Social Democratic Victory– Healthy Turn in Germany

Social Democratic Victory– Healthy Turn in Germany

The Western German election this past September could mark a turning point in the political history of a country dominated, since its inception, by conservative forces. A positive answer has been given to two important questions:

(1) whether the strategy of the Social Democrats (SPD), evolved three years ago, of joining the Christian Democrats (CDU) in a “Great Coalition” would pay off in a sufficiently increased vote to dislodge the CDU from the government;

(2) whether the vote for the NPD, the neoNazi party, could be kept below the 5 percent needed to enter the Bonn parliament.

A major contributing factor was the recent turn toward the Left by the small but decisive Free Democratic party (FDP), at the c...