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The Electoral System of the Federal Republic of Germany—a Study in Representative Government

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2013

James K. Pollock
James K. Pollock
Affiliation:
University of Michigan
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Extract

In the development of democracy in the modern world, increasing attention has been paid to the idea of representation. With the growth of large electorates which resulted from the extension of the franchise, it has been a necessary and logical process for thinkers and constitution-makers to devise methods by which the will of the electors can be formulated and translated into public policy. Since the voters are too numerous to gather in the market place, some means must be found to represent their opinions in the control and administration of the state. In the words of John Stuart Mill, “the meaning of representative government is, that the whole people, or some numerous portion of them, exercise through deputies periodically elected by themselves the ultimate controlling power, which, in every constitution, must reside somewhere.”

But specifically whom should the deputy represent—individuals, areas, groups, parties, or himself? Must he be popularly elected and, if so, how, and by whom? These and other vital questions have occupied the attention of scholars and statesmen for more than a hundred years. How to organize a system of good democratic representation is today a very live question in several countries, and a really critical question in one or two of them.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 46 , Issue 4 , December 1952 , pp. 1056 - 1068
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1952

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References

1 Representative Government, Ch. 5.

2 Kaisenberg, Georg, Die Wahl zum Reichstag, 4th ed. (Berlin, 1930)Google Scholar, and Pollock, James K., German Election Administration (New York, 1934)Google Scholar.

3 See Bolten, Seymour R., “Military Government and the German Political Parties,” Annals, Vol. 267, pp. 55–67 (01, 1950)Google Scholar.

4 Office of Military Government for Germany (U. S.), Documents on the Creation of the Federal Constitution (Berlin, 1949)Google Scholar.

5 See Clay, Lucius D., Decision in Germany (New York, 1950)Google Scholar.

6 Documents, pp. 140–154.

7 A study of the election laws of the eleven original German states which are included in the Federal Republic of Germany reveals many interesting variations in electoral procedures. All of the states except Rheinland-Palatinate and Bremen (and Berlin, which is not yet an integral part of the Bonn republic) have adopted some form of the combined plurality-P.R. system used in the election of Bundestag members. Although the percentages vary from state to state, they correspond to the 60-40 division of the federal law. Similarly, most of the states use the d'Hondt quota, and all of the states require a minimum percentage of votes before seats are obtained. When there have been more elections at the state level, it will be possible to compare state experience under varying electoral systems with the federal experience. There is at present an experimental attitude in the states toward their modified P.R. systems, and a healthy discussion of the relative merits of different systems is going on. Only the Heidelberg-centered Wählergesellschaft seems to have its mind made up.

8 Article 8 provides that “Land Governments shall, in an approximate proportion of 60 to 40, distribute the seats allocated to their Laender between district and supplementary Land nomination lists.” Article 9 provides that “one deputy shall be elected in each electoral district.” P.R. is introduced in Article 10, which directs that “all votes cast in a Land shall be added together and from this total the mandates accruing to each party shall be calculated according to the maximum figure procedure (d'Hondt).” The number of mandates each party acquires by direct vote in the districts is deducted from the P.R. compilation. The seats accruing to a party from the supplementary Land lists are then allocated in the order of precedence of these nomination lists. The number of representatives allocated to each state is specified in Article 8, and vacancies are filled either by special elections in a district (if the vacancy is in one of the district seats) or by taking the next person on a party list (if the vacancy occurs in one of the seats filled from the Land lists).

9 Finer, Herman, Theory and Practice of Modern Government, rev. ed. (New York, 1949), p. 556Google Scholar.

10 de Grazia, Alfred, Public and Republic (New York, 1951), pp. 251–8Google Scholar.

11 See also the excellent article by Kirchheimer, Otto and Price, Arnold, “Analysis and Effects of the Elections in Western Germany,” in State Department Bulletin, Vol. 21, No. 537, pp. 563–573 (Oct. 17, 1949)Google Scholar, and note Wirtschaft und Statistik, Vol. 1, No. 5, pp. 128–132 (Aug., 1949)Google Scholar.

12 Without P.R., four parties (KPD, DKP/DRP, WAV, and ZP) would have had no representation at all. Thus on a national basis P.R. effectively counters the defects of the district system by awarding representation to the smaller parties in close proportion to the popular vote received.

13 See Hermens, F. A., Demokratie oder Anarchie (Frankfurt, 1951)Google Scholar. This is a new German edition of an earlier English text with a new foreword by Alfred Weber. See also Brecht's, Arnold article in Social Research, Vol. 16, pp. 446–449 (Dec., 1949)Google Scholar, and Friedrich's, Carl J. in American Political Science Review, Vol. 43, p. 712 (Aug., 1949)Google Scholar, in addition to Friedrich's foreword to Hermens' book. A useful but opinionated German pamphlet is Hartmann, G. B., Für und wider das Mehrheits-wahlrecht (Frankfurt, 1950)Google Scholar, a publication of the German Institute of Public Affairs.

14 See Kirchheimer and Price (cited above, n. 11), pp. 564–6.

15 It may be significant that five of the six overpopulated districts were SPD constituencies.

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