USEUROPEAFRICAASIA 中文双语Français
World
Home / World / Europe

Story doesn't end despite Merkel's assured win in election

Xinhua | Updated: 2017-09-21 09:39

Therefore, an alliance of parties is common practice, but a game between parties will take place before an alliance is forged.

If the conservatives and their natural alliance the liberal FDP can win over 40 percent of votes and FDP can secure 10 percent as expected, it will be quite simple to form a government as they will win majority of the Bundestag.

If the Union and FDP perform as they are expected in polls, party coalition will not be a simple task. In a grand coalition in the outgoing government, the SPD found that their support rate was "eroded" by the Union as the conservatives won support from social democrats' followers by pursuing leftist and liberal policies focusing on social justice.

Realizing that the SPD, a party with a glorious history dating back to the first Industrial Revolution, will gradually become a smaller party in Germany, Schulz once said the SPD would not form another grand coalition with the Union after the election.

If the Union and the social democrats join hands again, the AfD is likely to become the largest opposition party in the Bundestag.

Professor Paul Nolte with Free University Berlin, an historian on right-wing extremism in Germany, told Xinhua that this scenario would give advantage to AfD as the speaker of the opposition and thus strengthen its influence, which most German people are not willing to see. Therefore, the scenario will push government formation far away from the grand coalition.

Therefore, the Union has to find another alliance among the small parties. As every party has ruled out any possibilities of cooperating with AfD, and Merkel once denied allying with the Left, the Union is likely to turn to the Greens to form a "Jamaica coalition" so called because the party colors correspond to the Jamaican flag.

However, the Greens and the liberal-minded FDP are at odds with each other on environmental protection and other issues, and it is not easy to coordinate with a government formed with the right, the center and the left.

In this case, the Union may not be able to form a government, while if SPD outperforms its expectations and is supported by Die Linke and the Greens, Schulz will be able to form a government with a majority in the Bundestag.

Although coalition among parties is not limited to these forms, the most possible forms will be decided upon the voting results. Despite many politicians' stances on coalition, adjustments will be possible after the election as the situation will be totally different from that of before.

Despite the uncertainties, observers believe that German politics will not be like that of France or the United States. The reason for their belief is that Germany has suffered from great tragedies of far-right populism and, as such, social justice and social democracy is deeply embedded in German people's minds.

Furthermore, in a world where populism is gaining momentum in many major Western countries, Germany may send a positive signal as a stabilizer.

Previous 1 2 Next

Most Viewed in 24 Hours
Copyright 1995 - . All rights reserved. The content (including but not limited to text, photo, multimedia information, etc) published in this site belongs to China Daily Information Co (CDIC). Without written authorization from CDIC, such content shall not be republished or used in any form. Note: Browsers with 1024*768 or higher resolution are suggested for this site.
License for publishing multimedia online 0108263

Registration Number: 130349
FOLLOW US