6 charts to help Americans understand the upcoming German elections
I&#x27;m not sure what the RILE score is but that chart is worthless if you want to understand party alignment.<p>Because Germany doesn&#x27;t have a two party system, putting the parties on a simple one-dimensional chart doesn&#x27;t tell you much.<p>For example, the Greens are one of the most &quot;socially progressive&quot; parties (think immigration, LGBT, gender theory, feminism) but their positions on social welfare &#x2F; workers&#x27; rights are fairly conservative compared to The Left (which in turn is extremely &quot;pro-worker&quot; to the point of bordering on anti-capitalist but doesn&#x27;t place as much emphasis on LGBT issues). The Left is also much more strongly anti-war. The Greens also (obviously) place a lot of importance on ecological issues and renewable energy (which in Germany always means anti-nuclear).<p>The CDU has indeed shifted towards the left under Merkel but the SPD has also previously shifted strongly towards the right under Schröder. In fact the left wing of the SPD split off (that&#x27;s the WASG mentioned in the footnote) and joined the Left, leaving both major parties left and right of the center. The SPD&#x27;s campaigning this time is a bit more &quot;left populist&quot; than usual but that seems to be almost entirely strategic (to steer protest voters away from the AfD by offering a &quot;real alternative&quot;).<p>The FDP is generally considered the most &quot;employer-friendly&quot; party and has a history of leaning towards neoliberal (&quot;privatise everything&quot;) but has recently marketed itself as more centrist libertarian.<p>I find it very odd to see both the FDP and CDU described as more conservative than the US Democrats, as well as seeing the FDP described as more conservative than the CDU.<p>The CDU is probably most tolerant of getting involved in wars and only the Left and Greens take a strong stance against weapons exports but none of them are anywhere near as militarist as the US Democrats (or Republicans). None of the parties could honestly be described as &quot;tough on crime&quot; either. If anything the CDU can be defined as generally being strongly in favour of the status quo.<p>If Merkel loses (which most likely also means she&#x27;ll leave CDU politics), the CDU will have an identity crisis. Merkel&#x27;s &quot;left-leaning&quot; course alienated many right-wing voters, the SPD has become indistinguishable in many aspects thus competing for the centrist voters. The CDU would be expected to snap back to a slightly more conservative, more right wing position but Merkel practically eliminated all possible leadership candidates. Von der Leyen will not be the next Merkel, but all other public figures are either gone already or on their way out.<p>We&#x27;re almost guaranteed to end up with another coalition government. It will likely be led by Merkel&#x27;s CDU. I think we&#x27;ll also see the AfD reach a two digit number -- I hope for less than that, but less than 5% (which is the minimum for getting any seats) seems unlikely.