German Elections & Politics

[mountvernon]

I've noticed that, ever since the Wall came down, the CDU has been unusually strong in Saxony and the SPD in Brandenburg.  Is that solely because of the early popularity of Kurt Biedenkopf and Manfred Stolpe, respectively?  I know that ideological voting is weak in the former DDR.

[mountvernon]

So a bit of a path dependence effect?  Early success by those parties encouraged ambitious politicians to sign up with them. 

Are there any significant demographic differences between Saxony and Brandenburg? I know Saxony has become the most prosperous new Land, but that occurred after the CDU rose to power, not before.  Brandenburg has some gritty industrial towns near the Polish border (Left strongholds, I gather) but also some prosperous suburbs of Berlin.

[mountvernon]

What was DSU?

Basically the CSU's short-lived attempt to expand to East Germany back in 1989/1990 (DSU stands for German Social Union instead of Christian Social Union).

However, the experiment was soon abandoned at the CDU's request, because they didn't want to face a conservative competition outside of Bavaria.

After the DSU was left to survive on its own, it was quickly reduced to the status of a minor splinter party.

That's one part of the story. The other part is: The right wing of the GDR civil rights movement founding a party. The CDU also had been a bloc party, so the DSU started as an alternative for those who did not want to be associated with bloc partydom and the old regime. DSU turned out to attract more conservative people. And then came the CSU intervention that did not really work out well, especially since most competent members went to the CDU quite quickly, at least after they did'nt pass the threshold in the 1990 Bundestag and Landtag elections.

What was the "right wing" of the GDR civil rights movement?  More associated with the Lutheran Church?

How important was the CDU block party in the creation of the "new" CDU in the East?

[mountvernon]

It's not unusual for protest or extremist parties to perform much better with men than with women, and to do especially well with young men.

[mountvernon]

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How important was the CDU block party in the creation of the "new" CDU in the East?
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Very important, as this (and the Democratic Peasant Party) was were most of the members and the ressources came from. With the exception of the top tier of the national level, that was ousted as a scapegoat, many politicians at district (Bezirk) and muncipal (Kreise und Gemeinden) level had unhurted careers, e.g. many CDU mayors and Landräte stayed in office after 1990, though of course the district and muncipial parties had been an fully integrated part of the GDR political system, and their role had not been opposition.
The German unification and the popularity of Kohl and some flagship imports like Kurt Biedenkopf overshadowed this, of course, so they all claim to have been purified and made an 180 degree turn from what they said before October 1989.

And only the SED/PDS was stripped of its property. CDU and FDP were allowed to keep it or at least sell it.
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Who tended to join the CDU block party under the GDR?  Was it stronger in some areas or with some social classes more than others?  I've read that the SPD (outside of Brandenburg) has been hurt a lack of "grassroots" in the East.  Is this because they didn't have a block party to build upon?  (I know that the Soviet-Zone SPD was forcibly incorporated into the SED).

[mountvernon]

I've noticed that, despite the East's famously low level of religious observance, people with church connections seem to have played a disproportionate role in post-unification politics.  This ranges from Merkel and Gauck on the national level to Manfred Stolpe and Christine Lieberknecht at the state level.   What explains this pattern?  The close ties between the Lutheran Church and the dissident movement?  With civil society so weak in the East, was church life the main place to find politically talented and aware people untainted by SED membership?  I know that the post-Communist GDR government was very pastor-heavy.

I have also read that, in the 1990s, religiously observant Easterners (of both confessions) backed the CDU at even higher rates than their Western counterparts.  The main explanation given was that maintaining a religious affiliation (even a nominal one) could be one manifestation of opposition to the GDR regime.  Has this continued?  As far as I can tell, "political Lutherans" run the gamut from Greens to the right-wingers who backed the DSU.  

I'd also expect church involvement in Eastern politics to decline over time, given that religiosity continues to fall, and that more conventional means of entering political life have emerged.

[mountvernon]

. So they probably started with advantages, but the phenomenon of pastor politicians really seems to be constrained to the generation that emerged in 1989/90, although more or less devoted Christians still seem to be overrepresented in CDU, SPD and Greens, though ( I'm not sure about FDP and AfD.)
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Does the Linke face generational challenges as well, given that younger voters have no memory of the GDR?  As former SED members age out of politics, will a nationwide SPD-Linke-Green alliance become more likely?  Or is the Linke still have too great a stigma?