1994 Swedish general election

1994 Swedish general election
← outgoing members elected members →
All 349 seats in the Riksdag ; 175 seats needed for a majority
	Map of the election, showing the distribution of constituency and levelling seats, as well as the largest political bloc within each constituency.
PM before election; Carl Bildt ; Moderate	Elected PM; Ingvar Carlsson ; Social Democrats

Last updated February 26, 2024

General elections were held in Sweden on 18 September 1994.^[1] The Swedish Social Democratic Party remained the largest party in the Riksdag, winning 161 of the 349 seats.^[2] Led by Ingvar Carlsson, the party returned to power and formed a minority government after the election. This was the final time the Social Democrats recorded above 40% of the vote before the party's vote share steeply declined four years later and never recovered. The Greens also returned to the Riksdag after a three-year absence.

The election saw the largest bloc differences for a generation, with the red-green parties making sizeable inroads into the blue heartlands of inner Småland and Western Götaland, at an even higher rate than 1988. The Social Democrats gathered more than 50% of the vote in all five northern counties, Blekinge, Södermanland, Västmanland and Örebro.^[3]

In spite of the loss of power, the Moderates retained their 80 seats and gained 0.5% from 1991. Due to the sizeable losses of their coalition, the net difference between the blocs was 53, with the red-greens making up 201 and the blue parties 148.^[3]

The Christian Democrats fared poorly, merely beating the threshold by 3,752 votes.^[3] New Democracy, a right-wing populist political party which had entered the Riksdag three years earlier, performed poorly, losing most of its voters and all of its seats in the Riksdag. In total the party's vote share dropped from 6.7% in 1991 to 1.2% in 1994. The election introduced an extended electoral cycle of four years, replacing the previous three-year terms.

The proportion of women elected to the Riksdag increased from 34% in 1991 to 40%,^[4]^[5] following a campaign by the Stödstrumporna [ sv ] (lit. 'The Support stockings') before the elections.^[6]

They were the first elections in the world in which the official results were published live on the nascent internet.^[7]

Debates

1994 Swedish general election debates
Date	Time	Organizers	Moderators	P Present I Invitee N Non-invitee
				S	M	L	C	KD	NyD	V	MP	Refs
												Refs
		Sveriges Television	Pia Brandelius [sv] Maud Zachrisson	P Ingvar Carlsson	P Carl Bildt	P Bengt Westerber	P Olof Johansson	P Alf Svensson	P Vivianne Franzén	P Gudrun Schyman	P Birger Schlaug	^[8]

Results



Party		Votes	%	Seats	+/–
	Swedish Social Democratic Party	2,513,905	45.25	161	+23
	Moderate Party	1,243,253	22.38	80	0
	Centre Party	425,153	7.65	27	–4
	Liberal People's Party	399,556	7.19	26	–7
	Left Party	342,988	6.17	22	+6
	Green Party	279,042	5.02	18	+18
	Christian Democratic Society Party	225,974	4.07	15	–11
	New Democracy	68,663	1.24	0	–25
	Other parties	57,006	1.03	0	0
Total		5,555,540	100.00	349	0

Valid votes		5,555,540	98.50
Invalid/blank votes		84,853	1.50
Total votes		5,640,393	100.00
Registered voters/turnout		6,496,120	86.83
Source: Nohlen & Stöver

Seat distribution

Constituency	Total seats	Seats won
		By party							By coalition
		S	M	C	F	V	MP	KDS	Left	Right	Others

Älvsborg North	12	5	2	1	1	1	1	1	6	5	1
Älvsborg South	6	3	2	1					3	3
Blekinge	6	4	2						4	2
Bohus	13	5	3	1	1	1	1	1	6	6	1
Gävleborg	12	6	2	1	1	1	1		7	4	1
Gothenburg	17	7	4		2	2	1	1	9	7	1
Gotland	2	2							2
Halland	9	4	3	1	1				4	5
Jämtland	5	3	1	1					3	2
Jönköping	14	5	3	1	1	1	1	2	6	7	1
Kalmar	11	5	2	2		1		1	6	5
Kopparberg	13	6	2	1	1	1	1	1	7	5	1
Kristianstad	12	6	3	1	1			1	6	6
Kronoberg	6	3	2	1					3	3
Malmö	8	5	3						5	3
Malmöhus North	10	5	3	1	1				5	5
Malmöhus South	12	5	4	1	1		1		5	6	1
Norrbotten	11	8	1	1		1			9	2
Örebro	13	6	2	1	1	1	1	1	7	5	1
Östergötland	15	7	3	1	1	1	1	1	8	6	1
Skaraborg	12	5	2	1	1	1	1	1	6	5	1
Södermanland	11	5	2	1	1	1	1		6	4	1
Stockholm County	36	14	11	2	3	2	2	2	16	18	2
Stockholm Municipality	26	9	8	1	3	2	2	1	11	13	2
Uppsala	12	5	3	1	1	1	1		6	5	1
Värmland	11	6	2	1	1	1			7	4
Västerbotten	11	5	1	1	1	1	1	1	6	4	1
Västernorrland	12	6	2	1	1	1	1		7	4	1
Västmanland	11	6	2	1	1	1			7	4
Total	349	161	80	27	26	22	18	15	183	148	18
Source: Statistics Sweden

By municipality

Votes by municipality. The municipalities are the color of the party that got the most votes within the coalition that won relative majority.
Cartogram of the map to the left with each municipality rescaled to the number of valid votes cast.
Map showing the voting shifts from the 1991 to the 1994 election. Darker blue indicates a municipality voted more towards the parties that formed the centre-right bloc. Darker red indicates a municipality voted more towards the parties that form the left-wing bloc.
Votes by municipality as a scale from red/Left-wing bloc to blue/Centre-right bloc.
Cartogram of vote with each municipality rescaled in proportion to number of valid votes cast. Deeper blue represents a relative majority for the centre-right coalition, brighter red represents a relative majority for the left-wing coalition.

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References

↑ Dieter Nohlen & Philip Stöver (2010) Elections in Europe: A data handbook, p1858 ISBN 978-3-8329-5609-7
↑ Nohlen & Stöver, p1873
1 2 3 "Allmänna valen 1994. Del 1, Riksdagsvalet den 18 september 1994" (PDF) (in Swedish). Statistical Central Bureau . Retrieved 18 November 2019.
↑ "Elections held in 1991". Inter-Parliamentary Union.
↑ "Elections held in 1994". Inter-Parliamentary Union.
↑ Törnqvist, Maria (2019). ”Varannan damernas eller hela makten? Kommentar till Maria-Pia Boëthius, "Krav på kvinnoparti"”. i Klara Arnberg, Fia Sundevall, David Tjeder. Könspolitiska nyckeltexter. Från Det går an till #metoo. p. 422–426
↑ General aspects of Sweden's electoral system Election Resources
↑ Sweden, Sveriges Television AB, Stockholm, Slutdebatter – Val-94: Slutdebatt (in Swedish), retrieved 2024-02-01{{citation}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)

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[NS-1] Dieter Nohlen & Philip Stöver (2010) Elections in Europe: A data handbook, p1858 ISBN 978-3-8329-5609-7

[N2-2] Nohlen & Stöver, p1873

[SCB-3] 1 2 3 "Allmänna valen 1994. Del 1, Riksdagsvalet den 18 september 1994" (PDF) (in Swedish). Statistical Central Bureau . Retrieved 18 November 2019.

[4] "Elections held in 1991". Inter-Parliamentary Union.

[5] "Elections held in 1994". Inter-Parliamentary Union.

[6] Törnqvist, Maria (2019). ”Varannan damernas eller hela makten? Kommentar till Maria-Pia Boëthius, "Krav på kvinnoparti"”. i Klara Arnberg, Fia Sundevall, David Tjeder. Könspolitiska nyckeltexter. Från Det går an till #metoo. p. 422–426

[7] General aspects of Sweden's electoral system Election Resources

[8] Sweden, Sveriges Television AB, Stockholm, Slutdebatter – Val-94: Slutdebatt (in Swedish), retrieved 2024-02-01{{citation}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)

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