German Elections & Politics

[politicus]

Federal poll from Forsa:

CDU/CSU: 42%
SPD: 22%
AfD: 10%
Linke: 9%
Grüne: 8%

FDP: 2%

So centre-right + right = 54% and centre-left + left is 39%, that leaves 7%. Where do they go?

2% Pirates, 1-2% Freie Wähler, 1-2% NPD, 2% other small parties

Germany seems to be roughly 40/60 left-right (in the crudest sense of those terms) at the moment. It seems centrist voters invariably break to the right.

[palandio]

Actually the current left/right proportions in Germany are not so much a result of centrist voters breaking to the CDU/CSU. They are at least as much the result of a massive voter demobilization on the left. Note that in 2002 CDU+CSU+FDP had 22 million votes and that this was less than SPD+Greens. Since then CDU+CSU+FDP have gone down to 20 million votes and yet SPD+Greens is not a realistic option on the federal level anymore.

(The AfD of course drains voters not only from FDP, CDU and CSU, but also from Left and SPD and therefore the AfD has shifted the political  landscape slightly to the right. I wouldn't call these swing voters centrists though.)

[politicus]

Actually the current left/right proportions in Germany are not so much a result of centrist voters breaking to the CDU/CSU. They are at least as much the result of a massive voter demobilization on the left. Note that in 2002 CDU+CSU+FDP had 22 million votes and that this was less than SPD+Greens. Since then CDU+CSU+FDP have gone down to 20 million votes and yet SPD+Greens is not a realistic option on the federal level anymore.

(The AfD of course drains voters not only from FDP, CDU and CSU, but also from Left and SPD and therefore the AfD has shifted the political  landscape slightly to the right. I wouldn't call these swing voters centrists though.)

That's interesting, but natural given the sort of policies SPD has advocated (and implemented while in government).

[Middle-aged Europe]

In the 2013 Bundestag election, the AfD had received most of their votes from: FDP, Left, CDU (in that order)

2014 European
1) CDU
2) SPD
3) Left

2014 Saxony
1) Other parties (NPD not included)
2) CDU
3) FDP

2014 Brandenburg
1) Left
2) CDU
3) FDP

2014 Thuringia
1) CDU
2) Left
3) Non-voters/SPD (tie)

Usually, the AfD seems to gain most of their votes from the CDU and the Left. Both is easily explained. They win right-wing conservatives from the CDU who think that their party has moved too far to the center, in addition to anti-establishment (and anti-EU) protest voters who jump on the newest populist bandwaggon.

They had a particularly strong showing with FDP voters in the 2013 Bundestag election, but this correlation became less important since then. Former FDP supporters still make up their third-most important source of votes overall. Motivations are probably similar to that of former CDU voters who crossed over to the AfD camp (aside from the fact that a vote for the FDP has largely become a "wasted" vote).

The fourth most supportive group are SPD voters, which seems a bit puzzling at first look, but you have to keep in mind that there's also a certain right-wing element existent within the SPD and among its supporters (Thilo Sarrazin, anyone?). The AfD's particularly strong showing among SPD voters in the European Parliament election is perhaps also an indication that SPD voters are less supportive of the European Union than the party itself.

Greens usually hate the AfD, and the feeling is mutually returned.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

It's interesting that the Alliance has not put the slightest dent on the CDU's numbers.

Alliance?

Well this is awkward :/

[Yeahsayyeah]

The migration of 39.000 "other" voters to the AfD in Saxony is quite doubtful, of course. I would guess that there are at least some proxy 2009 NPD votes in there. There isn't much room for that. Of the small right wing parties DSU is stable, the NPD offshoot SVP (Sächsische Volkspartei - Saxonian People's Party) has merged into the "pro movement" and got there votes.  "Freie Sachsen" in 2009 was merely a Freie Wähler proxy, and they got more votes in 2014 than their antecessors.
Small right wing parties not competing this time (PBC, REP, FPD [sic],)  added to about 12.000 in 2009
So the possiblities were the missing votes come from (other than proxy NPD) would be:
* Tierschutpartei (Animal protection): They lost half of their 36000 votes and are quite socially conservative (but I'm not sure many of their voters are aware of that)
* Some Pirate voters of 2009 (I quess, most of them went crazy with Sonneborn this time, but maybe I'm wrong). The areas Pirates are strong are not the typical AfD ones.
* Freie Sachsen: If their voters of 2009 differ much from "Free voters" supporters in 2014, but actually I see not much room for that

[Tender Branson]

Germany seems to be roughly 40/60 left-right (in the crudest sense of those terms) at the moment. It seems centrist voters invariably break to the right.

More like 52-46 for the Right, according to the latest polls.

Austria is 60-40 for the Right though.

[politicus]

Germany seems to be roughly 40/60 left-right (in the crudest sense of those terms) at the moment. It seems centrist voters invariably break to the right.

More like 52-46 for the Right, according to the latest polls.

Austria is 60-40 for the Right though.

I said "in the crudest sense" and its a matter of the left-right definition. In the polls I commented on it was true counting Linke, Greens ad SPD as Left and the rest as Right.

I guess I will land in the Irony Ore Mine if I say, "do you have to involve  Austria in everything", so I wont. .

[Tender Branson]

Germany seems to be roughly 40/60 left-right (in the crudest sense of those terms) at the moment. It seems centrist voters invariably break to the right.

More like 52-46 for the Right, according to the latest polls.

Austria is 60-40 for the Right though.

I said "in the crudest sense" and its a matter of the left-right definition. In the polls I commented on it was true countng Linke, Greens ad SPD as Left and the rest as Right.

I guess I will land in the Irony Ore Mine if I say, "do you have to involve  Austria in everything", so I wont. .

Not in everything, but still a lot of times ...

[Middle-aged Europe]

Last thing I heard from Thuringia was that SPD and Greens had demanded from the Left that all three parties sign a document in which the former East German regime is declared a dictatorship as a pre-condition for forming a governing coalition in this state.

The Left's leadership is generally okay with this, but it seemed to spark a bit of a revolt at the Left's base. Which forced the party leadership to relativize the meaning of the document to calm things down. Which in turn caused the Greens to threaten the end of the coalition talks.

[Tender Branson]

Last thing I heard from Thuringia was that SPD and Greens had demanded from the Left that all three parties sign a document in which the former East German regime is declared a dictatorship as a pre-condition for forming a governing coalition in this state.

The Left's leadership is generally okay with this, but it seemed to spark a bit of a revolt at the Left's base. Which forced the party leadership to relativize the meaning of the document to calm things down. Which in turn caused the Greens to threaten the end of the coalition talks.

Typical. I already thought that would happen.

The best thing would be to implement CDU-SPD again in that state, it worked in the last term (Thüringen even achieved a 400-500 Mio. € surplus last year, which is not bad for a small state like this, half of which was used for investments and half to pay down debt.)

[Middle-aged Europe]

It seems a bit bizarre that the parties started to argue over the finer points of history in the coalition talks.

Then again, it was always a potential source of friction between the Left and the Greens, given that the East German Greens trace their roots back to the GDR opposition movement more than any other political party in the former East Germany.

For all intents and purposes, they were once enemies.

[RodPresident]

And is Left-SPD-AfD coalition viable?

[Yeahsayyeah]

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Just no!

[Middle-aged Europe]

And is Left-SPD-AfD coalition viable?

This is in fact the least likely coalition model, by far.

It's relatively safe to say that such a coalition is never going to happen, even if the AfD continues to establish itself successfully and remains a relevant political force for the next decades.

[Middle-aged Europe]

Right. But AfD offered Ramelow to elect him PM (what he refused, of course).

The AfD was trolling.

[Franzl]

Infratest Dimap federal poll:

CDU/CSU 41%
SPD 24%
Linke 10%
AfD 9%
Grüne 9%

FDP 2%
others 5%

They really really need to start listing FDP under other.

[SUSAN CRUSHBONE]

are there any polls for baden-württemberg's next landtag elections yet?

[Beezer]

http://www.wahlrecht.de/umfragen/landtage/baden-wuerttemberg.htm

[SUSAN CRUSHBONE]

http://www.wahlrecht.de/umfragen/landtage/baden-wuerttemberg.htm

thanks!

[Middle-aged Europe]

A Left/SPD/Green coalition in Thuringia headed by Bodo Ramelow (Left) seems increasingly likely.

[politicus]

A Left/SPD/Green coalition in Thuringia headed by Bodo Ramelow (Left) seems increasingly likely.

That's going to be an interesting experiment, but will probably work fine.

[Zanas]

Could somebody point me to the nearest interactive clickable constituency map of Bundestag elections ? I was in Berlin last weekend and visited the Deutscher Dom museum about Parliamentarism in Germany, and they had this huge touch-screen map of all results by constituency and erst-stimme/zweite-stimme and I can't get it out of my head. I would have stayed there all afternoon hadn't my wife protested a bit...

[Middle-aged Europe]

^^

Try here...

http://www.bundeswahlleiter.de/de/bundestagswahlen/BTW_BUND_13/wahlatlas/start_wahlatlas.html

http://www.bundeswahlleiter.de/de/bundestagswahlen/BTW_BUND_09/onlineatlas/start_wahlatlas.html

http://www.election.de/cgi-bin/showcandres_btw13.pl?land=btw13

[Middle-aged Europe]

The results of the SPD "primary" election to determine the successor of retiring Berlin mayor Klaus Wowereit have been announced:


Michael Müller, state minister for urban development - 59.1%

Jan Stöß,  SPD state chairman - 20.9%

Raed Saleh, SPD state parliament caucus leader - 18.7%

Turnout: 65% (members of the Berlin SPD were eligible)


Hence Müller will be nominated by the SPD as the next mayor in the state parliament.