German Bundestag

The German Bundestag (commonly referred to as Bundestag) is the legislature of Germany. It meets in Berlin, in the Reichstag building, which was specially rebuilt ready for the Bundestag to move from Bonn.

German Bundestag

Deutscher Bundestag
20th Bundestag
Coat of arms or logo
History
Established7 September 1949; 74 years ago (1949-09-07)
Preceded byReichstag (Nazi Germany, 1933–1945)
Leadership
Bärbel Bas, SPD
since 26 October 2021
Aydan Özoğuz, SPD
since 26 October 2021
Yvonne Magwas, CDU/CSU
since 26 October 2021
Wolfgang Kubicki, FDP
since 24 October 2017
Petra Pau, The Left
since 7 April 2006
Vacant, AfD[a]
Wolfgang Schäuble, CDU/CSU
since 26 October 2021
Olaf Scholz, SPD
since 8 December 2021
Friedrich Merz, CDU/CSU
since 15 February 2022
Structure
Seats736[1]
20thBundestagV2.svg
Political groups
Government (416)
  •   SPD (206)
  •   Greens (118)
  •   FDP (92)

Opposition (320)

  •   Union (197)
  •   AfD (79)
  • <span class="legend-color" style="background-color:Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'Module:Political party/T' not found.; color:;border:1px solid silver;">  The Left (39)
  •   Non-attached (5)
Elections
Mixed-member proportional representation (MMP)
Last election
26 September 2021
Next election
On or before 26 October 2025
Meeting place
Deutscher Bundestag Plenarsaal Seitenansicht.jpg
Reichstag building
Mitte, Berlin, Germany
Website
www.bundestag.de/en
Rules
Rules of Procedure of the German Bundestag and Mediation Committee (English)
The plenary of the German Bundestag.

The Bundestag has at least 598 members. Every 4 years the German people vote. After the 2017 election there were 709 members. In the election of 26 September 2021, 736 members were assigned - the base 598 seats plus 138 overhang and leveling seats. The next elections are in 2025.

A party gets seats when it gets at least 5% of the votes or 3 direct mandates. Every voter has two votes, one for a person and one for a party. 299 members each represent a constituency, just as in the British House of Commons or the US House of Representatives. The other half are elected from a party list in each Land. The total number of seats a party gets depends on the number of the second "party votes" it gets.

But if a party wins more constituency seats than its share of the party votes, then it keeps those extra seats. These extra seats, or extra mandates, are the reason the Bundestag sometimes has more than 598 members. If a party gets extra mandates, the other parties get some extra seats too to make sure every party gets exactly its share of party seats. This system of giving extra mandates was changed in 2013. Before 2013, if a party won extra mandates, then it got to put more members in the Bundestag, which gave the party more influence over the Bundestag than it won in the elections.

The Bundestag president is named Bärbel Bas. She oversees the sessions of the body.

German Bundestag Media

Related pages

Notes

  1. The Rules of Procedure of the Bundestag (German: Geschäftsordnung) allocate one Vice-President to each political group (Fraktion). However, each candidate must still be elected by a parliamentary majority. Due to the AfD's rejection by other parties, no AfD candidate has reached such a majority.
  2. Though the by-laws of the Bundestag do not mention such a position, the leader of the largest opposition Fraktion is called leader of the opposition by convention.

References

  1. "Sitzverteilung des 20. Deutschen Bundestages" (in Deutsch). Deutscher Bundestag. 30 May 2022. Retrieved 30 May 2022.

Other websites

  Media related to Bundestag at Wikimedia Commons