The Crisis of German Social Democracy Revisited

Abstract: This article analyses the dramatic electoral decline of German social democracy since 2003. It argues that the SPD’s decision, under the leadership of former Chancellor Gerhard Schroder, to engage in welfare state retrenchment and labour market deregulation during the ‘Hartz reforms’ (2003-05) demoralised the SPD electorate. The SPD subsequently lost half of its former electoral coalition, namely blue-collar voters and socially disadvantaged groups, while efforts to gain access to centrist and middle-class voters have failed to produce any compensating gains. While the SPD’s decline from a large to a mid-sized party is part of a larger transformation of the German party system, no political recovery is possible for social democracy without a fundamental change of strategy, namely efforts to regain former voters by offering credible social welfare and redistributive policies. The SPD will not be able to delegate such policies in a ‘convoy model’ to other parties, such as the Left Pa

Object Details

• Location: Deutsche Nationalbibliothek Frankfurt am Main
• Extent: Online-Ressource
• Language: Englisch
• Notes: Veröffentlichungsversion ; begutachtet ; In: The Political Quarterly ; 88 (2017) 2 ; 230-239

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Politik

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (where): Mannheim
• (when): 2017
• Creator: Dostal, Jörg Michael

Further information

• URN: urn:nbn:de:0168-ssoar-55601-8
• Rights: Open Access unbekannt; Open Access; Der Zugriff auf das Objekt ist unbeschränkt möglich.
• Last update: 25.03.2025, 1:51 PM CET