The Austrian national council is up for election this Sunday, so we are taking a look at how the Austrian election system works. Here you can learn all about the electoral system of the Austrian national council.
Three-Tiered Seat Distribution
Austria was actually due to go to the polls in 2018. The national council stays session for five years, with the previous election, having taken place in 2013. However, the incumbent coalition of the Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPÖ) and the Austrian People’s Party (ÖVP) have failed to cooperate in the same government since May. A snap election was called to see if a new government could be formed. Ever Austrian citizen who is Sixteen years old or over on the day of the election is eligible to vote.
The Electoral system in Austria is divided up into three tiers. In addition to the national level, there are nine regional, and 43 local voting constituencies. The 183 seats are allocated according to population size using the Hare Neimeyer method. This method is a mathematical procedure to determine vote share under a system of proportional representation.
Learn more about how the Hare-Niemeyer method works
The Austrian Election System
Austrian voters have one vote per list, which they may use to vote for a party slate. In addition, they may cast a preference vote to mark a candidate as their preferred option. This will raise that candidate’s position on the list when the votes are counted. Votes received for a party are awarded via the three lists listed above: national, regional and local. Voters may cast votes for three different parties depending on who they wish to be running the country, their region and their locality.
Votes are first counted on a regional level, with seats being allocated to the 43 districts, the majority of which are allocated multiple seats. Votes that are remaining once the threshold has been reached are passed onto the Regional level, which in turn is transferred to the national level.
In the Austrian electoral system, only parties only progress to the second and third tiers if they have received above four percent of the popular vote, or alternatively a mandate in one of the local election constituencies.
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