Parliamentary elections were held in

Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

on 19 April 2015, with advance voting taking place from 8 to 14 April. The 200 members of the

Parliament of Finland The Parliament of Finland ( ; ) is the unicameral and supreme legislature of Finland, founded on 9 May 1906. In accordance with the Constitution of Finland, sovereignty belongs to the people, and that power is vested in the Parliament. The ...

were elected with the proportional

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 ...

. There were 4,463,333 people entitled to vote in Finland and abroad.

Background

Previous government coalition

The incumbent government was a four-party coalition composed of the

National Coalition Party sv, Samlingspartiet , leader1_title = Chairman , leader1_name = Petteri Orpo , leader2_title = Deputy chairs , leader2_name = Antti HäkkänenElina ValtonenAnna-Kaisa Ikonen , merger = Finnish Party, Young Finn ...

Social Democratic Party The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology. Active parties Fo ...

Swedish People's Party The Swedish People's Party of Finland ( sv, Svenska folkpartiet i Finland (SFP); fi, Suomen ruotsalainen kansanpuolue (RKP)) is a political party in Finland aiming to represent the interests of the minority Swedish-speaking population of Finlan ...

and the

Christian Democrats __NOTOC__ Christian democratic parties are political parties that seek to apply Christian principles to public policy. The underlying Christian democracy movement emerged in 19th-century Europe, largely under the influence of Catholic social ...

as well as independent Member of Parliament

Elisabeth Nauclér Elisabeth Nauclér (born 7 March 1952 in Eda Municipality) is a Swedish-born Finnish independent politician and jurist. Naucler was the single member of parliament for the autonomous region of Åland in the Parliament of Finland. She sat with the ma ...

. The Left Alliance and the

Green League The Green League (VIHR, fi, Vihreä liitto , sv, Gröna förbundet), shortened to the Greens ( fi, Vihreät, sv, De Gröna), is a green political party in Finland. Ideologically, the Green League is positioned on the centre-left of the polit ...

were initially also part of the governing coalition, but both left in 2014. On 22 June 2011, the parliament elected

Jyrki Katainen Jyrki Tapani Katainen (born 14 October 1971) is a Finnish politician who served as the European Commission's Vice-President for Jobs, Growth, Investment and Competitiveness from 2014 until 2019. Katainen was previously Prime Minister of Finland fr ...

as prime minister by a vote of 118–72; two Left Alliance MPs voted against Katainen, for which they were formally reprimanded by the Left Alliance parliamentary group. They were subsequently expelled from the group, reducing the government majority from 126 MPs to 124. In March 2014 the Left Alliance announced that it was leaving the cabinet, citing the party's opposition to budget cuts in social welfare programs, which had been agreed to by the other five parties. This reduced the government's majority to 112 MPs. In April 2014 Jyrki Katainen announced that he would not seek another term as the chairman of the National Coalition Party. The NCP chose

Alexander Stubb Cai-Göran Alexander Stubb (born 1 April 1968) is a Finnish politician who served as Prime Minister of Finland from 2014 to 2015. He rose to politics as a researcher specialized in the affairs of the European Union and was elected to the European ...

as its new chairman in June, and he subsequently became the new Prime Minister. In September 2014 the Green League announced that it was leaving the cabinet. The Greens were opposed to the other governing parties' decision to grant

Fennovoima Fennovoima Ltd ( fi, Fennovoima Oy) is a nuclear power company established by Russian state's nuclear company Rosatom and a consortium of Finnish state-owned power and industrial companies. The company does not own any nuclear capacities; however ...

a licence for building a nuclear power plant in

Pyhäjoki Pyhäjoki (; literally the "Holy River") is a municipality of Finland. It is located in the defunct province of Oulu, which was split in two regions; Pyhäjoki is part of the Northern Ostrobothnia region. It is located southwest of the city of O ...

. The Greens' departure cut the government's majority to 102 MPs (including the Speaker of the Parliament, who does not vote).

Electoral district changes

Electoral constituencies of Finland 2013-2020

In 2013 the parliament decided to merge certain

electoral districts An electoral district, also known as an election district, legislative district, voting district, constituency, riding, ward, division, or (election) precinct is a subdivision of a larger state (a country, administrative region, or other polity ...

to create larger districts: the electoral districts of

Northern Savonia North Savo (or Northern Savonia; fi, Pohjois-Savo; sv, Norra Savolax) is a region in eastern Finland. It borders the regions of South Savo, Central Finland, North Ostrobothnia, Kainuu, and North Karelia. Kuopio is the largest city in the r ...

and

North Karelia North Karelia ( fi, Pohjois-Karjala; sv, Norra Karelen) is a region in eastern Finland. It borders the regions of Kainuu, North Savo, South Savo and South Karelia, as well as Russia's Republic of Karelia. It is the easternmost region of Fin ...

were merged into a new district called Savonia-Karelia, while the electoral districts of Kymi and

Southern Savonia South Savo (or Southern Savonia; fi, Etelä-Savo; sv, Södra Savolax) is a region in the south-east of Finland. It borders the regions of North Savo, North Karelia, South Karelia, Kymenlaakso, Päijät-Häme, and Central Finland. The total are ...

were merged into a new district called South-Eastern Finland.

Opinion polls

Results

Government formation

As the leader of the largest party, Juha Sipilä of Centre was tasked with forming the new government coalition. In early May, Sipilä announced that he would seek to form a right-leaning majority coalition consisting of the three largest parties—the Centre Party, the Finns Party and the National Coalition Party.Sipilä opts for right-leaning government
YLE News 7 May 2015, accessed 7 May 2015. The coalition negotiations were successful and led to the formation of the

Sipilä cabinet The cabinet of Juha Sipilä was the 74th government of Finland, from 2015 to 2019. It was formed following the parliamentary election of 2015 and formally appointed by President Sauli Niinistö on 29 May 2015. From June 2017, the cabinet consis ...

on 29 May.

References

External links

{{Finnish elections General elections in Finland

Parliament In modern politics, and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: representing the electorate, making laws, and overseeing the government via hearings and inquiries. Th ...