German Politics -

How Centuries Old Local Differences Still Influence German Politics, by moonofalabama

The German federal election results did not surprise much. What they do show though are the long term effects of geographic-demographic-political idiosyncrasies.

Here are the general election results for each party and the potential coalitions they could form in parliament to create a government. Voter participation was a still healthy 77%.

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Some explanations:

• The Social-democrats (SPD) are the left of center mainstream party. They won new voters from the other side of the center as well as from the left (Linke). Their candidate for chancellor, the centrist Olaf Scholz, will likely lead the next government.
• The Christian Union (CDU + the Bavarian CSU) are the right of center mainstream party. They lost due to several recent corruption scandals as well as for presenting the gaffe prone Armin Laschet as chancellor candidate.
• The Greens are, well, camouflage green as they are pro-NATO Atlanticists. A few month ago they were artificially hyped as potential leading party but deflated over unexplained exaggerations in their main candidate's vita and a too unrealistic environmental program.
• The FDP are economic liberals who are at times trending towards libertarian.
• The AFD are right to very right wing 'alternative' conservatives. There losses are due to their anti-lockdown and anti-vaccine positions.
• The Left (Linke) is nominally socialist. Over the last two years their leadership has emphasized 'wokeness' instead of socialism which led to a loss of their long term supporters.

The previous government under Chancellor Merkel was a black-red coalition of the Union parties and the Social-democrats.