New Perspectives in German Political Studies

On October 3, 1990 the future of both Europe and Germany became powerfully and inexorably intertwined across a politically broadened continent powering transformative social, political and economic interactions. The thirty year mark after the then reigning chancellor Helmut Kohl promised 'flourishing landscapes' in the former GDR is more than just a new anniversary from which mandatory reflections must follow. Arguably, it represents a temporal boundary between the adjustments and reactions conditioned and captivated by a sense of something new and uncertain, and that point moving forward from which unification’s legacy inescapably tethers Germany’s future to normal politics shaped by the issues of the moment, and not politics gripped by the debates of unification itself. That legacy is defined by an accumulation over thirty years of adjustments, mutations, counter-adjustments and strategic reactions which have now delivered through the many ripples of change a Germany managing thecourse-trajectory which unification has relentlessly plotted. The foreseeable future will certainly see that legacy of unification tenaciously continue to project yet shrouded within the background of Germany’s routine politics. This volume explores that legacy within the post-unification era and reflects on the way forward into a near-term German future no longer consumed with unification itself but with the reality of politics it has steadily defined.

This book provides a systematic overview of the prevalence, causes, and stability of left-wing and right-wing extremist attitudes in Germany between 1994 and 2017. It shows that there are many similarities between left-wing and right-wing extremists, both in terms of their ideologies and their individual experiences. Overall, these causes can be traced back to three factors: unmet individual needs (e.g., deprivation or disenchantment with politics), access to ideological narratives that promise simplified solutions to individual problems, and the larger social circumstances of life (e.g., transformation processes, unemployment, or immigration). Although extremist attitudes are relatively rare, they are also shown to be highly stable: once acquired, individuals are difficult to bring back onto the democratic path. This book is the first to systematically compare left-wing and right-wing extremist attitudes, to provide an intensive methodological contribution to the measurability of such attitudes, and to relate their causes and stability.

This book provides an account of the reforms undertaken in German federalism throughout the 2000’s. It explores the consequences of the historic changes made to the German federal order through detailed analysis of a set of unique case study areas. It also evaluates the handling of the Covid-19 pandemic on German federalism, and the relationship between party politics and federalism in Germany. The authors investigate what happens when policy responsibility is decentralized. The reforms undertaken in Germany fundamentally altered the roles played by the federal and state-level governments in several policy fields, and the question as to what kind of impact this has for policy itself is a global one. In a world that sees an increasing trend towards the decentralization of political authority, this book offers insights and lessons that have a practical application on a global scale. It will find the interest of students and scholars in countries worldwide which are grappling with thenature of policy responsibility across levels of political authority. 

This book investigates the parliamentary negotiation of executive secrecy. Parliaments depend on information to fulfil their roles as the people’s representatives, legislators and overseers of the executive. However, there are examples of executive secrecy across all policy fields. How, then, do parliamentary actors try to reconcile secrecy and the normative demands of an open, democratic society? This volume analyses parliamentary arguments, conflicts and patterns of agreement around this topic in the case of Germany. Based on two case studies – intelligence agencies secrecy and Public Private Partnership secrecy – it argues that substantive justifications of secrecy focusing on necessity are highly contested. By contrast, procedural legitimation of secrecy, namely deciding about it democratically, is crucial. Still, there are inherent limits to the legitimation of executive secrecy. The book therefore underlines the fragility of secrecy’s legitimation, and its need for constant actualisation.

This book offers a systematic, theory-based, and empirically grounded introduction to the political system of Germany. Compared to other textbooks on government and politics in Germany, it has two particular benefits. First, it analyzes the individual dimensions of the German political system from a uniform theoretical perspective based on the well-known distinction between majoritarian and consensus democracy. Second, it particularly explains how political decision-making in the multi-level system takes place, including the local, state, federal as well as EU levels. This way, the book provides a comprehensive, detailed, and clear picture of how German democracy is organized and how it works.