The 2018 Lower Austrian state election was held on 28 January 2018 to elect the members of the Landtag of Lower Austria. The ruling

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 curr ...

(ÖVP) fell just short of an absolute majority of votes, but retained its majority in the Landtag. Nonetheless, this was its worst result in the state since 1998. 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) and

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"Au ...

(FPÖ) made gains, with the latter doubling its share of seats. The Greens took minor losses, while NEOS – The New Austria (NEOS) contested its first state election in Lower Austria, debuting at 5.2%.

Team Stronach The Team Stronach for Austria (german: Team Stronach für Österreich) was a Eurosceptic, right-wing populist political party in Austria founded by and named after Austrian-Canadian businessman Frank Stronach. It was dissolved in August 2017. Hi ...

, which had won 9.8% in the previous election, did not compete.

Background

The Lower Austrian constitution mandates 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 o ...

. As such, the government is a perpetual coalition of all parties that qualify for at least one state councillor. After the 2013 election, the ÖVP had six councillors, the SPÖ two, and Team Stronach one.

Electoral system

The 56 seats of the Landtag of Lower Austria are 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, p ...

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. The seats are distributed between twenty 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 4 percent state-wide electoral threshold. Seats are 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 any remaining seats 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 highe ...

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

Contesting parties

The table below lists parties represented in the previous Landtag.

, which contested the previous election and won 9.8% of votes, five seats, and one state councillor, did not contest the 2018 election. In addition to the parties already represented in the Landtag, four parties collected enough signatures to be placed on the ballot. * NEOS – The New Austria (''NEOS'') *

Christian Party of Austria The Christian Party of Austria (german: Christliche Partei Österreichs, CPÖ; formerly the Christians – german: Die Christen) is a minor political party in Austria, founded on 15 October 2005. It changed its name under its new chairman Rudol ...

(''CPÖ'') – on the ballot only in Amstetten, Melk, and Mödling * We for Lower Austria (''WFNOE'') – on the ballot only in Baden

Opinion polling

Results

Results by constituency

Preference votes

Alongside votes for a party, voters were able to cast a preferential votes for a candidate on the party list. The ten candidates with the most preferential votes were as follows:

Aftermath

The ÖVP retained its Landtag majority and six out of nine state councillors; the SPÖ also retained its two councillors. With the disappearance of Team Stronach, the FPÖ moved into third place on a strong swing, and won one state councillor.

Notes

References

2018 elections in Austria State elections in Austria January 2018 events in Austria {{austria-election-stub