German Politics Thread

Neither Greens nor SPD care much for foreign intervention or defence spending, so I don't think the FDP will contest them much there. Baerbock made a lot of noise against Russia and Nordstream 2, but I feel like both Greens and FDP will likely leave foreign policy to the SPD, since both parties like to concentrate more on domestic policies in the first place, as far as I understand. Maybe the FDP gets ministry of defence, if the SPD is willing to give it up, as a "bribe" for ministry of finance. But that is just speculation on my part.

Honestly, the biggest front seems really to be fiscal policy and thats pretty much why Greens and FDP are currently in talks. If they get it sorted, then the biggest hurdle to a coalition is taken. Though, it all depends how far the SPD will compromise, though I get the feeling there is plenty of leeway there. Scholz knows he needs both parties and both parties know they are Kingmaker.

In other news, it seems like the AFD fell for a made-up marketing-company, that offered to make election-flyers for them. A total of one million flyers were paid for, but did not get delivered. Zentrum für Politische Schönheit (Center of political beauty) claims to be responsible and states that the AFD downplayed the loss and that they actually paid for ''five million'.

Part of me should be frowning on fraud, but another part kinda admires their audacity.

EDIT: Pagetopper, again.

Edited by TheNohen on Sep 28th 2021 at 7:24:03 PM

The minister posts are not divided by party size but by the number of parties involved. Furthermore the FDP has a kingmaker scenario here, which means they are in a much stronger position than their election result indicates. The SPD needs to convince them to join a coalition, not vice versa.

Well, looks like the Af D was stupid enough to not sign a legal contract and thus can not sue them, but sabotaging the election campaign of a party is concerning and hopefully something that is looked into. It is all fun as long as the Af D is the victim, but there are certainly far-left and far-right groups that might look to do the same to democratic parties.

Edited by Zarastro on Sep 28th 2021 at 7:27:00 PM

The FDP's position is also drastically weakened by not being solely kingmaker, though. The FDP and the Greens have each other hostage, since if the grand coalition is off the table, they both must be in government—which means the smallest of the three necessary parties can't dictate getting the most important ministerial spots.

So we can't solely look at what the FDP desires out of this.

Edited by RainehDaze on Sep 28th 2021 at 6:31:05 PM

It seems odd that party size has no normative bearing on how many ministries a party gets, surely a party that won larger amounts of support shouldn't be treated as equal to one that did not?

Yeah, but the FDP is the party who could probably justify it the best to their voters if they end up refusing joining a government, especially when they can cite tax and economic policies that would have gone completely against their values.

The Green party would have to explain why they did not form a government, despite sending an urgent message during the campaign that actions have to be taken now against climate change, before it is too late.

Well, the bigger party needs the smaller one to form a government, and the smaller one is the one who - as history shows - is more in the danger of getting punished by their voters if they are perceived to not have implemented their agenda. Thus concessions are necessary.

Edited by Zarastro on Sep 28th 2021 at 7:38:45 PM

If it’s not based on party size how is it that the CDU had two thirds of the ministries in the last government, shouldn’t the SPD have been able to negotiate more than than their relative weight?

My assumption is that the FDP has to work out how far it can push the SDP before it comes across as being a tail trying to wag the dog and thus gets the blame if talks collapse.

I’d assume that the FDP is at a disadvantage when it comes to public perception, as if the SPD and Greens manage a united front then that increases the likelihood of blame falling on the FDP if talks collapse.

The SPD got all the important ministries they wanted - Finance, Labour, Justice, Foreign office - and a coalition treaty that heavily favoured their agenda while the CDU got mostly less important ones, or those that are either seen as minefields (defence) or simply not political suitable (interior) for the SP Ds' image. Merkel was really desperate to get them on board.

A similar deal would give the FDP Finance and Economy and Infrastructure, yet fewer ministries. However I am certain that SPD and Green party would rather give the FDP two or three less important ministries than e.g. the Economy.

Edited by Zarastro on Sep 28th 2021 at 9:05:20 PM

Yeah, I can't see anyone agreeing to give a party with a different economic platform than them both Finance and the Economy—that's not a coalition, that's handing over leverage to basically anything. Including, say, the Greens' highest priority.

Finance and economy are also pretty much the resorts the FDP shouldn't even be allowed near to, unfortunately.

Edited by DrunkenNordmann on Sep 28th 2021 at 9:15:27 PM

The FDP would in a traffic light coalition be the only one that could be trusted with those ministries.

From the perspective of a CDU voter sure, but as the CDU isn’t part of the proposed government I don’t think that perspective is going to get championed very far.

Pretty much that.

Greens and SPD already said they'd rather the CDU goes into opposition. They can use that time productively to do some re-organising (and probably pull their knives out against Laschet, considering many within the party blame him for the bad electoral performance).

Edited by DrunkenNordmann on Sep 28th 2021 at 9:39:35 PM

Note that the FDP walked away from joining a Coalition in 2017 already and got a lot of bad press and blood for it, doubt they want to repeat that.

So there's that too.

Also, very worst case I hope SPD, Greens, Left and FDP ram through a proper electoral reform before a possible nee election

Edited by 3of4 on Sep 28th 2021 at 10:37:32 AM

Arguably more from a perspective of anyone who is concerned about long-term fiscal solvency but we shall see.

And yet they got rewarded for it with a better election result than in 2017.

By the same token the EU bigwigs probably will want to keep the FDP as far away as possible from the finance ministry...

It’s a pretty arrogant and condescending argument, also one based not simply on economics but also emotional fears of certain economic conditions.

Walking away one says your principled, walking away twice says you’re a glorified protest vote with no interest in governing.

Also less than a percent better is not that much to write home about to the Greens getting over half their previous votes on top.

So if the FDP pulls a 2017 again and we get another round of elections I wouldn't be confident of them getting more votes...

Edited by 3of4 on Sep 28th 2021 at 11:41:38 AM

Doesn't make it any less true. The financial plans of the SPD and Green party are simply irresponsible knowing that we will soon face the real impact of Germany's demographic decline. Any future government will have the unenviable task of having balance Germany's finances again after Covid and the ongoing retirement of the baby boomer generation. With the FDP on board chances are higher that we will see it in a manner that does not just ruin our economy and burden future generations with even more debt.

Edited by Zarastro on Sep 28th 2021 at 12:15:39 PM

The point of it being arrogant and condescending is that it's not true, not in any way that matters. Economics and fiscal policy in general do not work on there being a One True Way, and an excessive focus on public debt in particular is definitely just an ideological point.

Yeah, I’m gonna go out on a limb and say that future generations would rather the government take on some debt than they have to deal with a collapsed Gulf Stream meaning Germany freezes.

Tell that to those who are obsessed with the debt and their statistical waifu, the black zero.

Are deficit hawks much of a thing in Germany?

Yes. Very much so. To the deficit hawks, inflation is of great concern there due in part to the hyper-inflation the country once suffered.

Edited by M84 on Sep 29th 2021 at 10:49:46 PM

Yeah, the Weimar era and its fascist consequences really warped the German political establishment.

Hence why they're infected with the balanced budgets brain bug.

And they've infected the EU with it.