1985 Swedish general election

General elections were held in Sweden on 15 September 1985.^[1] The Swedish Social Democratic Party remained the largest party in the Riksdag, winning 159 of the 349 seats.^[2] Its leader, Olof Palme, kept his position as prime minister. He would retain this position successfully until his assassination in 1986.

1985 Swedish general election

← 1982 15 September 1985 1988 →
All 349 seats in the Riksdag 175 seats needed for a majority
First party Second party Third party   Leader Olof Palme Ulf Adelsohn Bengt Westerberg Party Social Democrats Moderate Liberals Last election 166 86 21 Seats won 159 76 51 Seat change 7 10 30 Popular vote 2,487,551 1,187,335 792,268 Percentage 44.68% 21.33% 14.23% Swing 0.93pp 2.31pp 8.33pp   Fourth party Fifth party Sixth party   Leader Thorbjörn Fälldin Lars Werner Alf Svensson Party Centre Left-Communist Christian Democrats Last election 56 20 0 Seats won 43 19 1 Seat change 13 1 1 Popular vote 490,999 298,419 131,548 Percentage 8.82% 5.36% 2.36% Swing 6.46pp 0.20pp 0.49pp
Map of the election, showing the distribution of constituency and levelling seats, as well as the largest political bloc within each constituency.
PM before election Olof Palme Social Democrats Elected PM Olof Palme Social Democrats

Campaign

At a campaign meeting in Sundsvall on 22 August, Minister of Social Welfare Sten Andersson promised to increase the state pensions as a compensation for the price increases following the devaluation of the krona in 1982. The Social Democrat (Socialdemokraterna) government also stressed that it had managed to decrease the budget deficit from 90 billion to 60 billion kronas. The Social Democrats also promised not to increase taxes or lower the quality of the welfare system.

The Centre Party had a technical cooperation with the Christian Democrats. The Christian Democrats always received fewer votes than the 4% threshold for gaining seats to the Riksdag. The cooperation was criticized within the Centre Party. The aim was for both parties to gain votes, but in the end the Centre Party's share of the votes decreased in comparison to the previous election in 1982. The Christian Democrats only gained one seat in parliament for its leader, Alf Svensson.

The political debate was dominated by the Moderate Party and the Social Democrats. In January 1985, the Moderate Party had proposed in parliament a detailed plan with tax cuts and cuts in spending. The Social Democrats' leader Olof Palme managed to turn this against the Moderate Party by repeating the negative effects this would have on junior soccer teams. The Moderate Party was supported by 30 percent in an opinion poll by SIFO in June 1985, but its support decreased during the campaign.

The Liberal People's Party had chosen Bengt Westerberg as its party leader in October 1983; he had had trouble getting his message through, not least because of the party's small size in parliament and its only receiving 5.9 percent support in the 1982 election. However, in August Westerberg became viewed by the public as a calm and honest politician, in comparison to the constantly arguing Adelsohn and Palme. The Liberal People's Party was the big winner of the 1985 election, increasing its support to 14.2 percent.

Debates

1985 Swedish general election debates
Date	Time	Organisers	Moderators	P  Present    I  Invitee  N  Non-invitee
				S	M	C	L	V	Refs
28 August 1985				P Olof Palme	P Ulf Adelsohn	N Thorbjörn Fälldin	N Ola Ullsten	N Lars Werner	[3]
13 September 1985		Sveriges Television	Ingemar Odlander	P Olof Palme Kjell-Olof Feldt	P Ulf Adelsohn	P Thorbjörn Fälldin	P Bengt Westerberg	P Lars Werner	[4]

Results

Main article: Results of the 1985 Swedish general election

The Centre Party and Christian Democratic Unity (CDU) ran a joint list in some constituencies under the name "Centre".^[5] One CDU candidate was elected on the Centre list, the first time the party had had parliamentary representation.^[2]

Party		Votes	%	Seats	+/–
	Swedish Social Democratic Party	2,487,551	44.68	159	–7
	Moderate Party	1,187,335	21.33	76	–10
	People's Party	792,268	14.23	51	+30
	Centre Party	490,999	8.82	43	–13
	Left Party Communists	298,419	5.36	19	–1
	Christian Democratic Unity	131,548	2.36	0	0
	Green Party	83,645	1.50	0	0
	Centre (CDU–C)	73,711	1.32	1	–
	Other parties	21,546	0.39	0	0
Total		5,567,022	100.00	349	0
Valid votes		5,567,022	99.14
Invalid/blank votes		48,220	0.86
Total votes		5,615,242	100.00
Registered voters/turnout		6,249,445	89.85
Source: Nohlen & Stöver

Seat distribution

Constituency	Total seats	Seats won
		By party							By coalition
		S	M	F	C	V	KDS		Left	Right
Älvsborg North	10	4	2	2	2				4	6
Älvsborg South	7	3	2	1	1				3	4
Blekinge	6	3	1	1	1				3	3
Bohus	12	5	3	2	2				5	7
Fyrstadskretsen	20	9	6	3	1	1			10	10
Gävleborg	13	7	2	1	2	1			8	5
Gothenburg	18	7	4	4	1	2			9	9
Gotland	2	1			1				1	1
Halland	10	4	2	2	2				4	6
Jämtland	5	3	1		1				3	2
Jönköping	13	5	3	2	2		1		5	8
Kalmar	10	5	2	1	2				5	5
Kopparberg	12	6	2	1	2	1			7	5
Kristianstad	12	5	3	2	2				5	7
Kronoberg	7	3	2	1	1				3	4
Malmöhus	12	5	3	2	2				5	7
Norrbotten	11	7	1	1	1	1			8	3
Örebro	12	6	2	2	1	1			7	5
Östergötland	16	8	3	2	2	1			9	7
Skaraborg	11	5	2	2	2				5	6
Södermanland	9	5	2	1	1				5	4
Stockholm County	36	14	11	6	2	3			17	19
Stockholm Municipality	29	11	9	5	1	3			14	15
Uppsala	11	5	2	2	1	1			6	5
Värmland	12	6	2	1	2	1			7	5
Västerbotten	11	5	1	2	2	1			6	5
Västernorrland	11	6	1	1	2	1			7	4
Västmanland	11	6	2	1	1	1			7	4
Total	349	159	76	51	43	19	1		178	171
Source: Statistics Sweden

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 1982 to the 1985 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.

References

1. Dieter Nohlen & Philip Stöver (2010) Elections in Europe: A data handbook, p1858 ISBN 978-3-8329-5609-7
2. Nohlen & Stöver, p1873
3. Valet 1985 - Duellen - Olof Palme (S) och Ulf Adelsohn (M), retrieved 1 February 2024
4. "Slutdebatt 1985". SVT Play (in Swedish). 2 April 2017.
5. Nohlen & Stöver, p1869