2008 Austrian legislative election ballot. National candidate lists had to be submitted by 8 September 2008 and were published on [12 September 2008 in the "Wiener Zeitung"; all lists except STARK and Klement submitted national candidate lists. Voting booths closed at 13:00 in Vorarlberg, at 16:00 in Carinthia, Styria and Upper Austria, at 16:30 in Burgenland and at 17:00 in Lower Austria, Salzburg, Tyrol and Vienna. The election saw a historically low turnout. Both the SPÖ and the ÖVP had the worst result in history, while the combined so-called "third camp" ("drittes Lager", consisting of the FPÖ and the BZÖ) had the best result
Vorarlberg the Swiss French in the 19th century by invitation during the days of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. There has been a sizable minority of Turkish descent since the 1960s. 78% of the population are Roman Catholic, which puts Vorarlberg in line with the national Austrian average of 73.6%. The second-largest denomination, with a share of 8.4%, is Islam, mostly Turks. 7,817 (or 2.2%) of Vorarlberg's inhabitants are Protestants. For several years, the Vorarlberg economy has been performing well above the Austrian average. While the overall Austrian GDP in 2004 rose by 2.0% in real terms, Vorarlberg recorded an increase of 2.9%.