Elections 2023: Swiss parliament shifts to the right

Politicians from the Swiss People's Party in St Gallen celebrate the results Christian Merz/Keystone

The right-wing Swiss People’s Party is the big winner of Sunday’s Swiss federal elections. The left-wing Green Party is the big loser. 

Voters have elected a new parliament for the 2023-2027 legislative period. Up for grabs were 200 seats in the House of Representatives and 44 of 46 seats in the Senate.

Key points:

• The major winner on Sunday was the right-wing Swiss People’s Party with 27.9%* of the vote (+2.3 percentage points since 2019). The Green Party lost 3.4 percentage points, falling to 9.8%. Overall, parliament has moved to the right.
• Turnout was 46.6%, up from 45.1% four years ago.
• A record 5,909 candidates stood for election to the 200-seat House of Representatives this year; 41% of them were women. In the end, the number of women elected dropped from 84 in 2019 to 77.

Final results for the 200-seat House of Representatives – the composition of which sets the tone for overall gains and losses – show that the People’s Party gained nine seats (for a total of 62), the Social Democrats gained two (41) and the Centre Party gained one (29). The Radical-Liberals lost one (28), the Greens lost five (23), and the Liberal Greens lost six (10).

In the 46-seat Senate, the Centre Party and the Radical-Liberals have so far won the most seats, but because in some cantons none of the candidates won an absolute majority (more than 50% of votes), a second round will be necessary. These will take place in November. In the second round, the candidate(s) with the most votes wins, regardless of the absolute majority rule.

The race for third place, between the Centre Party and the Radical-Liberal Party, was a big talking point of the election. If the former overtook the latter in the House of Representatives for the first time, a seat in Switzerland’s seven-member consensus government could be up for discussion: currently, the “magic formula” of seat allocation gives the Radical-Liberals two ministers and the Centre just one.

According to final results on Sunday, the Centre Party came third with 14.6% of the vote, pipping the Radical-Liberals on 14.4%. However, three days later the government admitted those figures were incorrect (see note below). The Radical-Liberals in fact came third with 14.3%, ahead of the Centre Party on 14.1%.

*The results as a percentage of voter shares for the House of Representatives were corrected by the Federal Statistical Office (FSO) on October 25, 2023. The new figures have no impact on seat distribution in parliament.

Our analysis of the main takeaways from election Sunday in Switzerland:

Did Swiss voters abroad follow national trends?

And what did they make of e-voting?

How the major political parties reacted to the results:

And how the foreign media reacted:

Lukas Golder from the gfs.bern research institute analyses Sunday’s results:

What did the Swiss media make of the 2023 federal elections?

SWI swissinfo.ch journalist Balz Rigendinger explains how the Swiss voters who live abroad vote differently:

The federal elections in pictures:

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People flock to the polling station in the House of Generations in Bern Alessandro Della Valle/Keystone

People cast their ballots shortly before the closing of the polling station in Lausanne Valentin Flauraud/Keystone

Casting one’s vote in Bern Peter Klaunzer/Keystone

An official carries the ballot box through the streets of Appenzell to the counting venue Gaetan Bally/Keystone

Let the counting begin in Bern! Alessandro Della Valle/Keystone

Emptying the ballot boxes in Zurich Ennio Leanza/Keystone

Keeping focused in Bern Alessandro Della Valle/Keystone

A voter casting his vote at the town hall in Bellinzona Pablo Gianinazzi/Ti-press/Keystone

Counting votes in a sports hall in Bern Alessandro Della Valle/Keystone

The 856 valid ballot papers for a candidate in Appenzell are bound and sealed Gaetan Bally/Keystone

A candidate in Bellinzona checks the projections Pablo Gianuzzi/Ti-press/Keystone

Corina Gredig, co-president of the Liberal Greens in Zurich (right) Ennio Leanza/Keystone

Heads of the main political parties discuss the results Anthony Anex/Keystone

A successful candidate and his wife Eveline Beerkircher/Keystone

Two Green candidates in Bern react to the results Alessandro Della Valle/Keystone

Politicians from the Swiss People’s Party crack open some drinks in Aargau Michael Buholzer/Keystone

Marco Chiesa, president of the Swiss People’s Party, checks to see if he’s been re-elected to the Senate Anthony Anex/Keystone

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How the elections work and why they’re important:

• The Swiss parliament for dummies
• How parliamentary elections work (video)
• In a direct democracy, what’s the point of parliament?
• What our journalists reckon is at stake in the 2023 elections
• Swiss election campaigns: not as boring as you might think
• An overview of what Swiss political parties stand for

The breaking of the “Green wave”? The context and stakes of this year’s elections:

Predicting the present? The last big election poll published ten days ago:

On October 25 this article was amended to include correct percentages for party strength. The official figures reported on October 22 were incorrect, the government admitted. The number of seats and elected politicians were unaffected.