Sweden general election, 1998
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General elections were held in
Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...
on 20 September 1998.
Dieter Nohlen Dieter Nohlen (born 6 November 1939) is a German academic and political scientist. He currently holds the position of Emeritus Professor of Political Science in the Faculty of Economic and Social Sciences of the University of Heidelberg. An expe ...
& Philip Stöver (2010) ''Elections in Europe: A data handbook'', p1858
The
Swedish Social Democratic Party The Swedish Social Democratic Party, formally the Swedish Social Democratic Workers' Party ( sv, Sveriges socialdemokratiska arbetareparti ; S/SAP), usually referred to as The Social Democrats ( sv, link=no, Socialdemokraterna ), is a social-d ...
remained the largest party in the
Riksdag The Riksdag (, ; also sv, riksdagen or ''Sveriges riksdag'' ) is the legislature and the supreme decision-making body of Sweden. Since 1971, the Riksdag has been a unicameral legislature with 349 members (), elected proportionally and se ...
, winning 131 of the 349 seats.Nohlen & Stöver, p1873 The incumbent Social Democratic minority government, led by Göran Persson, was returned to power despite losing seats and receiving fewer votes than in their 1991 defeat. They remained in power with support from the Left Party and the
Green Party A green party is a formally organized political party based on the principles of green politics, such as social justice, environmentalism and nonviolence. Greens believe that these issues are inherently related to one another as a foundation ...
. While the three left-wing parties saw a net loss of 11 seats, the Left Party nearly doubled its representation in the Riksdag. This reflected how many Social Democratic voters were dissatisfied with the policies of the government, which had implemented austerity measures to reduce the budget deficit. The Social Democrats were able to form a government in spite of the sizeable decline of the vote, since the centre-right parties failed to recover more than a net share of 11 seats out of the required 27. The most notable gain was that the capital
Stockholm Stockholm () is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, largest city of Sweden as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in Scandinavia. Approximately 980,000 people liv ...
going blue in spite of a stable nationwide left-leaning majority, something that previously had been unlikely. In suburban areas around Stockholm and
Gothenburg Gothenburg (; abbreviated Gbg; sv, Göteborg ) is the second-largest city in Sweden, fifth-largest in the Nordic countries, and capital of the Västra Götaland County. It is situated by the Kattegat, on the west coast of Sweden, and has ...
several municipalities also flipped blue. Other gains were in the blue heartlands of Southern Sweden, with Jönköping and Linköping being major pickups. Even so, smaller municipalities away from the bigger cities gave the red-green bloc a sizeable edge, with the Left Party getting into double-digits nationwide. Even though there was a drop of support in major cities, many areas that had previously voted blue remained with the red-green bloc. For the Social Democrats, the steep drop of the party's nationwide vote share was still felt in many of its historically strong industrial areas. The party's vote share had dropped to a 70-year low and many absolute majorities from
1994 File:1994 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 1994 Winter Olympics are held in Lillehammer, Norway; The Kaiser Permanente building after the 1994 Northridge earthquake; A model of the MS Estonia, which Sinking of the MS Estonia, sank in ...
election were lost. Besides from the Left Party, the other party that made major gains were the Christian Democrats. The party had been on the verge of falling out of the Riksdag in
1994 File:1994 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 1994 Winter Olympics are held in Lillehammer, Norway; The Kaiser Permanente building after the 1994 Northridge earthquake; A model of the MS Estonia, which Sinking of the MS Estonia, sank in ...
, yet almost tripled its vote share to end up at 11.8%, even being the largest centre-right party in its stronghold of
Jönköping County Jönköping County ( sv, Jönköpings län) is a county or '' län'' in southern Sweden. It borders the counties of Halland, Västra Götaland, Östergötland, Kalmar and Kronoberg. The total county population was 356,291 inhabitants in Septe ...
. The former heads of government, the Centre Party, continued its decline and recorded 5.1% of the vote, more than a million fewer overall votes than in the 1970s elections. The People's Party fared even worse at 4.7%.


Results

There were 5,261,109 valid ballots cast, a sizeable decrease in turnout from the 1994 election, with turnout dropping from 86.8% to 81.4%.


Seat distribution


By municipality

Image:Sweden.1998.coalition.largest.map.svg, Votes by municipality. The municipalities are the color of the party that got the most votes ''within'' the coalition that won relative majority. Image:Sweden.1998.coalition.largest.cart.svg, Cartogram of the map to the left with each municipality rescaled to the number of valid votes cast. Image:Sweden.1994.to.1998.coalition.voting.shift.map.svg, Map showing the voting shifts from the 1994 to the 1998 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. Image:Sweden.1998.coalition.purple.map.svg, Votes by municipality as a scale from red/Left-wing bloc to blue/Centre-right bloc. Image:Sweden.1998.coalition.purple.cart.svg, 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.


References

{{Swedish elections General elections in Sweden
Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...
General
Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...