The German national elections are coming up on Sunday, September 22, 2013.
I am a newbie here, so I cannot post links yet, but once that hurdle has been overcome, I will be updating and enhancing the OP greatly.
The first thing to understand about German elections is that it really is an indirect election for the Chancellor of the Republic, who currently is Angela Merkel (CDU). The election is for the membership in and control of their larger house of Parliament, called the "Bundestag".
The Germans have a fascinating way of looking at the idea of "absolute majority".
We all know that 1 vote above 50.00% is absolute majority, but the germans reckon with up to 3% of the vote that will go absolutely nowhere - which is usually called the "scatter vote" - votes for splinter parties that have no chance in the world of making it into the parliament to begin with, for to get even just one seat, your party must get 5.01% in the election.
So: 100 - 3 = 97
97 / 2 = 48.5, and so, to be safe, the Germans establish 48.6% to be absolute majority in their elections.
Whichever party, or whichever coalition of two or more parties, gets to or over 48.6% will not only have the majority of seats in the "Bundestag", they will also get to pick the Chancellor. Of course, the voters know all along exactly who will be sitting in the Chancellor's residence long before the election, this is no secret.
Currently, in Germany, there are five parties that are very likely to get over the 5% hurdle. Two of them are the big "Volksparteien" - big national parties:
CDU/CSU (Christian Democratic Union, to the left of our GOP)
SPD (Social Democratic Party) - quite to the left of our GOP and also to the left of our Democratic Party.
Those two parties each have a kind of little-brother party:
FDP (The Free Democrats, who call themselves the "Liberals", in the sense of neoliberalism, in line with or to the right of our GOP on some things, but to the Left on a number of social issues. The FPD is the most capitalistic-oriented party in Germany.
Die Grüne/Bündnis '90 (The Greens - way to the left)
And there is one more party, made up of the old socialists, mostly from the old East Germany:
Die Linke (the Left).
In 2005, Angela Merkel (CDU) beat Gerhard Schröder (SPD) but was unable to form a coalition with the little brother party FDP. The only combination that was able to get to an absolute majority was the so-called "grand coalition" of the two major parties: CDU and SPD. Since the larger of the two parties gets to put it's man in as Chancellor and the "smaller" party gets to put it's man in as Vice-Chancellor, this would be the equivalent to having had Barack Obama elected President in 2008, but Sarah Palin elected as Vice-President in 2008. Amazingly, the Grand-Coalition seemed to work pretty darned well.
In 2009, the expected coalition of CDU and FDP won the election.
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In Germany, all citizens are automatically registered to vote. They then get a postcard about 3 weeks before the election reminding them of election day and the voting location to which they are assigned. Voting is uniform in Germany, I believe from 8 am to 6 pm. I will research this more. I know that the poll closing times are definitely 6 pm throughout the land.
At 6:01 pm, the results are displayed on the news and boom, it is over, unless of course, the vote is very close. In both 2002 and 2005 the vote was very close and it took a couple more hours to declare the winner.
Usually, a Chancellor's term is 4 years, but you will notice that there are only THREE years between 2002 and 2005. This is because then-Chancellor Gerhärd Schröder, sensing a massive landslide loss coming at him in 2006, pulled a slick parliamentary manuever called the "no-confidence" vote in parliament in July 2005, where he essentially ordered his own party to make a declaration that they no longer had confidence in his ability to lead as Chancellor. The vote went through with an absolute majority and as a result, per German law, national elections had to be called within, I believe, 90 days of the no-confidence vote. In this way, Schröder moved the national elections UP one year, hoping to ride a wave of disappointment in the USA and then-Presidend George W. Bush, Jr. and narrowly win the election - and it almost happened.
This is why what should have been a 2002-2006-2010-2014 election rhythm became a 2002-2005-2009-2013 rhythem, and so on.
There is much more information on German electoral politics to be shared an discussed. This is just the beginning and as soon as I am link-worthy (:)) then I will be linking to all sorts of cool things.
best,
bonncaruso1
questions? Fire away!!! :)
I am a newbie here, so I cannot post links yet, but once that hurdle has been overcome, I will be updating and enhancing the OP greatly.
The first thing to understand about German elections is that it really is an indirect election for the Chancellor of the Republic, who currently is Angela Merkel (CDU). The election is for the membership in and control of their larger house of Parliament, called the "Bundestag".
The Germans have a fascinating way of looking at the idea of "absolute majority".
We all know that 1 vote above 50.00% is absolute majority, but the germans reckon with up to 3% of the vote that will go absolutely nowhere - which is usually called the "scatter vote" - votes for splinter parties that have no chance in the world of making it into the parliament to begin with, for to get even just one seat, your party must get 5.01% in the election.
So: 100 - 3 = 97
97 / 2 = 48.5, and so, to be safe, the Germans establish 48.6% to be absolute majority in their elections.
Whichever party, or whichever coalition of two or more parties, gets to or over 48.6% will not only have the majority of seats in the "Bundestag", they will also get to pick the Chancellor. Of course, the voters know all along exactly who will be sitting in the Chancellor's residence long before the election, this is no secret.
Currently, in Germany, there are five parties that are very likely to get over the 5% hurdle. Two of them are the big "Volksparteien" - big national parties:
CDU/CSU (Christian Democratic Union, to the left of our GOP)
SPD (Social Democratic Party) - quite to the left of our GOP and also to the left of our Democratic Party.
Those two parties each have a kind of little-brother party:
FDP (The Free Democrats, who call themselves the "Liberals", in the sense of neoliberalism, in line with or to the right of our GOP on some things, but to the Left on a number of social issues. The FPD is the most capitalistic-oriented party in Germany.
Die Grüne/Bündnis '90 (The Greens - way to the left)
And there is one more party, made up of the old socialists, mostly from the old East Germany:
Die Linke (the Left).
In 2005, Angela Merkel (CDU) beat Gerhard Schröder (SPD) but was unable to form a coalition with the little brother party FDP. The only combination that was able to get to an absolute majority was the so-called "grand coalition" of the two major parties: CDU and SPD. Since the larger of the two parties gets to put it's man in as Chancellor and the "smaller" party gets to put it's man in as Vice-Chancellor, this would be the equivalent to having had Barack Obama elected President in 2008, but Sarah Palin elected as Vice-President in 2008. Amazingly, the Grand-Coalition seemed to work pretty darned well.
In 2009, the expected coalition of CDU and FDP won the election.
------------------------------------------------------
Nuts-and-Bolts of German electioneering:
In Germany, all citizens are automatically registered to vote. They then get a postcard about 3 weeks before the election reminding them of election day and the voting location to which they are assigned. Voting is uniform in Germany, I believe from 8 am to 6 pm. I will research this more. I know that the poll closing times are definitely 6 pm throughout the land.
At 6:01 pm, the results are displayed on the news and boom, it is over, unless of course, the vote is very close. In both 2002 and 2005 the vote was very close and it took a couple more hours to declare the winner.
Usually, a Chancellor's term is 4 years, but you will notice that there are only THREE years between 2002 and 2005. This is because then-Chancellor Gerhärd Schröder, sensing a massive landslide loss coming at him in 2006, pulled a slick parliamentary manuever called the "no-confidence" vote in parliament in July 2005, where he essentially ordered his own party to make a declaration that they no longer had confidence in his ability to lead as Chancellor. The vote went through with an absolute majority and as a result, per German law, national elections had to be called within, I believe, 90 days of the no-confidence vote. In this way, Schröder moved the national elections UP one year, hoping to ride a wave of disappointment in the USA and then-Presidend George W. Bush, Jr. and narrowly win the election - and it almost happened.
This is why what should have been a 2002-2006-2010-2014 election rhythm became a 2002-2005-2009-2013 rhythem, and so on.
There is much more information on German electoral politics to be shared an discussed. This is just the beginning and as soon as I am link-worthy (:)) then I will be linking to all sorts of cool things.
best,
bonncaruso1
questions? Fire away!!! :)
via JREF Forum http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=263898&goto=newpost
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