INTRODUCTION

Let us return to the 1998 federal elections in Germany, which I introduced in Chapter 1, and to some of the fifteen land elections following it. Concurrent with the general elections on September 27, the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania held elections for its land assembly. The Social Democrats and the Greens, winning a majority in the Bundestag, received almost identical support in the state in both federal and land elections – only 1.2 percentage points less in the latter compared with the former. Four and a half months later, in February 1999, the state of Hesse held elections for its assembly. The vote share of the national governing coalition was 3.2 percentage points less than it had been in the federal elections in the land. Seven months later, in September 1999, Saarland, Brandenburg, Thuringia, and Saxony held regional elections. The Reds and the Greens lost support in each of the four states by 13.6 percentage points on average.1 Next were elections in Berlin in October 1999, with a 16.8 percent drop in public support for the governing coalition. Eight additional land elections took place in the coming months, with the governing coalition losing support in all but one, ending with elections in Saxony-Anhalt in April 2002, five months before the next federal elections, with 19.4 percentage points less than in the federal elections. It seemed that the Red Green coalition was doomed.