Local elections were held in the German state of

Hesse Hesse (, , ) or Hessia (, ; german: Hessen ), officially the State of Hessen (german: links=no, Land Hessen), is a state in Germany. Its capital city is Wiesbaden, and the largest urban area is Frankfurt. Two other major historic cities are Da ...

on 14 March 2021 to elect

district A district is a type of administrative division that, in some countries, is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or county, counties, several municipality, municipa ...

municipal A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the ...

, and

city A city is a human settlement of notable size.Goodall, B. (1987) ''The Penguin Dictionary of Human Geography''. London: Penguin.Kuper, A. and Kuper, J., eds (1996) ''The Social Science Encyclopedia''. 2nd edition. London: Routledge. It can be de ...

councils and local boards, as well as mayors in some cities and district administrators in some districts. Indirect elections also took place for the Planning Board of the

Frankfurt Rhein-Main Regional Authority The Regional Authority of Frankfurt Rhein-Main is the cooperation body of the administratively fragmented Frankfurt am Main urban area and the common authority for Frankfurt am Main and its 75 neighboring communities. It manages and coordinates ...

and the regional councils of Hesse's three governing districts. All

EU citizens European Union citizenship is afforded to all citizens of member states of the European Union (EU). It was formally created with the adoption of the 1992 Maastricht Treaty, at the same time as the creation of the EU. EU citizenship is additio ...

aged 18 or over on election day were eligible to vote if they had lived in a municipality for at least six weeks. Eligible voters who were not EU citizens could vote if they had lived in a municipality for at least three months.

Election date

Local elections take place every five years in Hesse. The election date of 14 March 2021 was set by the state government on 18 May 2020. Direct elections for a number of mayors and district administrators were originally scheduled to take place between April and October 2020. Due to the

COVID-19 pandemic in Germany The COVID-19 pandemic in Germany has resulted in confirmed cases of COVID-19 and deaths. On 27 January 2020, the first case in Germany was confirmed near Munich, Bavaria. By mid February, the arising cluster of cases had been fully containe ...

, these were postponed on 24 March 2020 by the Hessian state parliament, and were scheduled to take place on 1 November 2021 at the earliest. However, city and district councils were permitted to hold alongside the regular local elections if they choose to do so. As a result, the district administrators of Bergstraße,

Odenwaldkreis The Odenwaldkreis is a ''Kreis'' (district) in the south of Hesse, Germany. Neighboring districts are Darmstadt-Dieburg, Miltenberg, Neckar-Odenwald-Kreis, Rhein-Neckar-Kreis and Kreis Bergstraße. ''Odenwaldkreis'' belongs to the Rhine Neckar Are ...

Schwalm-Eder-Kreis Schwalm-Eder-Kreis is a ''Kreis'' (district) in the north of Hesse, Germany. Neighbouring districts are Kassel, Werra-Meißner, Hersfeld-Rotenburg, Vogelsberg, Marburg-Biedenkopf, and Waldeck-Frankenberg. History In 1821 districts were created ...

Kassel Kassel (; in Germany, spelled Cassel until 1926) is a city on the Fulda River in northern Hesse, Germany. It is the administrative seat of the Regierungsbezirk Kassel and the district of the same name and had 201,048 inhabitants in December 2 ...

, and

Hersfeld-Rotenburg Hersfeld-Rotenburg is a ''Kreis'' (district) in the east of Hesse, Germany. Neighboring districts are Werra-Meißner, Wartburgkreis, Fulda, Vogelsbergkreis, Schwalm-Eder. History In 1821, districts were created in Hesse, including the districts ...

and the mayors of

Hanau Hanau () is a town in the Main-Kinzig-Kreis, in Hesse, Germany. It is located 25 km east of Frankfurt am Main and is part of the Frankfurt Rhine-Main Metropolitan Region. Its station is a major railway junction and it has a port on the rive ...

Bad Homburg vor der Höhe Bad Homburg vor der Höhe () is the district town of the Hochtaunuskreis, Hesse, on the southern slope of the Taunus mountains. Bad Homburg is part of the Frankfurt Rhein-Main urban area. The town's official name is ''Bad Homburg v.d.Höhe'' ...

Fulda Fulda () (historically in English called Fuld) is a town in Hesse, Germany; it is located on the river Fulda and is the administrative seat of the Fulda district (''Kreis''). In 1990, the town hosted the 30th Hessentag state festival. Histor ...

Marburg Marburg ( or ) is a university town in the German federal state (''Bundesland'') of Hesse, capital of the Marburg-Biedenkopf district (''Landkreis''). The town area spreads along the valley of the river Lahn and has a population of approx ...

, and

Wetzlar Wetzlar () is a city in the state of Hesse, Germany. It is the twelfth largest city in Hesse with currently 55,371 inhabitants at the beginning of 2019 (including second homes). As an important cultural, industrial and commercial center, the un ...

were elected alongside the local elections on 14 March 2021, with runoffs held as necessary.

Electoral system

Bodies with multiple members, such as councils, are elected via

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 ...

using

panachage Panachage (, from French meaning "blend, mixture") is the name given to a procedure provided for in several open-list variants of the party-list proportional representation system. It gives voters more than one vote in the same ballot and allows ...

. Voters have as many votes as there are seats up for election, which may be cast for candidates in lists. Voters may cast up to three votes for any given candidate, and may cast votes for candidates from multiple lists. Elections to a single position, such as mayors and district administrators, are conducted via the

two-round system The two-round system (TRS), also known as runoff voting, second ballot, or ballotage, is a voting method used to elect a single candidate, where voters cast a single vote for their preferred candidate. It generally ensures a majoritarian res ...

Size of councils

The number of members on each district and city/municipal council is determined by the number of residents it serves. For the 2021 elections, figures released by the Hessian State Statistical Office in September 2015 were used. The number of seats on local boards are determined by the statutes of the respective city or municipality. Local boards must comprise between three and nine members, unless the board serves over 8,000 people, in which case it may have up to nineteen members.

Background and parties

The table below lists the results of the 2016 local elections in the rural districts and the urban districts.

Results

Results in independent cities

References

{{2021 elections in Germany 2021 elections in Germany Elections in Hesse