Today, in a historic event, voters across Germany are heading to the ballot box to elect a new Bundestag, or parliament, replacing the one elected in 2017. This parliament will then select a chancellor, who will lead the government of Germany for the next four years. This election will also mark the end of Angela Merkel’s 16-year chancellorship; the results of today’s election will set a new vision for Germany.
As some of you may be aware, I have previously written an election and party primer on the German election; it can be found below. That article lays out what the issues are in the current cycle, as well as the stances of the six parties contesting the results.
Therefore, this article will not be discussing the central issues of the campaign in great depth. Instead, I will focus on the events of the campaign trail since the last piece, as well as my thoughts on what the future German government could look like.
Context
The following is an excerpt from my previous German article, linked above.
“Germany is a parliamentary democracy at the national level. On election day, all seats of Bundestag (the name of the German parliament) are up for election. Germany uses a complex electoral procedure to ensure that seats are allotted proportionally (i.e., a party that wins 32% of the vote will receive 32% of the seats). Parties then have to build a coalition that controls over 50% of the Bundestag. Once this is done, these parties form “the Government,” and the leader of this bloc becomes the Chancellor.”
The Campaign
When my previous article was published, the chancellorship race was considered a two-way contest between the incumbent Union group (CDU+CSU) and the German Greens. This has changed substantially, as the Greens have seen their support erode from 25% in the summer to around 15% now. Many attribute this to Annalena Baerbock becoming the face of the Greens, and her unpopularity as a leader. The German press has highlighted issues around her inflating her resume and plagiarizing large parts of her book from Wikipedia.
This isn’t to say that it’s all over for the Greens, as they are poised to be the party with the largest gain in vote-share since 2017. One of their favored issues, climate change, has come back into the forefront after massive floods hit Germany in late summer. Any viable coalition will need the Greens, and they are set to serve as kingmakers in the discussions pertaining to the selection of the next chancellor of Germany. But they will serve as kingmakers, and not kings themselves, as they have clearly fallen to third place.
Meanwhile, the center-left Social Democratic Party (abrev. SPD) has surged in the polls since July. In late summer, analysts predicted the SPD would face disaster, but as the polls shifted, they are now projected to be the largest or second-largest party in the next Bundestag. Led by Olaf Scholz, the current finance minister, the SPD has notably avoided any specific controversy this election, allowing them to have a stable hold on a sizable portion of the center-left vote. While Scholz is often dubbed “Scholzomat” (a portmanteau of “Scholz” and “automat”) due to his perceived similarities to a bureaucratic robot, this is not the worst thing in Germany. In fact, many see this as a plus for Scholz, who can utilize this perception to tie himself to the popular Merkel, who was also seen in a similar light. Scholz is also liked for his tenure as finance minister, as he kept the economy on even keel during the coronavirus crisis. His willingness to increase spending during the pandemic made him popular with voters who were financially struggling during this challenging time.
Scholz has a history of being a moderate. As a long-time senior figure in the SPD, he has expressed hesitation at rebuilding the formerly expansive, yet extremely expensive German welfare state. He was a proponent of “Agenda 2010,” a plan from the 2000s which sought to move the SPD to the center; an issue that still rankles many on the left of the party. Scholz often does refer to his radical views during his youth in an effort to appeal to the left wing of the SPD, however.
The Union, comprised of Angela Merkel’s CDU and its Bavarian sister party CSU, has held firm since the summer but is still far short of their previous performances. Not only do voters miss Ms. Merkel; many find the Union’s leader, Armin Laschet, to be uninspiring and unoriginal. Furthermore, Laschet has been hit with a very damaging scandal (by German standards): he was caught on camera, laughing at a remembrance event for the 180 Germans who died in the floods of last summer. This had strongly impacted his numbers in the last couple of weeks.
However, the last week has seen a surge in the party’s fortunes, as Angela Merkel has been campaigning strongly for the Union. This has brought a lot of Merkel-supporting Union-hesitant voters back into the fold and has put the wind back into the sails of the Union going into election day.
The Potential Results
The consensus from the polls is as follows:
A 65% chance of the SPD netting the most seats in parliament, and a 35% of the Union doing so. Both parties will net around 25% of the seats in the Bundestag.
The Greens will come in third, and net around 17% of the seats in the Bundestag. They are strong enough to be a solid third, but Annalena Baerbock’s unpopularity among the larger public prevents them from seriously competing with the SPD and CDU.
The anti-immigration, Euroskeptic AfD and the business-friendly, liberal FDP are expected to have similar performances, netting around 11% of the vote
Die Linke, Germany’s far-left party, is expected to barely clear the 5% threshold to sit in the Bundestag, with most polls giving them around 7%.
The Coalitions
These results make it inevitable that a chancellor will need a coalition to govern; the vote share is too fragmented for one party to achieve a majority in the Bundestag by themselves. From the predicted results, most people expect that a future governing coalition would be one of the following.
Traffic Light Coalition
Chancellor’s Party: SPD
Junior Parties: Greens and FDP
A coalition between the Red (SPD), Yellow (FDP), and Green is dubbed a traffic-light coalition and is the most probable next government of Germany if the SPD is the largest party in the Bundestag. All parties are considered comfortably within the Overton Window of German politics, with none of them being perceived as radical. In addition, several states are currently governed by traffic-light coalitions; these three parties have a history of working with each other and governing in a cohesive manner.
This grouping does have disagreements over economic policy. The SPD is considered the party of unions, and will probably push for greater trade-union influence in government. On the other hand, the FDP is the party of small business owners, the self-employed, and entrepreneurs; therefore, the interests of the SPD and FDP voting blocs often clash. Throw into this mix the Greens, and the disagreements become more complex. The Greens are closer to the SPD when it comes to certain government spending programs, especially environmental ones, but agree with the FDP’s opposition to any discussion of rebuilding the German welfare state.
The bulk of environmental policies from this coalition will seek to
Target the individual users of fossil fuels to disincentivize their use
Work with allies to reduce global emissions
While this is definitely not as far as the Greens or SPD would like to go, they would probably be comfortable in working towards this to begin with. The FDP seeks to balance the goals of environmentalism and greater international cooperation with a desire to protect entrepreneurs, small business owners, and the self-employed from a greater tax burden.
Outside of economics, the environment, and minor disagreements over the amount of civil liberties Germans should hold, the parties agree on almost everything. From a social-issues perspective, this government would be very progressive and left-leaning. All three parties push for the greater secularization of German culture, increased rights and protections for Germany’s LGBTQ+ community, and an acceptance of domestic multi-culturalism. All three parties support an agenda empowering women’s rights, though the FDP may not want this to translate into further regulations on the freedoms of small businesses.
On foreign policy, the grouping stands for greater globalization, increased ties to America, and greater European cooperation. The only disagreement the parties may have is on immigration: the Greens and SPD support more immigration into Germany, while the FDP is concerned that Germany can’t afford to extend government programs to these new arrivals. Other than this issue, international affairs will serve as a unifying, and not a divisive, factor in this coalition.
In summary, the lack of radical elements in the SPD, Greens, and FDP makes this the likeliest coalition to support an SPD chancellor. While the SPD/Green bloc does disagree with the FDP on certain issues, the unifying front they present on social justice and international affairs should help them bridge the divisions they have.
Jamaica Coalition
Chancellor’s Party: The Union (CDU and CSU)
Junior Parties: Greens and FDP
Dubbed the “Jamaica Coalition” as the colors of the three member-parties resemble the colors on Jamaica’s flag, a Jamaica coalition would serve as a bastion of centrism. Led by the conservative CDU, the coalition would steer Germany in a fiscally and socially moderate direction, while keeping foreign policy similar to how it has been in the past. It would be the coalition most in line with the status quo
This coalition would definitely take the side of business over labor in economic debates, though the Greens and CDU may push for social regulations on German companies, such as mandating the proportion of women a company must have on its board. In addition, the corporate sector may also face more environmental regulations.
On social issues, the coalition would probably maintain the current centrist course that Germany has been on. While the CDU remains conservative on social issues, they also emphasize Christian compassion for the underprivileged, leading them to often agree to liberal social causes after considerable internal debate. The FDP and Greens would probably pull the coalition leftwards on this front.
On international relations, all parties have pushed for greater European and international cooperation. However, the Union has not been as vocal about better ties with the US; it remains to be seen how this coalition would deal with Germany’s traditional ally.
It should be noted that, if the CDU was to become the largest party in the Bundestag, this is the only coalition they can form. Working with the AfD is political suicide, and the SPD has explicitly ruled out a coalition with them this time around.
Red-Red-Green
Chancellor’s Party: SPD
Junior Parties: Greens and Die Linke
This coalition government would be the most Left-wing grouping possible, and would presumably move Germany in a significantly new direction. If this coalition were to occur, expect Germany to move significantly leftwards on economic and social policy. Environmentalism would play a key part in this coalition, as all three parties have made it a significant part of their program to reduce Germany’s carbon footprint. This coalition will probably ring the death-knell of Germany’s domestic coal industry.
The main roadblock to the formation of this coalition is foreign policy, which holds an important role in determining coalition formation. Both the SPD and the Greens want Germany to play a larger part in the EU, strengthen ties with Biden’s America and NATO, and continue the current policy of wary cooperation with Russia. By contrast, Die Linke views the EU as an exploitative, capitalist institution, the US and NATO as imperialist forces of destruction, and Russia as an ally to cultivate, not demonize. While Die Linke has dropped NATO’s abolishment from their party platform, their leader, Janine Wissler, has expressed a preference to dissolve NATO and replace it with a broader alliance containing Russia.
While the Greens may have historically been receptive to Die Linke’s left-wing pacifism, the Greens of 2021 are very much not. Today’s Greens stand for increased defense spending and the deepening of US-German ties.
Furthermore, SPD’s moderate wing, of which Scholz is a part of, worries that a coalition that includes Die Linke would be electorally damaging in the future. Most Germans associate Die Linke with the former East Germany; an image that does not play well in the west of the country. In the eyes of SPD moderates, the last thing a center-left party should do is play into right-wing rhetoric and align with a party that includes actual communists. Scholz himself, whenever asked about the potential of a Red-Red-Green alliance, consistently plays up his excitement of potentially working with the Greens, while also refusing to comment about Die Linke, apart from expressing his disapproval of their foreign policy.
While a Red-Red-Green coalition is quite unlikely, it still falls within the realm of possibility, and should not be dismissed out of hand. Such a coalition could find common causes on issues of the environment, economic policy, and social policy. However, large disagreements over the role that Germany should play in the world create a significant impediment to the cohesiveness and plausibility of this potential grouping.
In conclusion
Germany will have to choose between an SPD, running on continuing Merkelism, and Merkel’s own Union party, which seeks to turn a chapter and return to the more conservative roots of the party. While the SPD holds the polling lead, the last few days have given the Union strong momentum going into the election. While I would rate the SPD as favorites, there is a considerable possibility that the Union retains their 15+year hold on the chancellorship of Germany.
If the SPD wins, they will have to make a choice between staying pragmatic or choosing a more radical path going forward. On the flip side, a Union victory will be tempered by the limited choices they have in forming a coalition.
Whoever is the next chancellor of Germany will have big shoes to fill, and the public is unlikely to feel that either Scholz of the SPD or Laschet of the Union can really live up to Merkel’s legacy. Over 16 years, Merkel has left Germany, Europe, and the world much different than when she ascended to power in 2005. Leaving with an 82% approval rating (according to Politbarometer, a respected German polling company), she has become a symbol of the calm, yet tough demeanor many Germans pride their nation on presenting. Her actions as chancellor have had wide-reaching implications vis a vis Germany, and its role on the European continent and the world stage. Her influence transcends parties, and the legacy of Angela Merkel will shape German and European politics for a long time to come.