Study sheet: German Federal Political System

📋 Course Outline

1. Creation of the Basic Law
2. Foundations of the Basic Law
3. German Reunification
4. Länder Institutions
5. Federal Distribution of Powers
6. German Political Parties
7. Bundestag Elections
8. Parliamentary Government
9. Federal Legislative Institutions
10. Federal President and Constitutional Court

📖 1. Creation of the Basic Law

★ Must-know

• The Allied requirements were:
  • a democratic and federal regime
  • approval of the constitution by the Länder
  • Allied control over Germany’s foreign policy

Further detail

• 🔄 The creation followed these stages: the Western Länder adopted their constitutions, the Allies issued the Frankfurt Documents, the Parliamentary Council worked in Bonn under Konrad Adenauer, the constitutional text was approved and ratified

💡 Memory Hook

1947 Länder constitutions → 1948 Allied conditions → 1949 Basic Law

📖 2. Foundations of the Basic Law

★ Must-know

• The Basic Law establishes Germany as a democratic and social federal state, makes fundamental rights directly binding on the legislative, executive, and judicial powers, and permits resistance when someone attempts to overthrow this order and no other remedy is possible.

• Under Article 18, the Federal Constitutional Court may deprive a person of specified fundamental rights when that person abuses them to combat the liberal and democratic constitutional order.

• An amendment affecting the Länder structure of the Federation, Länder participation in legislation, or the principles of Articles 1 and 20 is prohibited under Article 79(3).

Further detail

📌 Associations whose aims or activities violate criminal laws, oppose the constitutional order, or oppose international understanding are prohibited under Article 9.

💡 Memory Hook

A strong constitution protects democracy, while a weak head of state limits executive personal power

📖 3. German Reunification

📝 Essential Points

📌 Article 23 provided for the Basic Law to extend to other German territories after their accession, whereas Article 146 envisaged the Basic Law ending when a constitution freely adopted by the German people entered into force.

• The Berlin Wall fell on 9 November 1989, beginning the decisive phase of German reunification.

• 🔄 The reunification process included: free East German elections on 18 March 1990, monetary, economic, and social union on 18 May 1990, reconstitution of five Länder on 22 July 1990, an accession treaty on 23 August 1990, the Two-Plus-Four Treaty on 12 September 1990, entry into force of accession on 3 October 1990

💡 Memory Hook

Wall → elections → monetary union → accession → Two-Plus-Four → reunification

📖 4. Länder Institutions

★ Must-know

• The standard Land institutions are:
  • Landtag
  • minister-president
  • constitutional court

Further detail

• Hamburg, Bremen, and Berlin have governments called senates led by a mayor; their parliaments are called Bürgerschaft in Hamburg and Bremen and Abgeordnetenhaus in Berlin.

• Schleswig-Holstein does not have its own constitutional court.

📖 5. Federal Distribution of Powers

★ Must-know

📌 German federal competences are divided into exclusive federal competences, concurrent federal and Länder competences, and areas in which Länder may depart from federal legislation.

📌 Federal intervention in certain concurrent matters must be justified by the need for equivalent living conditions throughout the federal territory or by safeguarding legal or economic unity.

• Examples of exclusive federal competences include:
  • foreign affairs and defence
  • nationality
  • currency
  • customs and trade unity
  • air navigation
  • posts and telecommunications
  • weapons and explosives
  • peaceful nuclear energy

Further detail

• The listed deviation fields are: hunting, nature protection and site conservation, land distribution, spatial planning, water management, admission to higher-education institutions and higher-education degrees

💡 Memory Hook

Exclusive federal powers differ from concurrent powers and Länder deviation powers

📖 6. German Political Parties

★ Must-know

• The CDU-CSU is an alliance of two Christian-democratic parties founded after the Second World War.

• The SPD was created in 1875 through the merger of Ferdinand Lassalle’s General German Workers’ Association and the Social Democratic Workers’ Party of August Bebel and Wilhelm Liebknecht.

• After the 1959 Bad Godesberg Congress, the SPD abandoned Marxism and recognized the importance of the market economy.

Further detail

• The Greens were created in 1980 and have been represented in the Bundestag since 1983, marking the transition of the German system toward genuine multiparty politics.

• Die Linke was created in 2007 by merging the PDS, heir to the East German SED, with a dissident movement from the SPD led by Oskar Lafontaine.

• The AfD was created in 2013 by CDU dissidents and presents itself as eurosceptic and anti-system.

📖 7. Bundestag Elections

📝 Essential Points

• Since 2025, the Bundestag has 630 seats; it had at least 598 seats before 2025 and 736 seats between 2021 and 2025 because of additional mandates.

📌 Germany uses personalized proportional representation: the first vote chooses a candidate in one of 299 constituencies, while the second vote chooses a party list at Land level.

📌 Only parties obtaining at least 5% of the votes or three direct mandates participate in the distribution of Bundestag seats.

💡 Memory Hook

First vote chooses a constituency candidate; second vote determines party-list representation

📖 8. Parliamentary Government

★ Must-know

• The Bundestag elects the chancellor by an absolute majority in the first two rounds, while a relative majority is sufficient in the third round; after a merely relative result, the President may appoint the elected candidate or dissolve the Bundestag.

📌 Under the constructive vote of no confidence, the Bundestag can remove a chancellor only by simultaneously electing a successor.

📌 If a confidence vote is lost, the Bundestag has 21 days to elect a new chancellor; if it fails, the President may dissolve the Bundestag or declare a legislative emergency with Bundesrat approval.

Further detail

📌 During a legislative emergency, Bundesrat approval is sufficient to adopt a government bill, and the emergency may last no longer than six months for one chancellor.

💡 Memory Hook

Chancellor election → constructive confidence → confidence question → legislative emergency

📖 9. Federal Legislative Institutions

★ Must-know

📌 Simple laws allow the Bundesrat only a suspensive veto that the Bundestag can override, whereas approval laws concerning the Länder and their budgets require the Bundesrat’s consent.

• Each Land has at least three and at most six Bundesrat seats, for a current total of 69 seats, and its representatives hold an imperative mandate.

Further detail

• The Bundesrat is a permanent body whose composition changes according to the results of regional elections.

💡 Memory Hook

Simple laws face a suspensive Bundesrat veto, whereas approval laws require Bundesrat consent

📖 10. Federal President and Constitutional Court

📝 Essential Points

• The Federal President is elected by the Federal Convention, composed of the Bundestag and an equal number of representatives elected by the Landtags, for five years with one consecutive re-election permitted.

📌 The Federal President is politically irresponsible, is not supreme commander of the armed forces, and cannot declare a state of emergency.

• The Federal Constitutional Court has 16 judges elected by a two-thirds majority, half by the Bundestag and half by the Bundesrat; each judge serves a non-renewable 12-year term or until the age of 68.

• The Federal Constitutional Court reviews the constitutionality of laws and treaties, hears constitutional complaints by individuals, resolves federal-Länder competence disputes, decides deprivation of fundamental rights, rules on accusations against the Federal President, and hears appeals concerning Bundestag elections.

📊 Synthesis Tables

Main Federal Institutions

Institution	Composition or election	Main role
Bundestag	Elected through personalized proportional representation	Legislation and election of the chancellor
Bundesrat	Representatives of the Länder; 69 seats	Länder participation in federal legislation
Federal President	Federal Convention; five-year term	Head of state with limited political power
Federal Constitutional Court	16 judges elected by Bundestag and Bundesrat	Constitutional review and rights protection