Norway’s Labour Party has secured another four years in government after a tight election win over the right-wing Progress party, which saw an unprecedented surge in support, official results confirmed around Monday midnight. While Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre emerged as the winner, the outcome underscored deep divisions in the electorate and set the stage for a fragile and complex coalition.
With 99% of ballots counted, Labour and its four smaller left-leaning allies claimed 87 seats in the 169-member Storting, just above the 85 needed for a majority. Early projections had given the center-left 89 seats against 80 for the center-right.
Labour, led by Støre since 2021, remains the largest party, but its reliance on a broad array of smaller partners means governing will require difficult compromises on taxation, oil exploration, and the $2 trillion sovereign wealth fund’s investments in Israeli companies.
“Støre will continue as prime minister, but with a much more difficult parliamentary situation, in which he is dependent on five parties to govern,” Jonas Stein, associate professor in political science at the University of Tromsø, said.
The most interesting development of the night was the performance of the right-wing Progress Party, which doubled its representation to 48 seats, its best-ever result. The party’s leader, Sylvi Listhaug, positioned herself as a champion of tax cuts and opponent of what she called wasteful public spending on international aid and green subsidies. She also won significant support among younger voters, especially young men.
“Young people today are much more right-wing than earlier. I think the Progress Party has won a huge part of the youth vote, especially among young men,” said Eirik Loekke, a fellow at Civitas, an Oslo-based liberal think-tank.
Listhaug celebrated the outcome despite falling short of power. “It’s fantastic. We’re doing better than what the polls showed. So it’s incredibly good,” she said. “We still have reason to feel like winners today.” Her strong showing has even fueled discussion about whether she could one day claim the lead in a right-wing government.
The establishment center-right Conservative Party, by contrast, suffered its worst election in two decades. Leader Erna Solberg, a former Norwegian prime minister, conceded defeat, telling supporters in Oslo: “We can already state that the Conservative Party is embarking on a new term in the Storting as an opposition party.” Facing internal pressure, Solberg, admitted: “It is my responsibility, and I am incredibly sorry for that.”
Foreign policy and security weighed heavily on voters. The wars in Ukraine and Gaza sharpened debate over Norway’s role abroad and its massive oil fund, while the inclusion of former NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg in Støre’s cabinet was seen as a boost to Labour’s credibility. A recent survey by the Peace Research Institute Oslo showed that 59% of Norwegians believe a new war in Europe is likely within the next decade, up from 55% last year.
For Støre, the election was both a relief and a warning. Labour youth leader Gaute Børstad Skjervø hailed the result as “the comeback of the ages in Norwegian politics,” but the surge of the Right has redrawn the political map and signaled a new era of polarisation.
