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German Culture: German Politics

Robert Easton

Germany, or the Federal Republic of Germany as it is officially titled, is a parliamentary democracy of about 80 million people. It was created in 1949 at the end of four years of Allied occupation after World War II.

In 1990 it was united with East Germany (The German Democratic Republic). The post-unification political system is largely similar to that of pre-unification West Germany.

Germany has a written constitution known as the 'Basic Law', which states that the people of Germany hold sovereignty. Germans directly elect their house of parliament, the Bundestag, and Bundestag members then elect the head of government, the Federal Chancellor. Germany's other chamber, the Bundesrat, is made up of the delegates of state governments.

There is also a President who is elected once every five years by a Federal Assembly. This is a special body with the sole function of electing the President. The members are parliamentarians, representatives of state governments, and members of Germany's sport, business and cultural worlds.

The president's role is largely ceremonial, he is supposed to remain aloof of party politics.

The German Bundestag is the main legislative body. It is currently dominated by the Christian Democratic Union, the Social Democratic Party of Germany, the Free Democratic Party, the Party of Democratic Socialism, and the Greens.

The system by which they are elected is called personalised proportional representation. This means it's easier for smaller parties to be represented in parliament, and at the same time each region still gets its own special representative. It also means it's very complicated to understand.

Basically, the Bundestag is split into two parts, half of which are elected 'regionally', where the individual winner in each region 'takes it all' and gets the seat in parliament for that area.

Then the other half are elected by a proportional representation system, where seats are allocated according to the party's total number of votes. Every voter has two votes, one for each 'half' of the Bundestag.

The current German Chancellor is Angela Merkel, who rules in a Grand Coalition of her own CDU, and their traditional opponent the SDP. An East German with a background in science, Merkel only entered politics after the fall of the Berlin Wall. She was elected in 2005 after a hard-fought election where her CDU/CSU alliance gained a majority of only 1%.

The previous German Chancellor was Gerhard Schroeder, who took over from sixteen years of rule by the portly Helmut Kohl (Kohl means cabbage). Schroeder, who stepped down as leader of the Social Democratic party in 2005, is currently on his fourth marriage.

He was often criticised for having a lack of any strong convictions, and he did not manage to pull Germany out of its economic slump during his time as Chancellor.

Schroeder attempted the biggest overhaul of Germany's welfare state since World War II, cutting jobless benefit and pensions whilst making it easier to sack workers and introducing fees for visiting the doctor.

Before the election Merkel promised vigorous economic reforms which would have involved adding a market element to the healthcare system, but many of her plans will have to be shelved because of the accommodation necessary with a coalition government. She has already made several foreign trips, and is said to be in favour of reviving the EU constitution.

Germany's history, and the idea of what is Germany, and who is German, is a not only complicated, but also sensitive issue. The idea of a German nation is one that has not been around for a very long time.

Germans have been united as German-speakers for much longer than they have been united as people from the same country. Some regard the Holy Roman Empire as having been the first 'Germany', but it covered an area different from the Germany we see today.

The Holy Roman Empire lasted about 1000 years until its dissolution in 1806. It was once described by Voltaire as 'neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire'.

The first evidence of the Holy Roman Empire being a 'German' state, would appear to be around 1512, when the name 'The Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation' was first used.

To summarise, after the fall of the Holy Roman Empire, the area which is now Northern Germany became dominated by Prussia, and Southern Germany by the German Confederation.

This situation continued until the formation of the German Empire in 1871. The Weimar Republic, the first attempt to install a liberal democracy in Germany, was formed in 1918 at the end of World War I. This republic failed with the accession of Hitler in 1933.

In Nazi ideology the Nazi state was known as the Third Reich, (Reich meaning empire) counting the Holy Roman Empire as the first and the German Empire as the second, implying a return to former glory after the ignominy of the Weimar Republic.

The Third Reich lasted until 1945 when Germany was defeated in World War II. The time was dominated by the spread of Hitler's poisonous fascist ideology, National Socialism (Nazism).

Nazis believed that the German Nation and the Aryan race were superior to other races, and led persecution of many ethnic and social groups in Germany. They targeted Roma (gypsies), the handicapped, Poles, Russians, Communists, Socialists, Jehovah's Witnesses, but particularly Jews.

Approximately six million Jews were killed during Nazi times. This is known as the Holocaust, a Greek word meaning 'sacrifice by fire.'

In November 2004 a plot by Neo-Nazis to plant a bomb in a Jewish Centre was foiled by police. Around eleven members of 'Kameradschaft Süd' (Southern Comradeship), a Neo-Nazi organisation were arrested. Germany still struggles with such groups, which typically espouse anti-semitism, violence, holocaust denial and overthrow of the Federal Republic, whilst idolising Hitler.

Image of the Branderburger Gate courtesy of Berlin Tourist information Office

Other articles by Robert Easton
The Amber Room
The Berlin Wall
Austrian Beer
Austrian Food
German Beer
German Cars
German Food
German Music
German Philosophers
German Politics
German Stereotypes
Hiking in Austria
Johannes Gutenberg
Michael Schumacher
Sex in Germany
Sex in Austria
Sex in Switzerland
Skiing in Switzerland
Swiss Stereotypes
William Tell

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