Social Democratic Alliance Samfylkingin – jafnaðarflokkur Íslands | |
---|---|
Chairperson | Kristrún Frostadóttir |
Vice-chairperson | Guðmundur Árni Stefánsson |
Chairperson of the executive board | Guðmundur Ari Sigurjónsson |
Secretary | Arna Lára Jónsdóttir |
Chairperson of the parliamentary group | Logi Már Einarsson |
Founded | 5 May 2000 |
Merger of | National Awakening People's Alliance Social Democratic Party Women's List |
Headquarters | Sóltún 25 105, Reykjavík |
Youth wing | Social Democratic Youth |
Ideology | |
Political position | Centre-left[3] |
European affiliation | Party of European Socialists (associate) |
Nordic affiliation | SAMAK The Social Democratic Group |
Colours | Red |
Seats in Parliament | 6 / 63 |
Election symbol | |
Website | |
samfylkingin | |
The Social Democratic Alliance (Icelandic: Samfylkingin - jafnaðarflokkur Íslands, lit. 'The Alliance – Iceland's Social Democratic Party') is a social democratic political party in Iceland. The party is positioned on the centre-left of the political spectrum and their leader is Kristrún Frostadóttir.
The Social Democratic Alliance was founded in 2000 after a merger of four centre-left political parties (the National Awakening, the People's Alliance, the Social Democratic Party and the Women's List) following a joint run by all parties in the 1999 Icelandic parliamentary election. The vision of the party was to unite the left-wing of Icelandic politics, which had been fractured since the 1930 split of the Social Democratic Party, and present a united bloc to oppose the ruling Independence Party.
In the snap 2009 Icelandic parliamentary election called in the aftermath of the Icelandic financial crisis, the Social Democratic Alliance under the leadership of Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir emerged as the largest party and formed a coalition government with the Left-Green Movement, which was the country's first majority left-wing government. She was the country’s first female prime minister and the world’s first openly gay head of government.[4]
The party lost substantial support in the 2013 Icelandic parliamentary election, becoming the third largest in Alþingi and nearly losing all its representatives at the 2016 Icelandic parliamentary election, where it polled 5.7%.[5] In the 2017 Icelandic parliamentary election the party won 7 seats with 12.1% of the vote, but lost one of their seats and got 9.9% of the vote in the 2021 Icelandic parliamentary election.
In 2014 it became the largest party in the Reykjavík City Council,[6] and party member Dagur B. Eggertsson became mayor.[7] From 2018 it has been the second largest party in the City Council after the Independence Party[8] but remains in a majority coalition.[9]