Proportional representation (PR) is not a voting system in itself. Instead, it’s the idea that seats in parliament should reflect the proportion of votes cast; something which can be achieved through a variety of electoral systems.

As such, there’s not just one way that PR works. But it’s possible to understand what it might look like if it were implemented across Britain by getting to grips with the nuts and bolts of the different types of voting systems which do establish proportional representation.

It’s also worth considering examples of countries which use PR for their elections.

The Single Transferable Vote (STV)

The ERS’ preferred proportional voting system is the Single Transferable Vote (STV). For an example of STV in action, we can look no further than Scotland, where it’s used for local elections, as well as Northern Ireland, which uses STV for local elections and Northen Ireland Assembly elections.

Under STV, larger areas elect a small group of representatives, as opposed to one person being elected for a smaller area.

Ballot papers also differ: STV gives voters papers with a list of candidates which voters number in order of preference.

Then there’s the vote count. To get elected, a candidate needs to hit a vote quota. But it doesn’t end there: across several rounds of counts, surplus votes are re-allocated from both successful candidates and candidates who’ve missed the quota, using voters’ numbered preferences as a guide. Under this system, votes don’t go to waste if your favourite candidate doesn’t win, making it a far more proportional system.

By contrast, under the current system we use to elect our Westminster representatives, First Past the Post (FPTP), even if a large proportion of voters voted for a candidate, those votes will be wasted if a different candidate receives just a few more votes. There can only be one winner under FPTP.

Find out more about STV

The Additional Members System (AMS)

Another proportional system is the Additional Member System (AMS). In the UK, it’s used in Welsh Parliament, the London Assembly, and Scottish Parliament. AMS uses two ballot papers. One lists candidates standing to be your local MP; the other is a list of parties. A vote for a party translates to a vote to make more of a party’s pre-published list of candidates into MPs.

The first ballot paper is counted first, with the winner elected via FPTP.  The second ballot paper count elects ‘additional members’ based on the percentage of votes as well as the number of constituency members already elected. The result is that there’ll only be a single MP for a constituency, but parliament itself will be proportional.

Find out more about AMS

Party List Proportional Representation

Party list PR is used around the world. In fact, it’s the most popular voting system globally.

Under the party lists system, constituencies are larger, with a group of MPs are elected. Parties will publish a list of candidates, and voters will be able to select from a list of either parties or candidates themselves.

There are three main forms of party list election: closed list, open list, and semi-open list. Regardless of the method chosen, the result will be highly proportionate, with seats largely proportionate to votes cast.

Find out more about Party List PR

If we want fairer elections where votes truly matter, we need PR. Though not an exhaustive list, the mechanics of the three voting systems described above all enshrine proportionality – and therefore do a far better job than FPTP in making sure voters’ voices are heard.

Proportional Representation Around the World

Around the world, fair votes under proportional systems to elect representatives is commonplace. Taking note of how these elections play out is helpful in illustrating the workings of PR.

For example, the ERS’ favoured form of PR, STV, is used in Ireland and Malta. And party list PR is the world’s most popular system: it’s used in 74 countries across the world.

What’s striking is that Britain is in the minority, globally, in its use of First Past the Post. That means we are lagging behind when it comes to making sure every vote matters.

Learn more about the use of PR globally

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The Dutch prioritised proportionality above all else when creating their system of proportional representation; choosing a single nationwide constituency and a very low threshold. This is different to most countries which try to balance local representation, proportionality and enabling a pluralistic yet stable party system. So, why did they make the decision to go for such a radical and unusual voting system?

Early Dutch experiments with democracy

The wave of revolutions that spread across Europe in 1848 pushed King William II to move towards a constitutional monarchy with a directly elected parliament. These elections took place using the majority-based Two-Round Vote in mainly two-member constituencies, with half of MPs elected at every other election.   The franchise was initially restricted based on how much tax somebody paid, these restrictions were gradually eased in 1887 and again in 1896, with elections also becoming whole house elections in exclusively single-member constituencies by the end of the century.

Pillarisation in the Netherlands

The expansion of the franchise coincided with a wider trend in Dutch society – ‘pillarisation’. At this time, the Netherlands was heavily split along religious, class and ideological grounds. Beginning with the Protestants, each group began to create its own set of institutions for themselves – including schools, universities, trade unions, shops, newspapers and even hospitals.    By the early 20th century, there were four major pillars – Protestant, Catholic, secular working class (Socialist) and secular middle class (Liberal), though members of the latter tended to oppose pillarisation and the Protestant pillar was arguably split into sub-pillars. Although divides were not absolute, this did in effect amount to a self-imposed segregation of Dutch society.  Naturally, the process of pillarisation also extended to the political sphere, with each pillar having at least one party to represent itself and protect its institutions.

The 1913 Dutch general election

The pillarised party system didn’t mix well with the majoritarian voting system. This was perhaps most clear with the 1913 general election, where the Protestant Anti-Revolutionary Party won the most votes (21.5%) but had the 4th largest seat share (11%).  Meanwhile, the Catholic General League took a quarter of seats (25) on under 14.5% of the vote and had the largest seat share.

Results of the 1913 Dutch election

A major reason for these skewed results was that the system of constituencies was beneficial to the pillars whose support was most geographically concentrated – particularly the Catholics, who were dominant in the southern provinces of North Brabant and Limburg.

The Great Pacification of 1917

The 1913 election represented a breaking point. The new Liberal government formed special committees to deal with the major religious and democratic questions in Dutch politics and by 1917 compromises had been reached. Catholics and Protestants were allocated state funding for their schools and the Socialists gained support for universal male suffrage.   Alongside these compromises, there was agreement to change the voting system to a proportional system. PR faced opposition from the Liberals, as they knew that universal suffrage and a majority system would likely lead to them being wiped out, but faced little opposition from other pillars.   Although women were unable to vote at this time (the franchise was extended in 1919), they were able to be elected, leading to the peculiar circumstance of Social Democrat Suze Groeneweg elected as an MP whilst not being allowed to vote in elections.

Why did the Netherlands adopt National List PR?

Of the countries that had adopted PR at that time, most had opted for small constituencies electing a small number of MPs, these countries had shown that small constituencies were able provide a reasonable degree of proportionality. However, the Dutch had a negative experience of such constituencies due to pillarisation and concentrated support favouring certain parties. Each pillar didn’t want to see any other pillar gain an unfair advantage; therefore the only solution was a system that was as proportional as possible, ensuring each pillar was accurately represented. To achieve this, the Dutch chose a version of PR with a single 100-member nationwide constituency.   There have been periodic calls to reform the system and introduce some form of constituency representation – either through a constituency List PR or mixed-member system, since the collapse of the pillars in the 1960s and 70s. However, the fundamentals of the national List PR system have remained in place to this day.

This article was updated in November 2025.

Proportional representation is the most popular form of democracy for countries in the world today. Proportional Representation isn’t one electoral system though, it’s the simple idea that the strength of each faction in parliament should closely match their popularity in the country. For many people, that is what living in a democracy means.

Each country will have a slightly different way to reach this goal, but there are a few broad families of electoral systems.

There are over 130 countries which use either a Proportional Representation or a mixed system to elect their lower chamber across the world. Less than 55 use the First Past The Post system, a minority of countries globally, one of which is the United Kingdom.

Those who still use First Past the Post tend to have it as a result of being former British colonies.

This table is based on the Parline Database, and original research. We removed countries classified as ‘authoritarian’ by the Economist Intelligence Unit Democracy Index 2024. Please note that every country uses a slightly different implementation of their electoral system. Some countries could be argued to fit into multiple categories. With that in mind, the exact number for each system is contested.

Of the top 10 ranked countries on the Human Freedom Index 2024, an index which measures 86 indicators of personal and economic freedom, 9 are countries which use a form of PR for their elections (Switzerland, New Zealand, Denmark, Luxembourg, Ireland, Finland, Iceland, Sweden and Estonia).

Similarly, 9 of the top 10 ranked countries classed as ‘full democracies’ on the Democracy Index 2023, which is based on five categories “electoral process and pluralism, the functioning of government, political participation, political culture, and civil liberties”, use PR (Norway, New Zealand, Iceland, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Ireland, Switzerland and the Netherlands). The United Kingdom sits halfway down the rankings of full democracies, coming 18th out of 23 countries classed as full democracies.

What are the main proportional representation systems?

Party List Proportional Representation is the most popular

Party List proportional representation is the most widely used form of PR globally.

In Party List systems, constituencies are bigger than under First Past the Post and voters elect a group of MPs. These constituencies could be a town, county, or whole country.

Open and closed list systems

Party List systems differ in the extent to which citizens can choose which individuals get elected.

In a ‘closed’ list system, an ordered list of candidates is published by each party. Voters mark their support for the party on the ballot, rather than an individual candidate. Once the election results have been announced, the party fills the seats they have won from their list of candidates in that constituency.

Alternatively, in ‘open’ list systems, each party draws up a list of candidates and voters can vote for an individual candidate from this list (in some countries – voters can choose to simply vote for a party rather than choosing a specific candidate).

Single Transferable Vote gives power to voters

Ireland and Malta use the Single Transferable Vote (STV), a form of proportional representation invented in Britain and the preferred system of the Electoral Reform Society.

STV gives voters maximum choice on who to vote for. Voters put numbers by the candidates on their ballot paper with the number 1 as their favourite, they can rank all candidates or just vote for their favourite candidate.

To get elected, a candidate needs to reach a set number of votes based on the number of seats available in the constituency and the number of votes cast.

If your favourite candidate has more votes than they need to gain a seat or has no chance of winning then your vote is transferred to your next choice, rather than making no difference on the outcome as it would with First Past the Post.

Under STV, voters can choose between candidates from the same or different parties, which incentivises parties to stand candidates who reflect the diversity of the party and the constituency. Independent candidates are no longer seen as a ‘wasted’ vote, ensuring every voter can have their vote heard and counted.

Mixed Member Proportional Representation keeps a single local MP

Mixed Member Proportional Representation (MMP) is also known as the Additional Member System (AMS) in the UK. MMP is a mix of Westminster’s First Past the Post system and Party List PR – the goal is to provide a proportional parliament but also keep a single local MP. Both the Scottish Parliament and the Senedd use this system.

Voters have two ballot papers. On the first is a list of candidates who want to be the local MP. Voters choose one candidate from this list. The candidate with the most votes wins and gets a seat, even if most people didn’t vote for them.

On the second ballot paper is a list of parties, each party will have published a list of candidates prior to the election. Each voter can choose one party on the ballot paper, a vote for a party is a vote to support any candidate they have selected to be on their list.

From this second ballot paper, seats are allocated in proportion to the votes a party received, taking into account how many ‘first vote’ seats they obtained, then ‘topping-up’ the seats in the legislature to make the legislature closely match the votes cast on the second ballot.

Parallel Voting is only semi-proportional

Parallel Voting is often conflated with AMS/MMP as it is (most commonly) a mix of FPTP and PR. However, while in AMS/MMP the Party List element acts as a ‘top-up’ to cancel out the disproportionate results of the First Past the Post seats, in Parallel Voting the two ballot papers (FPTP and PR) are separate. The PR seats are simply added to the First Past the Post seats.

Conclusion

Each electoral system balances the competing requirements of how proportional they are (whether seats in parliament reflect votes cast), the connection between MPs and their communities and the extent to which voters can choose between different candidates.

While no system is perfect, the Electoral Reform Society has long championed the Single Transferable Vote as the best balance of these requirements for the UK.

Add your name to our call for a proportional parliament

Estonia is undoubtedly one of eastern Europe’s biggest success stories since the collapse of communism – its economy has developed quickly (with a GDP (PPP) per capita now on a par with Japan) and it scores highly on all democracy indices (including sixth in the world on V-Dem’s Liberal Democracy index). On Sunday 5^th March, Estonia will elect a new parliament for a four-year term. But how will the election take place and who will they be voting for?

The Estonian Voting System

Estonia’s parliament, the Riigikogu, is made up of 101 MPs elected using a Party List PR system. Voting is based on candidates though – voters see a list of all the candidates (with multiple from each party) standing in their constituency and vote by writing the allocated number of their favourite candidate in a box on the ballot paper, this vote also counts towards that candidate’s party.

Westminster’s First Past the Post system means we don’t get a parliament that fully represents the voting public.

Millions of people can support one party and get a single MP, while a few hundred thousand people who support a different party can get ten times as many. This means that the issues that are important in Westminster aren’t always the same as the issues the public feel most strongly about.

Parties can win the argument and increase the number of people who vote for them, but lose seats, and vice versa – actually winning more seats when they lose voters.

All this makes it hard for voters to tell politicians what they think – what matters is the seats in the House of Commons, not the voters in the country. Thankfully there are lots of options for upgrading the system to make Westminster more responsive to voters.

What does proportional representation mean?

Proportional representation is not an alternative system to First Past the Post in itself, but the idea that parliament should match the political make-up of the country. If half of the voters are left-wing, half of the MPs will be left-wing. It’s a basic idea, but one that First Past the Post has failed to provide. Around the UK though, we have been using alternative electoral systems for decades that do provide proportional representation.

Latvia’s election this Saturday (1^st October) has been in the calendar for a while – a referendum is required to dissolve the Latvian parliament early. Such a vote can be called either by the president, at the risk of their own job if it fails, or if 10% of the electorate demands a recall of parliament by petition. The power has been used once, in 2011.

The Latvian voting system

Latvia’s parliament – the Saeima – is comprised of 100 members and is elected using open list proportional representation in five constituencies based on the historic cultural regions of Latvia, plus the capital Riga. Each constituency elects a group of MPs to represent the constituency. To be able to win seats, a party must win 5% of the vote nationally.

As well as casting a vote for a party list, voters are able to cast positive votes (via a + next to their name) or negative votes (crossing their name out) for individual candidates on that list. Which members are elected is determined fully by these preference votes – with candidates elected in the order of positive votes, less negative votes.

The Latvian party system

The Latvian party system is notable for the fact that general ideological divisions (left/right, liberal/conservative) aren’t a big factor in its shape – most parties are broadly right-of-centre. Instead, key divisions are built around attitudes to Russia and the significant Russian minority in Latvia (25% of the population), as well as opposition to perceived corruption.

More broadly the Latvian party system is, like many in eastern Europe, fairly multi-party and not particularly settled. No party is currently polling higher than 20%. One of the more stable parties has been Harmony, who have won around a quarter of the vote at most recent elections. They were the only left-of-centre party to win seats in 2018 and are the main voice of the Russian minority. Polls suggest, however, that they will see significant losses this time in response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The government since the last election has been led by MEP Krišjānis Kariņš of the centre-right New Unity (JV), the prime minister doesn’t have to be an MP themselves. New Unity have been leading the polls going into this election but were the smallest party in the last parliament. He gained the position as a compromise candidate when the larger parties refused to back each other’s leaders as prime minister. Rather than setting the agenda, his role was that of an “honest broker between the competing interests”.

The prime minister chairs the meetings, but it is voters who decide the power of each party, and thus the number of cabinet positions they have if they decide to enter the government.

Parties hoping to cross the 5% threshold this time include the centrist Latvian Association of Regions (LRA), the extremely pro-Russia Latvian Russian Union (LKS) and the right-wing populist Latvia First. The most interesting challenger party is the Riga-based Progressives, who hope to become the first left-of-centre, progressive party in the Saeima in 20 years.

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Sunday 11^th September is election day in Sweden – where voters can elect a new parliament and decide the make-up of the country’s regional and municipal councils – all Swedish political bodies are elected to the same four-year term. Snap parliamentary elections are possible, but the new parliament would only get to serve what was left of the original parliament’s term – even if that was only a matter of months!

Sweden’s Parliamentary Voting System

Sweden’s parliament, the Riksdag, has 349 members. It’s had this many members since the 1973 election ended in an exact draw between parties of the left and right – to stop it from happening again they changed to an odd number of seats.

The Riksdag is elected using a two-tier List PR system. 310 seats are elected directly in Sweden’s 29 constituencies, which are based around Sweden’s counties (with the largest divided). Each constituency elects a small team of MPs that reflect the spread of political opinions in the seat. The remaining 39 seats are decided by national vote totals, designed to correct any disproportionality that arises in the constituencies.

To be able to win seats, a party must either win 4% of the vote across the country, or they can win seats in a particular constituency if they win more than 12% of the vote there.

Swedish ballot papers

When going to vote, voters pick from three types of ballot papers – ‘party’, which contain the name of just one party; ‘name’, which contain a list of candidates from one party; and ‘blank’, on which voters can write the name of their preferred party and/or candidate. On ‘name’ or ‘blank’ ballots, voters can indicate a single preference vote for one candidate on a party list. If a candidate wins more than 5% of the votes for their party in that constituency, they jump to the top of their list. But, as only around a quarter of voters cast a candidate vote, this can be tricky.

As each party has their own ballot papers, secrecy is provided by putting the ballot in an envelope before submitting it. While voters can select multiple parties’ ballots, and then only submit their chosen one, questions have been raised about the level of secrecy this provides.

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This Thursday (23^rd June), voters in the constituencies of Tiverton and Honiton, and Wakefield go to the polls in by-elections caused by the scandal-related resignations of their previous MPs. By-elections allow voters to pick a new MP and puts a small group of voters in the political limelight. But how are vacancies filled when they arise in the parliaments of other countries and is it possible to mix by-elections and proportional representation?

Next in line – By-elections with Party Lists

31 out of the 43 countries most often considered to be within Europe elect their parliament using some form of Party List PR, and the lists providing a handy way to fill vacancies. If an MP resigns or dies, the highest candidate on the list who isn’t currently in parliament automatically takes the seat. As being a government minister is a full time job, in some countries, such as the Netherlands or Sweden, if an MP is appointed as a minister, their seat is filled by a substitute from the list for the duration of their time in government.

In Germany, which uses a mix of first past the post and party lists, all vacancies are now filled by the next available candidate on the party’s state list. A by-election would only be held in the case that a vacancy was caused by a constituency member elected as an independent, though Germany has not elected any independent MPs since 1949.

Send in a sub – By-elections in France

France, with their Two-Round system, uses a mix of substitutes and by-elections. Substitutes are elected alongside Deputies to take their place if they die, become government ministers or are appointed to a position that is otherwise incompatible with sitting in the National Assembly. But, if a Deputy resigns, a by-election is held instead.

I demand a countback – By-Elections with STV

The one proportional voting system where by-elections are commonly used to fill all vacancies is the Single Transferable Vote (STV) – by-elections are used to fill vacancies in the Irish parliament and on Scottish councils. Unless multiple vacancies arise in the same constituency at the same time, an STV by-election effectively takes place using the Alternative Vote.

The Alternative Vote isn’t a proportional system though. A better method is ‘countback’, also called ‘count again’, – used in Malta and some Australian states. This involves returning to the original ballot papers from the general election and recounting them without the now retired candidate – effectively continuing the count of the original STV election. This method enables the representation of that constituency as a whole to remain somewhat proportional to its political opinion, and prevents the costly need for new elections.

Other methods of filling vacancies include co-option – whereby either parties or the legislative body itself chooses the new representative (Northern Ireland Assembly and parish councils in the UK) – and substitute lists (Irish seats to the European Parliament).

It seems that having an easy way to replace an MP when they resign, also makes it easy to temporarily replace them when they becoming the Speaker, a minister, or go on maternity leave.

Reform of the Senedd has been discussed since its inception. When it opened in 1999  it had just 60 members, no government function and limited powers. While the powers of the Senedd and the function of the executive have changed beyond recognition since then, the number of Members of the Senedd (MSs) has remained the same.

But that could all be about to change. Last Tuesday First Minister, Mark Drakeford and leader of Plaid Cymru, Adam Price released a joint letter to the Chair of a cross-party committee currently looking at reform, which set out their agreed position on how the Senedd should be reformed.

The letter gives us our first glimpse at how the Senedd could look  in 2026, setting out a Labour/Plaid agreed position of:

• An increase in the Senedd’s size to 96 members
• A change to the electoral system, consisting of closed proportional lists allocated via the D’hondt method. 
• Integrated statutory gender quotas and mandatory zipping (alternating male / female order) of party lists
• Sixteen new Senedd constituencies for 2026 each electing 6 members with boundaries pairing the 32 proposed Westminster constituencies
• And a boundary review taking place for the subsequent election.

An expanded chamber of 96 members is a huge step forward and something ERS Cymru has been campaigning on for nearly a decade. We’ve talked regularly about the need for more members, with the reality being at present that our parliament can’t properly function. 

A stronger Senedd

The current chamber of 60 members leaves just over 40 (those who are not part of the government or party leaders) to deliver the vital role of scrutiny. This has effectively led to a ‘part-time parliament’ in Wales with Senedd committees only being held every other week this term. Wales is the only one of the four nations of the UK without enough members to function full time – the lack of MSs is leaving its overstretched scrutiny committees unable to work effectively. The result of this is that the big decisions minisisters take over how our public services work or how billions of pounds of taxpayer money is spent risk being taken without the proper scrutiny and analysis the Senedd was set up to do. 

Increasing the size of the Senedd, in line with the Expert Panel recommendations and our own Size Matters report back in 2013, will deliver a more effective parliament that can properly scrutinise key legislation and a £17 billion budget. 

A more diverse Senedd

Another positive part of this deal is the commitment to increasing the Senedd’s diversity through statutory gender quotas and zipping. We have seen the effectiveness of quotas coupled with mandatory placement in countries like Costa Rica. With the Senedd the first parliament to reach 50:50 gender balance back in 2003 it is right we are building in measures to ensure women are represented properly in our national parliament in years to come. It shouldn’t rely on the effectiveness of parties selecting a diverse range of candidates to ensure that our parliament reflects the gender diversity of Wales as a whole. What is less clear at present are the measures that might be used to increase representation of other protected characteristics such as race, ethnicity, age, disability and those from the LGBTQ+ community. 

Next steps

While there are positive elements of this deal, there are also those that require further thought, which we hope the Special Purpose Committee will consider when they report at the end of this month. While the proposals are a clear rejection of First Past the Post and the move away from the Additional Member System is welcome, concerns remain about the use of closed lists due to the lack of choice voters will have. This system was rejected by the Expert Panel on Assembly Electoral Reform who said it left “No choice for voters between individual candidates” and “No accountability for individual Members directly to voters”. In our Reshaping the Senedd report in 2016 we recommended the Senedd move to the Single Transferable Vote (STV), something the Expert Panel on Assembly Electoral Reform and a subsequent Senedd committee also endorsed. 

The decision to use the D’Hondt method of allocating votes also threatens the proportionality of this new system, by creating a high bar for smaller parties to reach to ensure representation and see members elected. The use of D’Hondt is likely to make the end result only as proportional or even slightly less than the current system.

This package is a step forward for the Senedd in so many ways, but we must be careful it’s not also a step backwards in others. We await the Special Purpose Committee’s report in a few week’s time, then a debate in the Senedd on that report is scheduled for 8th June. Senedd members from across the Siambr (the Senedd’s debating chamber) should consider how to ensure this package delivers proper reform for the Senedd – not just on size and diversity but delivering a fairer deal for voters too. We have one chance to create a new Welsh democracy. Let’s do it properly.

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The process of democratisation since the collapse of communism has not been uniform across eastern Europe, but some countries, such as the Baltic states, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, are now drawing level with established democracies in western Europe in democratic league tables. Slovenia is another strong performer who happens to be going to the polls this Sunday 24th April, so here’s a guide to their voting system and parties.

The Voting System

There are 90 members of the Slovenian National Assembly in total, with 88 of them elected by List PR in eight constituencies that elect 11 MPs each. Unusually for a list system, voters don’t vote directly for a party list or for candidates on a list. Each constituency is subdivided into eleven electoral districts within which each party stands a single candidate.

While this might seem a bit like First Past the Post, voters are actually determining the order of the party list – with each candidate’s position depending on their vote in their electoral district. While this does give voters greater control over who is elected than a closed list system, voters are ultimately left with a take-it-or-leave-it situation for the candidate their preferred party nominates in their district. This is unlike an election under STV or other open list systems where voters can choose between candidates from the same party. It is also not uncommon for multiple candidates to be elected from one district, but none from others.

Seats are distributed to the parties across each constituency by adding up all the votes for each party’s candidates. Parties win a seat for each time they exceed a set quota of votes (roughly equivalent to 8.33%). As it is very unlikely for all eleven seats to be filled this way, remaining seats are allocated at the national level using the D’Hondt method with a 4% threshold. Ultimately the result in terms of parties is practically the same as a straight national List PR election with a 4% threshold.

The remaining two members are representatives of the Italian and Hungarian national minorities and are elected using a rarely used single-member voting system called the Borda Count. Voters rank candidates (1, 2, 3, etc.) with those rankings then being converted to points. If there are six candidates, a ranking of 1 gets 6 points, 2 gets 5 points, and so on. The candidate with the most points wins.

Parties and Government

Like in many relatively new democracies, the party system in Slovenia isn’t particularly stable and few parties have been able to sustain a significant level of support over multiple elections. The party system is also quite fragmented – nine parties crossed the 4% threshold in 2018, with the largest two parties only winning 38% of the vote between them.

The largest and probably most stable party is the right-wing Slovenian Democratic Party (SDS). It has won between 20 and 30% of the vote at each of the last five elections and has consistently been one of the two largest parties during that period. Though founded as a social democratic party during the dying days of communism, the party has moved towards conservatism and, more recently, right-wing populism under the leadership of Janez Janša, who has led the party for nearly 30 years.

Of the other ‘older’ parties, the Social Democrats are probably the next most stable – hovering around 10% since the mid-90s. Unlike some other reformed communist ‘social democratic’ parties, the Social Democrats are socially liberal and would fit in with many western European counterparts. The Christian democratic New Slovenia (NSI), ‘grey’ Democratic Party of Pensioners (DeSUS) and far-right Slovenian National Party (SNS) have also won steady and small numbers of seats at most recent elections.

Where the churn has really been is with liberal parties. Liberal Democracy (LDS) were the dominant political force in the early years of post-independence Slovenia, but the party disintegrated in the mid-2000s due to infighting. Since then, a number of start-up, often personality-led parties have attempted to fill this gap.

Zoran Janković’s Positive Slovenia (PS) was formed just weeks before the 2011 election that it won with 29% of the vote, it fell below the threshold in 2014. The Party of Miro Cerar (SMC) did almost exactly the same in that election, winning more seats than any party in any previous election. Unlike PS, they did enter government with Cerar as Prime Minister, but then fell to just 10% last time. Though not as dramatic or as sudden, the List of Marjan Šarec (LMŠ) entered parliament in second place in 2018.

Janša is currently on his third stint as Prime Minister, with the SDS leading the government since early 2020. They are in government with ‘Concretely’ (a rebranded SMC) and the NSI. This followed a Šarec-led five-party minority coalition that had been formed after the last election but resigned over disagreements in healthcare policy.

This election is shaping up to be a battle between the SDS and the newly formed green-liberal Freedom Movement (GS), with alternative governments likely being a continuation of the incumbent coalition or a new centre-left GS-led government. There is also a possibility that this vote might lead to a reduction of the number of parties in parliament, with polls projecting as few as six could reach the 4% threshold.