🇩🇪 German elections (federal & EU level)

[Oryxslayer]

Another question is earlier some forums were talking about decline of social democracy in Europe so if SPD forms government, does that help their cause or will it be more an isolated case like Portugal and Denmark who have popular social democratic governments but hasn't necessarily helped elsewhere.  Norway just elected theirs so too early to tell while in Sweden, Finland, and Spain polls show them struggling but still competitive not wiped out like Netherlands, France, or Greece.  Only reason I ask is Germany is largest EU member state so often what happens there has impact throughout Europe.  Portugal and Denmark are small countries which few pay attention to.

If anyone was telling you Social Democracy was in declines, you were lied to. If it was a decline of social democratic parties then they are right. This has less to do with any particular party or values but rather multiple mutually reinforcing factors that have been in effect for several decades. These include: The greying/death of the traditional Labor electorate and it's lack of replacement, decline of traditional union industries in favor of technical or professional ones, the internet which has broken the strength of local social groups - like unions - in favor of national ones, changing importance of values among young/middle aged voters, and parliamentary fragmentation as more groups see reason to challenge the old guard.

Mind you this only applies to PR-dominated systems, majoritarian-incentivized systems like the UK can replace their greying voters with new ones through domination of the electoral space.

Many of the examples you list still fit into this trend, because the other side of the declining SocDem/Labor "old-left" parties is the rise of Greens/Equality and Human Rights-focused Liberals/Radical Intelligentsias/Citizen Populists who make up the "new-left." The Scandinavian Social-Democratic parties continue to drop in their percentage at the expense of the minor left: Nowray is going to have a Left govt because of Sp SV, and R's growth, not Ap. Denmark saw the host of minor leftists win more votes and the same number of seats as the Social Democrats. And the SPD here didn't exactly grow enormously - this is still among their worst results ever - it's just that the Greens bit off enough of Merkel's Union vote to send it spiraling down.

Now what we may have been blind to, because these governments were/are still in power, was the simultaneous decline of the old-right in favor of a similar host of new-right parties. It just takes longer cause their natural base is the old and the old-left's is not, so generational replacement takes longer. But there are many examples. LR remain in tumult and are more or less along for the Macron ride, the fall of Berlusconi's machine, whatever ends up happening in Ireland in reaction to SF now getting seen as a left party rather than a nationalist one, and now the Union.

[mileslunn]

Its true fragmentation is a real issue in countries that use PR.  Malta and New Zealand seem two notable exceptions as first remains a two party system while latter used FTFP up until mid 90s so perhaps it will eventually fragment over time but is taking a bit longer.  Canada which uses FTFP is seeing that to some extent but more due to regional divides not across the country like in Europe.  UK is not largely due to system as I suspect in any other European country you wouldn't have Tony Blair and Jeremy Corbyn in same party (former in liberal or social democratic party, latter in further left) just as you wouldn't have Kenneth Clarke and Jacob Rees-Mogg in same party either.  US is off course the one you are not seeing fragmentation but since its winner take all, easy to unite half the country on stopping a particular party.

But yes you are right on parties on right seeing similar decline for most part with a few exceptions.  Even in Spain Popular party may be leading in polls but not too long ago anything under 40% was a bad result for them whereas now anything over 30% is considered a good result thanks to rise of Vox and to lesser extent C's.  Austria and Greece though still have centre-right doing well although in Greece bonus seats for winner probably helps.  OVP while doing better than most centre-right parties and highest its been in a while, still mid to upper 30s is below what they got historically but not record low.  FPO also has been around a lot longer than most right wing populist parties so perhaps that is why while Greens there mostly coming at expense of SPO.  Neos hard to say who they are hurting most but probably equally both sides.  But still point taken.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

East Frisia and Northern Hesse are SPD strongholds because they are very industrial and very Protestant.* Despite stereotypes they have not actually been rural backwaters for a long time; longer than anyone posting on this forum has been alive and the only North/Western European countries where they would not be fertile ground for the primary social democratic party of record are those in which that party has collapsed into irrelevance or never had much to start with.

_{*A couple of additional cultural matters add further to SPD strength in the former, much in the way that similar issues add extra percentages to CSU totals in Bavaria and so on.}

[palandio]

See also

"Why is East Frisia so red?"
https://talkelections.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=452537.0

By the way there is a lot to "tradition". Historical reasons form party allegiance. Party allegiance forms political convictions. Political convictions influence voting behaviour. Voting behaviour on the local level influences local politics, local politics influences what is considered "middle-of-the-road" etc. In most places electoral "tradition" plays a bigger role than in today's US and even there it keeps lurking behind every corner.

One point that is highly discutible but that may play a role is that Germany has the Greens that function as what comes closest to an American idea of "liberal" or "progressive" which might make it easier for the SPD to be perceived as a party that is socially "middle-of-the-road", focused on bread-and-butter issues and cares for the "simple man".

[mileslunn]

East Frisia and Northern Hesse are SPD strongholds because they are very industrial and very Protestant.* Despite stereotypes they have not actually been rural backwaters for a long time; longer than anyone posting on this forum has been alive and the only North/Western European countries where they would not be fertile ground for the primary social democratic party of record are those in which that party has collapsed into irrelevance or never had much to start with.

_{*A couple of additional cultural matters add further to SPD strength in the former, much in the way that similar issues add extra percentages to CSU totals in Bavaria and so on.}

That makes sense.  Obviously in Germany tough to compare to US or Canada as even so called rural areas are far more densely populated than in those two countries thus why right wing dominance not as automatic.  However UK is similar here and while its true areas like this were mostly Labour strongholds in UK until very recently, many similar areas Boris Johnson was able to win.  Correct me if I am wrong but they seem comparable to Copeland, Northwest Durham, Workington, Sedgefield which are all semi-rural and all Labour strongholds until very recently.  Mind you Scholz is a lot more moderate than Corbyn so its quite possible those areas in UK would have stayed Labour if they had someone similar to Scholz.  For US comparisons, a good example is Iron Range which will Democrats still have some residual strength, its not the Democrat stronghold it once was.  Only reason Minnesota has not moved right is due to Democrat gains in Minneapolis-St. Paul area easily cancel those out.  Asides from much lower population density, Canadian equivalents perhaps Northern Ontario, Cape Breton Island, and North Vancouver Island which did vote for Liberals or NDP, but were much closer than historical and wouldn't be surprised if Tories flip those areas whenever they return to power.

Also could fact all parties close to centre and Germany lacks the ideological polarization you see in English speaking world also play a role.  Left/right polarization seems much weaker in Germany than English speaking countries so that might help avoid the rural/urban polarization you have there.  I know in both US and Canada, Merkel and Laschet would be called RINOs in US or Liberal lite in Canada.  Certainly right in Canada and the US unlike Germany expects far more ideological purity and thus left being more dogmatic and turn off in rural areas could be partly a backlash to that.  Likewise on left, I believe a lot of the purists tend to be younger generations who are still very idealistic and not older members who are more pragmatic.  And SPD did quite well amongst seniors, quite a contrast with Labour Party which skews very much younger like Greens do.  To be fair in Canada Liberals do well amongst older voters while its NDP who skews younger, still both are very much big city parties and much weaker in rural areas than SPD, but not quite as urban centric as Greens are.

[Anzeigenhauptmeister]

Since this post had been reported for being "too big", I'll do you a favor and hope that I've now made it compatible with this site's ToS... 🙄

[Clarko95 📚💰📈]

Volt getting their strongest result in Frankfurt is a fitting example of why they are such a vapid, terrible party

[buritobr]

Sum of the progressive vote

1949: 35.0% (SPD+KPD)
1953: 31.0% (SPD+KPD)
1957: 31.8% (SPD)
1961: 36.2% (SPD)
1965: 39.3% (SDP)
1969: 42.7% (SPD)
1972: 46.1% (SPD+DKP)
1976: 42.9% (SPD+DKP)
1980: 44.6% (SPD+Grüne+DKP)
1983: 44.0% (SPD+Grüne+DKP)
1987: 45.3% (SPD+Grüne)
1990: 40,9% (SPD+Grüne+PDS)
1994: 48.1% (SPD+Grüne+PDS)
1998: 52.7% (SPD+Grüne+PDS)
2002: 51.1% (SPD+Grüne+PDS)
2005: 51.0% (SPD+Grüne+Linke)
2009: 45.6% (SPD+Grüne+Linke)
2013: 42.7% (SPD+Grüne+Linke)
2017: 38.6% (SPD+Grüne+Linke)
2021: 45.4% (SPD+Grüne+Linke)

This is an oversimplification, party platforms change, sometimes there can be progressive vote outside these parties.
But we can see here that since 1969, the sum of the progressive vote is stable around 45%. The exceptions are the bad performances of 1990 (reunification) and 2017, and the good performances of 1998, 2002 and 2005, when Gehrard Schröder was running.

[Astatine]

Sum of the progressive vote

1949: 35.0% (SPD+KPD)
1953: 31.0% (SPD+KPD)
1957: 31.8% (SPD)
1961: 36.2% (SPD)
1965: 39.3% (SDP)
1969: 42.7% (SPD)
1972: 46.1% (SPD+DKP)
1976: 42.9% (SPD+DKP)
1980: 44.6% (SPD+Grüne+DKP)
1983: 44.0% (SPD+Grüne+DKP)
1987: 45.3% (SPD+Grüne)
1990: 40,9% (SPD+Grüne+PDS)
1994: 48.1% (SPD+Grüne+PDS)
1998: 52.7% (SPD+Grüne+PDS)
2002: 51.1% (SPD+Grüne+PDS)
2005: 51.0% (SPD+Grüne+Linke)
2009: 45.6% (SPD+Grüne+Linke)
2013: 42.7% (SPD+Grüne+Linke)
2017: 38.6% (SPD+Grüne+Linke)
2021: 45.4% (SPD+Grüne+Linke)

This is an oversimplification, party platforms change, sometimes there can be progressive vote outside these parties.
But we can see here that since 1969, the sum of the progressive vote is stable around 45%. The exceptions are the bad performances of 1990 (reunification) and 2017, and the good performances of 1998, 2002 and 2005, when Gehrard Schröder was running.

Between 1972 and 1980 (maybe even including 1969), the FDP would probably also account for the progressive camp as the Liberals ran on forming a social-liberal coalition with the SPD.
I would lean to exclude KPD and DKP from this calculation.

[buritobr]

Yes, I read that the FDP in the 1970s had a left-wing that was more "liberal" concerning the support of the civil rights than "liberal" concerning the support of the free market economy. This wing doesn't exist anymore.

KPD had 5.7% in 1949, more than PDS/Linke in 1990, 1994, 1998, 2002 and 2021.

[Astatine]

Yes, I read that the FDP in the 1970s had a left-wing that was more "liberal" concerning the support of the civil rights than "liberal" concerning the support of the free market economy. This wing doesn't exist anymore.

KPD had 5.7% in 1949, more than PDS/Linke in 1990, 1994, 1998, 2002 and 2021.

The FDP was a social-liberal party from 1971 on at least (introducing the "Freiburger Thesen" manifesto), and slowly faded out of that role from 1977 on (introduction of the "Kieler Thesen", that were way more pro-free market) although they supported the SPD in their re-election bid in 1980 because the CDU/CSU chancellor candidate Franz Josef Strauß was a staunch conservative. With the FDP changing sides in 1982, the social-liberal wing gradually declined with prominent members either switching to the SPD or some splinter parties such as the "Liberal Democrats" (they still exist).
While the FDP doesn't really have classical "wing" organization like the SPD or Die Linke does (such as Seeheimer Kreis for SPD, Kommunistische Plattform and Emanzipatorische Linke for Die Linke etc.), there are still some members around that are more in line with the once-dominant social-liberal tradition of the party (once-Minister under the SPD/FDP coalition Gerhart Baum, but also some younger faces like Jens Teutrine, who was just elected to the Bundestag), that gets compensated by other more conservative members. But yeah, broadly speaking the party's emphasis on free markets is relatively unanimous.

Well I tend to not label a party that was banned for clearly aiming to abolish democratic principles and the liberal democratic basic order (that's written down in the constitution for obvious reasons) as "progressive".

[vileplume]

East Frisia and Northern Hesse are SPD strongholds because they are very industrial and very Protestant.* Despite stereotypes they have not actually been rural backwaters for a long time; longer than anyone posting on this forum has been alive and the only North/Western European countries where they would not be fertile ground for the primary social democratic party of record are those in which that party has collapsed into irrelevance or never had much to start with.

_{*A couple of additional cultural matters add further to SPD strength in the former, much in the way that similar issues add extra percentages to CSU totals in Bavaria and so on.}

That makes sense.  Obviously in Germany tough to compare to US or Canada as even so called rural areas are far more densely populated than in those two countries thus why right wing dominance not as automatic.  However UK is similar here and while its true areas like this were mostly Labour strongholds in UK until very recently, many similar areas Boris Johnson was able to win.  Correct me if I am wrong but they seem comparable to Copeland, Northwest Durham, Workington, Sedgefield which are all semi-rural and all Labour strongholds until very recently.  Mind you Scholz is a lot more moderate than Corbyn so its quite possible those areas in UK would have stayed Labour if they had someone similar to Scholz.  For US comparisons, a good example is Iron Range which will Democrats still have some residual strength, its not the Democrat stronghold it once was.  Only reason Minnesota has not moved right is due to Democrat gains in Minneapolis-St. Paul area easily cancel those out.  Asides from much lower population density, Canadian equivalents perhaps Northern Ontario, Cape Breton Island, and North Vancouver Island which did vote for Liberals or NDP, but were much closer than historical and wouldn't be surprised if Tories flip those areas whenever they return to power.

Also could fact all parties close to centre and Germany lacks the ideological polarization you see in English speaking world also play a role.  Left/right polarization seems much weaker in Germany than English speaking countries so that might help avoid the rural/urban polarization you have there.  I know in both US and Canada, Merkel and Laschet would be called RINOs in US or Liberal lite in Canada.  Certainly right in Canada and the US unlike Germany expects far more ideological purity and thus left being more dogmatic and turn off in rural areas could be partly a backlash to that.  Likewise on left, I believe a lot of the purists tend to be younger generations who are still very idealistic and not older members who are more pragmatic.  And SPD did quite well amongst seniors, quite a contrast with Labour Party which skews very much younger like Greens do.  To be fair in Canada Liberals do well amongst older voters while its NDP who skews younger, still both are very much big city parties and much weaker in rural areas than SPD, but not quite as urban centric as Greens are.

Not the Cumbia ones. Labour's strength there came from the manufacturing towns along the coast (Workington, Whitehaven, Maryport etc.). The rural areas of the Lake District as well as the smaller towns (e.g. St Bees) have long been Tory voting, but until Brexit the Labour areas could comfortably outvote them. Similarly in a seat like Bassetlaw the rural east of the seat always voted like neighbouring rural Lincolnshire (i.e. very Tory) but until recently it could be outvoted by the working class towns, the largest being Worksop and East Retford.

Durham does have more of a traditional 'rural' Labour vote though this was down to the very deprived pit-villages, not pretty farming/hill country. These areas were already shifting Tory pre-Brexit though as the demographics that made them Labour; working class, collectivist mindset was literally dying off and being replaced by more typical village demographics (i.e. Tory inclined). Bishop Auckland for example swung Tory in 2015 even though Labour did pretty well in working class northern areas that year.  

[parochial boy]

Well I tend to not label a party that was banned for clearly aiming to abolish democratic principles and the liberal democratic basic order (that's written down in the constitution for obvious reasons) as "progressive".

The difference between "progressive" and "left wing". I get the feeling that in atlas-speak they are often taken to be synonymous, which isn't always how they are used in descriptors in (probably principcally European). Eg, (being parochial) the Swiss Green Liberals are a progressive party, without being a left wing one - the same could also be said for the likes of Volt.

Which, continuing my obsession with small parties - a summary of the "progressive" vote would probably need to include the combined ~3,5% that the Tierschutzpartei, die Partei, Volt and Pirates got this year. Which is rather more than what the post war Communists were mostly getting.

Volt getting their strongest result in Frankfurt is a fitting example of why they are such a vapid, terrible party

Swabian Querdenker out in force. Although I met a guy from the Black Forest recently, and when I said that was Swabia I got a very, (very) long explanation as to why that wasn't actually the case.

[President Johnson]

Sum of the progressive vote

1949: 35.0% (SPD+KPD)
1953: 31.0% (SPD+KPD)
1957: 31.8% (SPD)
1961: 36.2% (SPD)
1965: 39.3% (SDP)
1969: 42.7% (SPD)
1972: 46.1% (SPD+DKP)
1976: 42.9% (SPD+DKP)
1980: 44.6% (SPD+Grüne+DKP)
1983: 44.0% (SPD+Grüne+DKP)
1987: 45.3% (SPD+Grüne)
1990: 40,9% (SPD+Grüne+PDS)
1994: 48.1% (SPD+Grüne+PDS)
1998: 52.7% (SPD+Grüne+PDS)
2002: 51.1% (SPD+Grüne+PDS)
2005: 51.0% (SPD+Grüne+Linke)
2009: 45.6% (SPD+Grüne+Linke)
2013: 42.7% (SPD+Grüne+Linke)
2017: 38.6% (SPD+Grüne+Linke)
2021: 45.4% (SPD+Grüne+Linke)

This is an oversimplification, party platforms change, sometimes there can be progressive vote outside these parties.
But we can see here that since 1969, the sum of the progressive vote is stable around 45%. The exceptions are the bad performances of 1990 (reunification) and 2017, and the good performances of 1998, 2002 and 2005, when Gehrard Schröder was running.

Between 1972 and 1980 (maybe even including 1969), the FDP would probably also account for the progressive camp as the Liberals ran on forming a social-liberal coalition with the SPD.
I would lean to exclude KPD and DKP from this calculation.

It's interesting that Lindner, while ruling out a "shift towards the left", recently spoke about a government of a "progress-friendly center" (fortschrittfreundliches Zentrum). I think that term should be a contender for word of the year, together with Vorsondierungen and Ampelkoalition.

[buritobr]

Yes, I wanted to mean "left" and I used the word "progressive" as a synonym.
I included the DKP in the 1970s because 0.3% is not negligible.

Die Partei is only a funny party.
I didn't include the Pirates in the sum because some Pirates are libertarian.

[Astatine]

Outgoing Ministers for Economy and Defense, Peter Altmaier and Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, are retiring from politics and just resigned from their seats in the Bundestag, to avail Nadine Schön and Markus Uhl (who had been MPs before) to succeed them.

[rob in cal]

Don't know if anyone has touched on this, but pre election polling was somewhat close in general to results, but most or all polls at the end were showing a red red green majority, some even a pretty big one like 48-44. So I suppose thats getting into the direction of moderate polling failure.

[President Johnson]

Aaand... Söder is at it again, now saying at a local party convention that Armin Laschet was de facto not wanted and is responsible for the defeat. He immediately got a harsh response from fellow MP Daniel Günther, who said Söder is trying to bully others to look better himself. Söder also added the Union should not ingratiate itsself to Greens and FDP. He's definitely working overtime to put the final nail in Jamaica's coffin and therefore Laschets last "life insurance" as CDU leader.

[buritobr]

Don't know if anyone has touched on this, but pre election polling was somewhat close in general to results, but most or all polls at the end were showing a red red green majority, some even a pretty big one like 48-44. So I suppose thats getting into the direction of moderate polling failure.

I already expected that red-red-green would not get the majority and wrote it in the forecast thread.
Except the german elections in 2002 and 2005, the right does always better than the polls predict

[mileslunn]

Earlier, we got a municipal map.  Wonder if anyone with good computer skills could produce the following: (chose whatever colours you think is best) but following two maps:

1.  Whether right or left got more votes so for simplicity right is CDU/CSU + FDP + AfD while left is SPD + Greens + Die Linke.  Be curious to see if urban/rural divide exists as seems a lot of smaller urban areas and rural ones SPD won, right got more votes whereas in urban areas, left generally got more.

2.  A map where left got over 50% and where right got over 50% and then ones where neither cracked 50% mark.

Just be interesting as this site is about maps, but understand doing it manually very tedious and would take a long time and most of us probably don't have the time or patience for that.  But if one knows how to code things by computer, could have it done instantaneously. 

[Sir Mohamed]

Do recent CDU developments mean any govt with a Christan Democratic chancellor is off the table? If Mr. Lashet is about to leave, it would be pretty bad optics to elect a chancellor that didn't run in the election as such. Even if that is technically legal.

[Middle-aged Europe]

Do recent CDU developments mean any govt with a Christan Democratic chancellor is off the table? If Mr. Lashet is about to leave, it would be pretty bad optics to elect a chancellor that didn't run in the election as such. Even if that is technically legal.

Greens and FDP haven't ruled it out as an option if Traffic light negotiations fail. Technically, Laschet is still the CDU chairman and Chancellor-candidate although scuttlebutt is that Markus Söder stands ready as a replacement in such a scenario (although this also raises the question whether the CDU would stand united behind Söder considering a lot of them scolded hin for his attacks on Laschet recently - CDU/CSU Bundestag caucus leader Ralph Brinkhaus is often mentioned as a compromise candidate though).

[Astatine]

On Friday, the final official result will be announced, and some minor changes that affect the seat distribution could happen by then. By then, all re-counts and possible irregularities have to be completed - In Germany, there is no real "law" mandating a recount, but rather a general check of results by the respective authorities, for instance if a party performed disproportionally well in one precinct while another did extremely bad. Such mistakes can happen, for instance if ballots were switched by accident when counting, but they have rarely ever had any impact on the final outcome.

- In the constituency of Munich West, the final result has been announced, and CSU retains that seat by 137 votes (the preliminary results had the CSU ahead by 146 votes). If the Greens had gained that seat instead of the CSU, the Bundestag would have shrunken from 735 to 716 seats thanks to the complicated leveling calculations and the CSU running as a distinct party, which complicates the seat compensation.
- CDU was 738 votes away from gaining another seat, and with most vote tallies completed, it seems like they made it (one county seemed to have report problems, but the precinct results have been added since in the final vote tally) by a comfortable amount of votes - Hence, the Bundestag size will probably increase to 736.
- One seat of the Greens flips from NRW's to Bavaria's list.

[Gass3268]

Is there any place where I could see how the math worked in this election for the Party list seats?

[President Johnson]

Is there any place where I could see how the math worked in this election for the Party list seats?

Try this one: https://www.mandatsrechner.de/