German federal election (September 18, 2005)

[Middle-aged Europe]

Information on the German electoral system (in English):
http://www.wahlrecht.de/english/bundestag.htm


German election results, 1949-2002:
http://www.parties-and-elections.de/germany.html
http://www.election.de/hist/hist_brd.html


Latest national polls:
http://www.wahlrecht.de/umfragen/index.htm
http://www.election.de/cgi-bin/showpoll.pl?name=btw_sf


News on the election in English:
http://www.dw-world.de/election05
http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,k-6712,00.html


Most important parties contesting in the 2005 election:
--> SPD
--> CDU + CSU
--> Greens
--> FDP
--> Left Party (in alliance with WASG)
--> NPD (in alliance with DVU)


Main candidates of the major parties:
SPD - Gerhard Schröder
CDU/CSU - Angela Merkel
Greens - Joschka Fischer
FDP -  Guido Westerwelle
Left Party - Gregor Gysi + Oskar Lafontaine

[Middle-aged Europe]

Wow, this is awesome. Thanks for the heads up.

Yeah, it was a huge surprise. Apparently Schröder and Müntefering didn´t inform anyone in their own party or in the Greens about this possibility.


The latest national poll results can be found here:

http://www.election.de/cgi-bin/showpoll.pl?name=btw_sf

http://www.wahlrecht.de/umfragen/index.htm

[Middle-aged Europe]

At the moment it seems that the North Rhine-Westphalia election will repeat itself on national level this fall. Most likely we will see a CDU/FDP coalition government.

The CDU/CSU will now rush to formally nominate Angela Merkel as their candidate for chancellor as soon as possible.

I certainly did not expect this.

Me neither.

I have little expertise on German poltics, but from what I read, the result was even more disastrous for Schröder than expected.

Well, not really. In the last days before the election some suspected that the SPD could pull a surprise victory, but the in the last poll the CDU stood at 43% and the SPD at 36% (actual result: CDU 45%, SPD 37%). Both the FDP and the Greens did relatively bad though.

Gotta admit that from a U.K perspective this seems weird...

I don´t think you would find a precedence for this in German history either.   But just imagine the Tories would win both the Scottish and and Welsh regional elections at the same time...

[Middle-aged Europe]

Pigs would be flying

Hey, after all NRW was considered THE SPD stronghold, governed by them for the last 40 years. Only a few years ago it would have been considered totally absurd that the CDU could win an election there.

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The nearest parrallel I can think of with the SPD calling an election now, would be Wilson calling an election in 1968... just after Labour were all but wiped out in local (council) elections; no councillers in Birmingham for one thing. Tories even won the Scotswood ward in Newcastle...

Yeah, like I said, that´s very unusual for Germany. Somehow it even seems that Schröder "stole" the idea of calling an election from Britain.


What will (probably!) happen next:

Schröder will call for a vote of confidence in the Bundestag, which he willl deliberately lose. The constitution states that the president is able to call an early election in the case that this happens. So, it would be up to Köhler. Because he´s from the CDU he will probably be under a lot of pressure from his own party to comply. So much to the theory. We will see what will really happen in the next weeks.

[Middle-aged Europe]

Did turkish immigration play a role in the election?

In NRW? Not much, if at all. This election was mainly about the issues of "unemployment" and "economy".

[Middle-aged Europe]

Doesn't happen here either; Wilson (for some funny reason) decided to wait until 1970 before calling the election. He still lost, but it was fairly close and he bounced back in '74 (Feb).

I was actually refering to the characteristic of the British system that the Prime Minister often calls for an election before the end of the five-year term. Of course this is done when a PM is confident to WIN the election and not in the time of a crisis.

This whole thing is weird... does Schröder know something no one else does?

Perhaps he has a secret plan.

I was as much surprised by this decision as everyone else in Germany. Probably it´s a kind of "attack is the best form of defense". It was widely expected that the defeat in NRW would lead to a major ideological conflict within the SPD. There were even rumours of a split of the party´s parliamentary group. So, for Schröder it was a lose-lose situation anyway. And before the government is totally paralyzed by internal fightings he probably thought that he could call for new elections just as well. So, there´s at least a small chance to survive. That´s what I suspect.

I suspect turkish immigration will play a significant role in the federal election.

I doubt it. Also see my comment in the NRW topic. There´s currently a political talkshow on TV where today´s events are discussed. The politicians there are talking mainly about unemployment, the economy, and the state of the welfare state. I´m not sure if the term "immigration" was even mentioned once. In other words: We have more important things to do.

[Middle-aged Europe]

Some news:

--> The election will most likely be held on September 18.

--> Apparently some "renegade" MPs from the Greens and the SPD are trying to prevent early elections by appealing to the Constitutional Court (Schröder´s plan to "fake" a defeat in the vote of confidence in order to make early elections possible is controversial among constitutional experts). We will see... at the moment I would say that this attempt to prevent the election is doomed to fail.




Candidates for Chancellor

SPD: Gerhard Schröder, incumbent chancellor

CDU/CSU: Angela Merkel, chairwoman of the CDU and leader of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group in the Bundestag


Top candidates of the minor parties

Greens: Joschka Fischer, vice chancellor and foreign minister

FDP: Guido Westerwelle, chairman of the FDP

PDS: no one yet, but it seems the party is trying to recruit the former PDS leader and former deputy mayor of Berlin Gregor Gysi as their candidate for this election. Gysi is probably the most known as well as the most popular PDS politician in Germany. The only problem is that Gysi´s health was often in a bad condition in recent months. So, we will have to see wether he´s going to run or not.


It´s noteworthy that except for the CDU/CSU and the PDS these are exactly the same candidates than in 2002.

[Middle-aged Europe]

I fully expect the parties of the left to engage in anti-Americanism during the campaign like they did last time.

No, not really. Not unless Bush decides to bomb Iran within the next four months or something like this.

Theoretically, the question whether German troops should be send to Iraq or not could play a role though. It would be wise for Merkel to rule this possibility out from day one of her campaign. No German politician does himself a favor by promising to send troops anywhere, no matter whether its Iraq, Afghanistan, Spain, or Luxembourg.
Instead I expect the SPD´s campaign to be based on something like "the CDU will completely destroy the welfare state, so vote for the lesser evil: us".

So again: Immigration (especially "turkish immigrants"), will only play a secondary role, if at all. Relations to the United States or foreign policy will only play a secondary role, if at all. "It´s the economy, stupid."

[Middle-aged Europe]

well, if it's to be 'the economy stupid,' then it should guarantee another in a string CDU/CSU/FDP  victories.

Schröder was originally elected in 1998 because of "It´s the economy, stupid". But you´re probably right...

In the end this election will be centered around the question who of the two major candidates has the better "managerial qualities" and how far reforms of the welfare state should go, with the CDU/CSU proposing a Thatcher-like policy and the SPD presenting itself as the "social alternative" (= the lesser evil). And it will certainly be fun to see how the labour wing of the CDU will react on Merkel´s reform proposals (especially AFTER the election).

It also seems that the SPD is now hoping to receive enough votes to enforce a grand coalition, after having stabbed the Greens in the back. On sunday the SPD didn´t inform the Greens about calling early elections. Today the SPD declared that they don´t want to run together with the Greens as a coalition this time. Considering that CDU/CSU and FDP already have agreed on a coalition it´s doubtful that the SPD´s plan will work.

Plus of course they need to keep WASG down...they scored 2.2% in NRW without any sort of TV presence.

Apparently, Oskar Lafontaine thinks about the possibilty to be a candidate for the WASG, if the WASG and the PDS agree to run together. A Gysi/Lafontaine ticket would a hard nut to crack for the SPD.

For those of you who are not familiar with every German splinter party:
The WASG is a left-wing split from the SPD, founded by SPD and labour union activists who disagreed with Schröder´s reforms. And Oskar Lafontaine is a former SPD chairman (and short-time finance minister in Schröder´s first cabinet) who often critizised these reforms as well.

And speaking about the unions... they have declared today not to support the SPD this time. It seems Schröder stands alone. IF Gysi and Lafontaine are really going to run we will almost certainly see a CDU/FDP victory as well as a very strong result for PDS/WASG.

[Middle-aged Europe]

Federal election law has some weird things to say on parties running joint lists, though. Basically the easiest way to do that is for the PDS to run WASG candidates and WASG activists campaigning for the PDS - without the name WASG appearing anywhere on the ticket.
Problem with that is that WASG would then receive no government campaign money...

Yeah, that´s the same problem NPD and DVU were facing.

Perhaps the WASG will have to decide whether they run alone without the support from the PDS or Lafontaine, but receiving some campaign money or running together with the PDS, getting extra support from Lafontaine, and finally some of their members into the Bundestag.

But we will see... it´s too early too say what exactly will happen over the next four months. Maybe neither Gysi nor Lafontaine will be a candidate in the end. The only thing I can say that it will be certainly interesting.

[Middle-aged Europe]

Or months.

Yes, that´s what I meant. The recent events were certainly to confusing for me.

[Middle-aged Europe]

And Lafontaine has just announced his attention to leave the SPD.

[Middle-aged Europe]

But first let's see whether PDS and WASG can really cooperate. There's very little time for negotiations and building a joint organization.

Yes, the PDS has confirmed this too now.

We will see whether a) the PDS changes its mind, b) Lafontaine runs for the PDS, c) Lafontaine runs for the WASG, or d) Lafontaine doesn´t run at all in the end, because the alliance between PDS and WASG he aimed for didn´t came into existence.

Could still be possible that WASG candidates (including Lafontaine) are simply running on the PDS´s list.

[Middle-aged Europe]

What's up with all this talk about the PDS? It's very doubtful they'll make any difference. The grand coalition of extreme right-wing parties has better chances of benefitting from voter disillusionment.

Nope. NPD/DVU should be glad when they receive 1% of the vote. The PDS, on the other hand, has a real chance to get back into the Bundestag. Especially if they manage to get Gysi and/or Lafontaine on their ticket. Each man alone could mean a real boost for the party.

Going by the old Reagan line "Are you better off today than you were four years ago,"   where is Germany today?  I know that unemployment is at or near postwar record highs, but what about inflation, rate of GDP growth, interest rates and the like, as compared to just prior to the last election?

They´ve recently changed the statistical method of counting the number of umemployed people. Under the new method the number is generally higher than under the old one. As a result the unemployment rate has artificially climbed to a new record high. So, comparisons are hard to make. I don´t know if there´s a site where the current unemployment rate is converted into the old counting method, so that comparisons are possible.

http://www.destatis.de/e_home.htm has lots of official statistical data (in English). Perhaps you will find there what you want to know.

[Middle-aged Europe]

1%? You're being very optimistic (pessimistic for them). I don't see how they can crack 5%, but 1% should not be a problem.

Three years ago the NPD got 0.4% (with the DVU not running).

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Schill got 0.9% though, much of that from their kind of voter.

Some Schill members would become furious hearing this. Well, on the other hand some would probably only pretending to get furious.

Schill got 0.9% though, much of that from their kind of voter.
Plus of course, back then the NPD was lying low in fear of getting banned. They're much stronger as an organization now.

Maybe... but I see them at 1%.

[Middle-aged Europe]

My ancestors are from Saxony, on the Eastern border. Who does that Lander usually vote for in national elections?

The CDU/CSU has its strongholds in the southern states: Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg in the west, Saxony and Thuringia in the east. Of course, you should be careful to speak of "strongholds" with respect to the territory of the former GDR (East Germany). Voting behaviour is still far more violatile there. North of those four states the CDU is generally strong in the rural areas.

In contrast the SPD does best in the cities, especially in densely populated and highly industrialized areas, such as the Ruhr Area. Speaking of states, the SPD´s most important strongholds are North Rhine-Westphalia in the west and Brandenburg in the east. Of course the latest election in NRW raises the question whether this is still the case there.

The Greens do well in the cities too. And the larger the city the better for the party. Their most important strongholds are probably Berlin and Hamburg, the two most populous cities in Germany. Looking at the national distribution of the Greens´ vote they generally tend to be much stronger in the west than in the east (former GDR).

The same could be said about the FDP. They´re also much stronger in the west, with relatively weak showings in the east. They do best in the states of Baden-Württemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate and some areas of NRW.

The PDS is generally strong in the whole east and virtually non-existent in the western states. Their most important stronghold is the eastern part of Berlin.




Maps showing the regional destribution of the party´s votes in the 2002 election:


SPD



CDU/CDU



Greens



FDP



PDS

2nd Question- Why did the CDU/CSU run Edmund Stoiber in 2002 instead of Angela Merkel? Did she refuse to run then or did the party not want her? Supposedly she has kept in touch with the Bush Administration over the past few years, I hope she doesn't take any advice from them.

Merkel already wanted to run in 2002, that´s for sure. Actually, she and Stoiber were the two frontrunners for the position of the CDU´s candidate for chancellor back then. So, why Stoiber instead of Merkel? Well, my take would be that Stoiber was much more popular among the party´s leadership as well as the base. Merkel was probably the more "electable" of the two, but not so popular in the party, especially among the CDU´s conservatives.

[Middle-aged Europe]

Some remarks on the geographic distribution of political parties.

I have my own experience about Low Saxony north west germany.

The division to rural and urban does not make difference in that state. The CDU is very strong in catholic Olldenburger Münsterland
(that darker blue seat  second next to Dutch border. Contrary Friesland (the most north western seat in country)) that is pretty rural two is allways very SPD.  In Göttingen area that I know best catholic cities like Duderstadt are CDU even in Heydays of Schroeder.

The most of state seems rather bellwether area.

 

That´s correct. Of course my remarks consisted of generalizations of voting behaviour.

In addition to a urban/rural divide there´s also a catholic/protestant divide, with catholics voting for CDU/CSU more often than protestants ( who are leaning more to the SPD). This is of course a generalization too.

[Middle-aged Europe]

States where the SPD did best in 2002:
1) Bremen (48.6%)
2) Lower Saxony (47.8%)
3) Brandenburg (46.4%)

States where the SPD did worst in 2002:
1) Bavaria (26.1%)
2) Saxony (33.3%)
3) Baden-Württemberg (33.5%)




States where the CDU/CSU did best in 2002:
1) Bavaria (58.6%)
2) Baden-Württemberg (42.8%)
3) Rhineland-Palatinate (40.2%)

States where the CDU/CSU did worst in 2002:
1) Brandenburg (22.3%)
2) Bremen (24.5%)
3) Berlin (25.9%)




States where the Greens did best in 2002:
1) Hamburg (16.2%)
2) Bremen (15.0%)
3) Berlin (14.6%)

States where the Greens did worst in 2002:
1) Saxony-Anhalt (3.4%)
2) Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania (3.5%)
3) Thuringia (4.3%)




States where the FDP did best in 2002:
1) North Rhine-Westphalia & Rhineland-Palatinate (both 9.3%)
2) Hesse (8.2%)
3) Schleswig-Holstein (8.0%)

States where the FDP did worst in 2002:
1) Bavaria (4.5%)
2) Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania (5.4%)
3) Brandenburg (5.8%)




States where the PDS did best in 2002:
1) Brandenburg (17.2%)
2) Thuringia (17.0%)
3) Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania (16.3%)

States where the PDS did worst in 2002:
1) Bavaria (0.7%)
2) Baden-Württemberg (0.9%)
3) Lower Saxony & Rhineland-Palatinate (both 1.0%)




For a map with the location of the states: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/States_of_Germany

[Middle-aged Europe]

Thanks for the information and maps Old Europe. Its funny how Bavaria is so overwhelmingly CDU/SU. Someone I who has been there called it the "Texas of Germany".

How true. Although the "Bible Belt of Germany" would probably fit it even better.

I see that Saxony was the only state in the former East to elect the CDU in 2002. Is this because of the religion divide like you said?

No, not really, considering how secular the east is. I would say that Saxony´s support for the CDU stems mainly from the popularity of the first minister-president (prime minister) after the end of the GDR, Kurt "King Kurt" Biedenkopf, who governed the state from 1990 to 2002. He basically turned Saxony into a CDU stronghold. Interestingly, the CDU lost its absolute majority (+50%) in the first state election after Biedenkopf´s resignation. So, we will have too see whether Saxony will stay so strongly pro-CDU in the future or not.

I wonder what the point of the FDP is. Is it a protestant or secular version of the CDU? They are both center-right parties if I remember correctly.

No, I wouldn´t say so. Speaking in American terms, the FDP is basically a libertarian party, although a moderate one (compared to the U.S. Libertarian Party). The FDP is also often seen as the party of "the well off", despite past efforts to change this image.

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Is the FDP as economically conservative as the GOP claims to be?

I have no idea what the GOP claims, but I can confirm that the FDP is probably the most conservative (or libertarian) party on economic issues in Germany.

[Middle-aged Europe]

Some news from the campaign:

1) The chances of an alliance between PDS and WASG have decreased. The WASG wants too see a formal merger of both parties before the election, while the PDS thinks there´s not enough time left for such a process. Instead, WASG candidates should run on the PDS´s list, a suggestion which is opposed by the WASG.

2) There are growing tensions between the SPD and the Greens. Apparently, the SPD tries to get rid of the Greens by pissing them off so much that they either leave the coalition or vote against Schröder in the vote of confidence. This is probably another indication that the SPD is hoping for a grand coalition after this election.

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What's WASG? I'm under the impression this is the party I'd vote for, although it'd probably depend on what district I lived in.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WASG

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News:

1) "Ceasefire" between SPD and Greens: The recriminations between the two parties came to a halt and relations within the governing coalition have improved a bit this week.

2) According to recent polls the CDU/CSU could win a absolute majority (more than 50% of the seats) in the election, thus eleminating the necessity of a coalition with the FDP. Of course, you should keep in mind that the CDU/CSU often held a absolute majority in opinion polls, but only for one time in reality... back in 1957. Meaning: Until election day the CDU´s numbers could (and probably will) have dropped by some points.

3) Today, Gregor Gysi officially announced his attention to run as the PDS´s main candidate, which probably increases the chance for the  return of the party into the Bundestag. Nothing new from the WASG however.