Thread: Merkel suffers historic defeat in German state elections

Official end results:

in parliament
SPD - 39.1%
CDU - 26.3%
Greens - 11.3%
FDP - 8.6%
Pirates - 7.8%

not in parliament
Left - 2.6% (postcommunists)
proNRW - 1.5% (anti-muslim rightwing-extremists)
Animal Protection Party - 0.7% (vegans)
NPD - 0.5% (neonazis)
Family Party - 0.4% (pro-family reformists)
Die PARTEI - 0.3% (parody party)
Free Voters - 0.2% (independent conservatives)
BIG - 0.1% (Turkish conservatives)
AUF - 0.1% (anti-muslim rightwing-extremists)
FBI - 0.1% (independent conservatives)
ÖDP - 0.1% (eco-conservatives)
PdV - 0.1% (libertarians)

Note: 0.1% parties sorted by absolute voter share. BIG got 10,700 votes (0.138%), PdV 6,500 (0.08%).

Ok, I have been trying to follow this off and on. What makes this very confusing to me is the fact that I can't seem to narrow down exactly what each party stands for and what they promote as their platform. Basically what they are for and against in a nutshell. To top it off we have the Christian Democrats, the Social Democrats and the Free Democrats

Originally Posted by tbm3fan

Ok, I have been trying to follow this off and on. What makes this very confusing to me is the fact that I can't seem to narrow down exactly what each party stands for and what they promote as their platform. Basically what they are for and against in a nutshell. To top it off we have the Christian Democrats, the Social Democrats and the Free Democrats

At least they don't have People's Democrats (I think).

Anyway, I like the pirates, guess their leader has an eye patch and promises to split the spoils with the followers

The platforms of the individual parties in Germany are complicated to explain since there's no clear division. In particular every party has multiple wings that can be all over the political board. Without delving too much into actual political topics:

The CDU promotes a conservative image with social responsibility, some elitism and a firm belief in state control for the bettership of the economy, although in the last three decades the latter's in a steady decline. The right wing of the party is patriotic in the sense of somewhat nationalist. The "Christian" bit is for the most part only in name, although there are groupings in the party, mostly among the right wing, that take it quite literally - in a "we need to build Germany on Christian values" way or in a sorta Eurabia-scare way, although the latter isn't very well-defined in the CDU.
In one state, Bavaria, the CDU by mutual agreement defers the field to the CSU (Christian Social Union). CDU and CSU form a joint faction in parliament at federal level. Politics-wise, the CSU is a bit more conservative than the CDU, however the CSU occupies a much wider political field, both on the right wing and the left wing. There are some groups within the CSU that can actually be termed "left-of-center".

The SPD - since the 60s - traditionally promotes the goal of combining essentially borderline socialist ideals with a free economy. Big on unions, big on employee rights, big on social issues. About 15 years ago, the right wing of the party took over and took the government, resulting in mostly Third Way politics (a la Blair). This right wing has since been reduced in power, especially after about one quarter of its members and voters - essentially the entire left wing - left the SPD for a more defined left-wing party. Nowadays the SPD is mostly sorta centrist, leaning towards similar politics as the CDU, but the leadership is making a (successful) effort to resharpen the social democrats as a left-wing party, regaining voters on the left edge.

Said left-wing party is "The Left". The Left is an amalgam of the former East-German government party - which was a combination of SPD, see above, and real communists -, some remaining parts of the former left wing of the SPD and about two dozen small splinter groups, mostly of a Trotzkist angle. The official party line is "postcommunism", basically similar to the SPD but with more defined socialist ideals - such as the idea of a state-sponsored basic income for everyone, or the essential communist idea of overcoming capitalism (albeit in a peaceful manner). The party has a number of left wings that mostly lean towards particular left-wing regimes - e.g. there's a pro-Cuba group, a maoist group and so on. There's a division between westerners and easterners in the party, mostly a power struggle.

The Greens were formed about three decades ago from eco-friendly initiatives, some communist groups and some hippies essentially. Nowadays, the party is divided into two wings, "Fundamentalists" and "Realists", which are nominally equal and share power within the party. Overall, the party promotes an eco-friendly version of the SPD's policies, albeit mostly of the Third Way style; it also depends on the state, e.g. in the South you'll often have traditionally ultra-conservative farmers voting for them too. The Greens in these states tend to follow more conservative politics. There is also a moderately strong civil liberties angle to the Greens, mostly stemming from them uniting with such a group from East Germany in 1990.

The FDP are plain and simple not-quite-so-extremist pseudolibertarians with a centrist pretense. They promote a free economy and capitalism over everything else; state as small as possible, taxes as low as possible, generally all that stuff Americans like. Politics tend to often be shaped by lobbyists and clientele benefits. There used to be a left wing in this party, mostly concerned with civil liberty issues and trying to give the FDP a social angle, but this social-liberal group left the FDP for the SPD after the big "treason" three decades ago, when the FDP switched sides to vote in Kohl as chancellor.

The Pirates are, in a nutshell, a protest party that pushes a civil liberties angle without having a defined opinion on the more important political topics like finances or social issues. To some extent the party might be seen as a rebirth of the former FDP social-liberal wing, albeit without voters being pressured into a precise political statement. They can't really be considered either left-wing or right-wing (lacking defined politics), and in the last couple state elections by voter movement analysis have harvested votes from all other parties equally. Basically mostly - not entirely anymore - younger people disillusioned with the otherwise rather bleak political landscape that want some "fresh wind" and to be different.

The smaller parties are for the most part irrelevant. There are three major neonazi parties in Germany (National Democrats, Republicans, German People's Union), but they tend to mostly not cooperate and only harvest protest votes, in particular in East Germany. There are a couple - relatively new - neoconservative anti-islamist parties that claim to be different from the neonazis, but of course in reality are pitching in for the exact same voter pool.
There are currently two somewhat relevant minor topics-specific parties, the Animal Protection Party and the Family Party (topics of either should be obvious), that both together get anywhere between 0.2 and 2.0% of the ballot depending on the state, the importance of the election and the current voter disillusionment. The Pirates initially started out as another such party. There are a few more, in particular concerned with rights of senior citizens - which actually may poll similar to the two above.

Other than that, there's a host of small parties of people that want to be different. Mostly conservatives who don't like the CDU or CSU, forming their own groups; at municipal level such groups are a lot stronger, sometimes on par with the CDU. The only state where such a group is significant is in Bavaria, where the Free Voters Union is actually in the state government as the minority partner of the CSU. There are other "wannabe different" groups - of the ones in this state election the ÖDP for example is a conservative version of the Greens, the PdV is a "true libertarian" version of the FDP etc. There are a handful small left-wing parties that want to be the "real communists" as opposed to simply joining The Left; these include as the single major group the Stalinists of the DKP.
We also have a couple religious fundamentalist parties, although they are basically irrelevant. Six of them (iirc) in total - two Catholic, one Protestant, one general Christian, one LaRouche-cultist, one "spiritual". If they get lucky - and find candidates in the first place - they'll get 0.2% of the ballot. Combined. The Christian parties tend to be of the lunatic kind, kinda like right-wing Republicans in the USA with the same primary concerns (i.e. condemning to hell: communists, homosexuals, aborting mothers, pornography...).
Final one are the fun parties; these are usually formed to protest established party culture, and tend to be - more or less - anarchist. Only one of these getting any significant vote count is DIE PARTEI, founded by chief editors of the Titanic magazine, a satirical monthly. Some tend to garner interesting vote counts in very localized areas, e.g. the Anarchist Pogo Party gets up to 5% in Hamburg's red-light and party district St. Pauli.

Originally Posted by Doktor

At least they don't have People's Democrats (I think).

In reverse we do. The FDP in the south-west state of Baden-Württemberg traditionally nears the name Demokratische Volkspartei since it was formed from this party. The Democrat People's Party.

As for the top pirate, the current one looks like he might fit in on a ships crew by looks. See here. I think the last general secretary drew more people though.

Thanks for that short concise explanation. Seems we over here complain about the two party system but then there is you with the how many parties today system...

Germany was traditionally (postwar) a three-party state. SPD covering the left wing, CDU covering the right wing, FDP for those in the middle that couldn't decide. FDP tended to be left-of-center, CDU tended to be a bit stronger than the SPD. The extreme edges on either side were cut off, with both communist and national socialist parties being outlawed in 1956 and 1953 respectively.

That changed in the early 80s, when the FDP switched allegiances against half the party member's wishes and voted for Kohl. Caused an upheaval not just in the FDP itself, a lot of people who didn't vote also sought to counterbalance this sudden right-wing shift. During the same time, the Greens were a small up-and-coming topic party mostly concerned with ecological issues, which in this upheaval up till the mid-80s grew into a real party. Hence we suddenly had four parties - two sorta right-of-center (CDU/FDP), two sorta left-of-center (SPD/Greens).
Next upheaval came with Kohl's reunification ploy, which was basically the only thing that kept him in office. The former East-German government party continued to show strongly in East-Germany, getting around 20% in those states - which resulted in enough votes to enter the Federal parliament. That gave us a fifth party, sorta on the left edge. That's where we still are today, although people now have become disillusioned with established parties and the Pirates are the new up-and-coming thing. Whether they actually get anywhere in the long term or are a short-term fad is something that remains to be seen.

All those small parties are basically the German version of voting for a third presidential candidate in the US. Insignificant. Throwing away your vote because you don't want to vote for the established ones.

If you want to compare political parties in the USA to German ones, you have to readjust the center. The US Republicans basically cover what the right wing of the CDU does along with a number of the small fringe parties. The US Democrats cover the left wing of the CDU along with most of the SPD.

Like Syriza in Greece

Merkel just sacked Röttgen, the CDU guy who lost the NRW election last sunday from his post as Federal Minister for the Environment, Nature Protection and Reactor Safety.

Or rather, she "proposed" to President Gauck to "relieve Röttgen of his duties".

Updated amalgated survey results for the Federal Parliament, following the NRW election:

in parentheses: compared to 2009 election result

CDU - 34.33% (+0.53)
SPD - 29.33% (+6.33)
Greens - 13.33% (+2.63)
Pirates - 9.66% (+7.66)
Left - 5.66% (-6.24)
FDP - 4.33% (-10.27)

(amalgated from: INSA 05/22, Forsa 05/16, FGW 05/16)

With that result the seat distribution in the Bundestag would look like this, provided we have the same number of overhang mandates, as a rough scale:

CDU/CSU - 231 seats (-6)
SPD - 197 seats (+51)
Greens - 89 seats (+21)
Pirates - 65 seats (+65)
Left - 38 seats (-38)
FDP - 0 seats (-93)

That would be 286 seats for Red/Green, 428 for a Grand Coalition. 311 needed to rule. In order to get a solid partisan majority, basically the Left and the Pirates both need to lose about 1% to any other party except the FDP. Perfectly possible btw.

Election's in autumn next year.

ES/PT is kinda boring right now (and at halftime break), so here's an update for late June, federal survey...

CDU/CSU - 33.8%
SPD - 29.7%
Greens - 13.2%
Pirates - 6.8%
Left - 6.0%
FDP - 5.0%
Others - 5.5%

Amalgated from: Forsa 06/27, INSA 06/26, GMS 06/22, Infratest 06/22, Emnid 06/17, FGW 06/15
(pretty wide choice of left, pro-pirate and conservative sources, so evening out fair)

Seat distribution with some overhang for 620 total mandates (like above) would be:
CDU/CSU - 221 seats (-16)
SPD - 195 seats (+49)
Greens - 87 seats (+19)
Pirates - 43 seats (+43) [note: compare to above post, where they would get half again as many]
Left - 39 seats (-37)
FDP - 33 seats (-60)

Coalitions:
Grand - 67.2% in parliament / 416 seats (that's damn slim - almost below the 2/3rds majority needed for constitutional changes)
Red/Red/Green - 51.7% in parliament / 321 seats (theoretical majority)
Red/Green - 45.4% in parliament / 282 seats (minority)
Black/Yellow - 41.1% in parliament / 254 seats (minority)

Been a while since the last update. Current surveys for federal level, mid-october timeline. 11 months till election.

CDU/CSU - 37.4%
SPD - 30.3%
Greens - 11.7%
Left - 7.0%
Pirates - 4.8%
FDP - 4.3%
Others - 4.5%

Amalgated from: Forsa (10/17), Allensbach (10/17), Emnid (10/14), FGW (10/11), INSA (10/10), Infratest (10/04)

Seat distribution with some overhang for 620 total mandates (like above) would be:

CDU/CSU - 268 seats (+31)
SPD - 218 seats (+72)
Greens - 84 seats (+16)
Left - 50 seats (-26)
FDP - 0 seats (-93)
Pirates - 0 seats (+0)

Coalitions:
Grand - 78.4% in parliament / 486 seats (solid majority)
Red/Red/Green - 56.7% in parliament / 352 seats (solid theoretical majority)
Red/Green - 48.6% in parliament / 302 seats (just shy of a minority)

Early November update:

CDU - 38.3% / 269 seats (+32)
SPD - 28.8% / 203 seats (+57)
Greens - 14.0% / 99 seats (+31)
Left - 7.0% / 49 seats (-27)
Pirates - 4.0% / 0 seats
FDP - 3.8% / 0 seats (-93)
Others - 4.1% / 0 seats

Red/Green - 48.6% in parliament / 302 seats (unchanged from a month ago)

Amalgated from: Forsa (11/07), Infratest (11/08), Emnid (11/04), INSA (11/06)

Pirates are continuing to deconstruct themselves, leading to voters instead going to shore up the Greens again. The FDP not regaining their voter share means the CDU still comes out rather strong. SPD somewhat lower compared to last month due to pitching in for Steinbrück as chancellor candidate, a member of their right wing.

Lower Saxony is voting today. Traditionally conservative rural state for the most part.

Expected results see the Greens making a good jump forward, CDU and SPD not changing much (CDU slightly down, SPD slightly up), and the FDP with remote chances of getting seats in the parliament. In case the FDP fails to get in their base has already announced the party will get a new leadership at federal level. Left will probably fail to make it in, Pirates have no chance at getting in. SPD will win the cities, CDU the countryside - as usual.