2010 Swedish general election

2010 Swedish general election

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All 349 seats to the Riksdag 175 seats are needed for a majority
First party Second party Third party   Leader Mona Sahlin Fredrik Reinfeldt Peter Eriksson Maria Wetterstrand Party Social Democrats Moderate Green Alliance Red-Greens The Alliance Red-Greens Leader since 17 March 2007 25 October 2003 12 May 2002 Last election 130 97 19 Seats won 112 107 25 Seat change 18 10 6 Popular vote 1,827,497 1,791,766 437,435 Percentage 30.7% 30.1% 7.3% Swing 4.3% 3.9% 2.1%   Fourth party Fifth party Sixth party   Leader Jan Björklund Maud Olofsson Jimmie Åkesson Party Liberals Centre Sweden Democrats Alliance The Alliance The Alliance Leader since 7 September 2007 19 March 2001 7 May 2005 Last election 28 29 0 Seats won 24 23 20 Seat change 4 6 20 Popular vote 420,524 390,804 339,610 Percentage 7.1% 6.6% 5.7% Swing 0.4% 1.3% 3.7%   Seventh party Eighth party   Leader Lars Ohly Göran Hägglund Party Left Christian Democrats Alliance Red-Greens The Alliance Leader since 20 February 2004 3 April 2004 Last election 22 24 Seats won 19 19 Seat change 3 5 Popular vote 334,053 333,696 Percentage 5.6% 5.6% Swing 0.3% 1.0%
Largest party within each constituency and municipality Distribution of constituency and levelling seats and largest political bloc within each constituency Red-Social Democratic, Blue-Moderate
Prime Minister before election Fredrik Reinfeldt Moderate Elected Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt Moderate

General elections were held in Sweden on 19 September 2010 to elect the 349 members of the Riksdag. The main contenders of the election were the governing centre-right coalition the Alliance, consisting of the Moderate Party, the Centre Party, the Liberal People's Party and the Christian Democrats; and the opposition centre-left coalition the Red-Greens, consisting of the Social Democrats, the Left Party and the Green Party.

The Alliance received 49.27 percent of the votes (an increase by 1.03 pp from the previous election) and 173 seats in the parliament (a decrease by 5 seats and 2 short of an overall majority), while the Red-Greens received 43.60 percent of the vote (a decrease by 2.48 pp) and 156 seats (a decrease by 15 seats).^[1] The election also saw the nationalist Sweden Democrats entering parliament for the first time, as the sixth largest and only non-aligned of the eight parties elected to the parliament, by receiving 5.70 percent of the votes (an increase by 2.77 pp) and 20 seats.^[1] Both in terms of percentage share; 30.06%, and the actual vote; 1,791,766, the Moderate Party had its strongest election of the unicameral parliamentary era, narrowly missing out on beating the Social Democrats to become the largest party.^[2] The Alliance dominated the Stockholm capital region of the municipality and county and made further gains in South Sweden including narrowly flipping Malmö blue as well as winning pluralities in traditionally red towns such as Kalmar, Landskrona and Trelleborg.^[1]

The Alliance lost its absolute majority in the parliament but continued to govern as a minority government. The new parliament held its opening session on 5 October, with Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt presenting the annual government policy statement, along with changes to his cabinet.^[3]

This was the first time in almost a century that a Swedish centre-right government that had served a full term was reelected.^[4]