Germany’s unexpected cliffhanger

An obviously desirable feature for an electoral system is that big differences in the result should not turn on very small numbers of votes. The German system (explained here), which is very satisfactory in other ways, has a tendency to fail that test, and it did so again overnight.

As noted in my preview on Friday, the likely fallback option from yesterday’s election was a grand coalition between centre-right (CDU)* and centre-left (SPD). Once upon a time, those two parties commanded the large majority of the vote; only three elections back, in 2013, they had 67.2% between them. But the trend has been mostly downwards. This year, the SPD has dropped to 16.4%, its worst result since 1887; the CDU, although it led the field, underperformed expectations with 28.5% (the second-worst result in its history, after 2021).

So the question was whether the two together would win a majority of seats. And that turned out to depend on whether another party, the Sarah Wagenecht Alliance (BSW), would reach the 5% threshold for representation. It didn’t, but it was very close: it finished with 4.97%, about 13,400 votes short. (See official results here.) The outcome was uncertain until the very end of the count, when the last results from Baden-Württemberg sealed its fate.

The BSW is far-left pro-Putin and anti-immigrant; there was no prospect of it becoming part of a coalition government anyway. But if it had won that handful of extra votes it would have won a bunch of seats (about 35 of them), some of which would have come at the expense of CDU and SPD, leaving them just short of a majority. In that event they would probably have had to rely on the Greens as well, which would have been a tense relationship at best.

This is the second time running that the threshold has been in play: in 2021 the Left party (from which BSW later split) finished on 4.87%. But it still won a full complement of seats because it came first in the local vote in three constituencies, which BSW had no hope of doing. Nor did the Liberals (FDP), who now drop out of parliament after falling more than seven points to 4.33%.

CDU and SPD therefore finish with a majority of 26 between them: 208 and 120 seats respectively out of the total of 630 (down from the large parliament of 735 last time; an electoral reform has eliminated the overhang seats). Their main rival is the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), which doubled its vote to 20.8% and 151 seats.

Three other parties will be represented, although one of them has just a single seat: the South Schleswig Voters Association on 0.2% (as an ethnic minority party it is exempt from the 5% threshold). The others are the Greens, with 11.6% (down 3.1%) and 85 seats, and the Left (Die Linke), with 8.8% (up 3.9%) and 64 seats. Turnout was 82.5%, up more than six points on last time and the highest since reunification.

Centre-right leader Friedrich Merz has claimed victory and will be tasked with forming a government, but it’s basically the SPD or nothing. Although the lavish endorsements from Donald Trump’s team don’t seem to have hurt AfD (nor did they seem to help) they have cemented its reputation as the anti-Ukraine party, and that if nothing else will keep the CDU away from it. Whatever Merz’s other faults, he is solidly in the pro-Ukraine camp.

So are the Greens and (somewhat less so) the Left, and they in combination with the CDU amount to the only other even theoretical majority once AfD is ruled out. The Left’s support surged in the final weeks of the campaign, particularly among young people looking for someone to make a stand against the far right. Given the need for unity in the face of that threat I think this would be a good time to try to bring the Left within the tent, but Merz – to say the least – is not the person to start that process.

Apart from the Left and AfD, no-one had much to celebrate. The CDU was well above 30% in the polls for most of last year, so 28.5% is something of a disappointment. The Greens have the consolation that their vote held up a bit better than the SPD’s, but even together the two have less of the vote than the SPD alone was routinely getting until a decade ago. BSW, having peaked at about 8% in the polls six months ago, will be even more disappointed, and the FDP has unsurprisingly been punished for breaking up the previous government and forcing an early election.

Updates to come after the Germans (and everyone else) have had some time to digest the result.

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* I include throughout under the CDU’s totals its sister party, the CSU, which runs only in Bavaria.

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UPDATE, 3 March: A week later, the CDU and SPD have begun talks on forming a coalition. By German standards that’s a speedy start, indicating that (for good reason) there’s a sense of urgency about the process.

There was also an election overnight in the city-state of Hamburg, the only state election scheduled for this year. Both parties in the incumbent coalition government, the SPD and Greens, went backwards, but they retained their majority: 70 of the 121 seats off 52.0% of the vote, with 45 SPD (down nine) and 25 Greens (down eight).

Of the others, the CDU just edged out the Greens to become the second-largest party with 19.8% (up 8.6%) and 26 seats (up 11). The Left and AfD also gained slightly, rising to 15 and ten seats respectively; no-one else got near the 5% threshold, the left-liberal Volt coming closest with 3.3%. (See official results here.)