Who are we?

SALK is a independent, privately funded non-profit foundation established in 2020 with an aim of supporting the values of liberal and open society. We work with political parties, free media, advocacy and civic society organisations, companies as well as academic and public institutions that are similarly committed to upholding, defending and preserving the liberal democracy against the challenges of the rise of hard right and illiberal political forces in Europe and elsewhere.

Premise:

In a functioning democracy, electoral politics is fundamentally a contest between competing visions of what constitutes a “good society”. This contest is structured through parliamentary representation, where parties vie for power via elections.

Because every seat won by one party is lost by another, elections are inherently zero-sum game. Mainstream liberal parties typically compete with each other within a shared democratic framework, targeting broadly similar voter bases. Illiberal and hard-right parties, by contrast, compete against everyone else, mobilising voters through grievances and opposition rather than a unifying vision.

This asymmetry produces a structural coordination problem that liberal parties are ill equipped to solve by themselves. The resulting electoral efficiency gap favours illiberal political forces who do not need to worry about “friendly fire” and are able to communicate efficiently with their respective constituencies.

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