Legislative elections in the Swiss Confederation were held on 19 October 2003. Although in Switzerland's peculiar political system, in which all four major parties form a permanent coalition, there can never be a change of government, this election produced an upset in the strong showing of the right-wing, anti-European Union and anti-immigration People's Party, led by Christoph Blocher. The left wing parties, the Socialists and the Greens, also improved their positions. The losers were the parties of the centre-right, the Christian Democrats and the Liberals.

The Legislature

Switzerland has a bicameral legislature, the Federal Assembly (Assemblée Fédérale / Bundesversammlung / Asamblea Federale / Assemblea Federala).

• The National Council (Conseil National / Nationalrat / Consiglio Nazionale / Cussegl Naziunal) has 200 members, elected for four-year terms by proportional representation in multi-member constituencies corresponding to the 26 Swiss cantons and half-cantons.
• The Council of States (Conseil des Etats / Ständerat / Consiglio degli Stati / Cussegl dals Stadis) has 46 members elected for four-year terms from multi-member and single-member constituencies.

These elections were to the National Council and for most of the members of the Council of States.

All parties in Switzerland have different names in French, German and Italian, and conduct separate campaigns in the different language areas.

Parties

Government parties

These four parties have formed a continuous coalition government since 1959 with each party allotted a fixed number of cabinet posts (the "magic formula").

Swiss People's Party (right wing-populist)

• SVP, Schweizerische Volkspartei
• UDC, Union démocratique du centre
• UDC, Unione democratica di centro

Social-Democratic Party or Socialist Party (centre-left)

• SP, Sozialdemokratische Partei
• PSS, Parti socialiste Suisse
• PS, Partito socialista

Christian Democratic Party (centre-right)

• CVP, Christlichdemokratische Volkspartei
• PDC, Parti Démocrate-Chrétien
• PDC, Partito popolare democratico

Radical Democratic Party (centre-right, liberal)

• FDP, Freisinnig-demokratische Volkspartei
• PRD, Parti radical-démocratique
• PLR, Partito liberale radicale

Other parties

Green Lists (under different names in each Canton)

Liberal Party

• LP, Liberale Partei
• Les Libéraux

Evangelical People's Party

• EVP, Evangelische Volkspartei
• PE, Parti évangélique
• PE, Partito evangelico

Federal Democratic Union

• EDU, Eidgenossisch-Demokratische Union
• UDF, Union Démocratique Fédérale

Preliminary Results

Votes and seats for each party are compared with those polled in 1999.

 Party Votes (%) Seats ---------------------------------------------------------- 1999 2003 99-03 1999 2003 99-03 ---------------------------------------------------------- SVP/UDC 22.5 27.7 +5.2 44 55 +11 SPS/PSS/PS 22.5 24.2 +1.7 51 52 +01 FDP/PRD/PLR 19.9 16.0 -3.9 43 36 -07 CVP/PDC 15.9 12.9 -3.0 35 28 -07 Greens 05.0 07.7 +2.7 9 13 +04 LPS/PLS 02.3 02.5 +0.2 6 4 -02 EVP/PE 01.8 02.5 +0.7 3 3 0 EDU/UDF 01.2 01.5 +0.3 1 2 +1 Others 08.9 05.0 8 7 -1 ---------------------------------------------------------- Total 200 200 ---------------------------------------------------------- 

Because voting is conducted on a cantonal basis, detailed national voting statistics cannot yet be displayed here. They can be viewed at the website of Statistics Switzerland (http://www.politik-stat.ch/nrw2003/index_f.shtml)

See also: Politics of Switzerland

External links and references

• NZZ English window (http://www.nzz.ch/english)
• Swiss Radio International newssite (http://www.swissinfo.ch/sen/swissinfo.html?siteSect=100)
• Election results (http://www.ch03.ch) in German, French, Italian, Romansh
• Le Matin, Geneva (http://www.lematin.ch) in French
• Adam Carr's Electoral Archive (http://psephos.adam-carr.net/switzerland/switzerlandindex.html)