Group Members:

Erandio, Zimbo

Dublado, Denise Lucille

Gaspang, Marielle

Montajes, Maria Romelyn

Manaog, Aldinne

POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS
THE CONSTITUTION

The Basic Law is the constitution of Germany. It was created during the Allied
occupation of Germany after the World War II. The Basic Law was designed mainly to avoid
both the chaos of the Weimar Republic and the authoritarianism of the Third Reich.
Specifically, the Basic Law created a system of cooperative federalism, in which the federal
government and state governments would share power. Then it guaranteed an elaborate set of
basic political, social, and economic rights. Also, to counter the powerful Weimar president,
the Bonn Republic established a weak, indirectly elected head of state. Thus political power
was concentrated in the head of government, the chancellor, elected by and directly
responsible to the legislature. Lastly, it established a powerful and independent judiciary to
check the government (O’Neil, 2010).
It is the Parliamentary Council who drafted the constitution and they approved the
draft on May 8, 1949.In an attempt to prevent excessive concentration of state power,
however, some constitutional features, such as Germany’s federal system and individual
rights, cannot be altered.

BRANCHES OF THE GOVERNMENT

 The Head of Government

The most powerful political figure and the chief executive in Germany is the federal
chancellor. The federal chancellor is far more powerful than the head of state. The federal
chancellor is elected by the Bundestag or the lower house of the legislature, who usually
comes from the largest elected party. the chancellor can appoint and oversee the cabinet,
he/she can also create or eliminate cabinet posts at will. The power of the chancellor greatly
depends on how he/she can handle or dominate parties. The chancellor also makes several
political appointments. Angele Merkel is the current chancellor of Germany (o’Neil, 2010).

 The Head of State

The head of state of Germany or the president has a more ceremonial figure and does
symbolic tasks. The president is elected for a maximum of two five year terms. Presidents are
mostly respected elder statesmen and it is expected of them to act and behave in an honest
nonpartisan manner while they are in office. The president can sign bills into laws, sign
treaties, and pardon criminals with the command of the chancellor. They can also refuse to
sign a law when it is believed to be unconstitutional. They can also formally nominate
candidates for chancellor. Presidents can also decide whether the legislature should be
dissolved or not when there is lack of majority (O’Neil, 2010).

 The Legislature

The highest bodies in the legislative branch are the two chambers of parliament -
the Bundestag (Federal Assembly) and Bundesrat (Federal Council). The Federal
Republic’s legislature is bicameral; the lower house – the Bundestag – has 598 members,
and the upperhouse – the Bundesrat – has 69 members.

The Bundestag members are elected through a proportional representation system. German
citizens elect members of the bundestag both by choosing individual district representatives
and selecting political parties that represent their interests, while the Bundesrat’s members
are officials who are elected or appointed to the governments of the states or Lander
(O’Neil, 2010).

Functions:

Bundestag

 The most important tasks performed by the Bundestag are the legislative process and
the parliamentary scrutiny of the government and its work.
 The Members of the German Bundestag also decide on the federal budget and
deployments of the Bundeswehr (Federal Armed Forces) outside Germany.
 One important function performed by the Bundestag is the election of the German
Federal Chancellor.

Bundesrat

 Responsible for the distribution of powers between national and state level
 Grants to the states the right to implement federal laws
 It is the intersection of the national and state governments, for it consists of the
members if the sixteen Lander governments

 The Judicial System

 The Federal Constitution Court is entirely independent from the government and from the
rest of Germany’s legal system that handles criminal and civil matters. It is a unified rather
than a federal system and tries to apply a consistent set of criteria to cases in the sixteen
states.
There are sixteen members of the Constitutional Court, is divided into two chambers
called Senates. One branch consists of the criminal-civil system which has the Federal High
Court at its apex. The Special Constitutional Court deals with matters directly affecting the
Basic Law. The Administrative Court system acts as a check on the arbitrary power of the
bureaucracy. Each house of the legislature selects half of the members of each chamber, and
judges must be approved by a two-thirds majority. Judges are elected to a single twelve-year
term and must retire by age sixty-eight (O’Neil, 2010). Enumerated below are the functions:
 Ultimate guardian of the Basic Law
 settles disputes between states, and between the federal government and states
 adjudicates disputes about elections and hears cases about the violations of
constitutional rights
 only acts in response to cases brought before it by either house of the legislature,
by lower courts, or by individual citizens
 has the power of abstract review, meaning that it can review pending legislation
on the request of one third of the members of either house of the legislature

THE ELECTORAL SYSTEM

In Germany only the Bundestag (lower house), which has 598 seats, are directly
elected through the people’s vote. The Chancellor is elected by the Bundestag after it is
formed, the Bundesrat (upper house) is composed of 3-6 delegated representatives from each
State Government or Länder while the President on the other hand, is elected through a
general assembly which is composed of the Bundestag and representatives from each of the
sixteen Länder of the same amount of that of the Bundestag.

Bundestag Elections

 Germany, just like any other parliamentary systems, adopts a Proportional

Representation (PR) system. But it also adopts a Single-Member District (SMD)
System. The PR system works in a way wherein the whole country of Germany
 serves as one PR district. The SMD system works through a First-Past-The-Post
criterion (that is, the candidate with the most votes wins the seats).
 One-half of the Bundestag, will be elected through PR system and half will be
elected through the SMD system.
 Each party however needs to gain at least 5% of the total population support to win
seats in the PR lists or win 3 single-member district seats for them to gain any seats at
all.
 The presence of two systems (PR and SMD) in the German elections basically means
that there are two votes, a combination of a close list and an open list type of
election. One vote for the party and one vote for the candidate itself. If the voter
chooses to vote for a certain party in the PR list, he/she is not compelled to vote for a
candidate of the same party in the SMD list and vice versa.
 Seats that are won through PR are much more significant than seats won through
SMD because PR determines the party’s national support.
 The same electoral process applies to the local level legislature.
 Bundestag Elections

9%

10%

Party A
Party B
Party C
Party D

59%
23%

Parties are awarded seats according to the percentage won. In the PR system, parties
are allowed to choose who among them within the party uses the seats that they won
from half of the Bundestag while the other half of the seats will be awarded to
whoever the citizens voted for in the SMD list.

 Since people are not compelled to vote for a party and a candidate with the same
party, underrepresentation occurs. Sometimes a party wins a lot of SMD seats but is
not accurately reflected in its party’s national support (as determined by the PR list
vote). In cases like these, additional seats are awarded to parties that are
underrepresented which mean that the Bundestag can have more than 598 seats.
 45

40

35

30

25
SMD seats won
20 PR seats won
15

10

0
Party A Party B Party C Party D

Let us say for instance that there are 100 seats. It is illustrated in the graph above that
although party A did well and is in the lead in the single-member districts, party B
still leads in the PR lists. In this situation additional PR seats are awarded to party A
to match the SMD seats that it won.

45

40

35

30

25
SMD seats won
20 PR seats won
15

10

0
Party A Party B Party C Party D

As shown in the graph above, party A gains 15 more seats while on the other hand,
parties B, C, and D get to keep the extra seats it gained which will change the total
number of seats from 100 to 115. These extra seats are called “overhang” seats.
CURRENT ISSUES IN GERMANY

 Open-door Refugee Policy

Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel decided to implement the open-door refuge

policy in Germany due to the Syrian war. As a welfare state, Germany has decided to open its
doors to the rising number of migrants and refugees because of the said war. However, for
some citizens it has come into a point where there normal daily living has been disrupted.
Some have downsized their apartments in order for the refugees to housed, some citizens
thinks that the migrants are already staying for too long in their sports complex, and some
citizens are worried about their safety because of refugees arriving in the middle of the night
with “people smugglers”. The assaults that happened during a New Year’s Eve party in
Cologne have worsened the situation. Several women were harassed and groped during the
said party by a group of men who were believed to have Arab or North African origin, an
Algerian man was arrested shortly after a few days. Despite all of the negative feedback
Angela Merkel firmly believes on her policy for humanitarian reasons (The Guardian, 2016).

 Elections in Germany

With regards to the open-door policy, the results of the state elections in Germany
seem to have a threatening backlash to Angela Merkel’s chancellery. Alternative fur
Deutschland or AfD, and anti-refugee party in Germany won 24 percent of the votes (in
Saxony-Anhalt), enough for them to enter the regional parliament. AfD also won 15 percent
of the votes in Baden-Wurrtemberg and 12.5 percent in Rhineland-Palatinate (Calamur,
2016). The Greens and the Social Democratic party have won the most votes with 47% and
39% respectively (Economist, 2016). The said results would affect Merkel’s chancellery
especially in the upcoming elections this 2017.
Bibliography

O’Neil, Patrick. (2010).Cases in Comparative Politics. New York: W. W. Norton &

Company.

Kesselman, Mark. (2009). European Plitics in Transition. Boston: Houghton Mifflin

Company.

Colone Attacks – Algerian Asylum Seeker Arrested. (2016, January 18). Retrieved
May 6, 2016 from http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jan/18/cologne-
attacks-algerian-asylum-seeker-arrested-new-years-eve-assaults

Calamur, Krishnadev. (2016, March 14). Retrieved May 8, 2016 from

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2016/03/germany-
elections/473586/

What Germany’s State Election Results Mean for its Politics. (2016, March 14).
Retrieved May 8 2016 from
http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2016/03/daily-chart-8