more wary of socialism than capitalism.
• The smallest faction is the that of the gender critical feminists, who tend to be single-issue in opposing transgender rights and supporting single-sex spaces. The group had previously caucused with the Bright or Shire Greens, but increasingly self-organised starting in the 2010s following the party's increasing commitment to transgender rights.