2024-10-02 01:28:26
parties
Stress test for democracy: How to deal with the AfD?
Updated on September 29, 2024Reading time: 4 min.
The AfD is strong in many parliaments – but in the minority. Nevertheless, it can shake up the democratic structure. The showdown in Thuringia may not have been the last.
No heckling, no insults, no scandal: the Thuringian state parliament managed its constituent session on the second attempt. But the lead-up was dramatic. Parliament only became operational on the orders of the Thuringian Constitutional Court after an unprecedented showdown between the AfD and the majority of the house. It may not have been the last stress test of democracy – not in Thuringia and not in other German parliaments.
In the most recent state elections in Thuringia, Saxony and Brandenburg, the right-wing party not only did very well, with around 30 percent each. In the state parliaments in Erfurt and Potsdam it also achieved a so-called blocking minority of more than a third of the mandates. This could block important decisions in the future – including the election of judges at the Constitutional Court, the institution that just decided against the AfD. Bonn political scientist Frank Decker told broadcaster Phoenix that the party actually wanted to use its position of power to “obstruct” the party with its behavior in Thuringia.
The case is different in Brandenburg than in Thuringia
In Erfurt, the conflict that led to chaos at the first attempt at the constituent meeting on Thursday apparently revolved around the fine print of the rules of procedure. It was about whether the AfD, as the strongest faction, could appoint the president of the state parliament. The party vehemently calls for this and refers to “customary constitutional law”. The other parties counter this: The AfD can propose someone, but whoever gets a majority is elected.
Something similar is not initially expected in Brandenburg. Firstly, unlike in Thuringia, the AfD is only a second force there. On the other hand, the parliamentary majority has taken precautions. “We were smart to change the state constitution and make the composition of the state parliament presidium open,” said Brandenburg SPD parliamentary group leader Daniel Keller to the German Press Agency. The majority in the Bundestag also changed the rules in 2017 as a precautionary measure. It is not the oldest member of parliament who becomes president by age, but rather the person who has been in parliament for the longest time.
This is exactly what the AfD is making a fundamental question: it is outraged by its isolation. “If a vote of voters is ignored in this way, if the entire established party landscape merges into a uniformity, I worry about the state of our parliamentary democracy,” wrote party leader Alice Weidel on X after the AfD candidate failed in the election for state parliament president in Thuringia was.
However, even after its recent election successes, the AfD only represents a minority. More than two thirds of voters in Thuringia, Saxony and Brandenburg did not vote for her. In the Bundestag she received 10.4 percent of the vote. And since the AfD cannot find allies for its goals, it can achieve little – unlike parties that seek compromises in coalitions, which the AfD regularly denigrates as “cartel parties”.
After Thursday’s scandal, political scientist André Brodocz said that in Erfurt we saw how “the minority in the state parliament tried to impose its will on the majority.” This is “the deepest disregard for the majority principle that underlies our parliamentary democracy.” He also notices that on such occasions the mood is created on social networks. “Their own clientele is thus strengthened in their views that the AfD is perhaps even being deprived of its rights in a supposedly undemocratic way,” said Brodocz.
Legally, the AfD has lost out several times with its legal opinion. It has now been defeated before the Constitutional Court in Weimar, which gave clear guidelines for the opening session of the state parliament. And the Federal Constitutional Court also ruled against them several times. The AfD sued in Karlsruhe because it has not had a vice president since it entered the Bundestag in 2017 – the other parties always let their candidates fail. The Federal Constitutional Court decided in March 2022 that the right to equal consideration is subject to election by the other members of parliament. Even after a lawsuit against the non-election and deselection of committee chairmen, the court ruled against the AfD.
In return, the party is sowing doubts about the highest courts – and is thus targeting another democratic institution. Thuringia’s AfD state leader Björn Höcke said before the decision on the state parliament scandal about the state constitutional court: “Nobody is sitting there who doesn’t have the right party register.” And further in the right-wing “Deutschland-Kurier”: “That’s why they are of course biased judges.” If the Thuringian constitutional guardians ruled against the AfD, then “as lawyers they are also making themselves ridiculous.” After the decision, Höcke said that they recognized the saying. But he renewed his criticism.