Three proxies of the Dutch bible belt (orthodox protestants) : 1. Geographical distribution of Orthodox calvinist schools 2. Measles outbreaks and measles vaccination coverage 3. Whether (male) amateur football matches are mostly played on Saturdays or on Sundays (via @SimonOtjes
Orthodox protestants have tended to resist vaccines because they believe that they interfere with the will of God. They also oppose working on Sundays. The website of the Orthodox Protestant party SGP is offline on Sundays.
The author of the great football map is @ReneWaning
Portugal votes tomorrow. The decline in electoral turnout since the establishment of democracy has been spectacular {
In fact, Portugal has one of the lowest turnouts in legislative elections of all the countries in the CPDS dataset
One relevant factor for the 2019 elections is that electoral law changed and residents abroad (Portugal has a huge diaspora) are now automatically registered. The electorate abroad expanded from ca. 250'000 to 1.5 million between the 2015 and 2019 elections.
A political economy thread on why the Netherlands has become the main entry point for South American cocaine into Europe.
33 tons of cocaine were seized in the port of Rotterdam in 2019. Last year cocaine amounts with a street value of 5 BILLION EUR were seized. How has it come to this? Let's go to 1980s Colombia. nltimes.nl/2019/11/11/coc…
At first, Colombian drug traffickers would channel cocaine into Miami via the Caribbean, using boats or planes flown by people like Barry Seal (there is a movie about him). But then, the amount of product that could be circulated was limited. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barry_Seal
A thread about how, sixty year ago, Portugal lost a 36-hour war against India.
In 1497, Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama discovers a maritime route to India via the Cape of Good Hope, providing an alternative to the trade routes to Asia by land controlled by the Ottoman Empire and Italian cities.
The Portuguese establish a number of trade posts in India through a combination of military battles and arrangements with local political leaders
How Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich became the richest Portuguese man alive, a thread.
In 1496, the King of Portugal Manuel I wanted to marry the daughter of the kings of Spain, Isabella, Princess of Asturias. She died shortly thereafter, in childbirth.
One of the requests of the King of Spain in the marriage negotiations was that Portugal would force Jews to convert to catholicism or be expelled, which Manuel did. Those that continued to practice in secret were burnt, most had to flee.
Interesting differences in naturalisation practices in Switzerland: 1) Man originally from Kosovo is denied citizenship because citizens of the town where he applied say he walks around in tracksuit bottoms. blick.ch/schweiz/basel/…
2) Woman originally from Germany, active on the neonazi scene, organising illegal demonstrations against corona measures and calling for revolution, was granted Swiss citizenship last year in Luzern. 20min.ch/story/corona-d…
3) Man, originally from Cape Verde, is denied Swiss citizenship because he had driven a car with a windshield that had only been *partially* de-iced. Got a fine, sufficient to fail his application. laliberte.ch/info-regionale…