Takeaways from the 2025 German election

Germany has voted, and the results call for some serious soul searching among the country’s mainstream political parties. For the first time in the country’s post-World War II history, a far-right party has become the second largest party in a general election. The Alternative for Germany party (AfD), which Germany’s Office for the Protection of the Constitution suspects in part to be right-wing extremist and thus a potential threat to the country’s liberal-democratic order, more than doubled its 2021 result. Coming first in the Eastern German states, the AfD won nearly 21 percent nationwide and finished second, only beaten by the Christian Democrats (CDU/CSU). The Christian Democrats themselves finished first, with a combined vote share of around 28.5 percent, the second worst result in their history and following a highly controversial campaign.

Still, the other parties acknowledged that CDU/CSU received a clear mandate to lead the next government. For the outgoing governing parties, the election was the expected nightmare. Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats (SPD) experienced their worst result in the history of the Federal Republic and, for the first time, only came third – at around 16 percent (-9.3 percent compared to the last election). Their coalition partners did not fare much better, with the Greens dropping to 11.6 percent (-3.1 percent) and the liberal FDP (4.3 percent, -7.1 percent) even dropping out of parliament by failing to clear the 5-percent threshold. In turn, the socialist Left Party celebrated an impressive comeback with 8.8 percent (+3.9 percent), while the newly formed left-conservative BSW, which split from the Left just over a year ago and opposes military support for Ukraine, narrowly failed to enter parliament at 4.97 percent.

Because the BSW narrowly missed to clear the threshold, government formation is expected to be easier – although still difficult. It has been widely anticiapted that the CDU/CSU would need to form a coalition to secure a parliamentary majority, as is common in German politics. CDU leader Friedrich Merz had previously ruled out a coalition with the far right, and working together with the Left Party or the BSW would be politically unimaginable given those parties’ stances on foreign policy and defence. This means that had the BSW made it into parliament, and the party has considered contesting the result given the small margin of just over 13,000 votes that separated it from the threshold, CDU/CSU would have needed the support of both SPD and Greens for majority support in the Bundestag. If the BSW does not move forward with contesting the result or is unsuccessful in doing so (as is likely), a CDU/CSU-SPD coalition will also have a majority – and will be the likely although not guaranteed outcome of the upcoming coalition talks after an unusually toxic campaign for German standards.  

More importantly, the election results highlight the importance for Germany’s mainstream parties to reflect upon their response to the far right. Friedrich Merz’s decision to accept AfD support to pass a (mostly symbolic) motion for stricter migration rules in January sent shockwaves through the country and triggered large-scale protests. Merz was widely accused of having eroded the so-called “fire wall” – a previously deeply entrenched political norm in Germany to not introduce parliamentary motions whose passage would depend on votes from the far right. This decision has just been the last of a series of statements and programmatic changes that marked the CDU/CSU’s right-wing turn since Merz became leader in 2022. In line with existing political science evidence, their right-wing turn has not been a vote maximizing strategy. Indeed, the Christian Democrats’ results remained below what the polls predicted them to achieve before Merz introduced his controversial motion.

So, what should they do? Ironically, Germany’s mainstream parties may take inspiration from another party on the fringes of the political spectrum. The socialist Left Party celebrated a comeback not thought possible. Polling around 3 percent by the end of last year, the party re-entered parliament with an impressive 8.8 percent after a well-run campaign. It focused on the party’s core issues of social justice, equality, and fair rents. One of its lead candidates, Heidi Reichinnek, even became an internet sensation after strongly criticizing Merz for his migration course – a position that in its intensity and clarity set the Left apart from Germany’s other left-leaning parties. It reminds us that in an increasingly crowded party system and an electoral formula heavily favoring the proportional translation of votes into seats, parties tend to do well when sticking to their brand and resisting the temptation of copying far-right positions.  

A more in-depth analysis of the results and implications of the 2025 German election by the PSA’s German Politics Specialist Group is coming up in the next issue of Political Insight.

Authors: Matthias Dilling, Trinity College Dublin and Hartwig Pautz, University of the West of Scotland of the German Politics Specialist Group