2011 Zürich cantonal elections

2011 Zürich cantonal elections
All 7 seats in the Executive Council of Zürich; All 180 seats in the Cantonal Council of Zürich (91 seats needed for a majority)
	Executive Council
	Cantonal Council

The 2011 Zürich cantonal elections were held on 3 April 2011, to elect the seven members of the cantonal Executive Council and the 180 members of the Cantonal Council.

The Green Party gained a seat on the Executive Council but the FDP-SVP coalition retained a majority of four seats.^[1] In the Cantonal Council, the SVP retained a plurality but no alliance reached an overall majority.^[2]

Electoral system

Executive Council

The Executive Council contains 7 members elected using a two-round majoritarian system. In the first round, electors have up to seven votes and the 7 most-voted candidates reaching an overall majority (>50%) are elected. If seats remain to be filled, a runoff is held where electors have as many votes as seats remaining, and the candidates with the most votes (simple plurality) are elected.

Cantonal Council

The Cantonal Council is elected using open-list proportional representation, with canton-wide apportionment of seats and allocation into 18 constituencies (biproportional apportionment). In each constituency, voters have as many votes as there are seats to fill (panachage is permitted); these votes each count both for the candidate and for the list they stand in. These votes counts are divided by the seats count to give fictional electors counts which can be summed up fairly throughout the canton.^[2]

Using the fictional electors counts, each party above the threshold (reaching 5% in at least one constituency) is apportioned seats canton-wide, which are then shared among their constituency lists. In each constituency list, the seats are attributed to the candidates reaching the most votes.

Candidates

Executive Council

Six of the seven incumbent councillors Ursula Gut (FDP), Hans Hollenstein (CVP), Thomas Heiniger (FDP), Regine Aeppli (SP), Markus Kägi (SVP), and Ernst Stocker (SVP, elected in a by-election in 2009) ran for re-election.^[1]

Incumbent Social Democratic executive councillor Markus Notter retired, with national councillor Mario Fehr running to hold the open seat.

The Greens fielded again Illnau-Effretikon mayor Martin Graf, who had reached an overall majority four years earlier but had failed to reach the top seven candidates needed to be elected. The EVP ran with national councillor Maja Ingold, while the Green-Liberals did not run any candidate for the executive council.^[1]

Cantonal Council

The table below lists contesting parties represented in the Cantonal Council before the election.

Name			Ideology	2007 result
Name			Ideology	Votes (%)	Seats
	SVP	Swiss People's Party Schweizerische Volkspartei	National conservatism Right-wing populism	30.5%	56 / 180
	SP	Social Democratic Party Sozialdemokratische Partei	Social democracy Democratic socialism	19.5%	36 / 180
	FDP	FDP.The Liberals^[a] FDP.Die Liberalen	Liberalism Conservative liberalism	16.0%	29 / 180
	GPS	Green Party Grüne Partei	Green politics Progressivism	10.5%	19 / 180
	CVP	Christian Democratic People's Party Christlichdemokratische Volkspartei	Christian democracy Social conservatism	7.3%	13 / 180
	GLP	Green Liberal Party Grünliberale Partei	Green liberalism Social liberalism	5.8%	10 / 180
	EVP	Evangelical People's Party Evangelische Volkspartei	Christian democracy Social conservatism	5.2%	10 / 180
	EDU	Federal Democratic Union Eidgenössisch-Demokratische Union	National conservatism	2.8%	5 / 180
	AL	Alternative List Alternative Liste	Socialism	0.9%	2 / 180

^ Formerly the Free Democratic Party

The Swiss Democrats also ran after having lost their seats in 2007. Three new parties contested this election: the Conservative Democratic Party (BDP, who seceded from the SVP in 2008), the European Reform Party (ERP), and the Pirate Party (PP), meaning a total of 13 parties ran in this election.^[2]

Results

Executive Council

Note: percentages here are calculated based on the number of valid votes (excluding blank and invalid votes) so that the absolute majority is at exactly 50%, but may result in candidates reaching over 100% of the valid votes.

Results of the 2011 Zürich Executive Council election
Candidate		Party	Votes	%
	Mario Fehr	SP	137,035	81.54
	Thomas Heiniger	FDP	134,061	79.77
	Ernst Stocker	SVP	129,943	77.32
	Ursula Gut-Winterberger	FDP	129,349	76.96
	Markus Kägi	SVP	123,159	73.28
	Regine Aeppli	SP	121,144	72.08
	Martin Graf	Grüne	120,815	71.88
	Hans Hollenstein	CVP	118,487	70.50
	Maja Ingold	EVP	68,996	41.05
Scattered votes			93,485	55.62
Total			1,176,474	61.51

Blank and invalid votes			736,318	38.49
Total votes			1,912,792	7×
Valid ballots			273,256	96.26
Invalid ballots			10,626	3.74
Total ballots			283,882	–
Registered voters/Turnout			855,243	33.19
Source: statistik.zh.ch^[3]^[4]

The results were a major upset and surprise as CVP candidate Hans Hollenstein fall from second to eighth, losing his seat to Green candidate Martin Graf by only two thousand votes, despite the polls predicting Hollenstein would finish in the top 3 candidates.

New candidate Mario Fehr gained a seat (retaining 2 seats for the SP) and topped the polls with over 81% of the votes by gaining votes from the bourgeois camp voters. FDP candidates saw their scores decrease slightly while the SVP gained slightly in votes.

The elections saw a high amount of consensus, as all elected candidates were voted on at least 44% of the ballots; Hollenstein's defeat was partly attributed to strategical voting based on his second-highest score in the previous election as well as opinion polls, but also to his policies' lack of appeal to leftist voters.

Despite the Green gain from the CVP, the FDP and SVP retained their majority of four seats in the executive council.^[1]

Results by district

Vote share of each candidate by district
District	Aeppli SP	Fehr SP	Graf GPS	Gut FDP	Hein. FDP	Holl. CVP	Ingold EVP	Kägi SVP	Stoc. SVP	Scattered
District										Scattered
Affoltern	72.4	78.0	72.5	75.1	81.9	67.7	40.7	79.6	83.6	48.5
Andelfingen	59.4	64.6	67.2	73.2	73.9	70.8	47.7	97.7	100.5	45.0
Bülach	62.6	71.4	61.9	78.7	81.8	67.2	38.7	86.3	88.5	62.9
Dielsdorf	60.5	67.8	58.1	78.1	80.4	71.2	34.2	94.7	94.7	60.4
Dietikon	64.7	70.9	56.6	81.2	84.9	71.9	31.1	86.1	89.0	63.7
Hinwil	60.5	70.4	60.5	79.8	81.5	69.9	40.0	89.5	94.1	54.0
Horgen	67.0	79.8	63.4	79.6	84.8	70.7	39.8	73.5	85.6	56.0
Meilen	61.3	69.5	59.5	95.9	95.2	69.0	35.5	82.9	87.5	43.7
Pfäffikon	62.5	71.6	74.7	77.5	79.8	74.6	37.1	82.5	86.5	53.2
Uster	68.7	78.4	68.4	77.7	81.0	69.8	35.6	73.3	77.2	69.9
Winterthur	67.5	79.3	71.7	70.2	72.1	81.9	57.2	66.6	70.0	63.5
Zürich	94.9	104.5	92.9	70.8	74.2	65.5	40.9	52.4	55.3	48.6
Total	72.1	81.5	71.9	77.0	79.8	70.5	41.1	73.3	77.3	55.6

Cantonal Council

Results of the 2011 Zürich Cantonal Council election
3 19 35 7 19 23 6 9 54 5
Party		Votes	%	+/–	Seats	+/–
	Swiss People's Party	90,035	29.63	−0.82	54	−2
	Social Democratic Party	58,687	19.32	−0.15	35	−1
	FDP.The Liberals	39,296	12.93	−3.04	23	−6
	Green Party	32,111	10.57	+0.13	19	±0
	Green Liberal Party	31,191	10.27	+4.51	19	+9
	Christian Democratic People's Party	14,774	4.86	−2.38	9	−4
	Evangelical People's Party	11,479	3.78	−1.45	7	−3
	Conservative Democratic Party	10,529	3.47	New	6	New
	Federal Democratic Union	7,815	2.57	−0.24	5	±0
	Alternative List	4,945	1.63	+0.36	3	+1
	Pirate Party	1,708	0.56	New	0	New
	Swiss Democrats	1,231	0.41	−0.92	0	±0
	European Reform Party	15	0.00	New	0	New
Total		303,816	100.00	–	180	–

Source: wahlen.zh.ch,^[5] electoral protocol^[6]

The SVP won a plurality of votes and seats, coming first but losing two seats; no bloc or alliance won an overall majority.^[2]

There were few shifts between the three “blocs”, as the left-wing (SP, GP, and AL), centrist (EVP, GLP, FDP, CVP, and now BDP), and right-wing (SVP and EDU) each won a third of the votes and seats; there were larger swings within the centrist bloc as the FDP, CVP, and EVP lost support while the GLP and BDP made gains.

There was also an increased fragmentation of the council as the three largest parties all lost seats. Older parties tended to see their support dwindle or stagnate, while the largest gains went to the newer parties: the GLP nearly doubled their support while the BDP entered with six seats.^[2]

Results by constituency

Number of seats and share of votes for each party by constituency
Total	54	35	23	19	19	9	7	6	5	3	180	29.6	19.3	12.9	10.6	10.3	4.9	3.8	3.5	2.6	1.6	0.4
Constituency	SVP	SP	FDP	GPS	GLP	CVP	EVP	BDP	EDU	AL	Total seats	SVP	SP	FDP	GPS	GLP	CVP	EVP	BDP	EDU	AL	SD
Constituency											Total seats
I Zürich City 1 & 2	1	1	1	1	1	0	0	–	0	0	5	18.2	28.6	18.2	14.3	10.9	4.6	1.4	–	0.9	2.3	0.5
II Zürich City 3 & 9	3	3	1	2	1	1	0	0	0	1	12	20.6	29.9	7.8	14.3	10.2	5.1	2.6	1.7	0.7	4.8	1.4
III Zürich City 4 & 5	0	2	0	1	1	0	0	–	0	1	5	10.4	34.4	5.5	18.6	11.3	3.4	1.2	–	0.3	11.8	0.7
IV Zürich City 6 & 10	2	3	1	1	1	0	0	0	0	1	9	16.4	30.2	11.9	15.0	12.0	3.9	2.2	1.6	0.7	4.2	0.6
V Zürich City 7 & 8	1	2	1	1	1	0	0	0	0	0	6	16.7	23.7	19.2	16.2	12.3	4.5	2.0	2.0	0.5	2.4	0.4
VI Zürich City 11 & 12	4	3	1	1	1	1	1	0	0	0	12	26.5	27.0	8.2	11.0	9.3	6.1	3.4	2.2	1.6	2.1	1.4
VII Dietikon	4	2	2	1	1	1	0	0	0	0	11	35.9	17.8	16.6	7.6	5.7	7.8	3.8	2.0	1.1	1.2	0.5
XIII Affoltern	2	1	1	1	1	0	0	0	0	0	6	30.8	15.5	13.1	10.5	11.0	3.2	7.6	4.9	2.7	0.4	0.3
IX Horgen	4	3	2	1	2	1	1	1	0	0	15	29.0	17.5	16.9	8.7	9.5	7.6	4.5	3.6	1.6	0.5	–
X Meilen	4	2	3	1	1	1	0	0	1	0	13	31.4	13.3	22.8	8.0	12.2	4.4	2.4	2.6	2.4	0.4	–
XI Hinwil	4	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	0	12	35.8	13.6	9.7	9.0	9.3	5.7	5.5	4.2	6.6	0.6	–
XII Uster	5	2	2	1	2	1	0	2	1	0	16	31.8	17.5	10.8	8.2	13.1	4.3	2.6	6.8	2.5	0.8	1.0
XIII Pfäffikon	2	1	1	1	1	0	1	0	0	0	7	36.0	14.7	10.0	10.8	9.3	3.1	6.3	4.9	4.6	0.4	–
XIV Winterthur City	3	3	1	2	1	1	1	1	0	0	13	21.6	21.7	10.8	14.6	10.2	6.0	5.3	2.6	2.3	2.7	0.7
XV Winterthur Land	2	1	1	1	1	0	1	0	0	0	7	38.8	13.4	10.8	8.1	9.9	3.8	6.4	4.3	3.3	0.3	–
XVI Andelfingen	2	1	1	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	4	40.8	13.8	12.2	10.4	7.2	2.1	2.7	6.9	3.4	0.4	–
XVII Bülach	6	3	2	1	1	1	1	1	1	0	17	36.3	16.7	11.9	7.5	9.2	4.0	4.0	5.0	3.7	0.7	–
XVIII Dielsdorf	5	1	1	1	1	0	0	0	1	0	10	43.4	14.9	9.9	8.0	9.7	4.0	2.2	2.6	4.9	0.4	–

References

^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Bühlmann, Marc (2011-04-03). "Regierungsratswahlen Zürich 2011". Année politique Suisse (in German). Retrieved 2022-10-18.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e Bühlmann, Marc (2011-04-03). "Kantonsratswahlen Zürich 2011". Année politique Suisse. Retrieved 2022-10-19.
^ "Regierungsratswahlen 2011". statistik.zh.ch (in German). 2011-04-03. Archived from the original on 2011-10-12.
^ "Wahlbeteiligung im Kanton". statistik.zh.ch (in German). 2011-04-03. Archived from the original on 2014-12-02.
^ "Kantonsratswahlen 2011". wahlen.zh.ch (in German). 2011-04-04. Retrieved 2022-10-18.
^ "Wahlprotokolle" (PDF). wahlen.zh.ch. 2011-04-05.

[3] Formerly the Free Democratic Party

[:0-1] Bühlmann, Marc (2011-04-03). "Regierungsratswahlen Zürich 2011". Année politique Suisse (in German). Retrieved 2022-10-18.

[:1-2] Bühlmann, Marc (2011-04-03). "Kantonsratswahlen Zürich 2011". Année politique Suisse. Retrieved 2022-10-19.

[4] "Regierungsratswahlen 2011". statistik.zh.ch (in German). 2011-04-03. Archived from the original on 2011-10-12.

[5] "Wahlbeteiligung im Kanton". statistik.zh.ch (in German). 2011-04-03. Archived from the original on 2014-12-02.

[6] "Kantonsratswahlen 2011". wahlen.zh.ch (in German). 2011-04-04. Retrieved 2022-10-18.

[7] "Wahlprotokolle" (PDF). wahlen.zh.ch. 2011-04-05.

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