Politics: Coalitions and the Multiparty System

The German political system is fundamentally different from the American political system. The US government was founded on ideas of protection against authoritarianism and individual sovereignty. They set up a rock-paper-scissors-esque federal structure to never give one branch too much power. The German government, on the other hand, was founded to firstly unify and protect many different minority factions. Them approaching democracy with a different angle ends up changing a lot about their systems.

As an American, I had many misconceptions about how Germany’s multi-party system worked. The best way it was explained to me was sort of like this. First, you split the Republican party into religious conservatives, pro-business people, and populist nationalists, and split the Democrat party into its different groups along the grid of ideologies too. Now there’s a lot of different, more specific parties, instead of just being “left” or “right.” Now, when elections come, the more centered parties will bring about compromises and govern, and the radical parties on the ends will stay in their lanes. Now, voters aren’t being profiled by the loudest angriest few, and the country isn’t torn into polarized camps.

The town where we have Language Camp is currently electing a new mayor, so I had the pleasure of talking first hand to representatives of some of the different German political parties, such as the SPD, CDU, and Die Grünen. Since I was so ignorant about what their parties supported, I had really refreshing and open minded conversations. At language camp, we also got to have a mock-Bundestag where we simulated making deals and forming coalitions, which showed me the logistics of the process a lot better.

I’m sure there are tradeoffs to this multiparty system, and as I interact more with the country I will see the cracks in it, but it does have some neat benefits that I find optimistic. 

It does ask the question, if the United States  were to be split into multiple parties, where would the lines be drawn, and what would galvanize such a change?