October 1959 Icelandic parliamentary election

October 1959 Icelandic parliamentary election
Iceland
← June 1959 25 and 26 October 1959 1963 →
All 40 seats in the Lower House
and 20 seats in the Upper House of Althing
Turnout90.37%
Party Leader % Seats +/–
Upper House
Independence Ólafur Thors 39.72 8 +1
Progressive Hermann Jónasson 25.71 6 0
People's Alliance Hannibal Valdimarsson 16.01 3 +1
Social Democratic Emil Jónsson 15.17 3 +1
Lower House
Independence Ólafur Thors 39.72 16 +3
Progressive Hermann Jónasson 25.71 11 −2
People's Alliance Hannibal Valdimarsson 16.01 7 +2
Social Democratic Emil Jónsson 15.17 6 +2
This lists parties that won seats. See the complete results below.
Prime Minister before Prime Minister after
Emil Jónsson
Social Democratic		 Ólafur Thors
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Early parliamentary elections were held in Iceland on 25 and 26 October 1959.[1] Following the electoral reforms made after the June elections, the Independence Party won 16 of the 40 seats in the Lower House of the Althing.[2]

Electoral reforms

The June 1959 elections had ended with both the Independence Party and the Progressive Party winning 13 seats, despite the IP receiving 42% of the vote to the PP's 27%.[3] The electoral system at the time was rural–urban proportional representation: a lower tier comprised single member constituencies elected using first-past-the-post voting, two-member constituencies elected using party-list proportional representation (party-list PR) and one large multi-member constituency for Reykjavík that also used party-list PR, topped up by an upper tier of eleven seats chosen from a single national compensatory list.[4][5]

The reforms saw the replacement of this rural-urban proportional system with a two-tier party-list PR system; the lower tier now comprised eight multi-member constituencies, all elected using party-list PR.[5][4] Five constituencies elected five members each, two elected six members each and Reykjavík elected 12. The number of seats for Reykjavík was also increased from the prior elections,[5] increasing the overall total in the Lower House from 35 to 40 and in the Upper House from 17 to 20.[6]

The voters’ capacity to change the order of names on the PR lists was greatly reduced compared to prior elections as well; the existing Borda count-based system was now only being used to calculate one-third of the final number of votes deemed to have been received by each candidate, while the party’s unaltered ordering determined the remaining two-thirds.[4]

Results

PartyVotes%Seats
Lower
House		+/–Upper
House		+/–
Independence Party33,80039.7216+38+1
Progressive Party21,88225.7111–260
People's Alliance13,62116.017+23+1
Social Democratic Party12,90915.176+23+1
National Preservation Party2,8833.390000
Total85,095100.0040+520+3
Valid votes85,09598.46
Invalid/blank votes1,3311.54
Total votes86,426100.00
Registered voters/turnout95,63790.37
Source: Nohlen & Stöver

References

  1. ^ Dieter Nohlen & Philip Stöver (2010) Elections in Europe: A data handbook, p961 ISBN 978-3-8329-5609-7
  2. ^ Nohlen & Stöver, p976
  3. ^ Nohlen & Stöver, pp970-976
  4. ^ a b c Renwick, Alan (2010). Helgason, Þorkell; Hermundardóttir, Friðný Ósk; Simonarson, Baldur (eds.). "Electoral System Change in Europe since 1945: Iceland" (PDF). Electoral system change since 1945. Archived (PDF) from the original on 4 October 2021. Retrieved 4 October 2021.
  5. ^ a b c Nohlen & Stöver, p955
  6. ^ Nohlen & Stöver, pp976-978
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