I just learned that very few Germans are formal members of any political party – the explainer video here (https://youtu.be/nnP2IC6bZzY?si=sok-jgAtCFUaCgmS) quotes only 1.2 million members in 2020. I’m sure that some non-members are convinced to donate now and then, but clearly they can’t mount national campaigns with this kind of funding alone.

In the US, individual citizens can only contribute a few thousand dollars to official candidates per “election.” And there is a big debate about unrestricted funding from undisclosed sources towards affiliated committees, which can still advocate on behalf of candidates. This is sometimes very explicit, but also can be more conspicuous. In many cases, it’s not transparent to voters where the money is coming from.

How does this work in Germany?

Edit to add: Thanks for the links, those are helpful. I should have watched the video to the end, it also explains the public financing. What I think I’m asking about is whether the German political system ALSO has issues with the dark money common in the US system.

by PuzzledArrival

6 comments

  3. Additional: the kind of election warfare common in the US is seen as idiotic here. The amount of money America dumps into their elections is seen as madness.

  4. Apart from *how* they are funded, you should also understand the amounts involved.

    In 2017, the SPD spent 24 million Euro on the entire campaign, while the CDU/CSU combined spent an estimated 29 million Euro. Three of the smaller parties spent 17 million combined. The AfD didn’t disclose it, but would probably have been in the 6 million range as well.

    So you get ~76 million Euro.

    That is for *the entire* federal election campaign, meaning the competition for every single local seat, and the overall party votes.

    https://www.bpb.de/themen/politisches-system/wahlen-in-deutschland/335674/wahlkampfkosten/

    https://de.statista.com/infografik/8805/kosten-des-bundestagswahlkampfes/

    Individual presidential candidates and “associated groups” in the US might [raise enough in a month](https://edition.cnn.com/2016/10/25/politics/hillary-clinton-fundraisers-election-2016/index.html) to run two German federal elections for all parties.

  6. In the US it’s not highly debated, citizens united is just straight up oligarchy material. The “individuals” that fund the superPACs are not your average citizens but the 1% almost exclusively

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