Change in electoral support in the parliamentary election in Norway 2017-2021

In the parliamentary election in Norway in 2021, the Centre Party won the highest share of votes compared to the 2017 election. Its share of votes increased by 3.3 percentage points. The Conservative Party, led by the recent prime minister Erna Solberg, suffered the biggest loss, and fell from 25 to 20.5 percent of the votes. The highest share of the votes, 26.3 percent, was received by the Labour Party, even though its share of the votes dropped slightly since the last election. However, there are significant varitions between the 19 electoral districts. Interestingly, the party Patient Focus, a local party from the northernmost district Finnmark, won one direct mandate to the parliament.

A change of government

In Norway, the seats in the parliament (Stortinget) are allocated through a proportional representation system in which the parties that reach the electoral threshold at four percent are given roughly the share of seats in parliament as share of votes they received. Hence, the Labour Party will form the largest fraction in the Norwegian parliament for the next four years. Furthermore, the center-right government, led by Erna Solberg over the last eight years, will be replaced by a center-left government, most likely consisting of the Labour Party, the Centre Party, and the Socialist Left Party. Jonas Gahr Støre of the former will be the next prime minister.

A growing share of women in the parliament

What is more, the share of women in the Norwegian parliament grew since the last election. Whereas 41.1 percent of the 169 representatives were women from 2017 to 2021, it will be 45.6 percent the next four years. The voter turnout was 77.2 percent, dropping by one percentage point since the 2017 election. The next parliamentary election in Norway will be held in 2025.