The West German Green Party

Abstract

On March 6, 1983, the three-year-old Green Party, Die Griinen, received 5.6% of the popular vote in the German federal election. Thus after its second attempt, and after being represented in six state legislatures and dozens of local governments, the Green ecology party was for the first time eligible to send 27 delegates to the Bundestag. The election result constituted an impressive victory for the Greens, seriously marred, however, by the unexpectedly low vote for the Social Democrats (38%) and concomitant gains by the alliance of Christian Democrats (48.8%) and Free Democrats (6.7%). The Social Democratic setback was especially deleterious to the Greens' short-range political prospects because their campaign strategy and special election appeal had rested on the possiblity of a Social Democratic-Green numerical majority in the Bundestag, providing the Greens with considerable bargaining power vis-z-vis the SPD. Instead, the ecology party, which by its own admission is in many ways the creature of Social Democratic failure, is further burdened by that failure and confronts what might turn out to be a long stretch of rule. The future course and prospects of the Green party are likely to depend nearly as much on the disposition and substantive policies of the conservative era now being proclaimed in Germany as they will depend upon the internal make-up, the character and the political aims of the Greens themselves.