Free Democratic Party (Germany)

The fundamental idea of the FDP in terms of content is liberalism, which it has always traditionally represented in Germany. Its fundamental ideal is thus the freedom of the individual, especially from state violence. The FDP's ideal is thus based on a negative concept of freedom. The orientation of the FDP is described as almost universally economic liberal or market liberal, as occurs in some two-dimensional models of the political spectrum.

The current guidelines of the FDP are anchored in the Karlsruhe Freedom Theses. These were adopted at the 63rd Ordinary Federal Party Congress in Karlsruhe on 22 April 2012. Previously, the Wiesbaden Principles applied, which were adopted at the 48th Ordinary Federal Party Congress on 24 May 1997 in Wiesbaden.

Economic policy

According to its own statements, the economic policy of the FDP is oriented towards a liberal and social market economy.

It calls for a state regulatory policy that creates the appropriate framework conditions for this, but does not distort the market through excessive intervention.

The central goal is to create jobs by improving the investment climate. This is to be achieved, among other things, by reducing bureaucracy, privatisation, deregulation, cutting subsidies and reforming collective bargaining law. The party sees opportunities above all in globalisation.

The national debt is to be reduced. The aim is to achieve a balanced budget without new borrowing.

Tax policy calls for a simpler tax code. The income tax model provides for a graduated tariff. In the long term, the aim is a so-called flat tax. Tax cuts are intended to increase the purchasing power of employees and stimulate the economy.

The FDP rejected the nationwide minimum wage in the 2013 federal election campaign. In contrast, the party wanted to introduce wage floors that take into account the specifics of the respective regions and industries.

Social policy

In social policy, the introduction of a citizen's income is being sought, in which all tax-financed social assistance from the state would be combined. This would be a model of a negative income tax. Like the current system, it would be tied to a work obligation. The pay-as-you-go social insurance schemes would be supplemented or replaced by funded schemes.

Health policy

In the area of health policy, the FDP advocates a reduction of bureaucratic regulations. Physical self-determination is also particularly emphasized. Thus, every person should also have the right to freely determine his or her body in the context of medical treatments. Furthermore, the FDP strives for a controlled release of marijuana.

Social policy

A common denominator of the Free Democrats is the critical attitude towards an overpowering state and towards conservative or egalitarian social designs. According to the motto "As much state as necessary, as little state as possible!", the FDP tries to limit the state's intervention in the life of the individual as much as possible. Therefore, it also rejects all elements of a surveillance state. The unifying element for them is the idea of "creating and preserving the freedom of the individual". Thus, it supported almost all social liberalizations that were realized in the Federal Republic.

Family policy

The FDP advocates the legal equality of different forms of cohabitation. Marriage between a man and a woman should not be favoured over other forms of cohabitation. Same-sex couples should receive the same rights as heterosexual couples, e.g. joint adoption rights. The opening of marriage for same-sex couples was supported. Marriage tax splitting is to be retained. The expansion of kindergarten places is to be increased nationwide.

Domestic policy

The FDP opposes, among other things, the retention of telephone and internet connection data without any reason.

The "grand eavesdropping attack" was also controversial: In 1995, the FDP held a referendum on the subject, in which a majority of 37.6 percent voted in favor of the possibility of wiretapping a private residence after approval by a judge. In reaction to the result, the then Federal Minister of Justice Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger (FDP) resigned from her office. When the Bundestag passed the law in question in 1998, several prominent FDP members from the left-liberal wing of the party filed a constitutional complaint, some of them successfully. In the meantime, the federal party conference in Cologne in May 2005 again called for the abolition of the Big Eavesdropping Act.

In its meeting on 12 December 2006, the Federal Executive Committee of the FDP also spoke out against the possibility of online searches, as these represented a serious encroachment on the right to informational self-determination.

The Free Democrats are critical of a tightening of the penal laws. It says that the current law is sufficient to ensure internal security. Instead, it calls for the recruitment of more police officers, judges and prosecutors to increase security and speed up court proceedings. It also calls for better resocialization, especially for juvenile offenders.

The FDP also demands that dual citizenship should be possible without any problems in the future.

Education policy

One of the goals of the FDP is the pre-school support of children. For example, there should be compulsory language tests from the age of four in order to identify possible language weaknesses, e.g. of children with a migration background, and to be able to train them in good time before school in a so-called starting class. Childcare should be free of charge for children and parents in accordance with the legal entitlement to a kindergarten place, half-day between the age of three and school enrolment (or the starting class). Already in the first grade, foreign language instruction should be started playfully as a fixed part of the curriculum.

In addition, the Free Democrats stand by the divided school system and reject a comprehensive school, as in their opinion it is not performance-oriented enough and individual support is not sufficiently guaranteed. The FDP is in favour of back-loaded tuition fees to finance universities. In addition, it demands that laws and regulations that are hostile to research be changed or abolished in order to secure Germany as a research location. Stem cell research is to be promoted.

European policy

The FDP calls itself the European Party. It wants a politically integrated European Union with a common foreign and security policy. In the FDP's view, the Lisbon Treaty should have been decided in a referendum. It advocates a Union capable of political action. Turkey's accession to the EU is rejected; instead, the Liberals advocate close relations within the framework of military and economic policy. The deepening of the EU has priority over enlargement. The party also supports the transatlantic free trade agreement (TTIP) with the USA.

Energy and environmental policy

In energy policy, the party calls for a mix of nuclear power, coal, oil and gas, and renewable energies. The rapid exit from nuclear power has long been viewed critically. Since the events at the Fukushima nuclear power plant, there has been an internal party discussion about an accelerated exit from nuclear energy; in the meantime, this is supported just as much as the medium-term switch to renewable energies, but according to the party's own statements through market-based instruments, such as emissions trading.

Transport policy

The FDP is in favour of further expanding transport routes and providing the necessary budgetary funds for this. The party currently rejects a state-imposed traffic turnaround away from the internal combustion engine towards electromobility. It also rejects a general speed limit on motorways or a reduction in the general speed limit.

Foreign Policy

The FDP is critical of Bundeswehr missions and sees them as justified only as a last resort - and only with a UN mandate. The Bundeswehr should be a strong NATO partner as well as a parliamentary and professional army. This is one of the reasons why the Free Democrats pushed through the suspension of compulsory military service. In the future, the FDP aims to build a European army under joint supreme command and parliamentary control.

Internationally, the FDP demands a more decisive enforcement and promotion of human rights and freedoms, the further advancement of disarmament efforts, and a reform of the United Nations. The party criticized the policy in Hong Kong pushed by the Chinese Communist Party as a breach of international law. In order to sanction violations of human and international law, the party advocates, among other things, a personal sanctions mechanism along the lines of the Magnitsky Act.

Immigration and asylum policy

In immigration policy, the Free Democrats call for a clear separation of immigration and asylum or flight, whereby qualified immigration is to be facilitated by means of a new immigration law and faster and clearer procedures are to be created for humanitarian protection: For example, a new temporary protection status for civil war refugees is to be created. The obligation to obtain work permits for asylum seekers should be abolished, as should the obligation to reside in Germany, which is considered an unjustified encroachment on the freedom of refugees. Furthermore, the FDP demands that the municipalities be relieved and that the federal government assume more costs.

In the medium term, a common EU asylum law is to be created with a European quota system that distributes asylum seekers among the member states.

Refugees should already be helped in their countries of origin by providing on-site assistance in the countries concerned (combating the causes of flight). A humanitarian visa should be introduced for people who are acutely threatened and it should be possible to apply for asylum abroad in order to spare them a life-threatening flight. The Western Balkan states should be declared safe countries of origin in order to stem the flow from these states.

With regard to the immigration of skilled workers, the FDP advocates "greatly simplifying the regulations for the immigration of skilled workers", for example, massively lowering the minimum earnings threshold and establishing the right to a settlement permit (a permanent right of residence) after only two years upon proof of language skills.

Liberalism is the oldest of the modern political movements. It originates from the epoch of enlightenment. The "Free Democratic Party" (FDP) is in the tradition of classical liberalism; as a political-liberal re-foundation of the post-war period in the three western occupation zones, it is associated with the social market economy.

The party was founded in 1948 by former members of the DDP and the DVP. The LDPD and the NDPD, as former GDR bloc parties, as well as the DFP and the F.D.P. of the GDR, which originated from the citizens' movement in the GDR, merged in 1990 into the all-German FDP.

The traditional Epiphany meeting of the FDP on 6 January in the State Theatre in Stuttgart goes back to the first state representative meeting of the people's associations of the Württemberg Democratic People's Party (DVP) in 1866. On 6 January 1946, the DVP was re-established in Stuttgart. After a twelve-year forced interruption during National Socialism, it thus resumed the tradition of the Epiphany meeting and participated in the founding of the FDP in 1948. Today, the Epiphany meeting of the FDP is a major event with federal political significance.

Until 15 June 2014, the FDP had the longest period of government responsibility of all parties in the Federal Republic of Germany, namely a total of 46 years, but always as the smaller of the coalition partners. It was in opposition only from 1956 to 1961, from 1966 to 1969 and from 1998 to 2009. It provided eight vice chancellors in a total of 15 different cabinets, as well as four German foreign ministers, Walter Scheel, Hans-Dietrich Genscher, Klaus Kinkel and Guido Westerwelle. Other classic FDP ministerial portfolios are justice and economics. With Theodor Heuss (1949-1959) and Walter Scheel (1974-1979), it has also provided two Federal Presidents. The best election result in federal elections so far was achieved in 2009 with Guido Westerwelle as the leading candidate. In the subsequent federal elections, the FDP was unable to clear the five-percent hurdle, which meant that for the first time the FDP did not enter the Bundestag for a legislative period.

An archive of programmes and documents of contemporary historical significance at the European, federal and state levels, which the German Liberals have produced since 1945, can be found on the website of the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom.

Roots of liberalism

The liberal movement advocated for more rights for the lower classes and national unification at the beginning of the 19th century in the wake of the Enlightenment. Liberal groups, largely made up of students and other intellectuals, protested for "unity and freedom". This was followed by countermeasures by the reactionary forces of Germany, especially by Chancellor Metternich, whom the liberal March Revolution forced to resign in 1848. From 1849, however, the revolution was exhausted for lack of structures and organization in the liberal camp, and the monarchy reasserted itself, even if liberal ideas remained firmly rooted and caused problems for the Prussian king, for example, in carrying out his policies until Bismarck stepped in.

Founded in 1861, the German Progressive Party was the first party in the modern sense, with a party program and clear political goals. Its right wing split off in 1867 and from then on formed the National Liberal Party, while the remaining left wing renamed and reformed itself several times during the German Empire. Together with the Liberale Vereinigung, a breakaway on the left fringe of the National Liberals, the Progress Party merged in 1884 to form the Deutsche Freisinnige Partei. The merger ended in 1893, when the Freisinnige split again into two independent parties, the Freisinnige Volkspartei and the Freisinnige Vereinigung. Both party groups merged into the Progressive People's Party in 1910 with the inclusion of the German People's Party.

In the Weimar Republic, the national-liberal German People's Party and the left-liberal German Democratic Party (from 1930 the German State Party) took up the predecessor organizations from the imperial era. Their members were later instrumental in the founding of the liberal parties in the post-war period.

Liberal parties after 1945

Soon after the end of the war, the Soviet military administration forced the founding of parties. Thereupon, at the beginning of July 1945, the former DDP members Wilhelm Külz, Eugen Schiffer as well as his son-in-law Waldemar Koch called for the foundation of the Liberal Democratic Party of Germany (LDP) as an all-German organization, which, however, was only constituted in the Eastern zone due to the hesitant approval in the three Western zones. In October 1946, in the only free state elections in the Soviet-occupied territories, the Liberal Democrats achieved between 7.8 percent in Greater Berlin (East) and 29.9 percent in Saxony-Anhalt, where they even provided the only non-communist prime minister, Erhard Hübener. As a "bloc party", however, the LDP soon had to subordinate itself to the SED's claim to leadership and accordingly could no longer pursue independent policies.

Meanwhile, the Party of Free Democrats (PFD) was founded in Hamburg in September 1945 as a bourgeois left-wing party and the first liberal party in the western zones. In October 1946, the party, now called FDP, achieved 18.2 percent in the first Hamburg parliamentary elections. In January 1946, the Democratic People's Party (DVP) was reestablished in the southwest, and it performed similarly well in the first state elections in 1946/47 in Württemberg-Baden and Württemberg-Hohenzollern. New liberal parties were also founded in the other Länder. Among others, the FDP Hesse, which at its founding in December 1945 had still operated under the name Liberal Democratic Party, achieved the best state election result in its history with 31.8 percent in the Hessian state elections in November 1950 through a list combination with the expellees, who at that time were not yet allowed to run as independent candidates.

In the zones and countries, the Liberals initially appeared partly under different names:

Hamburg: Party of Free Democrats (PFD) 1945-1946;

Bremen: Bremer Demokratische Volkspartei (BDV) 1945-1952;

Bremen: Freie Demokratische Partei Bremen (FDP) 1946-1947;

Bavaria: German Democratic Party (DDP) 1945-1946;

Bavaria: Free Democratic Party (FDP);

Hesse: German Democratic Party (DDP) 1945-1946;

Hesse: Liberal Democratic Party of Hesse (LDP) 1946-1948;

Hesse-Palatinate: Sozialer Volksbund (SV) 1946-1947;

Rhineland: Liberal Party of the Rhineland (LP) 1945-1947;

Rhineland-Palatinate: Democratic Party (DP) 1947-1948;

Württemberg-Baden: Democratic People's Party (DVP) 1945-1952;

Baden: Democratic Party (DemP) 1946-1948;

Württemberg-Hohenzollern: Democratic People's Party (DVP) 1946-1953;

Saarland: Democratic Association of the Saarland (DVS) 1945-1947;

Saarland: Democratic Party of Saar (DPS) 1947-1951 and 1955-1957;

British zone: Free Democratic Party (FDP);

SBZ: German Democratic Party (DDP) 1945;

SBZ/DDR: Liberal Democratic Party of Germany (LDP; from 1951 LDPD) 1945-1990;

Germany: Democratic Party of Germany (DPD) 1947-1948

On March 17, 1947, the Democratic Party of Germany (DPD) was founded in Rothenburg ob der Tauber as an all-German party. The delegates elected Theodor Heuss (DVP) and Wilhelm Külz (LDP) as equal chairmen. The party's offices were set up in Frankfurt am Main, as the seat of the Bizone administration, and Berlin, as the seat of the East Zone administration. However, due to disputes over Külz's conciliatory political course vis-à-vis the Soviet military authorities, this project could not become permanently established. In January 1948, the last general board meeting took place; there was no formal dissolution.

Party formation

The FDP was founded at the founding party congress on 11/12 December 1948 in Heppenheim an der Bergstraße as a merger of all 13 liberal state associations of the three western occupation zones. The name Liberal Democratic Party could not prevail, the name Free Democratic Party was approved by the delegates of the state associations with 64 against 25 votes. First chairman was Theodor Heuss, his deputy Franz Blücher. The place of the party's foundation had been chosen with care, because on 10 October 1847 a meeting of leading southern and western German liberals had taken place here, the Heppenheim Assembly, which was to be the prelude to the German Revolution of 1848/49.

Until the 1950s, some state associations of the FDP were to the right of the CDU/CSU parties, which for their part were initially still pursuing concepts of Christian socialism. With nationally oriented basic values, votes were also solicited from former National Socialists and officials of the Nazi state. Thus it is significant for the classification at that time that the FDP was always to be found "on the far right" in the German Bundestag, in that it was assigned the seats to the right of the Union.

1949-1969: Reconstruction of Germany

In the first elections to the Bundestag on August 14, 1949, the FDP won a share of 11.9 percent of the vote (with 12 direct mandates, mainly in Württemberg-Baden and Hesse) and thus received 52 of 402 seats. In September of the same year, FDP leader Theodor Heuss was elected the first Federal President of the Federal Republic of Germany. When he was re-elected in 1954, he received 871 of 1,018 votes (85.6 percent) in the Federal Assembly, the best election result for a Federal President to date. At the same time, Adenauer was elected the first Federal Chancellor by an extremely narrow majority on the proposal of the new Federal President. The FDP participated with CDU/CSU and DP in Adenauer's coalition cabinet and provided three ministers, Franz Blücher (Vice Chancellor, Minister for Marshall Plan Affairs), Thomas Dehler (Justice) and Eberhard Wildermuth (Housing).

On the most significant issues of economic, social and German policy, the FDP agreed with its coalition partners CDU/CSU. However, the FDP recommended itself to the bourgeois voters as a secular party, rejecting denominational schools and accusing the Union parties of clericalization. The FDP also professed to be a consistent advocate of the market economy, while the CDU at the time was nominally influenced by the Ahlen Programme, which allowed for a third way between capitalism and socialism; Ludwig Erhard, the "father" of the social market economy, had his supporters in the early years of the Federal Republic more in the FDP than in the Union.

The FDP voted in the Bundestag against the denazification procedure introduced by the CDU and SPD at the end of 1950. At its 1951 federal party conference in Munich, it demanded the release of all "so-called war criminals" and welcomed the founding of the Association of German Soldiers made up of former members of the Wehrmacht and SS in order to advance the integration of nationalist forces into democracy. The Naumann Affair (1953), named after Werner Naumann, marked an attempt by old Nazis to infiltrate the party, which had many right-wing conservative and nationalist members in Hesse, North Rhine-Westphalia, and Lower Saxony. After the British occupation authorities arrested seven prominent representatives of the Naumann Circle, the FDP federal executive committee set up an investigative commission chaired by Thomas Dehler, which sharply rebuked conditions in the North Rhine-Westphalian FDP in particular. In the following years, the right wing lost strength, the extreme right increasingly sought fields of activity outside the FDP. In the 1953 federal election, the FDP received 9.5 percent of the second votes, 10.8 percent of the first votes (with 14 direct mandates, mainly in Hamburg, Lower Saxony, Hesse, Württemberg, and Upper Franconia), and 48 of 487 mandates.

In the second legislative period of the Bundestag, forces of southern German liberal democracy gained influence in the party. With Thomas Dehler, a representative of a more left-liberal course took over the party and parliamentary group chair. Dehler, a former minister of justice who had suffered persecution by the National Socialists after 1933, became known for his rhetorical sharpness. In general, the various state associations were very independent and thus set different emphases within liberal politics from state to state. After the FDP left the coalition with the CDU in North Rhine-Westphalia at the beginning of 1956 and formed a new state government with the SPD and the Centre, a total of 16 members of the Bundestag, including the four federal ministers, left the FDP and founded the short-lived Free People's Party, which then participated in the federal government in place of the FDP until the end of the legislative period. The FDP thus went into opposition for the first time.

The FDP was the only one of the smaller post-war parties to survive despite many problems. In 1957 it achieved 7.7 percent of the vote and its last direct mandate until 1990, which meant that it held 41 of 497 seats in the Bundestag. However, it still remained in opposition because the Union won an absolute majority. In the following, the FDP campaigned, for example, for a nuclear weapons-free zone in Central Europe.

Dehler had already stepped down as party chairman before the election. At the federal party conference in Berlin at the end of January 1957, Reinhold Maier replaced him. Dehler's function as parliamentary group chairman was taken over after the Bundestag election by the very nationally minded Erich Mende. In 1960, Mende also became party chairman.

After the 1961 federal election (in which it achieved its best nationwide result to date with 12.8 percent), the FDP again participated in a coalition with the CDU after difficult negotiations. Although it was agreed before the election that under no circumstances would it continue to sit in government with Adenauer, Adenauer again became chancellor, but on the understanding that he would step down after two years. These events earned the FDP the derisive name of the "Umfallerpartei".

In the Spiegel affair, the FDP withdrew its ministers from the federal government. The coalition was renewed under Adenauer in 1962, but on condition that he resign in October 1963. This happened, and Ludwig Erhard became the new chancellor. This was again the reason for Erich Mende to join the cabinet: He took over the rather insignificant Federal Ministry for All-German Affairs.

In the 1965 federal election, the FDP gained 9.5 percent. The coalition with the CDU broke up in 1966 over the issue of tax increases, and a grand coalition between the CDU and SPD followed. In opposition, a change of course was also in the offing: The previous foreign policy and also the attitude to the Eastern territories were discussed. In 1968 the delegates elected Walter Scheel, a liberal with a European orientation, as the new chairman. Although he came from the national liberal camp, he led the new centre of the party with Willi Weyer and Hans-Dietrich Genscher. This centre endeavoured to make the FDP capable of forming coalitions with both major parties. In the process, the Liberals drew closer to the SPD in particular through their reorientation in Ostpolitik and Deutschlandpolitik.

1969-1982: Time in the social-liberal coalition

After the 1969 Bundestag elections, the period of a social-liberal coalition with the SPD and Chancellor Willy Brandt began on October 21. It was Walter Scheel who initiated the turnaround in foreign policy. Despite a very narrow majority, he and Willy Brandt pushed through the controversial New Ostpolitik. This policy was quite controversial within the FDP, especially as its entry into the federal government was followed by defeats in the state elections in North Rhine-Westphalia, Lower Saxony and Saarland on 14 June 1970. In Hanover and Saarbrücken, the party left the state parliament.

After the federal party congress in Bonn had supported the policy of the party leadership only one week later and confirmed Scheel in office, party right-wingers around Siegfried Zoglmann founded a "non-party" association called National Liberal Action on 11 July 1970 at the Hohensyburg with the aim of ending the left-liberal course of the party and overthrowing Scheel. However, this did not succeed. Zoglmann supported an opposition motion of censure against Finance Minister Alex Möller in October 1970; Erich Mende and Heinz Starke did likewise. Shortly afterwards, all three declared their resignation from the FDP; Mende and Starke joined the CDU, Zoglmann later founded the German Union, which did not get beyond the status of a splinter party.

The foreign policy as well as the socio-political turn were put on a theoretical basis in 1971 by the Freiburg Theses, which were sold several 100,000 times as a Rowohlt paperback, in which the FDP committed itself to "social liberalism" and social reforms. Walter Scheel was first Foreign Minister and Vice-Chancellor, then in 1974 he became the second liberal Federal President, thus clearing the way within the party for the previous Minister of the Interior, Hans-Dietrich Genscher. From 1969 to 1974 the FDP supported Chancellor Willy Brandt, after which it governed alongside Helmut Schmidt.

In 1977 another programmatic change took place. The Freiburg Theses were replaced by the Kiel Theses, which involved a move away from social-liberal themes. The party turned increasingly towards economic liberalism and positioned itself as a corrective to the economic and social policies of the left wing of the SPD. Already at the end of the 1970s the agreements between FDP and SPD seemed to be insufficient for a coalition, but the mutually rejected chancellor candidacy of Franz Josef Strauß for the CDU/CSU in the 1980 federal election welded SPD and FDP together again. The social-liberal coalition was finally confirmed again, also because of a strong election result of the FDP (10.6%). However, the FDP increasingly saw the differences with the SPD, especially in economic policy. In the attitude to the question of the NATO double decision, Chancellor Schmidt had his own SPD less and less behind him. Contradictions within the FDP were also growing.

Soon after the formation of the government in 1980, the cracks between the two coalition partners became increasingly apparent. In the summer of 1981, FDP party leader Hans-Dietrich Genscher wrote a letter to FDP members indirectly calling on the SPD to make a necessary policy change. At this time Hans-Dietrich Genscher also met for secret talks with CDU leader Helmut Kohl. On 9 September 1982, FDP Economics Minister Otto Graf Lambsdorff published an economic policy concept that was incompatible with SPD demands and was described as a "divorce paper". On September 17, 1982, the coalition finally broke down officially: Chancellor Helmut Schmidt declared that he had lost political confidence in the coalition partner. Thereupon all FDP ministers resigned, thus avoiding dismissal by the Chancellor. After 13 years in government, the social-liberal coalition ended. On October 1, about two weeks later, the CDU/CSU parliamentary group and the FDP parliamentary group initiated a constructive vote of no confidence, as a result of which Helmut Kohl was elected the new Chancellor and Helmut Schmidt's time in office ended after eight years.

1982-1990: Black-yellow coalition, economic reorientation and reunification

On October 1, 1982, the FDP, together with the CDU/CSU parliamentary group, elected the CDU party leader Helmut Kohl as the new chancellor (→ Wende (Federal Republic of Germany)). The change of coalition resulted in fierce internal disputes, and the FDP subsequently lost over 20 percent of its 86,500 members, which was also reflected in the 1983 federal election (falling from 10.6 percent to 7.0 percent). Most of the members defected to the SPD, the Greens and newly founded small parties such as the left-liberal party Liberale Demokraten (LD). Among the resigning members was the then FDP Secretary-General and later EU Commissioner Günter Verheugen. At the party convention in November 1982, the Schleswig-Holstein state chairman Uwe Ronneburger ran against Hans-Dietrich Genscher for party chairman. Ronneburger received 186 of the votes cast - around 40 percent - and was thus only narrowly defeated.

Young FDP members who did not agree with the policies of the then FDP youth organization Jungdemokraten had already founded the Junge Liberalen (JuLis) in 1980. For a while, both youth organizations existed side by side, until the JuLis asserted themselves as a result of the fall of communism and became the new official youth organization of the FDP. The Young Democrats separated from the FDP and became a left-wing youth association independent of the party.

At the time of reunification, the FDP pursued the goal of a special economic area in the former GDR, but was unable to prevail against the CDU/CSU, which wanted to prevent possible losses of votes in the five new federal states in the 1990 federal election.

During the political upheavals of 1989/1990, new liberal parties emerged in the GDR, such as the F.D.P. of the GDR or the German Forum Party. Together with the LDPD, which had previously acted as a bloc party alongside the SED and which, with Manfred Gerlach, also provided the last chairman of the Council of State of the GDR, they formed the Bund Freier Demokraten (BFD). In the following years, there were considerable internal discussions within the FDP about how to deal with the former bloc party. Even before the reunification of Germany, the West German FDP united with the parties of the BFD and the former bloc party NDPD to form the first all-German party at a unification party conference in Hanover on 11-12 August 1990. At the time, the participating East German parties had 135,000 members (due to the generally higher degree of organization in the GDR), while the West German F.D.P. had only 65,485. In order to prevent the East German members from dominating, the delegate key was changed and the influence of the electoral votes was upgraded over that of membership numbers. The massive increase in membership lasted only a short time, however, and most former bloc party members quickly left. The F.D.P. "inherited" assets of DM 6.3 million in cash and real estate from the LDPD and NDPD.

In the first state elections in the new Länder, the F.D.P. performed strongly, especially in Saxony-Anhalt (15.7 percent). Subsequently, with the exception of Saxony, it was involved in government in all the New Länder, mostly in CDU-FDP coalitions, and in Brandenburg in a "traffic light" with the SPD and Bündnis 90. In the first all-German Bundestag election, the CDU/CSU-FDP coalition was confirmed, and the FDP received 11.0 percent of the valid votes (79 seats), performing somewhat better in the New Länder than in the Old. In Halle (Saale) - Genscher's home town - the F.D.P. won its first direct mandate since 1957.

1990-2001: Losses at state level and beginning of opposition at federal level

After its success in the 1990 federal election, the FDP returned to the state parliament after the 1992 state election in Schleswig-Holstein and was thus represented in all 16 state parliaments at the same time for the first time.

In the second half of the 1990s in particular, however, the FDP had to contend with a series of electoral defeats at municipal and state level, which led to its dropping out of twelve of the 16 state parliaments as well as the European Parliament in the period from 1993 to 1995. She was derisively dubbed the "lady without an underbelly". In the period from the election to the Berlin House of Representatives in 1995 to the state elections in North Rhine-Westphalia in 2000, she was only represented in the state parliaments of Hesse, Rhineland-Palatinate, Baden-Württemberg and Schleswig-Holstein, and by 1999 was only involved in the state governments of Rhineland-Palatinate and Baden-Württemberg.

This series of electoral defeats culminated in the 1998 Bundestag election, in which it received 6.2 percent of the vote, its second-worst Bundestag election result ever to that point, and had to return to the opposition for the first time after 29 years of permanent government participation. In 1999, the party moved its seat of government from the Thomas-Dehler-Haus in Bonn to the Hans-Dietrich-Genscher-Haus in Berlin.

2001-2009: Opposition period under the presidency of Guido Westerwelle

In 2000, the FDP succeeded in returning to the North Rhine-Westphalian state parliament. When Guido Westerwelle, who was more than 18 years younger than Wolfgang Gerhardt, was elected party leader at a federal party conference on 4 May 2001, a generational change began in the FDP. At the same party congress it also adopted a new logo and henceforth dispensed with the dots between the three letters of the short name, which had been used since 1968 - in contrast to other parties.

In the 2002 Bundestag election campaign, the FDP entered the race with "Project 18", an election campaign strategy designed to increase its share of the electorate from 6 to 18 percent. This was essentially developed by Jürgen Möllemann's campaign advisor Fritz Goergen. Part of this strategy was that the party nominated Guido Westerwelle as its own candidate for chancellor for the first time. In doing so, it wanted to emphasise its independence alongside the two major parties and counter the widespread perception of it as a mere procurer of majorities for other parties. With an unconventional, pop-cultural election campaign, she also wanted to appeal to younger voters. Westerwelle drove around the country in a blue-and-yellow-painted camper van known as the "Guidomobile", wore shoes with the number 18 under the sole, and appeared as a guest on the then controversial television show Big Brother. The FDP was perceived as a "fun party". In opinion polls before the elections, the FDP achieved 10 to 13 percent.

At the same time, the North Rhine-Westphalian state chairman Jürgen Möllemann served right-wing populist tendencies during this period by adopting positions critical of Israel in the Middle East conflict, taking Jamal Karsli, a state parliamentary representative who had left the Greens because of vehement anti-Israeli and anti-Zionist statements, into the FDP parliamentary group, and verbally attacking representatives of the Central Council of Jews in Germany. Critics, including from within his own party, accused Möllemann of appealing to latent anti-Semitism in doing so. A few days before the Bundestag elections, Möllemann had a leaflet printed with a circulation of over eight million and distributed to all households in North Rhine-Westphalia, the text of which once again attacked Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and the deputy head of the Central Council of Jews Michel Friedman. The "grande dame" and one-time presidential candidate of the Free Democrats HildegardHamm-Brücher then left her party after more than fifty years of membership, as she felt that the dissociation of party leader Westerwelle in particular from Möllemann's attempts was insufficient.

With a first-past-the-post result of 5.8 percent and 7.4 percent in the second-past-the-post vote, the FDP improved its election results compared to the previous Bundestag elections, but it clearly missed its officially declared target of 18 percent of the vote, which was attributed, among other things, to the "Möllemann affair". In the Bundestag it became the fourth-strongest force and thus, contrary to all expectations, was behind the Greens. Möllemann himself lost more and more support in the FDP and, with his resignation in March 2003, avoided an expulsion from the party decided by the party executive.

In the 2004 European elections in Germany, the FDP achieved its best European election result to date with 6.1 percent and, with its leading candidate Silvana Koch-Mehrin, returned to the European Parliament after ten years of abstinence. She provided seven MEPs within the ALDE group, the third strongest force in the European Parliament. Koch-Mehrin took over the chairmanship of the FDP delegation and also the vice-chairmanship of the ALDE group.

In the early Bundestag election on September 18, 2005, the FDP received 9.8 percent of the second votes and thus became the third strongest force in the German Bundestag for the first time since 1990. The FDP was the largest opposition faction in the legislative period, after it had ruled out a possible traffic light coalition with the SPD and the Greens and after exploratory talks with the CDU/CSU and the Greens about a Jamaica coalition had failed. Party leader Westerwelle now also took over the office of parliamentary party leader from Wolfgang Gerhardt and became leader of the opposition.

In the 2009 European election, the FDP was able to almost double its 2004 result and, with its top European election candidate Silvana Koch-Mehrin, provided 12 members for the European Parliament. Koch-Mehrin subsequently became one of a total of 14 Vice-Presidents of the European Parliament.

In the 2009 federal election, the FDP once again achieved its best-ever result in a federal election, with Guido Westerwelle as its top candidate, with 14.6 percent, and won 93 of 622 seats in the German Bundestag. After the 2009 state elections, the FDP was also represented in all state parliaments with the exception of the Hamburg Bürgerschaft and participated in eight state governments, namely Baden-Württemberg (Oettinger II cabinet), Bavaria (Seehofer cabinet I), Hesse (Koch cabinet III), Lower Saxony (Wulff cabinet II), North Rhine-Westphalia (Rüttgers cabinet), Saxony (Tillich cabinet II), Schleswig-Holstein (Carstensen cabinet II) and Saarland (Müller cabinet III).

2009-2013: Black-yellow coalition in the federal government and losses in the states

Coalition negotiations with the CDU and CSU led to the conclusion of a coalition agreement on 26 October 2009. Following the re-election of Chancellor Angela Merkel on 28 October 2009, five FDP federal ministers were sworn into the Merkel II cabinet, namely Vice Chancellor and Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle, Justice Minister Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger, the first FDP Health Minister Philipp Rösler, Economics Minister Rainer Brüderle and Development Minister Dirk Niebel. The FDP was thus represented in the federal cabinet with a higher proportion than ever before.

A few months after the 2009 federal election, the party lost a lot of support. Approval dropped from record levels of just under 15% at the end of September 2009 to 5% in June 2010. Before coming to government with the CDU in 2009, many believed that a black-yellow coalition would go well together, but after the coalition agreement was negotiated in record time, controversy soon arose between different wings of the CDU, CSU and FDP over many issues, such as tax cuts, the future of nuclear energy, the health insurance premium, Turkey's accession to the EU and Unemployment Benefit II. In addition, the party's reputation suffered during this period from donations of falsely declared origin and the reduction of the VAT rate for hotel accommodation, which was publicly interpreted as patronage politics for the Mövenpick hotel group.

In the only state election of 2010, which took place in North Rhine-Westphalia, the FDP remained stable, but due to the high losses of the CDU, the black-yellow coalition in the state lost its majority and both parties went into opposition. After the Hamburg state elections on 20 February 2011, the FDP was again represented in all 16 state parliaments. Just one month later, after the state elections in Saxony-Anhalt, this nationwide representation in the state parliaments ended again. However, at that time the party was still involved in seven state governments.

After the FDP had failed to win a seat in the state parliament of Rhineland-Palatinate in March 2011 and had been forced into the opposition by a Green-Red majority in the state parliamentary elections in Baden-Württemberg in 2011, Guido Westerwelle announced before the federal party congress from 13 to 15 May 2011 that he would not run for the federal party chairmanship again at this congress. Philipp Rösler was elected as Westerwelle's successor at this party conference. Earlier, in the course of a cabinet reshuffle on 12 May 2011, Rösler had taken over as Federal Minister of Economics and Technology and from Guido Westerwelle as Vice Chancellor, while Daniel Bahr succeeded him as Federal Minister of Health. The previous Federal Minister of Economics, Rainer Brüderle, was elected Chairman of the FDP parliamentary group on the same day.

In May 2011, Silvana Koch-Mehrin resigned from her post as Vice-President of the European Parliament as well as from all party offices due to a plagiarism affair surrounding her doctoral thesis. However, Koch-Mehrin exercised her mandate as a Member of the European Parliament until the end of the 2014 parliamentary term. Alexander Graf Lambsdorff became the new chairman of the FDP delegation in the EU Parliament. Also in May 2011, the FDP failed in the 2011 parliamentary elections in Bremen with 2.4% of the vote at the five-percent hurdle.

In September 2011, the FDP lost heavily in the state elections in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania 2011, falling short of entering parliament with 2.7 percent of the vote. In the same month, the election for the Berlin House of Representatives took place, in which the FDP clearly missed re-entry with only 1.8 percent of the vote.

On 6 January 2012, Minister-President Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer terminated the coalition of CDU, FDP and Bündnis 90/Die Grünen, which had existed in Saarland since 2009, before the end of the legislative period. Kramp-Karrenbauer's statement said that the "ongoing discord within the FDP Saar for months" was the decisive factor for the termination.

In the subsequent new election of the Saarland state parliament, the FDP achieved only 1.2 percent of the vote, so that it also left it. This was the worst result for the FDP in a western German state since its foundation. In May 2012, on the other hand, the FDP achieved unexpectedly strong results in the early state elections in Schleswig-Holstein and in North Rhine-Westphalia, with 8.2 and 8.6 percent respectively, securing its representation in the state parliament there for another five years. However, in both states an SPD-led government took over and the FDP went into opposition. In the 2013 state election in Lower Saxony, the FDP gained 1.7 percentage points to 9.9 percent, which its federal leader Philipp Rösler credited as a success in his home state. At the same time, the black-yellow coalition lost its majority in the state parliament to a red-green coalition, so that the FDP left the state government after ten years.

2013-2014: Retirement from the Bundestag and several state parliaments

In the 2013 state election in Bavaria, which took place one week before the federal election, the FDP fell short of the 5-percent hurdle, thus losing its parliamentary representation and subsequently also dropping out of the Bavarian state government. One week later, the Bundestag and the Hessian state parliament were elected. While the FDP narrowly overcame the threshold in Hesse with 5.0 percent, it failed for the first time in federal elections with 4.8 percent and left parliament. In Hesse, the black-yellow coalition that had existed until then could not be continued. After that, the FDP was still represented in nine state parliaments and only in Saxony also in the government.

As a consequence of the exit from the Bundestag, the party executive committee of the FDP resigned as a whole. As a result, an extraordinary party congress was convened between 6 and 8 December 2013, at which a new presidium was elected and the causes of the electoral defeat were analysed. Christian Lindner was elected as the new party chairman. He called on the members to rebuild the party "from the bottom up" from now on. He also criticized the "second vote campaign" and warned against a departure from the previous European policy.

In an effort to contrast a state-fixated policy with the model of a modern social market economy and an active civil society, the FDP parliamentary party chairmen's conference, the union of the chairmen of the liberal parliamentary groups in the federal states and the group in the European Parliament, adopted the tasks of the Bundestag parliamentary group in the rebuilding of the party in its Stuttgart Declaration on 2 October 2013.

At the European Party Congress in Bonn on 19 January 2014, Alexander Graf Lambsdorff was elected as the top candidate for the 2014 European elections. The FDP suffered significant losses of 7.6 percentage points and achieved its second worst result in a European election with 3.4 percent, but will send three members to the European Parliament due to the elimination of the blocking clause.

In the state elections in Saxony, Thuringia and Brandenburg in 2014, the FDP was unable to clear the five-percent hurdle in any of the states and was thus represented in only six state parliaments in October 2014. With the completion of the formation of a government in Saxony, the FDP's last participation in government at state level up to that point ended in November 2014. This was the first time in the history of the Federal Republic that the FDP was not involved in a state government, which meant that it could no longer influence federal policy via the Bundesrat.

This situation was only brought to an end on 18 May 2016, when the FDP in Rhineland-Palatinate returned to the state parliament there as a result of the state elections in March 2016 and formed a joint state government together with the SPD and Bündnis 90/Die Grünen.

Party researcher Oskar Niedermayer saw the FDP in an "existential crisis" after its missed re-entry into the Bundestag, as the party was finding it difficult to still be perceived in federal politics. According to federal treasurer Hermann Otto Solms, the party's expenses had to be reduced by around 40 percent because it was elected from several parliaments and therefore received lower allocations from state party funding.

Initiated by mainly former politicians of the Hamburg FDP, the New Liberals party was founded in September 2014 as a left-liberal alternative to the FDP. However, when it first appeared on the ballot in the Hamburg parliamentary elections in February 2015, the new party remained a minor party with 0.5 percent of the vote.

Since 2015: Gains at state level and re-entry into the Bundestag

In the Hamburg parliamentary elections on 15 February 2015, the FDP succeeded in re-entering parliament with its top candidate Katja Suding with 7.4 percent of the vote, surpassing its previous result by 0.7 percent.

In the Bremen state elections on 10 May 2015, the FDP, with its top candidate Lencke Steiner, also managed to achieve its best result in 20 years with 6.6 percent and to be represented in the state parliament again. Compared to the previous election, the FDP gained 4.4 percentage points and was thus represented in seven state parliaments.

In the state elections in Baden-Württemberg, Saxony-Anhalt and Rhineland-Palatinate on 13 March 2016, she improved in all three state elections. In Baden-Württemberg, it re-entered the state parliament with 8.3 percent of the vote, and in Rhineland-Palatinate it received 6.2 percent of the vote. In Saxony-Anhalt, it narrowly missed re-entry with 4.9 percent.

As the red-green coalition in Rhineland-Palatinate lost its majority, the formation of a traffic light coalition was successfully negotiated. On 9 May 2016, the state party conference of the FDP Rhineland-Palatinate approved the coalition agreement with the SPD and the Greens with 82 percent of the vote. Since 18 May 2016, the FDP has thus been involved in a state government for the first time since October 2014 and, with Volker Wissing, provides the deputy prime minister. Although the FDP failed to enter the state parliament of Schwerin with 3.0 percent in the state parliament election in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania on September 4, 2016, it was also able to make gains here in percentage and absolute terms. In the parliamentary elections in Berlin on 18 September 2016, the FDP returned to the House of Representatives with 6.7 percent.

In the 2017 state election in Saarland, the FDP fell short of re-entering the state parliament with 3.3 percent of the vote, but was able to make significant gains in terms of both percentage and votes. The latter also applied to the 2017 state election in Schleswig-Holstein, where the party achieved a double-digit election result for the first time again and almost tied with the Greens as the fourth-strongest force in the state parliament and part of the Jamaica coalition there. Its performance was even better shortly afterwards in the 2017 state election in North Rhine-Westphalia, where it was not only elected by far the third strongest force in the state parliament with 12.6 percent, but also achieved its best result in the state's history and is now part of the state government of the most populous federal state.

In the 2017 Bundestag election, the FDP succeeded in re-entering the Bundestag after a four-year absence with a second vote result of 10.7 percent. The party then entered into exploratory talks with the Union parties (CDU/CSU) and Bündnis 90/Die Grünen. After four weeks of negotiations, the FDP pulled out of the talks because, according to party leader Lindner, it had not been possible to develop either a "common vision of the modernisation of the country" or a "common basis of trust". As a result, the Grand Coalition under Chancellor Angela Merkel was relaunched. In the 2017 state election in Lower Saxony, the FDP suffered losses in percentage terms for the first time in an election since 2015.

In the 2018 and 2019 state elections, the FDP managed to (re)enter the elections in Bavaria (5.1%), Hesse (7.5%), Bremen (5.9%) and Thuringia (5.0%), but missed out in Saxony (4.5%) and Brandenburg (4.1%).

From 5 to 8 February 2020, the FDP provided the Prime Minister of Thuringia with Thomas Kemmerich. The election triggered a nationwide echo, as it also took place with the votes of the AfD and, after Kemmerich's resignation, drew the government crisis in Thuringia 2020. In the previous state election, the FDP had surpassed the five-percent threshold with only 73 electoral votes, narrowly gaining entry into the state parliament, leading to particular criticism of Prime Minister Kemmerich's choice. Also under the impact of Kemmerich's highly controversial election based on AfD support, the FDP failed to clear the five-percent hurdle in the 2020 Hamburg state election with 4.96 percent, where it missed re-entering the state parliament as a parliamentary group for the first time since the 2008 Hamburg state election. However, it is still represented in the parliament with a constituency mandate from the Blankenese constituency.

The state elections in March 2021 did not bring much change for the FDP. In Baden-Württemberg they gained slightly (10.5 %), but still remained in opposition. In Rhineland-Palatinate, the FDP lost slightly (5.5%), but still remained part of the state government in the form of a traffic light coalition under Minister President Malu Dreyer. In Saxony-Anhalt in June 2021, the FDP returned to the state parliament after ten years of abstinence with 6.4 % of the vote.

Logo history

Program History

• The Liberals: Founding Program of the German Progressive Party (June 9, 1861)
• Founding Programme of the National Liberal Party (June 12, 1867)
• Programme of the German Progressive Party (November 25, 1878)
• Liberal Association: Declaration of Liberal Secessionists (August 30, 1880).
• Founding Programme of the German Free Democratic Party (March 5, 1884)
• Party Programme of the Freisinnige Vereinigung (May 6, 1893)
• Programme of the Progressive People's Party (March 6, 1910)
• Party Programme of the German People's Party (15 December 1918-1933)
• Programme of the German Democratic Party (20 November 1918-1933)
• Programme of the Radical Democratic Party (20 November 1918-1933)
• Founding appeal of the Liberal Democratic Party of Germany (LDPD, 1945)
• Syker Programmatic Guidelines of the FDP in the British Occupation Zone (1946)
• Economic programme of the FDP in the British occupation zone ("Wangeroog Programme", 1948)
• Heppenheim Proclamation of the FDP (1948)
• Party programme (LDPD, 1949)
• Bremen Platform (1949)
• Treaty and Ostpolitik ("Pfleiderer Plan", 1952)
• Berlin Programme (1957)
• Memorandum on the German Question ("Schollwer Paper", 1962)
• Reorganization of old-age provision ("Mischnick Plan", 1963)
• Germany and foreign policy ("Schollwer Paper", 1967)
• Action Programme ("Objectives of Progress", 1967)
• Freiburg Theses on the Social Policy of the FDP (1971)
• Stuttgart Guidelines for a Liberal Education Policy (1972)
• Thesis Paper ("Free Church in a Free State", 1974)
• Kiel Theses of the FDP (1977)
• Programme for Equality (1978)
• Genscher Letter (1981)
• Thesis paper "Concept for a policy to overcome weak growth" ("Lambsdorff Paper", 1982)
• The Liberal Manifesto ("Future Chance Freedom. Liberal Manifesto for a Society in Transition", 1985)
• Liberal Action Programme Europe (1987)
• Thesis paper "Courage instead of displeasure - for a liberal Germany" ("Lambsdorff Paper", 1992)
• Guidelines of liberal local politics (1993)
• Programmatic of the liberal parties in the final phase of the GDR:
• Declaration "What does the LDPD want? Goals of the GDR Liberals" (LDPD, 1989)
• Programme (German Forum Party, 1990)
• Liberal Manifesto (Free Democratic Party of the GDR, 1990)
• Election appeal for the Volkskammer election (Bund Freier Demokraten, 1990)
• Election programme for the Volkskammer elections (LDP in the Bund Freier Demokraten, 1990)
• "Wiesbaden Principles. For the liberal civil society" (1997)
• Guidelines for policy change in Germany ("Gerhardt/Westerwelle Paper", 2005)
• Karlsruhe Freedom Theses ("Responsibility for Freedom. Karlsruhe Freedom Theses of the FDP for an Open Civil Society", 2012).
• Citizens' Programme (2013)
• Stuttgart Declaration (2013)
• Berlin Manifesto "More Opportunities through More Freedom: Projects for a Republic of Opportunities" (2015)