2018 Carinthian state election
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All 36 seats in the Landtag of Carinthia 19 seats needed for a majority | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Turnout | 297,921 (68.6%) 6.5% | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Results by municipality. The lighter shade indicates a plurality; the darker shade indicates a majority. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The 2018 Carinthian state election was held on 5 March 2018 to elect the members of the Landtag of Carinthia.
The centre-left Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPÖ) was the clear winner, taking 47.9% of votes, an eleven percentage point increase from 2013. The Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ) gained six points, and the Austrian People's Party (ÖVP) gained one. This was enabled by a collapse in support for other parties: Team Carinthia, which had split from defunct Team Stronach, lost half its voteshare; The Greens tumbled from 12% to 3% and lost their representation; and the Alliance for the Future of Austria (BZÖ) collapsed from 6.4% to just 0.4%.
The SPÖ fell one seat short of an absolute majority, and held exploratory talks with the three other parties in the Landtag. They ultimately formed a coalition government with the ÖVP.[1]
Background
Prior to amendments made in 2017, the Carinthian constitution mandated that cabinet positions in the state government be allocated between parties proportionally in accordance with the share of votes won by each; this is known as Proporz. As such, the government was a perpetual coalition of all parties that qualified for at least one cabinet position. In June 2017, the SPÖ, ÖVP, and Greens (all members of the government) as well as Team Carinthia voted to amend the constitution to remove this requirement.[2] As such, the 2018 election was the first in post-war Carinthian history in which conventional coalition formation could take place.[3]
Electoral system
The 36 seats of the Landtag of Carinthia are elected via open list proportional representation in a two-step process. The seats are distributed between four multi-member constituencies. For parties to receive any representation in the Landtag, they must either win at least one seat in a constituency directly, or clear a 5 percent state-wide electoral threshold. Seats are distributed in constituencies according to the Hare quota, with any remaining seats allocated using the D'Hondt method at the state level, to ensure overall proportionality between a party's vote share and its share of seats.[4]
Contesting parties
The table below lists parties represented in the previous Landtag.
In addition to the parties already represented in the Landtag, four parties collected enough signatures to be placed on the ballot.[5]
- NEOS – The New Austria and Liberal Forum (NEOS)
- Communist Party of Austria (KPÖ) – on the ballot only in Klagenfurt, Carinthia East, and Villach
- Responsibility Earth (ERDE)
- FAIR (FAIR)
Results
Results by constituency
Constituency | SPÖ | FPÖ | ÖVP | TK | Grüne | NEOS | Others | Total seats |
Turnout | ||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
colspan="2" style="background:Template:Social Democratic Party of Austria/meta/color;"| | colspan="2" style="background:Template:Freedom Party of Austria/meta/color;"| | colspan="2" style="background:Template:Austrian People's Party (2017)/meta/color;"| | colspan="2" style="background:Template:Team Stronach/meta/color;"| | colspan="2" style="background:Template:The Greens – The Green Alternative/meta/color;"| | colspan="2" style="background:Template:NEOS – The New Austria and Liberal Forum/meta/color;"| | ||||||||||
% | S | % | S | % | S | % | S | % | S | % | S | % | |||
Klagenfurt | 51.7 | 5 | 19.9 | 1 | 13.3 | 1 | 4.9 | 5.0 | 2.6 | 2.7 | 7 | 67.4 | |||
Carinthia East | 46.4 | 4 | 25.8 | 2 | 17.0 | 1 | 4.8 | 2.2 | 1.9 | 1.9 | 7 | 69.3 | |||
Villach | 51.2 | 4 | 21.6 | 1 | 12.4 | 5.4 | 2.9 | 2.1 | 4.5 | 5 | 67.9 | ||||
Carinthia West | 42.3 | 3 | 24.5 | 1 | 19.0 | 1 | 7.9 | 2.3 | 1.9 | 2.1 | 5 | 70.0 | |||
Remaining seats | 2 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 12 | ||||||||
Total | 47.9 | 18 | 22.9 | 9 | 15.4 | 6 | 5.7 | 3 | 3.1 | 0 | 2.1 | 0 | 2.7 | 36 | 68.6 |
Source: Carinthian Government |
Aftermath
After the election, the SPÖ began exploratory talks with the three other parties in the Landtag. By the beginning of April, a coalition agreement had been reached with the ÖVP. However, after ÖVP leader Christian Benger unexpectedly resigned a few days later, the SPÖ led by Kaiser demanded the coalition be renegotiated, fearing the new ÖVP leadership may renege on promises made by their predecessors.[6] On 9 April, the coalition was finalised and presented.[1]
References
- ^ a b "New faces in the state government". ORF. 9 April 2018.
- ^ "Carinthia abolishes the Proporz". Die Presse. 1 June 2017.
- ^ "New rules for government formation in the future". ORF. 23 December 2017.
- ^ "LT2018_Mandate.pdf" (PDF). Carinthian Government.
- ^ "Landtag election 4 March 2018". Carinthian Government.
- ^ "Coalition wobbles after Benger resigns". ORF. 4 April 2018.
External links