Guide to the German Federal Elections

2017 has been a tumultuous year for politics. Donald Trump, one of the most divisive presidents in modern history, was inaugurated at the beginning of the year and his tenure has brought about scandal after scandal. The Dutch and French elections were held at a time of great populist, nationalistic sentiment and the world watched with bated breath to see whether Le Pen or Wilders would succeed. In Britain, a snap election was set to be the most important election in a generation with the outcome greatly impacting what path a post-Brexit Britain would take. In the end, Jeremy Corbyn upset the odds with his socialist message that appealed to young voters and humiliated the incumbent Theresa May who now has to maneuver a fragile, divided minority government through Brexit, Britain’s greatest challenge since the Second World War. In Turkey, Erdogan won a hotly contested referendum that made him legal dictator of Turkey setting Turkey on a dark path away from the country of Ataturk.

However Germany’s upcoming election on the 24th of September appears to offer little in the way of excitement appearing to be just a bit… boring in comparison to everything else that has gone this year. Merkel looks set to comfortably become the largest party in the Bundestag and win a fourth term as chancellor.

Christian Democrats/Christian Social Union (CDU/CSU)

Merkel’s Christian Democrats lie 17 points ahead of their nearest rivals, the Social Democrats, with her lows in the polls during the refugee crisis a distant memory as the economy continues to grow with low unemployment (just 3.8%) and as migration numbers decrease. As a result, with victory looking almost certain, Merkel is deploying a safe campaign strategy, promising full employment by 2025, cuts to income tax and public investment whilst still going out on a campaign trail as to not appear complacent. This strategy has worked before and it is unlikely to fail this time round with Merkel too far ahead to be caught up.

Social Democrats (SDP)

Merkel’s main opponent is Martin Schulz of the Social Democrats and former President of the European Parliament. The centrist Schulz has struggled to win votes from Merkel, unable to offer anything more enticing than what Merkel is and has a similar manifesto to Merkel. Any bid to attack Merkel on her main weaknesses of migration and the EU have failed and it is looking highly unlikely Schulz will manage to gain enough seats to produce a coalition with anybody but Merkel’s CDU (with whom they are currently the junior coalition partner with in the Bundestag).

The Green Party (Grüne)

Led by Katrin Göring-Eckardt and Cem Özdemir, The Green Party were among the most successful of Europe’s Green Parties, but has recently done poorly in elections, becoming a victim of their own success. The Greens were a centrist party focused on promoting renewables, pro-migration and anti-nuclear in a centrist country that has promised to close all nuclear power stations by 2022, accepted millions of migrants, promised to cut emissions by 40% by 2020 (promises they are working towards keeping unlike most nations), and has generated a record 35% of its power from renewables in the first half of 2017. As a result, they will struggle to reach double figures, but could prove the final key in forming a coalition.

Left Party (Linke)

The Left were formed from the remnants of East Germany’s communists and left wing rebels of the SPD and support increasing state control of the economy as well as raising the minimum wage. However their more controversial views on foreign policy (pro Russia and anti NATO) leave them on the fringes of German politics and rules them out of a coalition with the mainstream SPD.

Free Democratic Party (FDP)

The Libertarian FDP suffered the ignominy of failing to achieve the 5% necessary to appear in the Bundestag in 2013, but are now looking to break their way back in under the helm of Christian Lindner and policies such as lower tax rates and the digitisation (an issue that needs addressing in Germany). These have allowed the FDP to present themselves as a modern party thus helping them to attract young, metropolitan voters.

Alternative for Germany (AfD)

The far-right, populist AfD is hardline anti EU and anti-immigration rose in popularity in 2015 whilst the refugee crisis was in full swing, but has since had its fortune decline despite terrorist attacks and they are unlikely to really become a major force in swaying German politics as UKIP did in Britain.

The German election looks unlikely to throw up any twists and turns, but despite Germany’s economic success and stability in recent years, if there’s anything to learn from the past year it’s that anything can happen.

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