Q&A with Constanze Stelzenmüller
Germany is holding regional elections in three eastern states this month—Saxony and Thuringia voted on September 1 and Brandenburg will vote on September 22—and the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party has or is expected to make significant gains in all three. Expanding on her analysis in the Financial Times from before and after the September 1 elections, Constanze Stelzenmüller talks to us about how these elections are playing out in German politics.
What did the results in Saxony and Thuringia tell us about the power of anti-establishment parties, particularly the AfD and the far-left Alliance Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW), across Germany? Is this trend likely to continue in the September 22 elections in Brandenburg?
AfD and BSW are not just anti-establishment. They are ethno-nationalist, anti-system parties: against NATO and the EU; pro-Russian (Chinese support has also been documented); and opposed to foundational elements of Germany’s constitutional order, such as judicial independence, protection of minorities, and freedom of the press.
Saxony and Thuringia together only provide about a tenth of Germany’s roughly 60 million voters; and the surge of the extremists there is rooted in the persistent singularities of eastern German politics, which have resulted in weak political institutionalization and a culture of street protest (and violence). At current estimates, the outcome of the Brandenburg elections might be slightly more stable; and in nationwide polls less than 20 and 10% favor the AfD and BSW, respectively.
But all that only makes the ability of especially the BSW to set national issue agendas—e.g. on migration—all the more extraordinary. And it speaks to the profound insecurity and disorientation of the democratic parties ahead of the national election on September 28, 2025.
What will the success of the AfD and BSW in these state votes mean for the governing coalition in Berlin and the opposition Christian Democrats ahead of next fall’s national elections?
The AfD remains excluded from government by common consensus of the democratic parties. But there is no way past cooperation with the BSW in Thuringia, and possibly in Saxony as well; and that might show whether the leftwing nationalists are willing to constructively engage in co-governance. Currently, however, its fiery ex-communist leader Sahra Wagenknecht appears to be much more focused on polarizing national politics by insisting that she will not work with any party that supports military aid for Ukraine or the stationing of U.S. medium-range missiles in Germany—knowing full well that there is cross-party consensus on both issues in Berlin, but real divides in the electorate.
Much, therefore, depends on the governing traffic light coalition resolving its deep differences. As of now, that is by no means assured. The opposition conservatives of the CDU have just nominated their leader Friedrich Merz as chancellor candidate for the national vote next September—but he will also be measured by how his party handles extremist challenges in the eastern states.
The German government severely tightened its domestic security and migration policies following a knife attack in Solingen by an immigrant in late August which left three dead. How has the imposition of stronger border controls affected German politics, as well as relations with Germany’s neighbors?
It is one thing to acknowledge that Germany has a problem with uncontrolled immigration, and another to note that it is currently undermining the EU’s immigration regime in response to the ruthless instrumentalization of a migrant-committed crime by the domestic hard right and extreme left. The governments of Poland, Greece, and Austria have criticized Berlin sharply and said they would not take back migrants refused entry at the German border, while the Dutch hard right leader Geert Wilders and Hungary’s prime minister Viktor Orbàn were delighted.
Meanwhile, Chancellor Olaf Scholz has just been to Uzbekistan to conclude the latest in a series of “migration and mobility agreements,” which would permit Germany to send back illegal immigrants from these countries in exchange for offering visas to more qualified immigrants. This, he said in Samarkand, was another “small stone in a very large wall.” For the leader of a country that annually celebrates the fall of its own dividing wall on November 9, 1989 (the event that sparked the downfall of communist rule in all of Europe and the idea that history was at an end), that message is terribly sad.