Section 154 of the Constitution states: "All local issues shall be determined and administered by local governments, which operate independently pursuant to laws."

Had the authors of the Constitution, along with the Estonian citizens who approved it in a referendum, wished for a different system, the paragraph would have stated that this independence extends only until it conflicts with the desires of national party headquarters. Since the Constitution says no such thing, it is forbidden for any party's leadership to issue directives or attempt to influence or command individuals elected to local councils.

Parties, of course, see matters differently. This time around, campaign strategists from Isamaa and the Center Party were especially eager to convince voters that the entire purpose of the local elections was to evaluate and reject the outcome of the 2023 general election.

As the results show, voters across the country largely ignored that fairy tale. Instead, they elected people they believed were best suited to address the unique concerns of their cities or rural municipalities and move local life forward. There's no evidence suggesting that decisions at the ballot box were driven by a nationwide urge to exact revenge for something that lies outside the remit of local governments.

And yet, in the overall communications picture — both before the vote and after the results came in — the dominant narrative remained that the central issue in local life was ideology and the struggle for national political power. Unfortunately, the National Electoral Committee, as a neutral organizer of elections, also provided parties with tempting statistics on nationwide vote totals.

This isn't a reproach, but not everything that can be measured should be measured and apples and oranges shouldn't be added together. Comparing parties' nationwide vote tallies and drawing sweeping conclusions from them is as meaningless as ranking countries at athletics world championship by summing up the times from every running event — from the sprint to the marathon — and adding up all the meters and centimeters from the field events, from long jump to javelin, then tallying those hours and kilometers together.

Let me repeat: every municipality is unique. While an average can be calculated, there are about as many "average municipalities" as there are those earning exactly the average wage among all employees.

Despite the lack of substance in these nationwide generalizations, they're everywhere, even though neither voters nor elected officials recognize themselves in them. And what is a person more likely to believe when faced with two possibilities: that they're simply too ignorant to see "the bigger picture" or that the party spin is about as close to reality as Earth is to the Sun? Probably the latter, which means that portraying everyday life purely as a never-ending ideological and partisan battle only damages the credibility of political parties and their ability to contribute anything meaningful to Estonia's development.

Unfortunately, much of the media failed to resist the urge to amplify the parties' talking points this time. Every journalist has their own political likes and dislikes, but personal preferences should not influence the objectivity of professional reporting.

Even before the vote counts had cooled, Postimees was already running headlines like "Analysis: Estonia hit by a blue wave" and an editorial titled "Time to Fix Mistakes," whose main argument was that "the local elections amounted to a vote of no confidence in the government's policies."

Delfi didn't do much better. Yes, the same Delfi that since June has pledged in its ethics policy: "Our headlines and previews will accurately reflect the content of the articles, videos or audio clips they introduce. We avoid sensationalist or misleading language that might misrepresent the actual content." So how exactly does that square with headlines like "Power Took a Punch from the People" or "Big Story: Center Party Rose from the Ashes, Isamaa Conquered Councils and the Ruling Parties Got a Red Card from Voters"?

What "blue wave" (and whose blue, when at least three parties use it as their main color)? What punches and red cards? Which surveys painted the Center Party as a heap of ashes in Tallinn, Maardu or Sillamäe? Polling firms ought to conduct a separate study to find out how many voters actually went to the polls to deliver a blow to the government. And what should we conclude if it turns out that the electorate doesn't fit into the party-media narrative of society?

Did the wrong people somehow end up in Estonia? That would include me, since I too spent election night in Lääne-Harju Municipality by the seaside — and no wave came. The electoral alliance led by the current municipal mayor won nearly 70 percent of the vote and secured 16 out of 21 seats on the council. Was that a sign of approval or revenge?

Why have all the "analyses" of the election results and explanations of voter behavior completely ignored the most likely and in many municipalities factually confirmed possibility: that people were expressing deep satisfaction with the work of their current local leaders, gave them a grade of A and asked them to continue?

It's hard to imagine, for example, how a "blue wave" could have suddenly swept into the city of Rakvere and allowed Isamaa to "conquer the council" there. The water in that pool has been fairly blue for a long time already; this time, Isamaa simply got an extra 400 votes poured in. As someone from Rakvere, I'd be rather annoyed or confused if the message I intended — namely, that Kert Karus is a solid and trustworthy city leader — got spun by the media as me trying to punch Kristen Michal in the nose.

Equally odd is the notion that voters in Tartu were out en masse waving red cards — despite the fact that both journalists and politicians were desperately trying to turn the city into a stage for political drama or a major national battlefield. Perhaps a little history lesson about Tartu wouldn't hurt, and a young journalist whose memories don't go back to the turn of the millennium would benefit from looking at longer-term trends (see chart).

In Tartu, the Reform Party has enjoyed a stable and loyal voter base for decades. This year's vote count fell short of the long-term average by only about a thousand and was actually higher than in 2005 or 2013.

Isamaa's result looks impressive only in contrast to their total failures in the past two election cycles. In general, the party's performance has been shaped repeatedly by mergers, splits and internal national power struggles. The amplitude of its fluctuations far exceeds that of the Reform Party. This time, they managed to translate a steady potential into actual results.

More importantly, in the so-called "Reform Party stronghold," coalitions have always been necessary. Even in its best years, the Reform Party has never come close to holding an outright majority in Tartu and has never been able to dominate the way the Center Party has in Tallinn. Over the past four years, the city was governed by a coalition of Reform, Isamaa and the Social Democrats. In 2021, those three parties earned a combined 22,618 votes; this year, they earned 30,496. Is that a sign of protest and backlash — or satisfaction?

The embarrassing quarrel over the mayor's seat in Tartu could have been avoided had the coalition simply continued. The fighting cocks seem to have forgotten that the formulas Rein Taagepera developed for determining coalition longevity at the national level don't apply to local governments. Unlike at the national level — where the most durable coalition in parliament tends to be the one with the narrowest majority and fewest participants — forming a local government should be about maximizing representativeness. The more residents feel they have a voice in power, the more likely they are to reward it again in the next election.

In short, local life remains calm and the landslide occurred only in the minds of a few party leaders. Their family doctors have plenty to be concerned about if they start asking what exactly the patient means when he says, "My diagnosis is worry" (Urmas Reinsalu on Vikerraadio, October 21).

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