Three car bombs exploded near offices of the labour, interior and finance ministries. The fourth explosion was a suicide attacker in a car struck a police patrol in Dora, in southern Baghdad, causing 15 deaths, an interior ministry official said. 12 of the deaths were students at a nearby technical college, where the other 3 fatalities are police men.
The fifth car bomb targeted a courthouse in Mansur, western Baghdad.
The Baghdad goverment and the US military have warned of rise in attacks in the run up to a general election expected to take place in February.
Bloody attacks in Baghdad killed more than 250 people in August and October.
Tuesday's bombings came two days after the war-torn country's parliament passed a law governing the election, which will be the second national ballot since the 2003 US-led invasion. The United Nations on Monday urged Iraq to announce "as soon as possible" the date for the vote after more than two months of delays.
US diplomats, most notably Christopher Hill, Washington's ambassador to Baghdad, had pushed MPs to pass the law, seeking to avoid delays to the planned pullout of tens of thousands of American troops in 2010.
The United States has 115,000 soldiers in Iraq, but that figure will drop to 50,000 next year as all of its combat troops are pulled out before a complete withdrawal by the end of 2011.
Britain condemned car bombings, predicting that they would not derail progress towards peaceful government in Iraq.
Prime Minister Gordon Brown's spokesman promised to continue what he described "close work" with the Iraqi government to "continue progress".
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