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West Germany and the Politics of Centrality

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2014

Gordon Smith
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WHEN MANY COUNTRIES IN WESTERN EUROPE ARE EXPERIENCING A flux or even a teeming confusion in their party systems, West Germany stands out as a case of almost aberrant cohesion. The ageold yearning for ‘the German synthesis’ finds its apparent modern fulfilment in the party system. The uncomfortable extremes of left and right have for long hovered around virtual electoral extinction, and the rise of new movements – such as forms of neo-Poujadism in Scandinavia or the rediscovery of the territorial dimension of politics as in Britain – has left the Federal Republic untouched. The two major contenders for power, the SPD and the CDU, dominate the electoral scene, and in so doing seem to be locked in an embrace from which neither is able to escape.

Type
Original Article
Information
Government and Opposition , Volume 11 , Issue 4 , 01 October 1976 , pp. 387 - 407
Copyright
Copyright © Government and Opposition Ltd 1976

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References

1 However, the continuing Schmidt‐Brandt partnership is important: Chancellor Schmidt reassures the FDP whilst Brandt, as party chairman, presents a more flexible image within the party. Both Brandt and Schmidt won overwhelming votes for party offices at the SPD Mannheim conference in November 1975.

2 The new law on codetermination was finally passed in 1976 after years of haggling over the precise composition of the supervisory boards of the 600 large companies affected. Trade union and SPD demands were not met since the boards will have a marginal but critical weighting in favour of shareholders and executive management—a victory for FDP stubbornness.

3 The question posed by Left‐wing critics—Wolf‐Dieter Narr and others, SPD—Staatspartei oder Reformpartei?, Piper Verlag, 1976. The core of criticism is represented by the party’s Jungsozialisten, but the Jusos have little influence on party policy. All SPD members up to the age of 35 are eligible, but the proportion active is small; at their Dortmund conference in March 1976 there were indications of a waning influence of the extreme Left. Weight should also be given to the party’s own concern with future reform, especially the ten‐year policy‐document, Orientierungsrahmen′85, adopted at Mannheim in 1975. Reforms that the party has tried to bring about (abortion law, codetermination, vocational training, corporate and personal tax reform, family law) have always been watered down by forces outside the party’s control.

4 The selection of a ‘chancellor‐candidate’ is necessary for both major parties since a new Bundestag has to elect a chancellor and the prior election campaign polarizes between the two rivals. But the party’s candidate need not be the leader of the parliamentary party nor its national chairman; hence authority is frequently divided.

5 The career of Kurt Biedenkopf may be indicative of a trend in the CDU. He became secretary‐general of the party in 1973 (a post only created in 1966) and he is a political figure rather than an administrative one as his book, Fortschritt in Freiheit, Piper Verlag, 1974, amply shows. He also headed the CDU list in North Rhine Westphalia for the 1976 election. With an additional base in the Bundestag, he could secure an ascendancy over provincial contestants. However, the Länder are a valuable source of recruitment for federal office ‐ as the careers of Brandt and Schmidt demonstrate.

6 A good illustration of the dilemma of opposition facing the CDU was the ratification of the treaties with Poland, eventually agreed in March 1976. The treaties involved the repatriation of 125,000 ethnic Germans of the estimated 280,000 still in Poland in return for large West German credits and pension payments to Poles forced to work in war‐time Germany. The CDU/CSU majority in the Bundesrat was on the point of wrecking the treaties (by its veto over certain provisions), but the opposition would then have had to take responsibility for bad relations with Poland and for keeping the Germans there. The CDU/CSU climbed down after a face‐saving formula had been found: the word ‘will’ instead of ‘can’ to express a commitment from Poland to allow out the remaining Germans eventually.

7 The Bundestag comes into its own when the forces of government and opposition are evenly matched as they were from 1969 to 1972. By 1972 there had been numerous defections to the opposition over the Ostpolitik and in April of that year the CDU/CSU failed by a margin of only two votes to unseat Brandt. The ensuing stalemate in the Bundestag caused the election to be held a year early.

8 Although the SPD lost ground in ten of the eleven Land elections held from 1974 to 1976, in no case did its reverses lead to a change in power. The increase of the CDU/CSU majority in the Bundesrat came about through the ‘strange affair’ in Lower Saxony. Despite the fact that the SPD/FDP had an overall majority in the Landtag, when the incumbent minister‐president resigned, his nominated successor (also SPD) failed to gain election, and eventually the CDU nominee was successful. Because ballots are secret, there was no chance of locating the source of the FDP or SPD defections—or the reason. As a result of the change in government of Lower Saxony in January 1976, the CDU/CSU majority rose from one to eleven, or 26–15 as against 21–20. The opposition then gained a majority on Bundesrat committees as well as on the key conciliation committee with the Bundestag. This development made the opposition even less likely to seek compromise with the government, itself bent on passing legislation before the election. The episode in Lower Saxony is a good example of the impact of Land politics on the federal balance.

9 The ‘lottery’‐effect could have momentous consequences. Thus the Federal Constitutional Court had to rule on the validity of the Basic Treaty with the GDR in 1973. The case was referred to the court by the Bavarian government on the grounds that the treaty violated provisions of the Basic Law relating to a unified Germany. With stipulations (which could be of importance in the future) the court did happen to rule in favour of the treaty, but the majority vote could have gone the other way. See D. P.Kommers Judicial Politics in West Germany: A Study of the Federal Constitutional Court Sage Publications, 1976.

10 However it would necessarily happen that either the CDU/CSU or the SPD would win a majority of seats if the FDP fell below the ‘five per cent’ requirement of the electoral law, leaving one party with a relative majority of votes and an absolute majority of seats. With 8.4 per cent of the federal vote in 1972 and a reasonably good vote in subsequent Land elections, the FDP was not considered to be in serious danger in 1976.

11 A tendency towards coalition‐thinking was shown by Helmut Schmidt in an extended interview published in Der Spiegel (5 April 1976). Thus whilst Schmidt spoke of the FDP and even the CDU as coalition partners, he made no mention of the possibility—or even the desirability of the SPD governing alone: ‘I certainly wish to see the FDP as a coalition partner, strong and self‐confident … In the lor.g‐term I do not preclude a coalition between the SPD and the CDU—but without the CSU.’ Of course, the ‘threat’ of a coalition with the CDU is useful if the FDP should become too uppish.

12 There were doubts about the FDP loyalty to the coalition especially after the SPD had fared badly in Land elections. But at the party’s pre‐election conference (Freiburg, May 1976) the delegates voted almost unanimously to continue the alliance until 1980. Only a severe setback for the SPD in October 1976 would tempt the FDP to think again.

13 Considerable ‘travelling’ does take place between the parties. Thus in 1972 11.5 per cent of the SPD vote and 12.1 per cent of CDU/CSU vote came from previous supporters of the other party. For the FDP, no less than 38.5 per cent of its vote came from those previously attached to the SPD or CDU. The core vote for both large parties, 65.4 per cent SPD and 69.0 per cent CDU/CSU, was from ‘permanent’ supporters, but they represented only 40.0 per cent of the FDP total. But behind the actual transfer stands a much larger potential volatility—an ‘outer ring’ for the SPD and the CDU of up to 40 per cent of their total support. See Kaltefleiter, W., Zwischen Konsens und Krise: Eine Analyse der Bundestagswahl 1972, Carl Heymanns Verlag, 1973.Google Scholar

14 See Schweigler, Gebhard, National Consciousness in Divided Germany, Sage Publications, 1975.Google Scholar

15 See Williams, Arthur, Broadcasting and Democracy in West Germany, Granada Publishing/Bradford University Press, 1976.Google Scholar

16 The idea of the Rechtsstaat is only inexactly rendered by ‘the rule of law’ since the vital connection with the state is missing. Nevil Johnson has commented: ‘“Rule of Law” by itself will not do, with its strong overtones of Anglo‐American Common Law pragmatism. But even “a state based on the rule of law” fails to convey the fusion of state and law (= Right) implied in the German expression’. Government in the Federal Republic of Germany, Pergamon Press, 1973, p.12.

17 P. Blair, Law and Politics in Germany. A paper given at the Loughborough Conference of the Association for the Study of German Politics, January 1976.

18 The ‘public function’ of the parties was written into Article 21 of the Basic Law, a responsibility in law which cuts two ways: the possibility of banning parties for their unconstitutional or undemocratic behaviour or aims, but also a commitment on the part of the state to aid the parties, especially financial support. On this latter aspect, see Sontheimer, K., ‘The Funding of Political Parties in West Germany’, The Political Quarterly, July‐September 1974.CrossRefGoogle Scholar The Party Law of 1967 which ‘fills in’ Article 21 also lays stress on their public function in Articles 1 and 2: ‘Parties are, in constitutional law, a necessary component of the free and democratic basic order … Parties shall participate in forming the political will of the people in all fields of public life’ (italics added)’.

19 In this context, it is perhaps best to interpret the brief rise of Neo‐Nazism in the late 1960s as a direct but weak echo of the past rather than as a new political force. It was direct because it appealed in the same terms and to the same groups as National Socialism. It was weak because in seeking support, especially from rural voters, it failed to take into account the substantial structural changes that had meanwhile occurred. For a comparative analysis of Schleswig‐Holstein, see Tilton, T. A., Nazism, Neo‐Nazism, and the Peasantry, Indiana University Press, 1975.Google Scholar A new ‘fourth’ party would have to find a different basis of appeal, one which the CSU with its provincial outlook could hardly provide.

20 The declining salience of the specifically ‘Christian’ image of the CDU may account for a renewed interest in conservatism, but it does tend to be a motley collection of ideas ranging from revamped Deutschnationalen sentiments to a glossed‐over technocracy, and an all‐purpose twist given by Strauss: ‘marching at the vanguard of progress’. See Greifenhagen, M., Das Dilemma des Konservatismus in Deutschland, Piper Verlag, 1971.Google Scholar

21 Kurt Sontheimer has delivered a broadside polemic against the intellectual Left from the point of view of the moderates: Das Elend unserer Intellektuellen, Hoffman und Campe, 1976. In particular, he seeks to expose the perils in the modes of thought and argument (Denkstruktur) adopted by the Left which he regards as a devaluation of intellectual and political activity.

22 Membership of a ‘radical’ organization implies belonging to one of a variety listed by the federal government. There are two aspects to the problem: one is the so‐called ‘ban’ on the employment of applicants with a ‘radical’ background, the Berufsverbot, the other is the continued employment of officials whose loyalty is suspect and can therefore be dismissed. The original Radikalenerlass was a decree adopted by the federal government and the Länder in January 1972 which sought to achieve conformity of treatment. But in February 1976 the CDU/CSU majority in the Bundesrat rejected the government’s proposed ‘framework’ law which would have regularized the situation. Even though the Constitutional Court ruled in May 1975 that dismissal from the public service should only be possible for specific acts rather than the holding of opinions alone, there are now considerable differences between employing authorities. In CDU/CSU governed Länder membership of a radical organization may be sufficient grounds for exclusion, whilst for the federal government and SPD/FDP Länder an additional burden of proof as to unreliability rests with the authority. Either way, a hapless candidate or serving official who once belonged to a ‘suspect’ organization can expect a long wait, possibly a few hearings, and a large dossier before his ‘case’ is decided. See Dyson, K., ‘Left‐Wing Extremism and the Problem of Tolerance in Western Germany’, Government and Opposition, Summer 1975.CrossRefGoogle Scholar