1976 Swedish general election

1976 Swedish general election

19 September 1976
All 349 seats to the Riksdag 175 seats were needed for a majority
First party Second party Third party   Leader Olof Palme Thorbjörn Fälldin Gösta Bohman Party Social Democrats Centre Moderate Last election 156 90 51 Seats won 152 86 55 Seat change 4 4 4 Popular vote 2,324,603 1,309,669 847,672 Percentage 42.8% 24.1% 15.6% Swing 0.8% 1.0% 1.3%   Fourth party Fifth party   Leader Per Ahlmark Lars Werner Party Liberals Left-Communist Last election 34 19 Seats won 39 17 Seat change 5 2 Popular vote 601,556 258,432 Percentage 11.1% 4.8% Swing 1.6% 0.6%
PM before election Olof Palme Social Democrats Elected PM Thorbjörn Fälldin Centre

General elections were held in Sweden on 19 September 1976. Although the Swedish Social Democratic Party remained the largest party, winning 152 of the 349 seats in the Riksdag, a coalition government was formed with the Centre Party, the People's Party and the conservative Moderate Party (who won a combined 180 seats), which formed Sweden's first non-socialist government since 1936. Centre Party leader Thorbjörn Fälldin, who had widely been expected to take over the government in the previous election of 1973 (which turned out to bring a 175-175 draw between the left and right blocs), was appointed Prime Minister, the first not from the Swedish Social Democratic Party since Axel Pehrsson-Bramstorp's brief interregnum 40 years earlier.

Results

Main article: Results of the 1976 Swedish general election

Party	Votes	%	Seats	+/–
Swedish Social Democratic Party	2,324,603	42.7	152	–4
Centre Party	1,309,669	24.1	86	–4
Moderate Party	847,672	15.6	55	+4
People's Party	601,556	11.1	39	+5
Left Party Communists	258,432	4.8	17	–2
Christian Democratic Unity	73,844	1.4	0	0
Communist Party of Sweden	17,309	0.3	0	0
Other parties	4,663	0.1	0	0
Invalid/blank votes	19,295	–	–	–
Total	5,457,043	100	349	–1
Registered voters/turnout	5,947,077	91.8	–	–
Source: Nohlen & Stöver

Popular vote S   42.75% C   24.08% M   15.59% FP   11.06% VPK   4.75% KD   1.36% Others   0.41%

Parliament seats S   43.55% C   24.64% M   15.76% FP   11.17% VPK   4.87%

By municipality

• 
  Votes by municipality. The municipalities are the color of the party that got the most votes within the coalition that won relative majority.
• 
  Cartogram of the map to the left with each municipality rescaled to the number of valid votes cast.
• 
  Map showing the voting shifts from the 1973 to the 1976 election. Darker blue indicates a municipality voted more towards the parties that formed the centre-right bloc. Darker red indicates a municipality voted more towards the parties that form the left-wing bloc.
• 
  Votes by municipality as a scale from red/Left-wing bloc to blue/Centre-right bloc.
• 
  Cartogram of vote with each municipality rescaled in proportion to number of valid votes cast. Deeper blue represents a relative majority for the centre-right coalition, brighter red represents a relative majority for the left-wing coalition.