South Schleswig Voters' Association
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South Schleswig Voters' Association German: Südschleswigscher Wählerverband Danish: Sydslesvigsk Vælgerforening North Frisian: Söödschlaswiksche Wäälerferbånd | |
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| Abbreviation | Template:South Schleswig Voters' Association/meta/shortname |
| Chairman | Flemming Meyer |
| Vice Chairmen | Sybilla Lena Nitsch, Christian Dirschauer |
| National Secretary | Martin Lorenzen |
| Founded | 30 June 1948 |
| Split from | South Schleswig Association |
| Headquarters | Norderstraße 76 24939 Flensburg |
| Newspaper | Stimme des Nordens |
| Youth wing | Youth in the SSW |
| Membership (2016) | 3,394[1] |
| Ideology | Regionalism Danish minority interests Frisian minority interests Social liberalism[2] |
| Political position | Centre to centre-left |
| European affiliation | European Free Alliance |
| Colours | Blue and Yellow |
| Bundestag (Schleswig-Holstein seats) | 1 / 35 |
| Landtag of Schleswig-Holstein | 3 / 73 |
| Kiel City Council | 2 / 49 |
| Flensburg City Council | 8 / 43 |
| Website | |
| ssw.de | |
The South Schleswig Voters' Association[nb 1] (German: Südschleswigscher Wählerverband; SSW) is a regionalist political party in Schleswig-Holstein in northern Germany. The party represents the Danish and Frisian minorities of the state.[3][4]
As a party representing a national minority, the SSW declines to identify itself with a scale of left–right politics but models its policies on the Nordic model, which often means favouring a strong welfare state, while favouring a more free-market labour policy than the German social market economy model.[2] The SSW is represented in the Landtag of Schleswig-Holstein and several regional and municipal councils. The party contested federal elections in Germany until 1961, before returning in 2021,[5] where it obtained one seat.
As a party for the national Danish minority in Southern Schleswig, the SSW is not subject to the general requirement of passing a 5% vote threshold to gain proportional seats in either the state parliament (Landtag) or the federal German parliament (Bundestag).[3] In the most recent 2017 state election, the SSW received 3.3% of the votes and three seats. In the 2021 federal elections, the SSW stood in a federal election for the first time since 1961: official preliminary results gave them one seat, which if confirmed would make Stefan Seidler a Member of the Parliament, their first such member since the 1953 elections.
History
In the 2005 state election the SSW received 3.6% (two seats). This was enough for the SSW to hold the balance of power between the national parties of the left and right, and the SSW chose to support a coalition of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) and The Greens, without joining the coalition itself.[2] This resulted in criticism from the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and from German national conservative circles, who asserted that since the SSW had been granted a special status, it was obliged to defend only minority interests, and that its status should be revoked if the SSW behaved like a "regular" party. The SSW representatives, however, insisted on the full value of their parliamentary seats and their equal rights as German citizens. One particular point was that the SSW had taken a strong position on educational principles in the state (abolishing the traditional German system of dividing pupils according to academic ability already after the 4th grade into different types of secondary schools). The CDU argued that since there were separate Danish-language schools, it was unreasonable for the SSW to involve itself in the affairs of the public schools.
As the planned SPD-Greens coalition did not make it into office after the 2009 state election, a centre-right coalition was formed between the CDU and Free Democratic Party (FDP), and the SSW joined the opposition.
In the 2012 state election, the SSW gained 4.6% of all votes and three seats in the state Landtag.[6] A coalition of the SPD, Greens and SSW was concluded in June 2012, and the former parliamentary leader, Anke Spoorendonk, was appointed Minister for Culture, Justice and European Affairs.[7] This was the first time in German history that a minority party had participated in a state government. The new coalition government had plenty of nicknames, for instance "Dänen-Ampel" ("Dane-traffic light"), "Schleswig-Holstein-Ampel", "rot-grün-blaue Koalition" or "rød-grøn-blå koalition" (red–green–blue alliance), "Küstenkoalition" (Coastal alliance) and "Nord-Ampel" (North traffic light).
In the 2017 state election, the SSW backed to 3.3% of the votes, but retained three seats in the Landtag. However, since the government coalition parties lost their Landtag majority, a new government was formed without the SSW, which again joined the opposition.
Exempt from the threshold of 5%, it won a seat in the 2021 German federal election with 0.1% of the vote nationwide, its first federal seat since the inaugural 1949 West German federal election.[8][9] Though unlikely to change the balance of power in any way, Stefan Seidler will sit as its Member of the German Bundestag.[10]
SSWUngdom
The Youth in the SSW (Danish: SSWUngdom, German: Jugend im SSW) is the youth wing of the South Schleswig Voter Federation. The current chairman is Maylis Roßberg.
Bundestag election results
| Year | Votes | % | Seats |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1949 | 75,388 | 0.32% | 1 |
| 1953 | 44,339 | 0.16% | 0 |
| 1957 | 33,463 | 0.11% | 0 |
| 1961 | 24,951 | 0.08% | 0 |
| 1965–2017 | Did not contest | Did not contest | Did not contest |
| 2021 | 55,330 | 0.12% | 1 |
Notes
- ^ Other translations include South Schleswig Voter Alliance, South Schleswig Voters' Committee, South Schleswig Voter Federation, South Schleswig Voters Group, South Schleswig Voters League, South Schleswig Voters List, South Schleswig Voters' Union, South Sleswig Electoral Association.
References
- ^ Deutscher Bundestag: Rechenschaftsbericht der Partei (PDF; 37,9 MB)
- ^ a b c José Magone (2011). Contemporary European Politics: A Comparative Introduction. Routledge. p. 392.
- ^ a b Heiko F. Marten (2015). "Parliamentary Structures and Their Impact on Empowering Minority Language Communities". In Heiko F. Marten; Michael Reißler; Janne Saarikivi; Reetta Toivanen (eds.). Cultural and Linguistic Minorities in the Russian Federation and the European Union: Comparative Studies on Equality and Diversity. Springer. p. 264. ISBN 978-3-319-10455-3.
- ^ Jörg Mathias; Anne Stevens (2012). "Regions and Regional Politics in Europe". In Richard Sakwa; Anne Stevens (eds.). Contemporary Europe. Palgrave Macmillan. p. 208. ISBN 978-0-230-36719-7.
- ^ "Der SSW will den Minderheiten und der Region eine Stimme in Berlin geben". www.ssw.de (in German). Retrieved 2020-09-19.
- ^ "Landtagswahl in Schleswig-Holstein am 6. Mai 2012" (in German). Statistical Office for Schleswig-Holstein and Hamburg. 7 May 2012. Retrieved 14 May 2012.
- ^ "Dänen-Ampel steht – Albig regiert in Kiel". Die Welt (in German). 12 June 2012. Retrieved 18 June 2012.
- ^ Press, The Associated (2021-09-26). "Social Democrats Narrowly Beat Merkel's Bloc In German Elections". NPR. Retrieved 2021-09-27.
- ^ NDR (2021-09-26), Stefan Seidler (SSW): "Die ersten Zahlen sind sensationell" (in German), retrieved 2021-09-27
- ^ "Danish minority gets representation in German parliament". The Local. 27 September 2021. Retrieved 27 September 2021.
External links
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