Executive Council of Basel-Stadt
# Executive Council of Basel-Stadt

The Executive Council (German: Regierungsrat) is the executive body of the Swiss canton of Basel-Stadt. The seven-member collegial body is elected by the people for a period of four years. The last election was held in October/November 2016. The people directly elect the president. The president of the Executive Council also serves as mayor for the city of Basel.

## Current composition

As of 2012, the Executive Council was composed as follows:

| Name | Party | Department |
| - | - | - |
| Guy Morin | GB | Department of Culture and the Presidency, Mayor of Basel |
| Eva Herzog | SP | Department of Finance |
| Christoph Brutschin | SP | Department of Social Services, the Economy and the Environment |
| Hans-Peter Wessels | SP | Department of Construction and Transport |
| Baschi Dürr | FDP | Department of Justice and Security |
| Christoph Eymann | LDP | Department of Education |
| Lukas Engelberger | CVP | Department of Health |

## 2016 Executive Council elections

### Results

In the first round of voting on the 23 October 2016, following candidates were elected:

| Name | Party | Votes | Notes |
| - | - | - | - |
| Eva Herzog | SP | 33576 | Incumbent |
| Christoph Brutschin | SP | 29448 | Incumbent |
| Lukas Engelberger | CVP | 26635 | Incumbent |
| Conradin Cramer | LDP | 24078 | New, successor to Christoph Eymann |
| Elisabeth Ackermann | GB | 23546 | New, successor to Guy Morin |

In the second round of voting on the 27 November 2016, following candidates were elected:

| Name | Party | Votes | Notes |
| - | - | - | - |
| Hans-Peter Wessels | SP | 26155 | Incumbent |
| Baschi Dürr | FDP | 22906 | Incumbent |

As new president of the Executive Council and mayor of the city of Basel was elected:

| Name | Party | Votes | Notes |
| - | - | - | - |
| Elisabeth Ackermann | GB | 31634 | New, successor to Guy Morin |

### Major candidates not elected

From the two main alliances two out of nine candidates failed to get elected:

| Name | Party | Votes (1st round) | Votes (2nd round) |
| - | - | - | - |
| Heidi Mück | BastA! | 18105 | 21072 |
| Lorenz Nägelin | SVP | 17269 | 19084 |

### Campaign

The campaign was a hard fought one, mainly because of the vacancy arising from the decision of Guy Morin not to stand in the 2016 election. This opened the up the opportunity for the centre-right alliance consisting of the Liberal Democratic Party, the Free Democratic Party, the Swiss People's Party and the Christian Democratic People's Party to gain a majority in the Executive for the first time since 2004. They nominated four candidates for a joint ticket. The centre-left also formed an alliance to defend their majority in the Executive Council and nominated a joint ticket consisting of five candidates.

