The 2023 Carinthian state election was held in the Austrian state of Carinthia on 5 March 2023.
In the 2018 state election, the SPÃÂ became the strongest party with 47.9% of the vote. The FPÃÂ obtained 23.0%, the ÃÂVP obtained 15.5%, and the Team Carinthia achieved 5.7% of the vote.
Other parties like the BZÃÂ, ERDE, the Greens, the KPÃÂ and NEOS did not reach the electoral threshold of 5%.
In June 2017, the Proporz-system was abolished in Carinthia. As a result, a coalition between the SPÃÂ and the ÃÂVP was formed after the 2018 election, in which the SPÃÂ fell just one seat short of an absolute majority.
There is a 5% hurdle for entering the Carinthian state parliament, but parties can also win a seat outright in one of the 4 electoral constituencies (Grundmandat). Anyone who has their main residence in Carinthia and Austrian citizenship on the key date of January 3, 2023 and is at least 16 years old on the day of the election is entitled to vote. Parties need 100 declarations of support in each of the four constituencies or declarations of support from three members of the state parliament in order to gain ballot access. The deadline for submitting the declarations of support ended on 27 January 2023.
The table below lists parties represented in the previous Landtag.
The candidacy of the parties represented in the state parliament (SPÃÂ, FPÃÂ, ÃÂVP and Team Carinthia) was secured from the start, with the signatures of at least 3 members of the Landtag.
Additional parties on the ballot
Due to their exit from the state parliament in the 2018 election, the Greens had to collect declarations of support in order to gain ballot access. The same applied to NEOS, which had never been represented in the Carinthian state parliament. The new Vision Austria party also tried to get declarations of support. The party was founded by Alexander Todor-Kostic, former state spokesman and designated top candidate of the MFG. The BZÃÂ tried to run together with other lists as part of the Free Citizens' Party under the name Alliance for Carinthia. The small environmentalist party Responsibility Earth, which achieved respectable success in 2018, will not run in 2023. The KPÃÂ and the Stark list were only able to gather enough signatures in a few constituencies.
The state elections authority thus announced on 27 January 2023 that nominations for the state elections on 5 March 2023 had been submitted by ten campaigning groups within the deadline.
The following 4 parties will also be on the ballot statewide (with their lead candidates):
Only in constituencies 1 and 2 (Klagenfurt, Klagenfurt-Land, St. Veit an der Glan, Wolfsberg, Völkermarkt):
Only in constituency 3 (Villach, Villach-Land):
After reviewing the election proposals, they were finally approved by the state electoral authority on Thursday, February 2, 2023.
The SPÃÂ announced that it would negotiate with all 3 parties who are represented in the new Landtag, first with the FPÃÂ, then with the ÃÂVP and finally with the Team Carinthia. For the new term, experts predicted a continuation of the current SPÃÂ-ÃÂVP government.
On 14 March 2023, the SPÃÂ started official coalition talks with the ÃÂVP.
On 31 March 2023, the SPÃÂ and ÃÂVP announced the official renewal of their coalition for another term of 5 years.