Free Democratic Party (Germany)

Template:Infobox German Political Party The Free Democratic Party (Freie Demokratische Partei, FDP) is a liberal political party in Germany. The party's ideology emphasises the value of individual liberty under a government "as extensive as necessary, and as limited as possible" (German: so viel Staat wie nötig, so wenig Staat wie möglich). It promotes a market economy that retains reformed features of the German social welfare system. In foreign policy the FDP supports European integration and transatlantic partnership between the European Union and the United States. The FDP is currently the third largest party in the Bundestag.

The party has generally distinguished itself from the more dominant Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) by taking a more strongly pro-business orientation. It has been associated with the label "Partei der Besserverdienenden" ("Party of the Higher Earning [people]"), which the party coined in a draft manifesto for the 1994 federal elections; opponents seized on the term to portray the FDP as preeminently concerned with the causes of the most affluent. Alliance 90/The Greens, Germany's green party, and The Left, a democratic socialist party, usually follow lines quite distinct from the FDP's.

The FDP-supporting electorate has traditionally been composed mainly of middle-class and upper-class people who consider themselves to be independents and proponents of European liberalism. The party has usually been the third or fourth largest party in Germany, historically having gained between 5.8 and 12.8% of the votes in federal elections. The FDP has held the balance of power for most of the federal republic's existence. It was the junior partner in coalition governments with the Christian Democrats from 1949 to 1956, from 1961 to 1966 and from 1982 to 1998, and with the Social Democrats from 1969 to 1982, thereby participating in governments more often than other German parties.

History

The FDP was founded on 11 December 1948 through the merger of regional liberal parties formed in 1945 from the remnants of the German People's Party (DVP) and the German Democratic Party (DDP), which had been active in the Weimar Republic. The FDP's first Chairman, Theodor Heuss, was a former member of the DDP.

Throughout its history, the party's policies have shifted between emphases on social liberalism and market liberalism. Since the 1980s, the FDP has maintained a consistent pro-business stance. However, its orientation to a free market is qualified by the principle that certain desirable objectives cannot be achieved solely through market mechanisms. The FDP supports a minimum standard of welfare protection for all and strong competition laws, for example.

In federal election campaigns since the 1980s, the party has generally sided with the CDU and CSU, the main conservative and (relatively) pro-business parties in Germany; an exception was made in the the 2002 campaign, in which it adopted a position of "equidistance" to the CDU and SPD. Following German reunification in 1990, the FDP merged with the Association of Free Democrats, a grouping of liberals from East Germany. During the 1990s, the FDP won between 6.2 and 11 percent of the vote in Bundestag elections. Between 1982 and 1998, it served as the junior partner in the government of Chancellor Helmut Kohl of the CDU.

2005 federal election

In the 2005 general election the party won 9.8 percent of the vote and 61 federal deputies, an unpredicted improvement from prior opinion polls. It is believed that this was partly due to tactical voting by CDU-CSU supporters who supported strong economic reforms. However, because the CDU did less well than predicted, the FDP and the CDU were unable to form a coalition government (a contrast to the situation after the 2002 federal election where a coalition between the two parties was impossible primarily because of the weak results of the FDP).

Disagreements over social issues (the FDP taking a liberal stance, the CDU more conservative) also complicated a coalition agreement. The party was considered as a potential member of various possible political coalitions, following the election. One possibility was a partnership between the FDP, the Social Democrats and the Greens (called a "traffic light coalition" because the colours of the three parties are those displayed on traffic lights), but most Free Democrats felt that the Social Democrats were sufficiently committed to economic reform. Also considered was a CDU-FDP-Green coalition (called a "Jamaica coalition" because the colours of the respective parties are those of the Jamaican flag), but the Greens quickly ruled out participation in any coalition with the CDU-CSU. Instead, the CDU formed a grand coalition with the SPD, and the FDP entered the opposition. FDP leader Guido Westerwelle became the unofficial Leader of the Opposition by virtue of the Free Democrats' position as the largest opposition party in the Bundestag.

Guido Westerwelle, Chairman of FDP

Leadership

Chairmen of the party since 1948:

• Theodor Heuss 1948–1949
• Franz Blücher 1949–1954
• Thomas Dehler 1954–1957
• Reinhold Maier 1957–1960
• Erich Mende 1960–1968
• Walter Scheel 1968–1974
• Hans-Dietrich Genscher 1974–1985
• Martin Bangemann 1985–1988
• Otto Graf Lambsdorff 1988–1993
• Klaus Kinkel 1993–1995
• Wolfgang Gerhardt 1995–2001
• Guido Westerwelle 2001–

See also

• Liberalism in Germany
• Friedrich Naumann Foundation
• Young Liberals (Germany)
• Liberal Students Association

External links

• Official website