In Search of Confidence

Germans have a strong preference for stability in their governments and do not normally like when one collapses in the middle of a legislative period. But given instability in earlier chapters of the country’s history, the Federal Republic’s constitution set out specific guidelines to steer through snap elections to preserve continuity and transitions from one governing coalition to another. 

The mechanism used to initiate new elections involves the German chancellor asking for a vote of confidence among all members in the parliament. If the vote fails, new elections are then on the agenda. 

On December 16, Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s efforts to get a majority failed. The doors and procedures are now open to have an election on February 23. 

The three-party coalition’s failure to sustain itself raises the question about the future of the next German coalition, whatever combination emerges after the election. The three way “traffic light” option—comprised of the Social Democrats (SPD), the Free Democrats (FDP) and the Greens—collapsed due to policy and personal clashes within leadership circles. The budget was a major stumbling block, although arguments over strategic weapons support for Ukraine and immigration policies were equally abrasive. All those challenges will confront a new government regardless of the combination of parties. 

Based on the current polls, a possible and likely outcome of the election in February could be a coalition headed by the Christian Democratic Union/Christian-Social Union (CDU/CSU) and with the Social Democrats or the Greens. If a binary choice is insufficient to reach a majority in the Bundestag, the collation might again require three parties, which would be possible with the CDU/CSU, the SPD, and the Greens. The FDP could also serve as a candidate for a coalition, assuming the party will receive sufficient electoral support to remain seated in the Bundestag. It also seems likely that the CDU’s leader, Friedrich Merz, will be the next chancellor in these scenarios. 

But have lessons been learned for the purpose of forming a new coalition in the wake of the one that just failed? One irony of the confidence vote in the Bundestag is that Chancellor Scholz posed a trust question, “Vertrauensfrage”, which he lost. But there will be a new set of questions about trust in the next two months for all political parties and their leaders. How will they try to earn trust in the voting public after it watched one coalition dissolve? Germany faces serious economic, infrastructure, and security challenges, as well as questions about its future in an unpredictable and dangerous world. German voters will decide whom to trust with these challenges. They expect less acrimony and more answers.