The results of the German parliamentary elections could be understood from three major defining characteristics: the degree of crossover between pre-election polls and results, the trends of young voters’ support for each party, as well as potential challenges facing the makeup of Germany’s incoming federal government.
Additionally, the foreign policy directions of Christian Democratic Union (CDU) leader and chancellor-elect Friedrich Merz, as well as his impact on Taiwanese-German relations are also worth further exploration.
The first major characteristic in the results is that the pre-election polling and results match. The elections for Germany’s federal parliament — the Bundestag — were on Feb. 23. The results essentially accord with predictions made in pre-election polls. The CDU garnered the most representation with 208 seats. The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) greatly expanded its hold, winning 152 to become the second-largest party in the Bundestag. The administrative coalition’s leading Social Democratic Party (SPD) saw a heavy setback, only winning 120 seats. The Greens only won 85 seats, and various smaller left-wing parties won 64 seats.
The results show that the CDU’s wins were expected, mainly due to dissatisfaction with many of the policies of outgoing Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s government, which led to a rapid drop in voter support for the SPD. Primarily, in terms of his China policies, Scholz’s stance was seen as overly amiable toward Beijing — he was not seen as being tough enough in his responses to the challenges China poses to Germany’s economy and national security, leading to a lack of voter confidence in his administration.
Second, his leadership style, characterized as “strategically vague,” lacked a clear direction regarding how he would handle the “great powers,” with his hesitation and irresolution increasing voter dissatisfaction. Apart from this, the German economy during Scholz’s tenure has run up against steep challenges and issues, such as massive inflation, an energy crisis, as well as aid for Ukraine, which left the public calling into question the left-wing coalition’s ability to govern, indirectly aiding in the rise of voter sentiment that favored the right-wing CDU.
The second distinguishing feature is the trend in younger voters’ support for extremist parties, regardless of left or right-wing affiliation. Younger voters’ support in this election for extremist parties has clearly risen. This indicates that the German political field is changing. Support for far-left parties earned 25 percent of the votes of people aged 18 to 24, while the AfD party gained 21 percent of their support, German public broadcaster Deutsche Welle’s statistics show. By comparison, support for the CDU was only 13 percent among the same age group, and the SPD only garnered 12 percent. For those aged 25 to 34, support for far-right parties reached as high as 23 percent, showing younger generations’ dissatisfaction with mainstream parties, as well as interest in extremist positions. This trend is worthy of our attention, as younger voters’ would become the central driving force in German society, and the sharp rise in extremist parties could alter Germany’s political ecosystem. As for mainstream parties, how they innovate to attract younger voter support and avoid advancing social schisms would become an important issue in political developments.
The third distinguishing feature from this election is that the formation of a coalition Cabinet and policy challenges would be much more difficult. As none of Germany’s parties won more than half of the seats in the Bundestag, the CDU must seek out partners with which to form a coalition. As things stand, there are several possible avenues for how the makeup of the coalition could turn out. Among them, the most feasible path would be the CDU forming a coalition government with the SPD. However, both parties have clear differences in their policy stances. If we look at their differences in terms of climate, economics, social policies, immigration, and national defense and national security, the CDU and SPD can only find common ground in climate policy, and national defense and national security. When it comes to economic, social and immigration policies, the policy divergences are much greater, meaning it would be easier for a coalition to break down. The CDU supports lowering taxes and promoting business investment, but the SPD leans toward supporting public expenditures to bolster social welfare. This would cause both sides much frustration in policy cooperation.
Apart from possibly working with the SPD, the CDU only a few weeks ago took a much more conservative stance on immigration policies, cooperating with the AfD on pushing immigration restrictions. This clashes with the SPD’s policy stance and could also impact progression on Cabinet-forming talks. If the CDU is unable to reach an agreement with the SPD, it would need to consider working with the Greens or other fragmented parties that could form a third party, or with multiple smaller parties to build a coalition government, but such a Cabinet-forming model could further lead to instability and raise hurdles for policy coordination.
What most needs discussion is how Germany’s election impacts its relations with Taiwan. As it stands, Merz’s positions on foreign affairs, particularly as they pertain to Taiwan, still lack clarity and resolve. Although he is a relative hardliner on China, that does not necessarily mean that he would adopt much more proactive and positive attitudes toward Taiwan. If we look back at past CDU policy trends, the party often claims it adheres to Germany’s “one China” policy. Despite maintaining economic cooperation with Taiwan, it would not greatly expand its relations with Taipei in the areas of diplomacy or national security issues.
We could expect that Merz would adhere to his nation’s preconditions in its “one China” policy and adopt much more practical Taiwan policies. This could signify that Taiwan-Germany relations would advance no further, or could perhaps even regress.
Taipei would need to increase its contacts with Merz and the CDU to ensure that the two nation’s bilateral relations could continue to improve. Additionally, Taiwan still needs to continue promoting parliamentary exchanges between its legislature and each party in the Bundestag, ensuring that their bilateral relations would not be impacted by foreign policy changes in Germany.
As the US attempts to decrease its involvement in Europe, Germany’s role is following a renewed rise in conservatism or right-leaning politics in European politics. For Taiwan, cooperation with Germany would not only concern their bilateral relationship, but could involve a renewed position for Germany in its Indo-Pacific strategy. Taiwan should engage in policy talks with Europe to ensure its strategic value in international political developments and avoid gradual marginalization.
Wang Hung-jen is a professor in the Department of Political Science at National Cheng Kung University.
Translated by Tim Smith
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