History of liberal parties

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The history of liberal parties begins in the broadest sense with the publications and actions of liberal-thinking philosophers, writers and statesmen around the 18th century. It is not always easy to distinguish moderate conservatives from early liberals, for example in the case of Montesquieu in France, Hardenberg in Prussia and Hogendorp in the Netherlands.

Early liberalism , like conservatism, was an upper-class affair. Just as the conservatives emphasized the divine class differences between people and wanted to maintain old privileges, so the liberals assumed that education and property were natural differences and had to be taken into account in the structure of the state. That is why the liberals, sometimes until the 20th century, were not democrats and rejected universal suffrage . The occasional strength of the Liberals in elections (in Germany especially in the 1860s and 1870s) was due in part to the provisions in the electoral law and electoral system that favored the haves.

In Great Britain and the United States , liberals were very influential early on, while mainland Europe did not become the century of liberals until the 19th century. The French Revolution of 1789 set the political landscape in motion across Europe, and the later revolutions (1830, 1848) also had this influence. As a rule, however, the liberals did not see themselves as revolutionaries, but as reformers. They advocated freedom of trade , low taxes, freedom of expression , free trade , women's rights and the rule of law . So they often stood between the revolutionary, democratic left on the one hand and the conservatives, who were traditionally in power, on the other. However, in many countries there was also a split in political liberalism into a right-wing, traditional government supportive, and a left, often oppositional direction.

Around 1900 and especially after 1918 the strength of the liberal parties in parliaments decreased considerably. This was due to the introduction of universal suffrage, but also to changes in other parties: the conservatives and socialists slowly opened up to the political center and attracted right and left liberals. Nevertheless, in many countries the liberals remained popular governing parties that saw themselves as correctors of an otherwise right-wing or (less often) left-wing government.

Germany

First half of the 19th century until after the March Revolution of 1848/49

Hambacher Fest (1832), a climax of early liberal efforts in the German Confederation

The first climaxes of political liberalism in the German states after the Enlightenment, which in the 18th century had an important philosophical representative in the then Prussian Königsberg in the form of Immanuel Kant , fall in the period of Vormärz between 1815 and 1848. This phase of German history was strongly shaped from the culture of romanticism and the philosophies of German idealism (cf. Fichte , Hegel , Schelling ).

During the pre-March period , liberalism was combined with the ideas of a national unity of the German states. Significant events were, for example, the Wartburg Festival in 1817, the Hambach Festival in 1832 and the revolution of 1848 . The corresponding pre-revolutionary liberal movements fought the principalities , which were again orientated towards absolutism , during the post-Napoleonic era and later during the restoration that followed the Congress of Vienna (1814/15) until 1848 . They demanded constitutions and democratic rights for the people. At the same time, they advocated the unification of the states of the German Confederation in an all-German nation-state .

During the National Assembly in the Paulskirche in Frankfurt in 1848/1849, which resulted from the March Revolution , the bourgeois-liberal factions Casino and Württemberger Hof ( Heinrich von Gagern ), the so-called “Halben”, made up the majority. They advocated a constitutional monarchy , popular sovereignty and parliamentary rights. The minority of the "whole", which also liberalism, sometimes the early socialism associated with radical democrats , among them, for example, Robert Blum and called for a German Republic . On June 6, 1861, the liberal German Progressive Party was founded, the first (German) modern program party in Prussian Berlin.

The time of the establishment of the Empire and the Empire until 1918

Helene Lange
Chart of the liberal parties in Germany 1870–1910
Election results of liberal parties in the German Empire 1871–1912

During the time of the German Empire , the liberals - spurred in particular by Friedrich Naumann - campaigned for the goals of the women's movement. Leading women of the bourgeois women's movement such as Helene Lange , Marie Lischnewska or Gertrud Bäumer were involved in political parties and tried from there to strengthen women's rights. The German Progressive Party (DFP), which was founded in June 1861, was the first political party in Germany in today's sense, with a party program in which clearly defined political goals were formulated. In addition to the national unification of the individual German states, which were only loosely linked in the German Confederation, under the leadership of Prussia, above all the consistent implementation of the rule of law . As a result of the Prussian constitutional conflict of the 1860s, between 1866 and 1868 - before the founding of the German Empire - the politically organized liberalism was split. The National Liberal Party (NLP) split off from the right wing of the Progressive Party in 1867 . It supported Bismarck's policy and favored a small German solution in the process of unification , that is, the amalgamation of the individual German states without the inclusion of Austria . The NLP approached the conservatives and for a long time was the strongest parliamentary group in the Reichstag of the German Empire .

Friedrich Naumann , a founder of social liberalism

The remaining Progressive Party merged in 1884 with the Liberal Association (LVg), the formerly "left" wing of the NLP, which had split off in 1880 as a result of the support of the "right" party leadership for Bismarck's protective tariff policy , to form the German Free Party (DFrP). Under the party leader Eugen Richter , the DFrP advocated the unrestricted implementation of democratic freedoms and advocated a strict separation of state and church . In addition, she called for the abolition of Bismarck's protective tariff policy and vehemently rejected the social laws he proposed . The two wing of the party - former progressives and secessionists - never really found each other, so that the DFrP split in 1893 into the “left” Liberal People's Party (FrVP) and the “right” Liberal Association (FrVg). The latter took up the National Social Association (NsV) in 1903 , which was founded in 1896 by Friedrich Naumann . Due to the partnership in the Bülow Block , a small group around Theodor Barth left the FrVg and founded the Democratic Association (DVg) in 1908 . As a left-liberal collective movement, the Progressive People's Party (FVP) emerged in 1910 from a merger of the FrVP, the FrVg and the German People's Party (DtVP), which mainly operates in southern Germany .

With the strengthening of the labor movement , the liberals had to gradually share their influence as a formative political force with the social democrats and - based on the voter potential - even give it up to them by the beginning of the 20th century. The imperial government in the empire was determined by the emperor and did not emerge from the center of parliament. So the liberals did not have to form a government, which they would hardly have seen a majority to do anyway: the Social Democrats were not considered capable of governing at the time, and many liberals were also suspicious of the Catholics.

Weimar Republic and the National Socialism: 1918 to 1945

Gertrud Bäumer, one of the first MPs, member of the Reichstag in the Weimar Republic (on a West German postage stamp)

In the founding phase of the Weimar Republic after the November Revolution, the liberals again played an important role in the spectrum of parliamentary parties, alongside social democracy and political Catholicism (center party). Two parties emerged from the left and national liberal predecessor organizations of the imperial era: the German Democratic Party (DDP) and the German People's Party (DVP). Despite its same name, the latter had no content-related connection with the DtVP of the German Empire.

The left-liberal DDP, together with the SPD and the center, participated in the so-called Weimar coalition , from which four of the first five Reich governments emerged between February 1919 and November 1922. Although the DDP had to accept steadily losing votes from election to election since 1920, it was also involved in all other governments until May 1932. The national liberal DVP, which lost a similar number of voters during the Weimar Republic, had been involved in eleven of the twelve governments from June 1920, when it first entered government, until May 1932.

Reich Foreign Minister Gustav Stresemann (DVP) when Germany joined the League of Nations , 1926

While the DDP represented a rather social liberal policy and supported the republic from the beginning, there was a strong anti-republic tendency in the DVP, most of which had emerged from the National Liberal Party (NLP), which supported the monarchy . The small “left” wing of the NLP had converted to the DDP in 1918, while the “right-wing nationalist” -volkish wing joined the German National People's Party (DNVP).

The DVP took part in the Reich government for the first time in 1920 and then from 1922 to 1932. In 1923 she and Gustav Stresemann formed the Reich Chancellor for a few months in a grand coalition made up of the SPD, Zentrum, DDP and DVP, and then with him and his successor Julius Curtius the Foreign Minister for many years . Stresemann, according to his own statement, stood behind the republic for reasons of reason and reconciled the party with the republican form of government, but had significant internal party opponents, including in the industrialist Hugo Stinnes . After Stresemann's death (1929), the DVP oriented itself more and more to the right and ultimately belonged to those who wanted to change the parliamentary system in favor of a more authoritarian solution.

In 1930, after violent internal party disputes, the DDP united with the Volksnationalen Reichsvereinigung, which came from the Bundische tradition, and renamed itself the German State Party (DStP). The partly anti-Semitic and nationalist, but on the other hand also in favor of the reconciliation with France, damaged the party’s reputation among its regular voters, without opening up new groups of voters. Much of the left wing left the party, including the pacifist and 1927 Nobel Peace Prize laureate Ludwig Quidde , and founded the short-lived Radical Democratic Party (RDP), which, however, remained an extra-parliamentary splinter group until the fall of the republic.

After 1930, both parties were wiped out in the Reichstag elections and together only achieved two percent of the vote and seven of 647 seats in the Reichstag election in March 1933 .

During the National Socialist era , liberal parties were banned unless they dissolved themselves. Many liberals were persecuted politically or were forced to emigrate . Personalities from the Weimar period, such as Friedrich Naumann , Max Weber , Walther Rathenau , Gustav Stresemann , Hugo Preuss , Reinhold Maier , Theodor Heuss , and Ludwig Quidde, are considered to be protagonists of political liberalism up to the present day.

Western zones of occupation, Saarland and Federal Republic: 1945 to 1990

From the foundation to 1969

Federal President Theodor Heuss 1953, co-founder of the FDP

After the Second World War , former left-wing and national liberals gathered in parties at the state or regional level, most of which had name components such as Democratic , Liberal-Democratic , Free Democratic or Democratic People's Party . After the failure of the Democratic Party of Germany (DPD), which included all four zones of occupation , the liberal groups in the three western zones merged to form the Free Democratic Party (FDP) in December 1948 . They wanted to overcome the division of liberalism into a national and a left-wing liberal camp. A number of former DDP and DVP politicians also joined the new non-denominational collecting party Christian Democratic Union (CDU), which consequently has a notable liberal legacy in addition to the Christian and conservative ones.

With Thomas Dehler , Erich Mende , Walter Scheel , Hans-Dietrich Genscher and Klaus Kinkel, the FDP was involved in various federal governments both in a coalition with the CDU / CSU and with the SPD . It was the third and, from 1994 to 2005, the fourth strongest force among the parties represented in the Bundestag . With Theodor Heuss , the FDP provided the first Federal President of the Federal Republic of Germany from 1949 to 1959 and the fourth with Walter Scheel from 1974 to 1979.

In Saarland, which only joined the Federal Republic in 1957, there was an independent liberal party, the Saar Democratic Party (DPS). It was banned in 1951 after the infiltration by German nationalist forces and former National Socialists. In the run-up to the referendum on the status of Saarland in October 1955, it was re-admitted. After joining the Federal Republic of Germany, it became a regional association of the FDP.

In the 1950s and beyond, the FDP continued to combine two very different wings, the national-liberal to nationalist, especially in north and north-west Germany (Hesse, Lower Saxony, North Rhine-Westphalia), and a more left wing in the south-west and in the city-states (Baden- Württemberg, Hamburg). An infiltration movement by former National Socialists ( Naumann district ) even led to an intervention by the British occupying forces in North Rhine-Westphalia in 1952. Overall, the FDP leaned mainly on the CDU / CSU. A rare exception was the SPD-FDP coalition in NRW 1956-1958, with which the FDP prevented the union with the CDU Prime Minister of NRW from receiving a Federal Council majority in favor of other voting rights. At that time, a group was formed around the Düsseldorf “Young Turks” around Willi Weyer , Wolfgang Döring and Walter Scheel , which originally came from the nationalists, but tried to be able to form coalitions with both major parties. This then became the real center of the FDP, including with Hans-Dietrich Genscher , after whom this attitude was later jokingly called "Genscherism". In 1968 their exponent, Walter Scheel, became party chairman, replacing their national-liberal predecessor Erich Mende .

Social-Liberal Coalition 1969–1982

Freiburg theses, 1971

A discussion began about “holistic” or “modern” liberalism, which culminated in the resolution of the Freiburg theses at the FDP federal party conference in 1971 . The left-liberal theses were mainly supported by Karl-Hermann Flach , Werner Maihofer and Walter Scheel . Maihofer had mainly drafted the text. However, the theses hardly stood for the entire party and were replaced in the same decade by the more traditional Kiel theses. Among the young democrats , more far-reaching ideas developed, which were reflected in the policy paper, the “Leverkusen Manifesto”. In Lower Saxony, for example, differences in content led to a temporary break among the young democrats and the establishment of the Social Liberal Youth .

In the 1969 Bundestag election campaign , the FDP faced the problem of moving to the left, while the NPD was gaining strength on the right . To this, the FDP lost parts of its right-wing base voters. Officially, the party had not made a coalition statement, but a week before the election Scheel indicated that he was leaning towards the SPD. After the narrow re-entry into the Bundestag with 5.8 percent, the party entered into a coalition with the SPD under Willy Brandt . The partial reorientation, the changes in the electorate and the unfamiliar coalition led to national liberals subsequently leaving the FDP; some founded the short-lived National Liberal Action . The most threatening factions were converts to the Union, as suffered by the SPD. The 1972 federal election put an end to this trend , and Scheel was able to continue the coalition with a more normal election result.

FDP party congress 1980 in Freiburg

The so-called social-liberal coalition stood for a new direction in foreign policy with the Eastern Treaties and domestic reforms. Soon, however, the 1973 oil crisis at the latest thwarted any further requests. The social democratic Chancellor Brandt and, since 1974, Helmut Schmidt were able to invoke the liberal coalition partner to counter demands of the SPD left. Already in the second half of the 1970s, the coalition parties' common ground decreased, but the CSU chairman Franz Josef Strauss's candidacy for chancellor united the SPD and FDP once again. The last Schmidt cabinet, however, since 1980, sensed in 1982 at the latest that the FDP wanted to reorient itself, because the FDP wanted to enforce a more liberal budget and economic policy. In September 1982 the coalition broke up and the FDP elected CDU chairman Helmut Kohl as the new chancellor.

After the political change in 1982

The turn towards the Union caused some members to leave the FDP. Some joined the SPD or the Greens , others founded the Liberal Democrats (LD) in 1982 . However, the LD was never able to achieve more than one percent in state elections , and it never ran for federal elections . In the same year, the Young Democrats, the Liberal University Association (LHV) and the Liberal Student Action (LiSa) on the one hand and the FDP on the other parted from each other. The Young Liberals became a youth association of the party, which was founded in 1979 as a working group of young liberals in the FDP. At the end of 1987 the Federal Association of Liberal University Groups (LHG) was founded as a new FDP student association. By changing the membership structure of the Young Democrats, the LHV and the LiSa, especially due to the age-related retirement of the “two-way strategists”, they developed into more radical democratic associations.

Soviet occupation zone and GDR: 1945 to 1990

In the Soviet occupation zone (SBZ), the liberal groups organized in July 1945 in the Liberal Democratic Party of Germany (LDP). Like the FDP in the West, it wanted to unite the former left and national liberal camp of the Weimar Republic (DDP and DVP). She was only approved by the Soviet Military Administration (SMAD) on condition that she joined the bloc of anti-fascist-democratic parties to which the KPD , SPD and CDU of the Soviet zone already belonged. In the state elections in October 1946 , the last elections with various options in the Soviet Zone, the LDP became the second strongest force behind the SED with an average of 24.6% (to which the SPD and KPD had meanwhile been forcibly united). The LDP was strongest in Saxony-Anhalt , where it received 29.9% of the vote. Also with the aim of weakening the LDP, the National Democratic Party of Germany (NDPD), loyal to the SED, was founded in 1948 , which addressed similar social classes: the middle class, craftsmen, and small traders. The Liberal Democrats were seen as the legal party that most clearly opposed the SED's claim to leadership and opposed it.

Before and after the founding of the German Democratic Republic (GDR) on October 7, 1949, LDP politicians who stood for a genuine opposition were eliminated and, like all other bloc parties , the SED finally recognized the leadership role of the SED. In October 1951, the Liberal Democrats changed their abbreviation from LDP to LDPD in order to emphasize the part of the name “Germany”. This corresponded to the SED's wish at the time that the GDR should represent all of Germany. In all elections in the GDR, a previously determined number of LDPD members entered the People's Chamber via the joint lists of the National Front ; the party was represented by ministers in all governments of the GDR and from 1960 in the Council of State , where it had two deputy chairmen until 1969 and then one. Many members joined the LDPD (as well as the other bloc parties) less out of conviction than out of a desire to avoid being forced to become a member of the SED.

In the course of the turnaround and peaceful revolution in the GDR , the LDPD was the first of the bloc parties to distance itself from the SED leadership (in September 1989). However, new liberal parties also formed, including the GDR 's FDP, which was founded on the model of the Western FDP . The German Forum Party (DFP) formed by members of the New Forum can also be classified as liberal. After Egon Krenz 's resignation , Manfred Gerlach from the LDPD was the last Chairman of the GDR's Council of State from December 1989 to April 1990. In February 1990 the LDPD deleted the second 'D' from its abbreviation. For the first (and last) free Volkskammer election in March 1990, the LDP, FDP and DFP joined forces to form the Bund Free Democrats (BFD), which received 5.3% of the vote. After the election, the 21 BFD MPs were also joined by the two NDPD MPs, the joint parliamentary group called itself “The Liberals”. You were represented in the de Maizière government until the end of the GDR . On August 11, 1990, all four liberal parties in the GDR merged with the West German FDP. Because of the significantly higher level of party-political organization of the GDR population, the number of members rose briefly to almost three times, but quickly returned to normal as a result of the massive resignations of former block party members.

Reunified Germany since 1990

After 1998, after the formation of the first Red-Green coalition at the federal level , the FDP went into the opposition . Leaving prominent left-wing liberals such as Hildegard Hamm-Brücher led to an election program with statements on economic and civil rights policy at the 2005 party conference in Cologne. The result of this new trend is the rejection of the great eavesdropping , widespread video surveillance and the biometric passport . On the economic front, the FDP calls for a fundamental tax reform , reform of social security , the introduction of a civil money as well as a de-bureaucratization of the economy with the aim of growth promoting and thus jobs to create.

In the 2005 Bundestag elections , the FDP, under its top candidate Guido Westerwelle , was re-elected as the third largest parliamentary group in the 16th German Bundestag with 9.8% of the vote, i.e. 61 seats after the CDU / CSU and the SPD . After the FDP received 14.6% of the vote in the 2009 Bundestag election , and thus had an absolute majority in the Bundestag with the Union, the FDP was involved in the federal government as a junior partner. It was the third largest party in the 17th German Bundestag. The election result of 2009 represents the vote record of the FDP in the Federal Republic of Germany.

The period after 2009 was marked by a decline in the proportion of votes held by the FDP in subsequent elections. So she repeatedly resigned from various state and local parliaments. In the 2013 federal election , the FDP missed the five percent hurdle and was therefore no longer represented in the German Bundestag for a legislative period for the first time since the Federal Republic of Germany came into existence.

In the 2000s and 2010s, there was increasing discussion as to whether the Green Party was not just an ecological but also a social or left-wing liberal party. For example, party researcher Franz Walter stated : "The free-thinking, radical democratic, left-wing libertarian and social-liberal traditional elements" had been "thoroughly disposed of" at the FDP as a representative of party-political liberalism, "in some cases they have resettled with the Greens ."

The two more successful party foundations of the 21st century were, at least in part, ascribed to varieties of liberalism. The political scientist Simon T. Franzmann wrote in connection with the federal election 2013 of "three liberal parties" in Germany: in addition to the FDP, the Pirate Party and the Alternative for Germany (AfD). The pirate party, which was represented in several state parliaments from 2011, embodied a left-wing liberalism focused on civil rights and social politics. In its early phase, under the leadership of Bernd Luckes, the AfD was described as economic and national liberal. As early as 2014, however, an “exodus” of the national liberals from the AfD began, while a völkisch-nationalist and right-wing extremist wing of the party formed. The turning point of the AfD from economic and national liberalism to national conservatism and völkisch nationalism was the fact that Luckes was voted out of office in July 2015.

In the 2017 federal election , the FDP was the first party in the history of the Federal Republic of Germany to return to the Bundestag with 10.7% of the vote.

The history of German liberalism is processed in the archive of liberalism of the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom in Gummersbach , which contains the documents of the FDP.

Austria

In Austria , too , the liberals experienced an upswing in the second half of the 19th century (after 1860) and formed an important group in parliament. In this way, religious freedom, the emancipation of Jews and the separation of school and church could slowly gain acceptance. All of this against the resistance of the emperor and the conservative Tyrolean MPs allied with him. The German Liberal Party (also known as the “Constitutional Party”) existed from 1861 to 1881. Subsequently, there were a number of short-lived, German-free parties, e.g. B. the United German Left from 1888 to 1897, and finally the German Progressive Party from 1896 to 1910. The German freedom and German national parties merged in 1911 to form the German National Association.

After the end of the monarchy, there was no independent liberal party in the Republic of Austria - with small exceptions - for a long time. National liberals were also represented in the Greater German People's Party , but they were in the minority compared to the German Nationals or Pan-Germans. Even after the Second World War , no political party could sustain itself that was exclusively committed to the goals of liberalism. Herbert Alois Kraus , for example, was one of the founders of the Association of Independents (VdU; forerunner of the FPÖ ), but German national forces and former Nazis soon set the tone in the party. The FPÖ was accepted into the Liberal International in 1979. In the period that followed, it was considered relatively liberal - especially during the SPÖ-FPÖ coalition - until Jörg Haider took over the party leadership in 1986, without, however, parting with its German-national tendencies.

Presentation of the 2008 LIF candidates

It was not until 1993 when the FPÖ split off with the Liberal Forum around Heide Schmidt , an explicitly liberal party. This was able to hold up in the Austrian parliament until 1999 ; in the 1999 and 2002 elections, however, it failed because of the 4 percent clause. In the 2006 National Council elections, members of the LIF ran on the list of the SPÖ . As a result, the party was again represented in the National Council for a short time with its federal spokesman Alexander Zach . The Liberal Forum with its front woman Heide Schmidt and the industrialist Hans Peter Haselsteiner ran for the National Council election in 2008 as economic spokesman and chairman of the support committee, but could not get into the National Council.

In 2012, NEOS - Das neue Österreich, a new liberal party was launched. The former ÖVP employee Matthias Strolz was their first party chairman. In 2013, NEOS formed an electoral alliance with the Liberal Forum for the 2013 National Council election . The liberal association succeeded in entering the National Council with 4.9%. On January 26, 2014, NEOS and LIF merged into one party, which took over LIF's membership in the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE). NEOS has also been represented in the European Parliament since the 2014 European elections.

Switzerland

The liberal movement arose in the aristocratic, urban and oligarchic governed old Confederation already during the Enlightenment in circles of the disadvantaged rural nobility and the educated middle class. After 1814 there was also a conservative-aristocratic restoration in Switzerland . In particular, the equality of the rural and urban elites was revoked in many places. For this reason, the liberal movement, which saw itself as the defender of the gains of the French Revolution , was particularly well represented among the young rural elites. The new liberal movement organized itself into singing and shooting clubs as well as reading societies. The movement split up into liberals (free radicals) and radicals. The latter also demanded the liberal rights of freedom, but wanted to replace the census suffrage with a general, free male suffrage and achieve a radical replacement of the feudal basic burdens. The radicals were also ready to enforce their ideas by force.

In various cantons in Switzerland, after the July Revolution of 1830, there were radical upheavals, the " regeneration ". In 1844/45 the radicals organized free marches against the conservative canton of Lucerne . The Sonderbund War of 1847 also brought victory for the Liberals at the national level. The Swiss Federal Constitution of 1848 was clearly liberal. The newly created Swiss federal state was politically completely dominated by the free-thinking movement in its beginnings.

Hans-Rudolf Merz , then Federal President, at the founding meeting of his party, the FDP, in 2009 in Bern

After 1847, radical and liberal was often used synonymously with liberal in German-speaking countries. As a rule, the liberals tended to be on the right politically, while the radicals or liberals tended to be center-left. Between 1860 and 1870, the so-called Democratic Movement, the third liberal force, campaigned for the popular election of the authorities and for the introduction of initiative and referendum, partly against the dominant free-thinking movement. The various groups of the liberal movement were for the most part united in the Free Democratic Party (FDP) in 1894 . The so-called Democrats temporarily formed an independent party.

In addition, there was the strongly federalist Liberal Party of Switzerland (LPS), anchored mainly in the Protestant cantons of Western Switzerland and Basel , which, however, never spread across the country. From 2003 she formed a parliamentary group with the FDP in the United Federal Assembly ( National Council and Council of States ). After numerous attempts at rapprochement, the Union of Freethinkers and Liberals (UFL) was founded in mid-2005 . On February 28, 2009, the FDP and the LPS merged to form the FDP, The Liberals .

The Green Liberal Party , founded in 2004 initially in the canton of Zurich and also on a national level in 2007, combines liberal and ecological elements. Alongside the FDP, she has been the second Swiss representative in the European Liberal Party Association ( ALDE ) since 2019 .

Belgium

State as a whole

The state of Belgium arose in 1830 as a political initiative by Catholics and Liberals, in response to the absolutism of the Protestant Netherlands. It had a very modern constitution at the time. After the founding of the state, however, Catholics and liberals were sharply opposed.

The Liberale Partij was founded in 1846, supported by the Freemasons of the Greater Orient of Belgium. From 1848 to 1892, the period of liberal hegemony, she had a decisive influence on Belgian politics. However, the introduction of universal suffrage at the time made it a small opposition party. Between the two world wars, their share of the vote fell from 24.5 percent to 12.4 percent. After World War II, the party stalled at about ten percent.

In 1961 the party reformed and renamed itself: in Flanders Partij voor Vrijheid en Vooruitgang (PVV), in Wallonia Parti de la Liberté et du Progrès (PLP). She had electoral success again, around 1965 it was 21.6 percent. However, in 1971 it split into a Flemish and a French-speaking party, in line with the federalist trend that began in Belgium at the time.

Flanders

Guy Verhofstadt , one of the best-known VLD politicians: party leader (1992–1995 and 1997–1999), then Belgian Prime Minister (1999–2008) and leader of the Liberals in the EU Parliament (2009–2019)

The Flemish PVV reformed in 1992 under Guy Verhofstadt , who later became Prime Minister of Belgium. He succeeded in attracting left-wing liberals and Christian Democrats to join the new Vlaamse Liberalen en Democrats party . From 1999 to 2003, Verhofstadt led a couple-sized (“purple-green”) coalition of liberals, socialists and Greens (the Christian Democrats had to go into the opposition for the first time), then a “purple” coalition (without the Greens) and from From 2007 to 2008 a kind of “grand coalition” made up of liberals, Christian democrats and Walloon socialists. Since the merger with the radical democratic Vivant in 2007, the party has called itself Open VLD . While the VLD was still the strongest force in Flanders in 2003 (25.9%), it fell to fourth place in 2019 (13.6%).

In addition to the traditional liberal party, there was also the Volksunie , a moderate nationalist party, in Flanders since 1954 . As a result of this nationalism, it took a centrist position on many political issues , especially after the departure of the radical nationalists (later Vlaams Belang ) in the 1970s. The Volksunie, which is considered to be socially liberal, split in 2001 into the left-liberal SPIRIT (which joined the Greens in 2009 ) and the more conservative and national, right-of-center Nieuw-Vlaamse Alliantie (N-VA). Since then, the N-VA has grown in importance: in the elections since 2010, it became the strongest force in Flanders, with 32.5% of the Flemish votes, it peaked in 2014.

In the 2000s there were a number of right-wing liberal spin-offs from the VLD and Open VLD. While the Liberaal Appèl (founded in 2002) essentially rejoined the parent party, VLOTT (2005) tended towards the Vlaams Belang . Former VLD Senator Jean-Marie Dedecker founded his Lijst Dedecker in 2007 , which was later renamed Libertair, Direct, Democratisch (LDD). It promotes direct democratic elements and is classified as right-wing liberal, libertarian, but also right-wing populist. From 2007 to 2014 she was represented with a few seats in the Belgian Parliament as well as in the Flemish and European Parliaments.

Wallonia

In Wallonia, the Parti de la Liberté et du Progrès en Wallonie merged with the moderate wing of the Rassemblement Wallon to form the Parti de la Liberté et de la Liberté en Wallonie (PRL) in 1976 . In 1979 the French-speaking Brussels Liberal Party was added, creating the Parti reformateur libéral (also abbreviated to PRL).

In March 2002 the PRL became part of the Mouvement Réformateur . Other liberal parties or parties positioned in the political center also joined the MR, but they retained their organizational independence: the Brussels Front démocratique des francophones (FDF), the Mouvement des Citoyens pour le Changement (MCC), split off from the Christian Democrats, and the German-speaking one Party for Freedom and Progress (PFF). The FDF left the alliance in 2011 and has been called Démocrate Fédéraliste Indépendant (DéFI) since 2015 . As in Flanders, the proportion of votes held by the Liberals is declining in the French-speaking part of Belgium: In 2007 the MR was the strongest force in Wallonia and Brussels with 33.6%; in 2019 it was only 20.3%. The MR presented the Belgian Prime Minister, Charles Michel, from 2014 to 2019, who headed a center-right government made up of liberals, Christian Democrats and the N-VA (until 2018).

The social liberal party Vivant , founded in 1998 by the millionaire Roland Duchâtelet , plays no role at the national level, but has been represented in the parliament of the German-speaking Community of East Belgium since 2004 .

The Parti Populaire (PP) , founded in 2009 and mainly active in Wallonia, played a role similar to that of the LDD in Flanders . It was initially described as right-wing liberal, but under Mischaël Modrikamen from 2010 it increasingly developed in the direction of right-wing populism. She won a seat in the Belgian Chamber of Deputies in the 2010 and 2014 elections.

France

Origins

The roots of French liberalism can be traced back to Montesquieu , Voltaire , the Physiocrats and Turgot . Representatives of classical liberalism in France are Jean-Baptiste Say , Charles Comte , Charles Dunoyer , Alexis de Tocqueville , Frédéric Bastiat and Gustave de Molinari .

Georges Clemenceau, one of the most prominent representatives of the French radicals

The French liberals of the 19th century advocated formal constitutionalism and economic freedoms (free trade and entrepreneurship), represented the upper class and were ready to compromise with the royalists. Democratic rights such as universal suffrage, freedom of association, freedom of the press or freedom of religion were not on their agenda. These were represented by the Republicans , also known as radicals . They also embodied a direction of liberalism, which in France is not called libéralisme , but rather as républicanisme or radicalisme . Since since the Third Republic (1870 to 1940) all relevant parties have invoked the republican tradition, they reject the designation "libéral" for themselves, even if there are parties that can be classified as liberal in a European comparison.

Third and Fourth Republic (1870–1958)

In the Third Republic, the left-wing, decidedly republican and secular Parti Radical was influential for a long time and often provided the prime minister, including Georges Clemenceau , Édouard Herriot and Édouard Daladier . The Alliance républicaine démocratique (ARD), which was active at the same time and located right of the center, can also be classified as liberal . a. the heads of government Raymond Poincaré and Paul Reynaud belonged.

In the Fourth Republic (1946–58) the Parti radical continued, but lost its importance; The ARD was replaced by several liberal-conservative parties, the most successful of which was the Center national des indépendants et paysans (CNIP), which differed from most other French parties (regardless of political direction) in that it rejected state interventionism .

Fifth Republic (since 1958)

Valéry Giscard d'Estaing from the right-wing liberal Parti républicain

The constitution of the Fifth Republic (since 1958) with majority voting and direct election of the president favored the formation of large parties or blocs with charismatic leaders and weakened smaller parliamentary parties, such as those typically formed by the liberals. The Parti radical shrank to a small party. Since it moved from the left to the center right, the left wing split off in 1972 as the Mouvement des radicaux de gauche , which was later called Parti radical de gauche (PRG). The remaining body of the Parti radical has since been called Parti radical valoisien (after the seat of the party headquarters on Place de Valois in Paris) to distinguish it.

While the Parti radical de gauche advocated cooperation with the left-wing cartel of socialists and communists , the Parti radical valoisien joined the center-right alliance Union pour la démocratie française (UDF) in 1978 . This also included the more conservative-liberal Parti républicain by Valéry Giscard d'Estaing . It was in the tradition of the ARD, the CNIP and later the Républicains indépendants . The UDF included not only liberal, but also Christian and social democratic parties. In elections, the UDF often cooperated with the Gaullist right. For a long time, the UDF was, alongside the Gaullists, one of two large right-of-center parties. However, in 1997 economically liberal forces split off from the UDF and unsuccessfully tried their own path as Démocratie Libérale (DL).

In 2002 the DL joined the new right-wing ruling party Union pour un mouvement populaire (UMP), which sought to overcome the fragmentation of the bourgeois camp and, alongside Gaullists, united liberals and Christian democrats. The secular Parti radical valoisien also became part of the UMP, but retained its own structures. In the UDF, which had been transformed from a loose alliance into a unity party, mostly Christian Democrats remained.

In 2007 the UDF split into the Mouvement démocrate (MoDem), independent of the center-right camp, and the Nouveau Center (also: Parti Social Libéral Européen), which continues to work closely with the UMP . MoDem works at the European level in the liberal ALDE group and belongs to the centrist European Democratic Party , while the Nouveau Center, like the UMP, joined the Christian Democratic EPP group . In 2011/12 Parti radical valoisien, Nouveau center and other small bourgeois parties broke away from the UMP and founded the Union des démocrates et indépendants (UDI), whose members of the European Parliament also sat in the ALDE group.

The party La République en Marche (LREM), founded by Emmanuel Macron in 2016, is predominantly part of the liberal spectrum, even if it has so far rejected membership of a party family. In 2017, Macron became the first liberal to win the presidential election since Giscard d'Estaing (1974) and LREM was the first liberal party in the Fifth Republic to win parliamentary elections . After the European elections in 2019 , LREM formed a group with the liberal ALDE group under the name Renew Europe . The small social liberal parties Parti radical valoisien and Parti radical de gauche merged in 2017 - 45 years after the split of the historical Parti radical - to form the Mouvement radical . A majority of the PRG members renounced it after a year and continued their own party.

Great Britain

William Gladstone

The first liberal movement in Great Britain were the Whigs , who were involved in initiating the Glorious Revolution of 1688 and advocated a strong parliament with the right of resistance in the spirit of John Locke . This party belonged e.g. B. Robert Walpole (the first official Prime Minister of Great Britain, ruled ca. 1721–1743), Lord Gray (Prime Minister 1830–34) and Lord Melbourne (Prime Minister 1835–41). The Whigs merged in 1859 with the radicals and a split from the Tories around Robert Peel ("Peelites") to form the Liberal Party . Its most important representatives included Lord Palmerston (Prime Minister 1855–65), William Ewart Gladstone (several times Prime Minister between 1868 and 1894; founder of Gladstonian liberalism ) and HH Asquith (Prime Minister 1908–16). The last Premier from the Liberal Party was David Lloyd George (1916-22).

Whigs and the Liberal Party were for a long time - as opponents of the conservative Tories - a decisive force in British politics, but lost their importance at the beginning of the 20th century, which was reinforced by the prevailing majority suffrage. The founding of the Labor Party was largely due to the liberals' loss of importance for the labor movement and for the subordinate classes. Previously, the Liberals represented a political platform for trade unions and democratic currents against conservative political models.

In 1988, the Liberal Party merged with the Social Democratic Party to form the Liberal Democrats , currently the third largest force in the House of Commons . After decades in the opposition, the Liberal Democrats were in a coalition government with the Conservatives from 2010 to 2015, with Nick Clegg as deputy prime minister.

However, the decline of party-like liberalism was not accompanied by a decline in liberal ideas - on the contrary: the Labor Party adopted social-liberal ideas, the Conservative Party classical-liberal or neoliberal ideas. Major political and economic debates in Great Britain often take place between the varieties of classical and social liberalism and not between conservatism and socialism.

Italy

kingdom

Camillo Cavour, Prime Minister of Sardinia-Piedmont (1852–61) and founder of the liberal-conservative "historical right"

Liberalism also had its heyday in Italy in the 19th century, under King Victor Emanuel II and Camillo Cavour , who from 1852 to 1861 played a key role in the unification of Italy as Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Sardinia-Piedmont . His liberal anti-clericalism also determined the constitution of the Kingdom of Italy (1861–1946). Until the First World War, various liberal parties made up the majority in the parliament of the Italian monarchy, but they never developed into parties in the modern sense. Until 1912 Italy had a census suffrage , under which, for example, only 2% of the population could vote in 1861.

Giuseppe Mazzini, thought leader of the Italian Republicans

In retrospect, the two most important currents of this time are called “historical right” (destra storica) and “historical left” (sinistra storica) . The former represented the right-wing liberals founded by Cavour, the latter can be classified as left-liberal. Both groups were loose dignitaries , to which predominantly upper-class members of parliament came together, and neither of the two questioned the monarchical constitution. They differed more through personal conflicts of interest than through ideological or programmatic contradictions. The “historical right” dominated until around 1876, followed by a phase in which the “historical left” dominated. The republicans , founded by Giuseppe Mazzini and advocating true democracy and popular sovereignty, played only a subordinate role. They formed in 1895 as Partito Repubblicano Italiano (PRI).

Giovanni Giolitti , who ruled as a non-party from 1903 (with brief interruptions), founded the Unione Liberale in 1912 , which united representatives of the “historical left” and “right” and was a forerunner of the Italian Liberal Party. After the introduction of universal male suffrage, the liberals disappeared into insignificance with the rise of the socialists and the entry of the Catholic People's Party ( Partito Popolare Italiano , PPI) of Don Luigi Sturzo into the political landscape in 1919 and the rise of fascism. The anti-fascist resistance group Giustizia e Libertà ("Justice and Freedom"), active from 1929 onwards, and the Partito d'Azione that emerged from it in 1942 , represented left-wing liberalism or "liberal socialism".

republic

In the Republic of Italy (from 1946) the political discourse was determined by the struggle between Christian Democrats ( DC ) and the Communist Party of Italy (PCI). The two liberal parties Partito Liberale Italiano (PLI; right-wing liberal) and Partito Repubblicano Italiano (PRI; left-liberal) were mostly involved as small partners in the government, but were never able to emerge from the shadow of the big DC. The Partito Radicale (PR) represented a radical form of liberalism. Although it hardly played a role in elections, it did so with acts of civil disobedience and collections of signatures, e. B. attracted attention to the rights to divorce, abortion and drug legalization. As part of the five-party coalition Pentapartito, the PLI and PRI parties "imploded" in the course of the complete reshaping of the Italian party system after the great Tangentopoli corruption scandal in the early 1990s.

Since then, party-like liberalism has played a rather subordinate role in Italy, at most the Radicali Italiani (successor to PR) with former EU Commissioner Emma Bonino were able to achieve certain successes, as in the European elections in 1999. The radicals and the Italia dei Valori party (IdV ) of the anti-corruption prosecutor Antonio Di Pietro belong to the ALDE party at European level and their deputies were members of the ALDE group in the European Parliament. However, the IdV cannot be seen as a real liberal party.

The " Berlusconism " of the Forza Italia party, founded in 1994 by the entrepreneur Silvio Berlusconi , can - especially in its early phase - be characterized as a mixture of (right-wing) liberalism and populism , insofar as it advocated a withdrawal of the state, which was less regulative and should be more of a "service provider". From the end of the 1990s, however, the liberal aspects receded in favor of the populist element. A more social liberal tendency was found in the party I Democratici (1999–2002) and its successor party Democrazia è Libertà - La Margherita (2002–07). This merged into the center-left collecting party Partito Democratico (PD), which thus has liberal roots in addition to social-democratic and Christian-social roots. But she decided on the European level for the social democratic party family.

Lithuania

In Lithuania , the roots of liberalism go back to the 19th century. The liberal movement was an important current in the struggle for the independence of the country then occupied by the Russian Empire . The most important representatives of this movement were among others the author of the national anthem of Lithuania Vincas Kudirka and Bishop Motiejus Valančius . After the occupation of the country by Soviet troops in June 1940 Democratic parties were banned. Liberal ideas spread in exile: Liberals gathered in various organizations and movements, campaigning for the restoration of Lithuania's independence.

When Lithuania regained its independence in 1990, the Liberal Union of Lithuania (LLS) was one of the first parties to be established. This party campaigned for the guarantee of human and minority rights, a market economy and integration of the country into the West. The Lithuanian Center Union (LCS), which was founded in 1992/93 and was more successful than the LLS in elections in the 1990s, is the country's second liberal party . Naujoji sąjunga (NS; New Union), founded in 1998 by Artūras Paulauskas, positioned itself as a social liberal and became the second strongest force in the 2000 election. The LLS also gained popularity through Rolandas Paksas ' transfer from the Conservatives and provided the head of government from 2000–01. Paksas left the LLS in 2002 and founded the "Liberal Democratic Party" (LDP), which despite its name was rather nationally conservative and right-wing populist and renamed itself in 2006 to Tvarka ir teisingumas (TT; "Order and Justice").

In 2003 LLS, LCS and the Union of Progressive Christian Democrats merged to form the Liberal and Center Union (LiCS), which was a member of the Liberal International . The electorate of this party were mostly young, well-educated residents of the big cities; in the country the position of the liberals was much weaker. The Darbo partija (DP; Labor Party), founded in 2003, belongs to the liberal group in the European Parliament and is sometimes described as social liberal, but is primarily a populist vehicle of the millionaire Viktor Uspaskich . It became the strongest force in the 2004 general election.

The right-wing liberal Lietuvos Respublikos liberalų sąjūdis (LRLS) split off from LiCS in 2005. Both came to just over 5 percent each in 2008. The New Union merged with the Labor Party in 2011 after both lost votes significantly. The merged party again became the strongest force in 2012 and since that year has been a member of the European liberal party association ALDE . The LiCS left parliament, while the LRLS gained something. The LiCS merged in 2014 with the TAIP party (“Yes”) of the Vilnius Mayor Artūras Zuokas to form Lietuvos laisvės sąjunga (liberalai) (LLSL; Lithuanian Freedom Union). In the 2016 election, the Labor Party fell below the five percent hurdle, the LLSL remained without parliamentary representation, while the LRLS rose slightly to around 9%.

Luxembourg

The Liberal League was founded in Luxembourg in 1904 . This campaigned against the dominant Catholic Church, for a secularization of the state and especially of the school system. To this end, she formed a left bloc with the Social Democrats. B. enforced the 1912 School Act . Long-time Prime Minister Paul Eyschen (ruled 1888–1915) was close to the Liberals, but was not officially a member of the League. The introduction of universal suffrage in 1919 weakened the liberals, which were dominated by upper-class men, and were only the third strongest force behind the Catholic-conservative right -wing party and the socialists . After a conflict between the “old”, classic-liberal, and “young”, left-wing liberal wing, the Liberal League split in 1925 into the Radical Socialist Party , the Liberal Left and the Radical Party . These three reunited in 1934 to form the Radical Liberal Party . Its most prominent representative was Gaston Diderich , who was Mayor of Luxembourg City from 1921–40 and 1944–46.

The Democratic Party has represented Luxembourg liberalism since 1955 . In its history it represented between 12 and 24 percent of the electorate and was often involved in governments as a junior partner. From 1974 to 1979 she was head of government with Gaston Thorn , later Thorn was the EU Commission President. Since 2013, Xavier Bettel has been a prime minister from the DP for the second time. He leads a “Gambia” coalition (blue-red-green) together with the social democratic LSAP and déi Gréng .

Netherlands

Johan Rudolf Thorbecke , 1852, the founder of liberal parliamentarism in the Netherlands

In the Netherlands , Gijsbert Karel van Hogendorp is considered the first real liberal, Johan Rudolf Thorbecke the most important. Both contributed in a special way to the constitution of the Netherlands .

It was not until 1884 that local electoral associations in Amsterdam, Rotterdam and The Hague formed a Liberal Unie , which had no program, but apparently advocated universal suffrage, better vocational training and also working time limits. When in 1894 a liberal politician propagated plans for the expansion of universal suffrage, some more cautious liberals left the university, although it was not until 1912 that they founded a Vrij-Liberale Party . Conversely, in 1899, when there was a renewed discussion of the right to vote, left-wing members left the university. Together with the Radicale Bond of 1894, they formed the Vrijzinnig Democratische Bond , which campaigned for universal suffrage for men and women.

The realization of universal suffrage in 1918/1922, however, brought with it a decline in the number of liberal MPs. At that time, out of 100 members, only ten belonged to the Unie and five to the VDB. In 1922 the right-wing Vrije and the Unie liberals came together in the Liberal State Party De Vrijheidsbond . In 1937 it came about for the first and last time that the left-wing liberal VDB had more MPs than the right-wing liberal Unie.

After the Second World War, the Doorbraak idea was very strong for a while , the idea that there must now be a breakthrough, a break-up of old political structures. In fact, however, the parties have ultimately been restored under a new look. In the spirit of the Doorbraak , most of the members of the VDB had joined the Partij van de Arbeid of 1946. But they found that the PvdA was essentially a continuation of the old social democracy. The majority of them left the PvdA under Pieter Oud.

Party members from the Volkspartij voor Vrijheid en Democratie and from D66

In addition to the Partij van de Arbeid, the Partij van de Vrijheid , the former Liberal State Party , arose. In 1947/1948 Oud united his supporters with the PvdV to form the Volkspartij voor Vrijheid en Democratie . This party has a more left wing, social liberal, and a right wing, national liberal wing. In the mid-1970s it started its soaring from a party around ten percent to the 24.7 percent in 1998. Alongside the Christian Democrats, the Liberals are the party with the most government experience in the Netherlands. After 2000, the VVD lost Geert Wilders and Rita Verdonk, a parliamentary group member and a former minister who continued with their own right-wing populist parties ( Partij voor de Vrijheid and Trots op Nederland ).

As the gray eminence of the VVD, Hans Wiegel reports to the media from time to time , who was Minister of the Interior in Van Agt's first cabinet (1977–1981). Frits Bolkestein , who later became the EU Commissioner of the Netherlands , is known from the 1990s ; he is also considered an important theoretician of (classical) liberalism. EU Commissioner Neelie Kroes is also a member of the party . Mark Rutte has been leading the party since 2006 , after narrowly winning against Rita Verdonk in a vote .

In addition to the VVD, the Democrats 66 party came into being in 1966 as an initiative of left-wing VVD members who were previously non-party. In 1967 she achieved a respectable success in the elections, since then she has often had very changeable election results with between two and fifteen percent. D66 originally wanted to break the pillar and contribute to the creation of a progressive people's party. In the course of time it established itself as a middle party between Social Democrats and Left Greens on the one hand and VVD and Christian Democrats on the other. She describes herself as social liberal. The political leader of D66 from 2006 to 2018 was Alexander Pechtold .

United States

The United States was founded on classically liberal principles. Both major parties, Republicans and Democrats , therefore historically follow a liberal tradition. From this, however, two main directions developed: Classical liberalism defending individual freedoms and free market economies ( laissez-faire ) and modern liberalism, which is more socially and politically progressive, and is more socially and politically progressive towards the welfare state and state intervention . To simplify matters, the supporters of the latter direction are now referred to as liberals , which in European usage is often referred to as “socially liberal” or “left-wing liberal”. They are mostly associated with the Democratic Party. But the American conservatives , who are typically associated with the Republican Party, also stand for core positions that stem from classical liberalism and not from the traditional European line of conservatism: free markets, individual entrepreneurship and the protection of private property. Although these two camps are often portrayed as opposing poles from a domestic American perspective, there is indeed substantial overlap. The advocates of state intervention reduced to an absolute minimum have been gathering under the term libertarians since the 1930s, especially in contrast to the “liberals” .

literature

Web links

supporting documents

  1. ^ Johannes Leicht, Arnulf Scriba: German Progressive Party 1861-1884. In: German Historical Museum , Berlin. Retrieved November 13, 2016 .
  2. ^ Founding program of the German Progressive Party 1861 (.pdf)
  3. ↑ See for example the assessment of the importance of liberalism for the women's movement in Helene Lange / Gertrud Bäumer: Handbuch der Frauenbewegung. Berlin: Moeser, 1901, p. 68.
  4. ^ Alf Mintzel: Occupation Policy and Development of the Bourgeois Parties in the Western Zones (1945-1949). In: Dietrich Staritz : The party system of the Federal Republic of Germany. Leske + Budrich, Opladen 1976, pp. 73-89, here p. 79; Dieter Hein : Between liberal milieu party and national collection movement. Foundation, development and structure of the Free Democratic Party 1945–1949. Droste Verlag, Düsseldorf 1985, ISBN 3-7700-5127-0 .
  5. ^ Thomas Großbölting: SED dictatorship and society. Bourgeoisie, bourgeoisie and de-bourgeoisie in Magdeburg and Halle. Mitteldeutscher Verlag, Halle 2001, p. 278.
  6. ^ Günther Heydemann: The internal politics of the GDR. Oldenbourg, Munich 2003, pp. 11-12.
  7. ^ Karl Wilhelm Fricke, Peter Steinbach, Johannes Tuchel (eds.): Opposition and resistance in the GDR. Political images of life. CH Beck, Munich 2002, entries Hermann Becker (editor: Jürgen Louis), pp. 38-42, on p. 39; Peter Moeller (editor: Katrin Passens), pp. 130–134, on p. 132.
  8. ↑ Ines Soldwisch: "... to achieve something for the whole people and not just serve the goals of one party ...". History of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) in Mecklenburg 1946–1952. Lit Verlag, Münster 2007, especially p. 239 ff.
  9. ^ Bernard Bode: LDP (D) and national question before 1961 - a sketch. In: "Bourgeois" parties in the Soviet Zone / GDR. Verlag Wissenschaft und Politik, Cologne 1994, pp. 175–181, on p. 180.
  10. ^ Ehrhart Neubert: History of the opposition in the GDR 1949–1989. 2nd edition, Ch.links, Berlin 1998, p. 46.
  11. ^ Jürgen Dittberner: The FDP. History, people, organization, perspectives. VS Verlag, Wiesbaden 2005, p. 79.
  12. ↑ Deniz Anan: Party programs in transition. A comparison of the FDP and the Greens between 1971 and 2013. Springer VS, Wiesbaden 2017, pp. 47–48.
  13. ^ Franz Walter: Before a renaissance of social liberalism? In: Neue Gesellschaft / Frankfurter Hefte , No. 10/2008, pp. 39–41, on p. 41.
  14. ^ A b c Simon T. Franzmann: The Failed Struggle for Office Instead of Votes. The Greens, Die Linke and the FDP. In: Gabriele D'Ottavio, Thomas Saalfeld: Germany After the 2013 Elections. Ashgate, Farnham (Surrey) / Burlington (VT) 2015, pp. 155–179, at pp. 166–167.
  15. ^ Felix Neumann: Platform neutrality. On the program of the Pirate Party. In: Oskar Niedermayer: The Pirate Party. Springer VS, Wiesbaden 2013, pp. 175–188, on p. 184.
  16. ^ Matthias Jung , Yvonne Schroth, Andrea Wolf: Voter behavior and election results. Angela Merkel's victory in the middle. In: Karl-Rudolf Korte: The Bundestag election 2013. Springer VS, Wiesbaden 2015, p. 40.
  17. ↑ Volker Weiß : The authoritarian revolt. The New Right and the Fall of the West. Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 2017. Section A German Tea Party?
  18. ↑ http://www.parlament.ch/ra-fraktion-r ( Memento from October 16, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
  19. ↑ https://www.ned.univie.ac.at/node/12700  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.ned.univie.ac.at  
  20. ↑ Klaus Kottmann: The Freemasons and the Catholic Church . Frankfurt 2009, Peter Lang GmbH, ISBN 978-3-631-58484-2 . P. 66 ff.
  21. ^ Sarah L. de Lange, Tjitske Akkerman: Populist parties in Belgium. A case of hegemonic liberal democracy? In: Cas Mudde, Cristóbal Rovira Kaltwasser: Populism in Europe and the Americas. Threat Or Corrective for Democracy? Cambridge University Press, 2012, pp. 27-45, at pp. 27-30.
  22. ^ Teun Pauwels: Belgium - Decline of National Populism? In: Exposing the Demagogues. Right-wing and National Populist Parties in Europe. Center for European Studies, Brussels 2013, p. 85.
  23. ^ Günther Haensch, Hans J. Tümmers: France. Politics, society, economy. 3rd edition, CH Beck, Munich 1998, p. 39.
  24. ↑ Klaus von Beyme : Political Theories in the Age of Ideologies, 1789-1945. Westdeutscher Verlag, Wiesbaden 2002, p. 982.
  25. ^ Stefan Grüner: Between longing for unity and pluralistic mass democracy. On the understanding of parties and democracy in German and French liberalism in the interwar period. In: Democracy in Germany and France 1918-1933 / 40. Oldenbourg, Munich 2002, pp. 219-249, on p. 224.
  26. ^ Roland Höhne: The party system of France. In: The party systems of Western Europe. VS Verlag, Wiesbaden 2006, pp. 161-187, on p. 161.
  27. ^ Christine Pütz: Party change in France. Presidential elections and parties between tradition and adaptation. VS Verlag, Wiesbaden 2004, p. 109.
  28. ^ Pütz: Party change in France. 2004, p. 108.
  29. ^ Höhne: The party system of France. 2006, p. 179.
  30. ^ Höhne: The party system of France. 2006, p. 182.
  31. ↑ Andrew Vincent: Modern Political Ideologies. 3rd edition, Wiley-Blackwell, Chichester (West Sussex) et al. a. 2010, p. 54.
  32. ↑ Steve Bastow, James Martin: Third Way Discourse. European Ideologies in the Twentieth Century. Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh 2003. Chapter Italian Liberal Socialism: Anti-fascism and the Third Way , pp. 72-92.
  33. ^ Stefan Köppl: The political system of Italy. An introduction. VS Verlag, Wiesbaden 2007, p. 73.
  34. ↑ Luciano Bardi, Richard S. Katz, Peter Mair: Towards a European Politics. In: Parties and Party Systems. Structure and Context. UBC Press, Vancouver 2015, pp. 127–147, at p. 136.
  35. ^ Giovanni Orsina: Berlusconism and Italy. A historical interpretation. Palgrave Macmillan, 2014, p. 82 ff.
  36. ↑ Paolo Segatti: Italy's majoritarian experiment. Continuities and discontinuities in Italian electoral behavior between the First and Second Republic. In: Hideko Magara, Stefano Sacchi: The Politics of Structural Reforms. Social and Industrial Policy Change in Italy and Japan. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham / Northampton (MA) 2013, pp. 103–125, on p. 113.
  37. ↑ Jan van Putten: Politieke stromingen , 4th edition, Het Spectrum: Utrecht 1995 (1985), p. 55.
  38. ↑ Jan van Putten: Politieke stromingen , 4th edition, Het Spectrum: Utrecht 1995 (1985), p. 62 f.
  39. ^ Jan van Putten: Politieke stromingen , 4th edition, Het Spectrum: Utrecht 1995 (1985), p. 63/64.
  40. ↑ Jan van Putten: Politieke stromingen , 4th edition, Het Spectrum: Utrecht 1995 (1985), p. 64.
  41. ^ Joseph Romance: The Enlightenment and Classical Liberalism. In: A History of the US Political System. Ideas, Interests, and Institutions. ABC-CLIO, Santa Barbara CA 2010, pp. 3-13.
  42. ↑ a b Christopher A. Simon: Public Policy. Preferences and Outcomes. 2nd edition, Longman, New York 2010, p. 306.
  43. ↑ Dagmar Eberle, Rainer-Olaf Schultze, Roland Sturm: Mission Accomplished? A Comparative Exploration of Conservatism in the United States and Canada. In: Conservative Parties and Right-Wing Politics in North America. Leske + Budrich, Opladen 2003, pp. 11–30, on p. 15.
  44. Jump up ↑ David Jones, Jodyn Platt, Daniel B. Rubin, Peter D. Jacobson: Individual and Societal Responsibility for Health. In: Debates on US Health Care. Sage, Los Angeles et al. a. 2012, p. 50.
  45. ^ Thomas M. Magstadt: Understanding Politics. Ideas, Institutions, and Issues. 8th edition, Wadsworth, Belmont CA 2009, p. 33.