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90-628: After its exclusion from the parent organization Social Democratic Party of Germany, the SDS became the leading element in the Außerparlamentarische Opposition (APO; English: Extraparliamentary Opposition ). In late 1966, it became active when the SPD and Christian Democratic Union formed a grand coalition, which left Germany without a strong opposition inside parliament, since members of those two parties represented more than 90% of

180-848: A Free Democratic Party was founded in May 1946. In the first post-war state elections in 1946, liberal parties performed well in Württemberg-Baden (16.8%), Bremen (18.3%), Hamburg (18.2%) and Greater Berlin (still undivided; 9.3%). The LDP was especially strong in the October 1946 state elections of the Soviet zone—the last free parliamentary election in East Germany—obtaining an average of 24.6% (highest in Saxony-Anhalt, 29.9%, and Thuringia, 28.5%), thwarting an absolute majority of

270-478: A CDU-FDP centre-right governing coalition in the Bundestag with a 53% majority of seats. On election night, party leader Westerwelle said his party would work to ensure that civil liberties were respected and that Germany got an "equitable tax system and better education opportunities". The party also made gains in the two state elections held at the same time, acquiring sufficient seats for a CDU-FDP coalition in

360-567: A European-oriented liberals, although it came from the national liberal camp, but with Willi Weyer and Hans-Dietrich Genscher led the new centre of the party. This center strove to make the FDP coalition support both major parties. Here, the Liberals approached to by their reorientation in East Germany and politics especially of the SPD. On 21 October 1969 began the period after the election of

450-712: A Social-Liberal coalition with the SPD and the German Chancellor Willy Brandt . Walter Scheel was he who initiated the foreign policy reversal. Despite a very small majority he and Willy Brandt sat by the controversial New Ostpolitik. This policy was within the FDP quite controversial, especially since after the entry into the Federal Government defeats in state elections in North Rhine-Westphalia, Lower Saxony and Saarland on 14 June 1970 followed. In Hanover and Saarbrücken,

540-737: A central part of the German student movement . Its membership consisted mostly of young people disillusioned with the grand coalition ( Große Koalition ) of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) and the Christian Democratic Union (CDU). Since the coalition controlled 95 percent of the Bundestag , the APO provided a more effective outlet for student dissent. Its most prominent member and unofficial spokesman

630-545: A coalition between the FDP and CDU/CSU was impossible primarily because of the weak results of the FDP. The CDU/CSU parties had achieved the third-worst performance in German postwar history with only 35.2 percent of the votes. Therefore, the FDP was unable to form a coalition with its preferred partners, the CDU/CSU parties. As a result, the party was considered as a potential member of two other political coalitions , following

720-651: A famous kabarettist in the 1980s and the 1990s. A watershed in the history of the West German APO commenced on 2 June 1967, during demonstrations against the official visit of the Iranian Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi when student Benno Ohnesorg was shot by a policeman. Ohnesorg was attending his first-ever political demonstration, and his death left his pregnant girlfriend to fend for herself. The student movement radicalised itself, became more militant and focused its attention on

810-783: A liberal coalition party was founded in the state of Bremen under the name of Bremen Democratic People's Party. In January 1946, liberal state parties of the British occupation zone merged into the Free Democratic Party of the British Zone (FDP). A similar state party in Hesse , called the Liberal Democratic Party, was licensed by the U.S. military government in January 1946. In the state of Bavaria,

900-464: A near-revolutionary situation and much disruption, street fighting and mass strikes in May 1968, culminating in a state crisis. One of the protagonists of the German and French APO, activist and later Green Party politician Daniel Cohn-Bendit was refused reentry into France on the initiative of president Charles de Gaulle . Further members of the APO were Joseph "Joschka" Fischer (German foreign minister from 1998 to 2005) and Matthias Beltz, who became

990-685: A pan-German party of liberals from all four occupation zones. Its leaders were Theodor Heuss (representing the DVP of Württemberg-Baden in the American zone) and Wilhelm Külz (representing the LDP of the Soviet zone). However, the project failed in January 1948 as a result of disputes over Külz's pro-Soviet direction. The Free Democratic Party was established on 11–12 December 1948 in Heppenheim , in Hesse , as an association of all 13 liberal state parties in

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1080-538: A time JuLis and the Young Democrats operated side by side, until the JuLis became the sole official youth wing of the FDP in 1983. The Young Democrats split from the FDP and were left as a party-independent youth organization. At the time of reunification, the FDP's objective was a special economic zone in the former East Germany, but could not prevail against the CDU/CSU, as this would prevent any loss of votes in

1170-494: A week later, the FDP not only crossed the electoral threshold, but also increased its share of the votes to 2 percentage points higher than in the previous state election. This was attributed to the local leadership of Christian Lindner . The FDP last won a directly elected seat in 1990, in Halle —the only time it has won a directly elected seat since 1957. The party's inability to win directly elected seats came back to haunt it at

1260-616: Is a liberal political party in Germany. The FDP was founded in 1948 by members of former liberal political parties which existed in Germany before World War II, namely the German Democratic Party and the German People's Party . For most of the second half of the 20th century, particularly from 1961 to 1982, the FDP held the balance of power in the Bundestag . It has been a junior coalition partner to both

1350-605: Is aligned to the centre or centre-right of the political spectrum. The FDP is a member of the Liberal International , the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe and Renew Europe . The history of liberal parties in Germany dates back to 1861, when the German Progress Party (DFP) was founded, being the first political party in the modern sense in Germany. From the establishment of

1440-462: Is believed that this was partly due to tactical voting by CDU and Christian Social Union of Bavaria (CSU) alliance supporters who hoped for stronger market-oriented economic reforms than the CDU/CSU alliance called for. However, because the CDU did worse than predicted, the FDP and the CDU/CSU alliance were unable to form a coalition government. At other times, for example after the 2002 federal election,

1530-472: The 1965 federal elections the FDP gained 9.5 percent. The coalition with the CDU in 1966 broke on the subject of tax increases and it was followed by a grand coalition between the CDU and the SPD. The opposition also pioneered a course change: the former foreign policy and the attitude to the eastern territories were discussed. The opposition leader for the FDP in the Bundestag was Knut von Kühlmann-Stumm . The new chairman elected delegates in 1968 Walter Scheel,

1620-430: The 2013 election , in which it came up just short of the 5% threshold. With no directly elected seats, the FDP was shut out of the Bundestag for the first time since 1949. After the previous chairman Philipp Rösler then resigned, Christian Lindner took over the leadership of the party. In the 2014 European parliament elections , the FDP received 3.4% of the national vote (986,253 votes in total) and returned 3 MEPs . In

1710-520: The 2014 Brandenburg state election the party experienced a 5.8% down-swing and lost all their representatives in the Brandenburg state parliament. In the 2014 Saxony state election , the party experienced a 5.2% down-swing, again losing all of its seats. In the 2014 Thuringian state election a similar phenomenon was repeated with the party falling below the 5% threshold following a 5.1% drop in popular vote. The party managed to enter parliament in

1800-613: The 2015 Bremen state election with the party receiving 6.5% of the vote and gaining 6 seats. However, it failed to get into government as a coalition between the Social Democrats and the Greens was created. In the 2016 Mecklenburg-Vorpommern state election the party failed to get into parliament despite increasing its vote share by 0.3%. The party did manage to get into parliament in Baden-Württemberg , gaining 3% of

1890-572: The British occupation authorities had arrested seven prominent members of the Naumann Circle, the FDP federal board installed a commission of inquiry, chaired by Thomas Dehler, which particularly sharply criticized the situation in the North Rhine-Westphalian FDP. In the following years, the right wing lost power, and the extreme right increasingly sought areas of activity outside the FDP. In the 1953 federal election ,

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1980-478: The CDU/CSU (1949–1956, 1961–1966, 1982–1998 and 2009–2013) and Social Democratic Party (SPD) (1969–1982, 2021–present). In the 2013 federal election , the FDP failed to win any directly elected seats in the Bundestag and came up short of the 5 percent threshold to qualify for list representation, being left without representation in the Bundestag for the first time in its history. In the 2017 federal election ,

2070-765: The Federal Republic of Germany . In his 1954 re-election , he received the best election result to date of a President with 871 of 1018 votes (85.6 percent) of the Federal Assembly . Adenauer was also elected on the proposal of the new German President with an extremely narrow majority as the first Chancellor. The FDP participated with the CDU/CSU and the DP in Adenauer's coalition cabinet; they had three ministers: Franz Blücher (Vice-Chancellor), Thomas Dehler (justice), and Eberhard Wildermuth (housing). On

2160-700: The GDR new liberal parties emerged, like the FDP East Germany or the German Forum Party. They formed the Liberal Democratic Party, who had previously acted as a bloc party on the side of the SED and with Manfred Gerlach also the last Council of State of the GDR presented, the Alliance of Free Democrats (BFD). Within the FDP came in the following years to considerable internal discussions about dealing with

2250-453: The Kommune I (Commune 1) had begun, spurred on by the words of Fritz Teufel , Dieter Kunzelmann and Rainer Langhans . Its members were often prosecuted, which caused a platform for further protests. The APO also found support and theoretical guidance from intellectuals and philosophers such as Ernst Bloch , Theodor W. Adorno , Herbert Marcuse and Jean-Paul Sartre . On the whole,

2340-543: The Kosovo War in 1999 and the Afghan War in 2002. A small number of APO activists such as Andreas Baader , Gudrun Ensslin , journalist Ulrike Meinhof resorted to arson in department stores and illegal underground work. They collaborated in the "RAF" (German: Rote Armee Fraktion; English: Red Army Faction) . This was initially called the "bewaffneten Widerstand" (English: armed opposition), and eventually became

2430-666: The National Liberal Party in 1867 until the demise of the Weimar Republic in 1933, the liberal-democratic camp was divided into a " national-liberal " and a "left-liberal" line of tradition. After 1918 the national-liberal strain was represented by the German People's Party (DVP), the left-liberal one by the German Democratic Party (DDP, which merged into the German State Party in 1930). Both parties played an important role in government during

2520-676: The Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) that was favoured by the Soviet occupation power. This disappointment to the communists however led to a change of electoral laws in the Soviet zone, cutting the autonomy of non-socialist parties including the LDP and forcing it to join the SED-dominated National Front , making it a dependent " bloc party ". The Democratic Party of Germany (DPD) was established in Rothenburg ob der Tauber on 17 March 1947 as

2610-464: The Spiegel affair , the FDP withdrew their ministers from the federal government. Although the coalition was renewed again under Adenauer in 1962, the FDP withdrew again on the condition in October 1963. This occurred even under the new Chancellor, Ludwig Erhard. This was for Erich Mende turn the occasion to go into the cabinet: he took the rather unimportant Federal Ministry for All-German Affairs. In

2700-619: The Springer Press , namely the Bild Zeitung (the German equivalent of the British publication The Sun ), which greatly opposed the student movement to the general public. Less than a year after the death of Benno Ohnesorg, a young worker named Josef Bachmann attempted to assassinate Rudi Dutschke, one of the most prominent leaders of the student movement; Bachmann shot Dutschke three times at close range, hitting him once in

2790-477: The Weimar Republic . In the first elections to the Bundestag on 14 August 1949 , the FDP won a vote share of 11.9 percent (with 12 direct mandates, particularly in Baden-Württemberg and Hesse), and thus obtained 52 of 402 seats. It formed a common Bundestag group with the hard-right German Party (DP) . In September of the same year the FDP chairman Theodor Heuss was elected the first President of

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2880-522: The anti-nuclear movement in Germany , the peace movement activists and other new social movements in the 1970s and 1980s, whose founders had previously been very active in the APO. In 1983, the German Green Party was elected into the Bundestag, where it stood for the concept of movement and change, so that its roots and philosophy were seen in new social movements. Within only a few years, the Greens gained much political power and prestige. In

2970-615: The terrorist group known as the Baader-Meinhof Gruppe . Bank robberies, kidnappings and even murders were committed against protagonists of businesses, politics and justice by the RAF, the " Bewegung 2. Juni " (Movement of the 2nd June) and the "Revolutionären Zellen" (Revolutionary Cells) until the 1980s. Free Democratic Party (Germany) The Free Democratic Party (German: Freie Demokratische Partei , FDP , German pronunciation: [ɛfdeːˈpeː] )

3060-519: The " Heppenheim Assembly " was held at the Hotel Halber Mond on 10 October 1847, a meeting of moderate liberals who were preparing for what would be, within a few months, the German revolutions of 1848–1849 . The FDP was founded on 11 December 1948 through the merger of nine regional liberal parties formed in 1945 from the remnants of the pre-1933 German People's Party (DVP) and the German Democratic Party (DDP), which had been active in

3150-569: The 1950s, several of the FDP's regional organizations were to the right of the CDU/CSU, which initially had ideas of some sort of Christian socialism, and even former office-holders of the Third Reich were courted with nationalist values. The FDP voted in parliament at the end of 1950 against the CDU- and SPD-introduced de-nazification process. At their party conference in Munich in 1951 they demanded

3240-521: The APO, and the SDS as its best known representative. The students involved used the same methods of protest as the anti-war movement in the United States at that time, for example sit-ins and demonstrations. The student movement reached its height in 1968 (its membership peaked at 2,500 at that time); after that the influence of the SDS declined. In 1970 it disbanded. A resurrection of the SDS in 1988 proved of no importance. Important members of

3330-571: The Ahlen Programme, which allowed a Third Way between capitalism and socialism . Ludwig Erhard , the "father" of the social market economy , had his followers in the early years of the Federal Republic in the CDU/CSU rather than in the FDP. The FDP won Hesse's 1950 state election with 31.8 percent, the best result in its history, through appealing to East Germans displaced by the war by including them on their ticket. Up to

3420-483: The FDP achieved 12.8 percent nationwide, the best result until then, and the FDP entered a coalition with the CDU again. Although it was committed before the election to continuing to sit in any case in a government together with Adenauer, Chancellor Adenauer was again, however, to withdraw under the proviso, after two years. These events led to the FDP being nicknamed the Umfallerpartei ("pushover party"). In

3510-635: The FDP received 9.5 percent of the party votes, 10.8 percent of the primary vote (with 14 direct mandates, particularly in Hamburg , Lower Saxony, Hesse, Württemberg and Bavaria ) and 48 of 487 seats. In the second term of the Bundestag, the South German Liberal Democrats gained influence in the party. Thomas Dehler, a representative of a more social-liberal course took over as party and parliamentary leader. The former Minister of Justice Dehler, who in 1933 suffered persecution by

3600-507: The FDP regained its representation in the Bundestag, receiving 10.6% of the vote. After the 2021 federal election the FDP became part of governing Scholz cabinet in coalition with the Social Democratic Party and the Greens . Since the 1980s, the party, consistently with its ordoliberal tradition, has pushed economic liberalism and has aligned itself closely to the promotion of free markets and privatization , and

3690-417: The FDP was the only opposing party in the parliament at the time; the rest were in extraparliamentary opposition. This weakened the opposition, the Bundestag strengthened the APO in Germany. The APO demanded a democratization of university politics. A motto of the student movement protesting against the old-fashioned nature of higher education institutions was "Unter den Talaren – Muff von 1000 Jahren" ("under

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3780-466: The FDP's nearly three decade reign in government. In its 2002 campaign the FDP made an exception to its party policy of siding with the CDU/CSU when it adopted equidistance to the CDU and SPD. From 1998 until 2009 the FDP remained in the opposition until it became part of a new centre-right coalition government. In the 2005 general election the party won 9.8 percent of the vote and 61 federal deputies, an unpredicted improvement from prior opinion polls. It

3870-490: The FDP's position as the largest opposition party in the Bundestag. In the 2009 European election , the FDP received 11% of the national vote (2,888,084 votes in total) and returned 12 MEPs . In the September 2009 federal elections , the FDP increased its share of the vote by 4.8 percentage points to 14.6%, an all-time record. This percentage was enough to offset a decline in the CDU/CSU's vote compared to 2005, to create

3960-478: The Freiburg Thesis, which were as Rowohlt Paperback sold more than 100,000 times, on a theoretical basis, the FDP is committed to " social liberalism " and social reforms . Walter Scheel was first foreign minister and vice chancellor, 1974, he was then second-liberal President and paving the way for inner-party the previous interior minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher free. From 1969 to 1974 the FDP supported

4050-459: The Nazis, was known for his rhetorical focus. Generally the various regional associations were independent. After the FDP had left in early 1956, the coalition with the CDU in North Rhine-Westphalia and made with SPD and centre a new state government, were a total of 16 members of parliament, including the four federal ministers from the FDP and founded the short-lived Free People's Party, which then up

4140-542: The SDS were Helmut Schmidt , later Chancellor of Germany (he was a member while the SDS was still part of the SPD); the later Red Army Faction member Ulrike Meinhof ; and Rudi Dutschke . In 2007, the student organization of the recent German Left Party , Die Linke, adopted the name Die Linke.SDS (Sozialistisch-Demokratischer Studierendenverband) at its founding congress. A number of people who would later hold important positions in German society and politics were members of

4230-565: The SDS: This article about a political party in Germany is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Au%C3%9Ferparlamentarische Opposition The Außerparlamentarische Opposition ( German for extra-parliamentary opposition , commonly known as the APO ), was a political protest movement in West Germany during the latter half of the 1960s and early 1970s, forming

4320-485: The SPD Chancellor Willy Brandt, who was succeeded by Helmut Schmidt . Already by the end of the 70s there did not seem to be enough similarities between the FDP and the SPD to form a new coalition, but the CDU/CSU chancellor candidate of Franz Josef Strauss in 1980 pushed the parties to run together again. The FDP's policies, however, began to drift apart from the SPD's, especially when it came to

4410-535: The SPD. The APO was formed through the opposition mounting against the " grand coalition " government in power since 1966, which united the CDU and the SPD under the Chancellor Kurt Georg Kiesinger (CDU) and its proposed German Emergency Acts (emergency laws), which would maximise governmental control in case of a public dispute, allowing them to restrict civil rights such as privacy and freedom of movement. With 49 seats in parliament,

4500-738: The Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi visited West Germany . On June 2, 1967 in West Berlin , Iranian and German students (including the Socialist German Student Union and Confederation of Iranian Students ) protested the Shah's visit, and it resulted in one student being killed. Alternative lifestyles and more tolerance for same-sex couples , a more open treatment of sexual topics, the right to abortion and equal rights for women are also associated with

4590-419: The Union won an absolute majority. The FDP also called for a nuclear-free zone in Central Europe. Even before the election Dehler was assigned as party chairman. At the federal party in Berlin at the end January 1957 relieved him Reinhold Maier. Dehler's role as Group Chairman took over after the election of the national set very Erich Mende. Mende was also chairman of the party. In the 1961 federal election ,

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4680-482: The Weimar Republic era, but successively lost votes during the rise of the Nazi Party beginning in the late-1920s. After the Nazi seizure of power , both liberal parties agreed to the Enabling Act of 1933 and subsequently dissolved themselves. During the 12 years of Hitler's rule, some former liberals collaborated with the Nazis (e.g. economy minister Hjalmar Schacht ), while others resisted actively against Nazism, with some Liberal leaning members and former members of

4770-403: The West German APO consisted of young people, mostly students, who could hardly gain a foothold in workforce. A few analysts of the time, such as Jutta Ditfurth , spoke out against these assumptions and embraced the workforce, including them in the political movement. In France, the case was somewhat different. Their solidarity was found between the unions and the student activists, which led to

4860-546: The actions of the US. Among other protagonists, the movement idolised Cuban guerilla fighter Che Guevara and the founder of the Vietnamese Communist Party Ho Chi Minh . "Ho-Ho-Ho-Chi-Minh" was often chanted at demonstrations towards the end of the 1960s. Soon student movement took part in discussions about society and criticised society, demanding fundamental changes in society towards a socialist revolutionary ideal. New forms of communal life were tried, as well as new forms of protests and political actions. In particular, life in

4950-400: The backdrop of this movement were criticism of the Vietnam War and the United States , students' anti-authoritarian rebellion against their parents' generation, criticism of professors' dominance of universities and continuity of the societal relations of power, especially the continuity in the civil service since the Nazi era, and the criticism of the centre-left SPD by those to the left of

5040-544: The constitutional freedom of opinion, the press and assembly to convey its demands publicly. New political currents usually begin outside the parliament and usually creep over the Länderparlamente into the German Bundestag (federal parliament) or even into the Bundesregierung Deutschlands (the German federal government). For example, the Green Party entered into a coalition with the SPD (the social democratic party in Germany) in 1998, it remained in government until 2005. The student movement began to gain strength and momentum in

5130-489: The debt crisis. Westerwelle stepped down as party leader following the 2011 state elections, in which the party was wiped out in Saxony-Anhalt and Rhineland-Palatinate and lost half its seats in Baden-Württemberg . Westerwelle was replaced in May 2011 by Philipp Rösler . The change in leadership failed to revive the FDP's fortunes, however, and in the next series of state elections, the party lost all its seats in Bremen , Mecklenburg-Vorpommern , and Berlin . In Berlin,

5220-462: The economy. Within the SPD, there was strong grassroots opposition to Chancellor Helmut Schmidt's policies on the NATO Double-Track Decision . However, within the FDP, the conflicts and contrasts were always greater. In the fall of 1982, the FDP reneged on its coalition agreement with the SPD and instead threw its support behind the CDU/CSU. On 1 October, the FDP and CDU/CSU were able to oust Schmidt and replace him with CDU party chairman Helmut Kohl as

5310-408: The election. One possibility was a partnership between the FDP, the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) and the Alliance 90/The Greens , known as a " traffic light coalition ", named after the colors of the three parties. This coalition was ruled out, because the FDP considered the Social Democrats and the Greens insufficiently committed to market-oriented economic reform . The other possibility

5400-497: The end of 1950 in the Bundestag because the opposition SPD supported the motion along with the governing CDU/CSU; the governing FDP voted along with the hard-right DP and the openly neo-Nazi German Reich Party (DRP) against the law against Nazis. The 1953 Naumann Circle , named after Werner Naumann , consisted of a group of former Nazis who tried to infiltrate the party, which had many right-wing and nationalist members in Hesse , North Rhine-Westphalia and Lower Saxony . After

5490-474: The end of 2010, the party's support had dropped to as low as 5%. The FDP retained their seats in the state elections in North Rhine-Westphalia , which was held six months after the federal election, but out of the seven state elections that have been held since 2009, the FDP have lost all their seats in five of them due to failing to cross the 5% threshold. Support for the party further eroded amid infighting and an internal rebellion over euro-area bailouts during

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5580-429: The five new federal states in the general election in 1990. In all federal election campaigns since the 1980s, the party sided with the CDU and CSU, the main conservative parties in Germany. Following German reunification in 1990, the FDP merged with the Association of Free Democrats , a grouping of liberals from East Germany and the Liberal Democratic Party of Germany . During the political upheavals of 1989/1990 in

5670-409: The former bloc party. Even before the reunification of Germany united on a joint congress in Hanover, the West German FDP united with the other parties to form the first all-German party. Both party factions brought the FDP a great, albeit short-lived, increase in membership. In the first all-German Bundestag elections, the CDU/CSU/FDP centre-right coalition was confirmed, the FDP received 11.0 percent of

5760-443: The head. Dutschke suffered health problems from the shooting for the rest of his life, including an epileptic condition that caused his death by an accidental drowning in 1979. After 1969, the APO, in its then-current form, played no further role in West Germany, although there was further extraparliamentary opposition. New social movements in the 1970s affected political and social areas, which had already been addressed in part by

5850-521: The middle of the 1960s in West Germany. The student movement is often used synonymously with APO, since it was at the time the most prominent form of extraparliamentary opposition in Germany. The student movement reached its peak in 1967 and 1968, especially in towns with universities. The most cited form of student-led APO was headed by the Sozialistischer Deutscher Studentenbund (the socialist German student group). According to social democratic historian Heinrich August Winkler , major factors that formed

5940-413: The military joining up with Henning von Tresckow (e.g. the Solf Circle ). Soon after World War II, the Soviet Union pushed for the creation of licensed " anti-fascist " parties in its occupation zone in East Germany. In July 1945, former DDP politicians Wilhelm Külz , Eugen Schiffer and Waldemar Koch called for the establishment of a pan-German liberal party. Their Liberal-Democratic Party (LDP)

6030-416: The most important economic, social and German national issues, the FDP agreed with their coalition partners, the CDU/CSU. However, the FDP offered to middle-class voters a secular party that refused the religious schools and accused the opposition parties of clericalization. The FDP said they were known also as a consistent representative of the market economy, while the CDU was then dominated nominally from

6120-480: The new Chancellor. The coalition change resulted in severe internal conflicts, and the FDP then lost about 20 percent of its 86,500 members, as reflected in the general election in 1983 by a drop from 10.6 percent to 7.0 percent. The members went mostly to the SPD, the Greens and newly formed splinter parties, such as the left-liberal party Liberal Democrats (LD). The exiting members included the former FDP General Secretary and later EU Commissioner Günter Verheugen . At

6210-404: The northernmost state, Schleswig-Holstein , and gaining enough votes in left-leaning Brandenburg to clear the 5% hurdle to enter that state's parliament. However, after reaching its best ever election result in 2009, the FDP's support collapsed. The party's policy pledges were put on hold by Merkel as the Great Recession unfolded and with the onset of the European debt crisis in 2010. By

6300-399: The party convention in November 1982, the Schleswig-Holstein state chairman Uwe Ronneburger challenged Hans-Dietrich Genscher as party chairman. Ronneburger received 186 of the votes—about 40 percent—and was just narrowly defeated by Genscher. in 1980, FDP members who did not agree with the politics of the FDP youth organization Young Democrats founded the Young Liberals (JuLis). For

6390-416: The party left the parliament. After the federal party congress in Bonn, just a week later supported the policy of the party leadership and Scheel had confirmed in office, founded by Siegfried party rights Zoglmann 11 July 1970 a "non-partisan" organization called the National-Liberal action on the Hohensyburgstraße—to fall with the goal of ending the social-liberal course of the party and Scheel. However, this

6480-548: The party lost nearly 75% of the support they had had in the previous election. In March 2012, the FDP lost all their state-level representation in the 2012 Saarland state election . However, this was offset by the Schleswig-Holstein state elections, when they achieved 8% of the vote, which was a severe loss of seats but still over the 5% threshold. In the snap elections in North Rhine-Westphalia

6570-637: The release of all "so-called war criminals " and welcomed the establishment of the "Association of German soldiers" of former Wehrmacht and SS members to advance the integration of the Nazi forces in democracy. The FDP members were seen as part of the " extremist " block along with the German Party in West Germany by the US intelligence officials. Similarly, a de-Nazification Act could only be passed at

6660-502: The seats in the Bundestag . The group consisted mainly of college and university students. The SDS opposed the Vietnam War and Germany's political involvement in it, as well as the use of nuclear weapons ; and objected that many former National Socialists (or Nazis) still held influential positions in West Germany. They also wanted to advance democratic structures in all institutions, for example in schools. In May and June 1967,

6750-421: The student movement. Environmental protection and nuclear power became the latest themes focused on by former APO activists. The APO disbanded itself in 1968, dividing into smaller communist groups known as K-Gruppen , which remained on the political landscape but had no notable influence on West German politics. The "Marsch durch die Institutionen" (march through the institutions) propagated by Rudi Dutschke

6840-491: The three Western zones of occupation. The proposed name, Liberal Democratic Party, was rejected by the delegates, who voted 64 to 25 in favour of the name Free Democratic Party (FDP). The party's first chairman was Theodor Heuss, a member of the Democratic People's Party in Württemberg-Baden; his deputy was Franz Blücher of the FDP in the British Zone. The place for the party's foundation was chosen deliberately:

6930-432: The time following the party's founding, there was a divide between the fundamentalists and the realists, which still exists. It was the willingness of the Greens to compromise and adapt that has led to their increased political power. In particular, since they entered into a coalition government with the SPD in 1998 and supported issues targeted by the APO which were in the eyes of many underrepresented such as participation in

7020-511: The university gowns, the musty smell of a thousand years"), which also referred to Hitler , who had called his regime a rule for a thousand years. The APO criticised society's repression of the crimes of National Socialism through its parents' generation, only interested in economic recovery. Thus, it joined worldwide protests against the Vietnam War and showed solidarity with the guerrilla fighters campaigning in North Vietnam against

7110-542: The valid votes (79 seats) and won in Genschers city of birth Halle (Saale) the first direct mandate since 1957. During the 1990s, the FDP won between 6.2 and 11 percent of the vote in Bundestag elections. It last participated in the federal government by representing the junior partner in the government of Chancellor Helmut Kohl of the CDU. In 1998, the CDU/CSU-FDP coalition lost the federal election, which ended

7200-411: The vote and 7 seats. It also managed to enter government under a traffic light coalition . In 2016 Saxony-Anhalt state election the party narrowly missed the 5% threshold, receiving 4.9% of the vote and therefore receiving zero seats despite a 1% swing in their favour. The 2017 North Rhine-Westphalia state election was widely considered a test of the party's future as their chairman Christian Lindner

7290-416: The vote and a total of 12 seats. This represents a five-seat improvement over their previous results. In the 2016 Berlin state election the party gained 4.9% of the vote and 12 seats but still failed to get into government. A red-red-green coalition was instead formed relegating the FDP to the opposition. In the 2016 Rhineland-Palatinate state election , the party managed to enter parliament receiving 6.2% of

7380-550: Was Rudi Dutschke . As opposed to APO, there was also opposition from other parties that, although they are represented in parliament, do not participate in the formation of the government. Small parties receive too few votes in an election to reenter the parliament. For example, in the past the Free Democratic Party (FDP) has often not been represented in Länderparlamente (federal state governments), but they are not classified as APO. APO in Germany called primarily for

7470-411: Was a CDU-FDP-Green coalition, known as a " Jamaica coalition " because of the colours of the three parties. This coalition wasn't concluded either, since the Greens ruled out participation in any coalition with the CDU/CSU. Instead, the CDU formed a Grand coalition with the SPD, and the FDP entered the opposition . FDP leader Guido Westerwelle became the unofficial leader of the opposition by virtue of

7560-408: Was also leading the party in that state. The party experienced a 4% swing in its favour gaining 6 seats and entering into a coalition with the CDU with a bare majority. In the 2017 Saarland state election the party again failed to gain any seats despite a 1% swing in their favour. The party gained 3 seats and increased its vote share by 3.2% in the 2017 Schleswig-Holstein state election . This success

7650-495: Was embarked upon, resulting in the formation of the Green Party 11 years later. The idea behind this march was that political structures could be manipulated only from within, so it made more sense for larger groups to disband and for individuals and smaller groups to work more or less independently in their local areas to change the political system of their federal republic. The Green Party was formed to organize and accommodate

7740-428: Was involved to the end of the legislature instead of FDP in the Federal Government. The FDP first took it to the opposition. Only one of the smaller post-war parties, the FDP survived despite many problems. In 1957 federal elections they still reached 7.7 percent of the vote to 1990 and their last direct mandate with which they had held 41 of 497 seats in the Bundestag. However, they still remained in opposition because

7830-498: Was not done. Zoglmann supported in October 1970 a disapproval resolution of opposition to Treasury Secretary Alexander Möller, Erich Mende, Heinz Starke, and did the same. A little later all three declared their withdrawal from the FDP; Mende and Strong joined the CDU, Zoglmann later founded the German Union (Deutsche Union) , which remained a splinter party. The foreign policy and the socio-political changes were made in 1971 by

7920-418: Was often credited to their state chairman Wolfgang Kubicki . They also managed to re-enter the government under a Jamaica coalition . In the 2017 federal election the party scored 10.7% of votes and re-entered the Bundestag, winning 80 seats. After the election, a Jamaica coalition was considered between the CDU, Greens, and FDP. However, FDP chief Christian Lindner walked out of the coalition talks due to

8010-538: Was revived in some states of the Western occupation zones (in the Southwestern states of Württemberg-Baden and Württemberg-Hohenzollern under the name of Democratic People's Party ). Many former members of DDP and DVP however agreed to finally overcome the traditional split of German liberalism into a national-liberal and a left-liberal branch, aiming for the creation of a united liberal party. In October 1945

8100-568: Was soon licensed by the Soviet Military Administration in Germany , under the condition that the new party joined the pro-Soviet " Democratic Bloc ". In September 1945, citizens in Hamburg —including the anti-Nazi resistance circle "Association Free Hamburg"—established the Party of Free Democrats (PFD) as a bourgeois left-wing party and the first liberal Party in the Western occupation zones. The German Democratic Party

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