Turnout: 47.50%
About this election
On 23 January 2022 Finland held its first-ever county elections (aluevaalit), choosing 1,379 councillors for the 21 newly created wellbeing services counties (hyvinvointialueet) that took over responsibility for health, social and rescue services in 2023. The National Coalition Party finished first with 21.60%, narrowly ahead of the Social Democrats (19.30%) and the Centre Party (19.20%); the Centre nonetheless won the most council seats owing to its rural strength. Helsinki, which runs its own services, and the autonomous Åland Islands did not take part. Turnout was 47.5%.
The election created an entirely new, directly elected level of Finnish government. For decades health and social care had been the responsibility of the municipalities, but persistent concerns about cost, equity and the strain of an ageing population drove more than a decade of attempts at reform. The wellbeing services counties were the eventual solution, consolidating these services into 21 regional bodies with their own elected councils.
County councillors are elected by open-list proportional representation (d'Hondt) within each wellbeing services county for a four-year term, on the same candidate-centred model as Finland's other elections. Voters cast a personal vote for an individual candidate. Because Helsinki organises its own health and social services, it does not elect a county council, and Åland's autonomous status places it outside the system.
The national parties contested the new elections, and the result mirrored the familiar pattern of Finnish local politics: the National Coalition strong in the cities and the south, the Centre dominant across the rural counties, and the Social Democrats competitive in industrial regions. As in municipal elections, the Centre's rural reach translated a third-place vote share into the largest bloc of seats.
Because the counties were brand new, the election doubled as a verdict on the health-and-social-care reform itself, the signature domestic achievement of Sanna Marin's government. Debate centred on funding, waiting times and how services would be organised across large, sometimes sparsely populated regions.
Turnout was just 47.5% — low even by the standards of Finnish local elections. The unfamiliarity of the new tier of government, the mid-winter timing and a wave of the COVID-19 pandemic all dampened participation, raising early questions about the democratic legitimacy of the new councils.
The inaugural county elections marked one of the largest administrative reforms in modern Finnish history, redrawing how core public services are governed and funded. The low turnout and the complexity of the new structures meant the counties faced a challenging start, with their finances quickly becoming a contentious national issue.
Statistics Finland (Tilastokeskus) and the Ministry of Justice election results service — stat.fi.
Compiled and reviewed by Bartłomiej Paruzel, Election Data Analyst, from official results. See our data methodology.