ZParl Zeitschrift für Parlamentsfragen

To what extent does contemporary political science successfully approach political representation with regard to power – that is, in terms of a relationship of domination? The Italian sociologist and political scientist Carlo Mongardini (1938 –...

This article argues that Karl Lauterbach accomplished the office of federal secretary of health mainly due to his Twitter activities and the concomitant exposure in political TV talk shows . Lauterbach had little intraparty support after his failed...

In March 2023, the German Bundestag passed legislation to reform the electoral law with the votes of the governing coalition of SPD, Greens and FDP to prevent the parliament from growing beyond its regular number of seats . Contrary to an initial...

Discussions on the reform of the electoral law have so far mostly been conducted without the perspective of the sovereign . Therefore, given the current reform discussion and the change of the electoral law in Baden-Württemberg, we examine whether...

Can sitting Minister-Presidents rely on an incumbency advantage in German state parliament elections despite the indirect nature of their election? Changes in the office of the Minister-President after (and between) state parliament elections in...

Over the course of the process of transformation in East Germany elites from the West moved into the new Bundesländer of the East . This transfer took place in a number of domains of society including the political system of the new Bundesländer ....

From the beginning, the red-red-green coalition formed after the election of 2016 had to fight against severe problems . Especially the SPD lost public support, which led to the replacement of Michael Müller by Franziska Giffey as leading candidate...

The state election in Lower Saxony on October 9, 2022, was the first election in Germany following the termination of Russian gas supplies to Western Europe . The election campaign was therefore dominated by the energy crisis and the associated...

With the first black-green government coalition in a major territorial state in Germany, Hessian state politics (once again) set relevant political accents that have a signal effect on federal policy . What was initially seen as a risky experiment...

This article examines the debate surrounding the proposed lowering of the voting age from eighteen to sixteen for German Bundestag elections, from a political science perspective . The author carefully considers and counters the arguments raised by...

Following allegations that he had accepted undue advantages in his position, a referendum was held on 6 November 2022 to recall the mayor of Frankfurt, Peter Feldmann . The article first presents the legal framework of the recall election in Hesse...

Why do women parliamentarians perceive the issue of female underrepresentation in parliaments and politics as a problem at all? This question arises directly from Hanna Fenichel Pitkins assessment that it remains unclear to what extent descriptive...

Responsiveness of politicians to the citizens is one of the key characteristics of a representa- tive democracy . It can be measured by whether and to what extent the preferences of politi- cians and the population coincide . Particularly in times...

From its very beginning, the Covid-19 pandemic was politicized in the United States . Then- President Donald Trump saw it was little more than another attempt by his political oppo- nents and the media to harm his electoral chances . The Democratic...

The five percent hurdle for the Bundestag has proven its worth and should be retained . On the one hand, it was able to keep splinter parties out of the Bundestag and, on the other hand, it did not block the way for newly founded parties to enter...

Republicans went into the 2022 election year expecting to capture both chambers of Con- gress . The eventual results turned out to be disappointing, however . The seizure of parlia- mentary power was hindered by their own cadre of candidates in...

Covid-19 presented a major external shock to the United States governmental system . The system itself, crafted in the 18th century, was not designed to easily absorb this shock . The U .S . government is divided by the Constitution in two important...

The two handbooks of the history of political parties in Germany between 1789 and 1945 that Dieter Fricke published in Jena in the 1960s through to the 1980s continue to be con- sidered the gold standard for research on this subject . Yet, though...

Should the CDU/CSU open up itself politically to the Left and the AfD? This question has recently been asked more frequently, especially in the east of the Federal Republic of Ger- many, although the CDU/CSU, as well as the common Bundestag...

One function of national parliaments is to transpose EU law into the domestic legal order . This article examines whether and under what conditions opposition parties in the Bunde- stag support such an implementation . The results of a statistical...