1974 Greek legislative election

1974 Greek legislative election

17 November 1974
All 300 seats in the Hellenic Parliament 151 seats needed for a majority
First party Second party   Leader Konstantinos Karamanlis Georgios Mavros Party ND EK–ND Seats won 220 60 Popular vote 2,669,133 1,002,559 Percentage 54.37% 20.42%   Third party Fourth party   Leader Andreas Papandreou Ilias Iliou Party PASOK EA Seats won 12 8 Popular vote 666,413 464,787 Percentage 13.58% 9.47%
Prime Minister before election Konstantinos Karamanlis ND Prime Minister after election Konstantinos Karamanlis ND

Parliamentary elections were held in Greece on 17 November 1974. They were the first after the end of the military junta of 1967–1974, and took place during the metapolitefsi era. The winner was Konstantinos Karamanlis and his newly formed conservative party, New Democracy. Karamanlis had already formed a government of national unity just after the fall of the dictatorship. The second-largest party was the centrist Center Union – New Forces. The third party in the Parliament became the newly formed PASOK, a radical socialist party led by Andreas Papandreou, son of the former Prime Minister Georgios Papandreou.

Electoral system

The members of the Hellenic Parliament were elected via open list proportional representation in 56 multi-member constituencies using the Hagenbach-Bischoff system.

Additionally, 5% of seats (in this case, 12) were reserved for "state deputies" nominated by the parties, who neither belonged to a particular constituency nor competed for election. These seats were allocated proportionally between the parties.

Results

Party		Votes	%	Seats
	New Democracy	2,669,133	54.37	220
	Centre Union – New Forces	1,002,559	20.42	60
	PASOK	666,413	13.58	12
	United Left	464,787	9.47	8
	National Democratic Union	52,768	1.07	0
	Democratic Centre Union	8,509	0.17	0
	Revolutionary Communist Movement	1,539	0.03	0
	Liberal Democratic Union–Socialist Party	975	0.02	0
	Independents	42,291	0.86	0
Total		4,908,974	100.00	300
Valid votes		4,908,974	98.90
Invalid/blank votes		54,584	1.10
Total votes		4,963,558	100.00
Registered voters/turnout		6,241,066	79.53
Source: Nohlen & Stöver

Aftermath

These were the priorities of the Karamanlis's government:

• The adoption of a new constitution
• The abolition of the monarchy after a free referendum
• The submission of a new application for Greece to join the European Community.

The new government decided on a referendum on retaining the republic, which was held on 8 December 1974.

In 1975 Konstantinos Tsatsos, a close friend of Karamanlis, was elected President of the Republic by parliament.

Further reading

• Tridimas, George (2010). "Referendum and the choice between monarchy and republic in Greece". Constitutional Political Economy. 21 (2): 119–144. doi:10.1007/s10602-009-9078-4. S2CID 154282086.