Schröder's Last Campaign: An Analysis of the 2005 Bundestag Election in Context

Abstract

At the end of May 2005, it seemed the (early) Bundestag election scheduled for September of that year would lead to a complete change of power in Germany. The Red-Green government's reforms came late and had been ineffective in the short run, and several setbacks during the first months of 2005 caused Chancellor Gerhard Schröder to call an early election. Yet, elections are won or lost on election day, and not in opinion polls. Thanks to an intensive campaign, the SPD and especially Schröder were able to mobilise and to activate their social and political support base better than expected, but they lost parts of their left wing to the Linkspartei formed by PDS and the SPD-breakaway WASG. The CDU/CSU and Angela Merkel ran a mediocre campaign, probably because some Christian Democrats thought the election would be won anyway. In addition, the Christian Democrats made the mistake of elevating taxation to the status of a major campaign issue by nominating Paul Kirchhof, a highly polarising law professor for the post of finance minister. This unwise move enabled the SPD to campaign negatively on the person and the CDU/CSU tax proposals that were anything but clear. In the end the SPD lost, but not as badly as previously expected. More surprisingly, the CDU/CSU lost votes as well. The winners were the small parties, especially the FDP and the Linkspartei. The losers, the major catch-all parties, were more or less forced to form a Grand Coalition. On the one hand, this coalition will make it more difficult for both CDU/CSU and SPD to regenerate and to sharpen their political profiles. On the other hand, the agenda powers enjoyed by the governing parties should not be underestimated in their effect. Therefore, predicting the end of the major catch-all parties would be pre-mature at this point.

Notes

1. See Hermann Schmitt and Andreas M. Wüst, ‘The Bundestag Election of September 2005: The Interplay of Long-term Trends and Short-term Factors’, German Politics and Society 24/1 (2006), pp.27–46.

2. Angus Campbell, Gerald Gurin and Warren E. Miller, The Voter Decides (Evanston: Row, Peterson and Company, 1954), pp.136–43.

3. Earlier in his career, Kohl participated quite frequently in televised discussions during Bundestag campaigns, but – especially after successfully managing German unification – he increasingly avoided such events.

4. See Jürgen Maier and Thorsten Faas, ‘Schröder gegen Stoiber: Wahrnehmung, Verarbeitung und Wirkung der Fernsehdebatten im Bundestagswahlkampf 2002’, in Jürgen W. Falter et al. (eds), Wahlen und Wähler. Analysen aus Anlass der Bundestagswahl 2002 (Wiesbaden: VS-Verlag, 2005), pp.77–101, p.87.

5. See Forschungsgruppe Wahlen e.V., Bundestagswahl. Eine Analyse der Wahl vom 18. September 2005 (Mannheim: FGW Report No. 122, 200) pp.25–8.

6. Maier and Faas, Stoiber gegen Schröder.

7. See Dieter Roth and Andreas M. Wüst, ‘Abwahl ohne Machtwechsel. Die Bundestagswahl 2005 im Lichte längerfristiger Entwicklungen’, in Eckhard Jesse and Roland Sturm (eds), Bilanz der Bundestagswahl 2005. Voraussetzungen – Ergebnisse – Folgen (Wiesbaden: VS-Verlag, 2005), pp.43–70, p.63.

8. See Andreas M. Wüst, ‘Ein verschossener Elfmeter und die Verpflichtung zum Erfolg’ Einsichten und Perspektiven 3 (2005), pp.24–31, p.28.

9. Miller et al., The Voter Decides, pp.112–35.

10. See Benzinpreis.de, www.benzinpreis.de for a detailed listing.

11. Politbarometer, Week 17.

12. Ian Budge and Dennis J. Farlie, Explaining and Predicting Elections: Issue Effects and Party Strategies in Twenty-Three Democracies (London: Allen & Unwin, 1983).

13. Dieter Roth, Empirische Wahlforschung: Ursprung, Theorie, Instrumente und Methoden (Opladen: Leske and Budrich, utb 2045, 1998), pp.38 ff.

14. Spiegel-online, 16 August 2005, http://service.spiegel.de/digas/servlet/find/ON = spiegel-369913.

15. See also Wüst, Ein verschossener Elfmeter.

16. Paul F. Lazarsfeld, et al, The People's Choice: How the Voter Makes Up His Mind in a Presidential Campaign (New York: Columbia University Press, 1944).

17. Symour M. Lipset and Stein Rokkan (eds), Party Systems and Voter Alignments: Cross-National Perspectives (New York: The Free Press, 1967).

18. Cees van der Eijk, ‘Design Issues in Electoral Research: Taking Care of (Core) Business’, Electoral Studies 21 (2002), pp.189–206, p.196.

19. See Harold D. Clarke et al.: Political Choice in Britain (Oxford: OUP, 2004), chapter 6.

20. Roth, Empirische Wahlforschung, p.43.

21. See Bernhard Kornelius and Dieter Roth,'Bundestagswahl 2005: Machtwechsel bleibt aus, Verlierer bilden die Regierung', in Christoph Egle and Reimut Zohlnhöfer (eds), Politik unter Rot-Grün. Eine Bilanz der Regierung Schröder 2002–2005 (Wiesbaden: VS-Verlag, 2007, in print).