Suchergebnisse

Als Odysseus auf seiner langen Heimfahrt an der Insel der Sirenen vorbeikam, mussten er und seine Männer Mittel und Wege finden, dem verzaubernden Gesang der Sirenen zu entgehen. Odysseus ließ sich fest an den Mast seines Schiffes binden, und seine Männer stopften sich Wachs in die Ohren. Vor einem ähnlichen Problem stehen Parteien und Politiker, wenn sie Entscheidungen in eigener Sache treffen, also Entscheidungen, in denen sie selbst die Regeln des politischen Wettbewerbs und damit ihres Machterwerbs bestimmen können.

Die Vorbereitung von Wahlen gehört zu den sensibelsten Bereichen staatlicher Organisation.
Fehler imWahlverfahren wirken vertrauensmindernd1 und sind überdies nur
mit beachtlichem Mehraufwand korrigierbar, wie zuletzt die teilweise Zulassung der
Landesliste der AfD Sachsen zur Landtagswahl 2019 vor Augen geführt hat.2 Einer der
empfindlichsten Bereiche der Wahlvorbereitung in Deutschland dürfte die Zulassung
von Parteien zu Bundestagswahlen sein. Ob eine Vereinigung als Partei teilnehmen darf,
entscheidet der Bundeswahlausschuss. Diesem Gremium obliegt damit die Frage, ob
Parteien ihre zentrale Funktion – die Teilnahme an Wahlen – wahrnehmen können.

The Ochsentour describes the slow, hard road to the top of political positions and is colloquially negatively associated . But despite this negative image, it remains unclear what actually constitutes this process of intra-party proving and how to interpret the metaphor of the arduous journey of the ox dragging the plough . A descriptive analysis based on the IParl survey shows that an aspirant's nomination success depends on much more than the symptomatical duration of his or her party membership . These findings instead indicate that the development of a trusted relationship between candidate and party base is the key component of intra-party promotion . Overall the data suggests that aspirants are mostly flexible, show high levels of engagement and have proved themselves to their party base . Thus, the Ochsentour metaphor does not fit to the actual performance of candidature applicants.

In this paper we analyzed whether candidates who share policy values with their selectorates are more likely to be nominated. Our data contains 709 aspirants who competed for a candidacy for the 19th German Bundestag. Our data suggest that policy congruence seems to lack influence on the outcome of those procedures with little party specific differences.

The German electoral law is a permanent object of criticism . This is mainly due to the Bun- destag's size, which grew to a record of 736 MPs in 2021 . Key reasons for this growth are surplus and compensation seats which are hard to explain to the broader public . The reform of 2013 according to which surplus seats are offset between the state lists of one party, is only partly effective to stop the growth of Parliament, since the long-term partners CDU and the CSU run for the Bundestag as separate parties . Against this background, a twofold proposal for reform is needed . First, the electoral law would enable joint lists of parties that do not compete against each other . Second, an amendment of the Bundestag's standing orders can establish that only parties with joint lists can form a parliamentary party group . The incentives provided by this combined reform could be effective because both Chris- tian-democratic parties benefit from a joint parliamentary group . This proposal could be one component for the upcoming electoral reform since it does not change the proportion of seats and, thus, could also be supported by the CDU as well as the CSU .

Party statutes stipulate their internal rules . Among other things they address how candidates are selected, who is allowed to nominate candidates, who is eligible to stand as a candidate and which voting procedures apply . For the 2017 Bundestag election, we studied the CDU, CSU, SPD, Bündnis 90/Die Grünen, Die Linke, FDP and AfD statues . As a consequence of Germany's comparatively rigid legal frame for candidate selection all parties show several similarities but we were also able to identify a few differences . These differences indicate deviations in participation culture, e .g . how many members are allowed to nominate candidates, with smaller parties generally being more inclusive than bigger parties . AfD has the lowest grade of formal rules, which is owed to its relative short existence and therefore no need to institutionalize more formal rules . We also compared the aforementioned statues to the 2002 Bundestag election in a longitudinal analysis and concluded remarkable continuity and with only little change .

Before an election takes place, the party members select their parliamentary candidates . Their nomination decisions depend on their vision of an ideal candidate . Based on the IParl survey of party members participating in the candidate selection for the 2017 German Bundestag elections we are able to investigate these preferences . As we see, there is neither a common ideal among all participants, nor are there any distinctly different groups . Differentiating between district and state level these variations are less distinct than between the different parties . We could also show that competitors seem to perceive demands from their electors at least partially different . Presumably those aspirants who are better at anticipating their electors' complex preferences might have better chances in the intra-party nomination process .