The 2005 Styrian state election was held on 2 October 2005 to elect the members of the Landtag of

Styria Styria (german: Steiermark ; Serbo-Croatian and sl, ; hu, Stájerország) is a state (''Bundesland'') in the southeast of Austria. With an area of , Styria is the second largest state of Austria, after Lower Austria. Styria is bordered to ...

. The result was a historic defeat for the

Austrian People's Party The Austrian People's Party (german: Österreichische Volkspartei , ÖVP ) is a Christian-democratic and liberal-conservative political party in Austria. Since December 2021, the party has been led provisionally by Karl Nehammer. It is currentl ...

(ÖVP), who had governed the state uninterrupted since 1945. The

Social Democratic Party of Austria The Social Democratic Party of Austria (german: Sozialdemokratische Partei Österreichs , SPÖ), founded and known as the Social Democratic Workers' Party of Austria (german: link=no, Sozialdemokratische Arbeiterpartei Österreichs, SDAPÖ) unti ...

(SPÖ) became the largest party on a swing of over nine

percentage point A percentage point or percent point is the unit (measurement), unit for the Difference (mathematics), arithmetic difference between two percentages. For example, moving up from 40 percent to 44 percent is an increase of 4 percentage points, but a ...

s. The election was also significant in other ways: the

Freedom Party of Austria The Freedom Party of Austria (german: Freiheitliche Partei Österreichs, FPÖ) is a right-wing populist and national-conservative political party in Austria. It was led by Norbert Hofer from September 2019 to 1 June 2021.Staff (1 June 2021"Aust ...

(FPÖ) lost all its seats for the first time since entering the Landtag in 1949, and suffered its worst result since 1974 in terms of vote share. Conversely, the

Communist Party of Austria The Communist Party of Austria (german: Kommunistische Partei Österreichs, KPÖ) is a communist party in Austria. Established in 1918 as the Communist Party of Republic of German-Austria, German-Austria (KPDÖ), it is one of the world's oldest ...

(KPÖ) returned to the Landtag after a 35-year absence. It became the third largest party with four seats. SPÖ leader

Franz Voves Franz Voves (born 28 February 1953 in Graz, Styria, Austria) is an Austrian politician of the SPÖ and a former player in the Austrian ice hockey national team. From 25 October 2005 to 16 June 2015 he has been governor of Styria (Landeshauptman ...

became the new Governor of Styria. Outgoing Governor

Waltraud Klasnic Waltraud Klasnic (née Tschiltsch, born 27 October 1945) is an Austrian politician who was (governor) of Styria from 1996 until 2005. Politics Klasnic joined the women's organisation of the Austrian People's Party (ÖVP) in 1970. She was ...

sought to remain regional ÖVP leader, but was forced to resign shortly after the election.

Background

Prior to amendments made in 2011, the Styrian constitution mandated that cabinet positions in the state government (state councillors, german: Landesräten) be allocated between parties proportionally in accordance with the share of votes won by each; this is known as

Proporz ''Proporz'' (, from german: Proportionalität, "proportionality") is a long-standing practice in the Second Austrian Republic in which positions in government are distributed between political parties in a manner proportional to their electoral or ...

. As such, the government was a perpetual coalition of all parties that qualified for at least one state councillor. The 2000 election was a decisive victory for the ÖVP, which improved its vote share by eleven points to 47%, falling two seats short of an absolute majority. This was balanced by losses for the SPÖ, FPÖ, and

Liberal Forum The Liberal Forum (german: Liberales Forum, LiF) was a centrist, Liberalism in Austria, liberal political party in Austria. The party was active from February 1993 to January 2014, when the party merged into NEOS – The New Austria. A member ...

. The KPÖ gained national attention after an unexpected record showing in the 2003 local elections in

Graz Graz (; sl, Gradec) is the capital city of the Austrian state of Styria and second-largest city in Austria after Vienna. As of 1 January 2021, it had a population of 331,562 (294,236 of whom had principal-residence status). In 2018, the popul ...

, the capital of Styria, winning 21% and becoming the third largest party in the municipal council. This was attributed to an effective campaign and the popularity of leader Ernest Kaltenegger. The party gained popularity statewide in the aftermath, particularly after Kaltenegger was announced as lead candidate for the 2005 state election.

Electoral system

The 56 seats of the Landtag of Styria were elected via

open list Open list describes any variant of party-list proportional representation where voters have at least some influence on the order in which a party's candidates are elected. This is as opposed to closed list, which allows only active members, par ...

proportional representation Proportional representation (PR) refers to a type of electoral system under which subgroups of an electorate are reflected proportionately in the elected body. The concept applies mainly to geographical (e.g. states, regions) and political divis ...

in a two-step process. 48 of the seats were distributed between four multi-member constituencies. For parties to receive any representation in the Landtag, they must win at least one seat in a constituency directly. Seats were distributed in constituencies according to the

Hare quota The Hare quota (also known as the simple quota) is a formula used under some forms of proportional representation. In these voting systems the quota is the number of votes that guarantees a candidate, or a party in some cases, captures a seat. Th ...

, with nine

leveling seat Leveling seats ( da, tillægsmandat, sv, utjämningsmandat, no, utjevningsmandater, is, jöfnunarsæti, german: Ausgleichsmandat), commonly known also as adjustment seats, are an election mechanism employed for many years by all Nordic countrie ...

s allocated using the

D'Hondt method The D'Hondt method, also called the Jefferson method or the greatest divisors method, is a method for allocating seats in parliaments among federal states, or in party-list proportional representation systems. It belongs to the class of highest- ...

at the state level, to ensure overall proportionality between a party's vote share and its share of seats.

Contesting parties

In addition to the parties already represented in the Landtag, four parties collected enough signatures to be placed on the ballot: *

(''KPÖ'') * Hirschmann List (''LH'') * Alliance for the Future of Austria (''BZÖ'') * Party-free List (''Parteifrei'')

Results

Results by constituency

References

{{Austrian local elections 2005 elections in Austria State elections in Austria October 2005 events in Europe