Alliance '90/The Greens

History

Background

The Green Party was initially founded in West Germany as Die Grünen (the Greens) in January 1980. It grew out of the anti-nuclear energy, environmental, peace, new left, and new social movements of the late 20th century. More specifically, social and political movements that contributed to the milieu that produced the Greens included protests during the 1970s against Wyhl and Brokdorf Nuclear Power Plants, the nuclear waste processing facility at Gorleben and the construction of a new runway at Frankfurt Airport, and the grassroots civic Citizens' Initiative movement. Alternative left groups that flourished after the SPD abandoned Marxism, entered a grand coalition with the CDU/CSU under Christian Democratic chancellor Kurt Georg Kiesinger, and later banned radical activists from being employed as civil servants, also formed a movement that contributed to the party's formation, including the Außerparlamentarische Opposition, the West German student movement, the K-Groups and the Spontis, as did a broader alternative subculture that included collectives, cooperatives, communes, self-help groups, new religious movements and cultural organisations.

Between 1977 and 1979 local parties running on on environmental and peace issues were established across West Germany. Although most environmental and anti-nuclear activists were initially sceptical of these efforts, a lack of results from pressure group activity and early electoral successes meant the approach gained momentum and led to local groups amalgamating into state-level parties.

Grüne Liste Umweltschutz (GLU - green list for environmental protection) was the name used for some branches in Lower Saxony and other states in the Federal Republic of Germany, including Hamburg, Hesse, North Rhine-Westphalia, Rhineland-Palatinate and Baden-Württemberg. These groups were founded in 1977 and took part in several elections. Most GLU activists had been involved in environmental protection activism, although it increasingly also attracted campaigners on social issues. Most GLU branches merged with The Greens in 1980.

The West Berlin state branch of The Greens was founded as Alternative Liste, or precisely, Alternative Liste für Demokratie und Umweltschutz (AL; alternative list for democracy and environmental protection) in 1978 and became the official West Berlin branch of The Greens in 1980. In 1993, it renamed to Alliance 90/The Greens Berlin after the merger with East Berlin's Greens and Alliance 90.

12–13 January 1980: Foundation congress

The political party The Greens (German: Die Grünen) sprung out of the wave of New Social Movements that were active in the 1970s, including environmentalist, anti-war, and anti-nuclear movements which can trace their origin to the student protests of 1968. Officially founded as a German national party on 13 January 1980 in Karlsruhe, the party sought to give these movements political and parliamentary representation, as the pre-existing people's parties were not organised in a way to address their stated issues. Its membership included organisers from former attempts to achieve institutional representation such as GLU and AUD. Opposition to pollution, use of nuclear power, NATO military action, and certain aspects of industrialised society were principal campaign issues. The party also championed sexual liberation and some of their members supported the abolition of age-of-consent laws.

The formation of a party was purportedly first discussed by movement leaders in 1978. Important figures in the first years were – among others – Petra Kelly, Joschka Fischer, Gert Bastian, Lukas Beckmann, Rudolf Bahro, Joseph Beuys, Antje Vollmer, Herbert Gruhl, August Haußleiter, Luise Rinser, Dirk Schneider, Christian Ströbele, Jutta Ditfurth, Baldur Springmann and Werner Vogel.

In the foundational congress of 1980, the ideological tenets of the party were consolidated, proclaiming the famous Four Pillars of the Green Party:

Social justice

Ecological wisdom

Grassroots democracy

Nonviolence

1980s: Parliamentary representation on the federal level

As the 1980s commenced, the movement built on their success in the 1979 Bremen state elections, winning six seats in the 1980 Baden-Württemberg state election and nine seats in the 1981 West Berlin state election, although the result in the 1980 West German federal election was disappointing, with only 1.5 percent of the vote scored. In 1982, the conservative factions of the Greens broke away to form the Ecological Democratic Party (ÖDP). Those who remained in the Green party were more strongly pacifist and against restrictions on immigration and reproductive rights, while supporting the legalisation of cannabis use, placing a higher priority on working for LGBT rights, and tending to advocate what they described as "anti-authoritarian" concepts of education and child-rearing. They also tended to identify more closely with a culture of protest and civil disobedience, frequently clashing with police at demonstrations against nuclear weapons, nuclear energy, and the construction of a new runway (Startbahn West) at Frankfurt Airport. Those who left the party at the time might have felt similarly about some of these issues, but did not identify with the forms of protest that Green party members took part in.

After some success at state-level elections, winning 11 seats in Lower Saxony, nine seats in Hesse and eight seats in Hamburg during the course of 1982, the party won 27 seats (plus one non-voting delegate from West Berlin) with 5.7% of the vote in the Bundestag, the lower house of the German parliament, in the 1983 federal election. Among the important political issues at the time was the deployment of Pershing II IRBMs and nuclear-tipped cruise missiles by the U.S. and NATO on West German soil, generating strong opposition in the general population that found an outlet in mass demonstrations. The newly formed party was able to draw on this popular movement to recruit support.

The state electoral success in Hesse and Hamburg saw the party holding the balance of power in both states. In Hamburg the party won nine seats in the June 1982 election and made an offer of terms for confidence and supply to the Social Democrats, but these were rejected. At the following December election the Greens lost a seat and the SPD won an absolute majority. In Hesse the Greens rejected the idea of cooperating with the SPD after the 1982 election. Another state election took place there the following year, resulting in the Greens losing two seats but no party achieving a majority. Following the election the state Greens voted to accept a confidence and supply agreement with the Social Democrats. Although this was implemented in 1984 after long negotiations between the Greens and the SPD, with the former voting in favour of Holger Börner as minister-president and the SPD budget in June, the agreement broke down in December over subsidising the expansion of the Nukem / Alkem nuclear enrichment plant in Hanau. Despite this negotiations immediately commenced over terms for a coalition agreement.

1990s: German reunification, electoral failure in the West, formation of Alliance 90/The Greens

In the 1990 federal elections, taking place post-reunified Germany, the Greens in the West did not pass the 5% limit required to win seats in the Bundestag. It was only due to a temporary modification of German election law, applying the five-percent "hurdle" separately in East and West Germany, that the Greens acquired any parliamentary seats at all. This happened because in the new states of Germany, the Greens, in a joint effort with Alliance 90, a heterogeneous grouping of civil rights activists, were able to gain more than 5% of the vote. Some critics attribute this poor performance to the reluctance of the campaign to cater to the prevalent mood of nationalism, instead focusing on subjects such as global warming. A campaign poster at the time proudly stated, "Everyone is talking about Germany; we're talking about the weather!", paraphrasing a popular slogan of Deutsche Bundesbahn, the German national railway. The party also opposed imminent reunification that was in process, instead wanting to initiate debates on ecology and nuclear issues before reunification causing a drop in support in Western Germany. After the 1994 federal election; however, the merged party returned to the Bundestag, and the Greens received 7.3% of the vote nationwide and 49 seats.

1998–2002: Greens as governing party, first term

In the 1998 federal election, despite a slight fall in their percentage of the vote (6.7%), the Greens retained 47 seats and joined the federal government for the first time in 'Red-Green' coalition government with the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD). Joschka Fischer became Vice-Chancellor of Germany and foreign minister in the new government, which had two other Green ministers (Andrea Fischer, later Renate Künast, and Jürgen Trittin).

Almost immediately the party was plunged into a crisis by the question of German participation in the NATO actions in Kosovo. Numerous anti-war party members resigned their party membership when the first post-war deployment of German troops in a military conflict abroad occurred under a Red-Green government, and the party began to experience a long string of defeats in local and state-level elections. Disappointment with the Green participation in government increased when anti-nuclear power activists realised that shutting down the nation's nuclear power stations would not happen as quickly as they wished, and numerous pro-business SPD members of the federal cabinet opposed the environmentalist agenda of the Greens, calling for tacit compromises.

In 2001, the party experienced a further crisis as some Green Members of Parliament refused to back the government's plan of sending military personnel to help with the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan. Chancellor Gerhard Schröder called a vote of confidence, tying it to his strategy on the war. Four Green MPs and one Social Democrat voted against the government, but Schröder was still able to command a majority.

On the other hand, the Greens achieved a major success as a governing party through the 2000 decision to phase out the use of nuclear energy. Minister of Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety Jürgen Trittin reached an agreement with energy companies on the gradual phasing out of the country's nineteen nuclear power plants and a cessation of civil usage of nuclear power by 2020. This was authorised through the Nuclear Exit Law. Based on an estimate of 32 years as the normal period of operation for a nuclear power plant, the agreement defines precisely how much energy a power plant is allowed to produce before being shut down. This law has since been overturned.

2002–2005: Greens as governing party, second term

Despite the crises of the preceding electoral period, in the 2002 federal election, the Greens increased their total to 55 seats (in a smaller parliament) and 8.6%. This was partly due to the perception that the internal debate over the war in Afghanistan had been more honest and open than in other parties, and one of the MPs who had voted against the Afghanistan deployment, Hans-Christian Ströbele, was directly elected to the Bundestag as a district representative for the Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg – Prenzlauer Berg East constituency in Berlin, becoming the first Green to ever gain a first-past-the-post seat in Germany.

The Greens benefited from increased inroads among traditionally left-wing demographics which had benefited from Green-initiated legislation in the 1998–2002 term, such as environmentalists (Renewable Energies Act) and LGBT groups (Registered Partnership Law). Perhaps most important for determining the success of both the Greens and the SPD was the increasing threat of war in Iraq, which was highly unpopular with the German public, and helped gather votes for the parties which had taken a stand against participation in this war. Despite losses for the SPD, the Red-Green coalition government retained a very slight majority in the Bundestag (4 seats) and was renewed, with Joschka Fischer as foreign minister, Renate Künast as minister for consumer protection, nutrition and agriculture, and Jürgen Trittin as minister for the environment.

One internal issue in 2002 was the failed attempt to settle a long-standing discussion about the question of whether members of parliament should be allowed to become members of the party executive. Two party conventions declined to change the party statute. The necessary majority of two-thirds was missed by a small margin. As a result, former party chairpersons Fritz Kuhn and Claudia Roth (who had been elected to parliament that year) were no longer able to continue in their executive function and were replaced by former party secretary general Reinhard Bütikofer and former Bundestag member Angelika Beer. The party then held a member referendum on this question in the spring of 2003 which changed the party statute. Now members of parliament may be elected for two of the six seats of the party executive, as long as they are not ministers or caucus leaders. 57% of all party members voted in the member referendum, with 67% voting in favor of the change. The referendum was only the second in the history of Alliance 90/The Greens, the first having been held about the merger of the Greens and Alliance 90. In 2004, after Angelika Beer was elected to the European Parliament, Claudia Roth was elected to replace her as party chair.

2005–2021: In opposition

For almost two years after the federal election in 2005, the Greens were not part of any government at the state or federal level. In June 2007, the Greens in Bremen entered into a coalition with the Social Democratic Party (SPD) following the 2007 Bremen state election.

In April 2008, following the 2008 Hamburg state election, the Green-Alternative List (GAL) in Hamburg entered into a coalition with the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the first such state-level coalition in Germany. Although the GAL had to agree to the deepening of the Elbe River, the construction of a new coal-fired power station and two road projects they had opposed, they also received some significant concessions from the CDU. These included reforming state schools by increasing the number of primary school educational stages, the restoration of trams as public transportation in the city-state, and more pedestrian-friendly real estate development. On 29 November 2010, the coalition collapsed, resulting in an election that was won by SPD.

Following the Saarland state election of August 2009, The Greens held the balance of power after a close election where no two-party coalitions could create a stable majority government. After negotiations, the Saarland Greens rejected the option of a left-wing 'red-red-green' coalition with the SPD and The Left (Die Linke) in order to form a centre-right state government with the CDU and Free Democratic Party (FDP), a historical first time that a Jamaica coalition has formed in German politics.

In June 2010, in the first state election following the victory of the CDU/CSU and FDP in the 2009 federal election, the "black-yellow" CDU-FDP coalition in North Rhine-Westphalia under Jürgen Rüttgers lost its majority. The Greens and the SPD came one seat short of a governing majority, but after multiple negotiations about coalitions of SPD and Greens with either the FDP or The Left, the SPD and Greens decided to form a minority government, which was possible because under the constitution of North Rhine-Westphalia a plurality of seats is sufficient to elect a minister-president. So a red-green government in a state where it was defeated under Peer Steinbrück in 2005 came into office again on 14 June 2010 with the election of Hannelore Kraft as minister-president (Cabinet Kraft I).

The Greens founded the first international chapter of a German political party in the U.S. on 13 April 2008 at the Goethe-Institut in Washington D.C. Its main goal is "to provide a platform for politically active and green-oriented German citizens, in and beyond Washington D.C., to discuss and actively participate in German Green politics. [...] to foster professional and personal exchange, channeling the outcomes towards the political discourse in Germany."

2021–2025: Return to government

The Greens finished in third place in the 2021 federal election with 14.8% of votes. Though their best ever federal election result, it was considered a bitter disappointment in light of their polling numbers during the previous three years. They entered coalition talks with the FDP and SPD, eventually joining a traffic light coalition under Chancellor Olaf Scholz which took office on 8 December 2021. The Greens have five ministers in the Scholz cabinet, including Robert Habeck as Vice-Chancellor and Annalena Baerbock as foreign minister.

Since party statute mandates that party leaders may not hold government office, Baerbock and Habeck stepped down after entering cabinet. At a party conference in January 2022, Ricarda Lang and Omid Nouripour were elected to succeed them. At the time of her election, Lang was 28 years old, speaker for women's issues, and a former leader of the Green Youth. 46-year-old Nouripour was foreign affairs spokesman and a member of the Bundestag since 2006. Of the new leaders, Lang is considered a representative of the party's left-wing, while Nouripour represents the right-wing.

Lang and Nouripour announced their resignations as party leaders in September 2024 after heavy defeats in the Saxony, Thuringia and Brandenburg state elections that month, as well as the earlier European Parliament election. In all three states, governing coalitions involving the Greens were not returned, and the party was wiped out in the latter two states while only narrowly retaining representation in Saxony. In the European elections, the Greens fell to fourth (behind the CDU/CSU, AfD and SPD) and lost 9 seats in the European parliament, falling to 12 seats. The party had fallen out of five state governments (additionally Berlin and Hesse) since entering the federal governing coalition in 2021. Analysts pointed to its participation in the federal government requiring it to take stances that are contrary to its traditional clean-energy and pacifist ideals, as well as a stark collapse in support with young voters.

Felix Banaszak and Franziska Brantner elected as co-leaders in November 2024. During the 2024 government crisis, in which the FDP left the traffic light coalition, the Greens stayed in a red-green minority coalition. The party abstained in the succeeding vote of no confidence, ensuring the government's collapse and the calling of the 2025 federal election.

2025–present: Return to opposition

The party chose incumbent Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck as their chancellor candidate for the 2025 federal election. The Greens would go on to lose 33 seats in that election, garnering 11.6% of the vote. The unpopularity of the Scholz cabinet has been credited with the result, although this was still the party's second best ever result. The morning after the election, Habeck announced his withdrawal from the party's leadership. The other co-candidate for The Greens, Annalena Baerbock, as well as former party leader Ricarda Lang, were expected to become the next party leaders in the Bundestag.

Ideology and platform

The party's main ideological trends are green politics and social liberalism. The party has also been described as left-libertarian, and influenced by the postmaterialist left. The party's political position is generally described to be centre-left, while others describe the party as centrist or left-wing. The Greens originated as a left-wing protest party in the 1980s but have since evolved into a centre-left party, especially after merging with Alliance 90 in 1993. The West German Greens played a crucial role in the development of green politics in Europe, with their original program outlining "four principles: ecological, social, grassroots, and non-violent". Initially ideologically heterogenous, the party took up a position on the radical left in its early years, which were dominated by conflicts between the more left-wing Fundi (fundamentalist) and more moderate Realo (realist) factions.

Writing in the late 1980s, Sara Parkin characterised the factional divides in the party as occurring along three axes: the strategic divide between fundis and realos, the left–right political spectrum, and the existence of affinity groups. She described the fundi perspective as one that stressed the importance of the green critique of existing developed industrial society and the Green's initial philosophy of being an "anti-party party" (in the words of fundi Petra Kelly) which was radically different from traditional political parties. From this view, watering down a radical worldview risked a failure to take sufficiently drastic action in the face of environmental crisis. As Kelly put it, "It does not help us in any way if we begin accepting lower and safer levels of, for example, radioactivity... We must speak out clear, loudly and courageously, if we know there are no safe levels".

Fundis also express concern about losing touch with grassroots activists, and in Germany particularly emphasise solidarity with groups they consider to be victimised by the state, resulting in them being less likely to condemn use of violence by protest movements than realos. According to Parkin, fundis were particularly prevalent on state and federal committees and executive bodies and formed a minority in parliamentary parties. Along with Kelly, other prominent fundis in the early years of the party included Rudolf Bahro (who colourfully described compromise as "cleaning the dragon's teeth and wiping away its excrement"), Jutta Ditfurth, Lukas Beckmann and Claudia Roth and the tendency also included the factional organisation Left Forum.

Economic policies

The party has economically left-liberal views.

Foreign policy

The Greens are regarded as taking a Atlanticist line on defense and pushing for a stronger common EU foreign policy, especially against Russia and China. Former Green Party co-leader Annalena Baerbock proposed a post-pacifist foreign policy. She supports eastward expansion of NATO and has considered the number of UN resolutions critical of Israel as "absurd compared to resolutions against other states." The party's program included references to NATO as an "indispensable" part of European security. The Greens have promised to abolish the contested Nord Stream 2 pipeline to ship Russian natural gas to Germany. The party criticized the EU's investment deal with China. It describes China as a "systematic rival", though the party also favors cooperation with China to fight climate change. In 2016, the Greens criticised Germany's defense plan with Saudi Arabia, which has been waging war in Yemen and has been accused of massive human rights violations.

The party remains divided over issues such as nuclear disarmament and U.S. nuclear weapons on German territory. Some Greens want Germany to sign the United Nations' Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. About the Gaza war, the Federal Minister of Food and Agriculture Cem Özdemir (member and former president of the party) criticized Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg for her presence and support of pro-Palestinian demonstrations in Berlin, calling on everyone to reconsider their opinions about her.

Energy and nuclear power

Ever since the party's inception, The Greens have been concerned with the immediate halt of construction or operation of all nuclear power stations. As an alternative, they promote a shift to non-nuclear renewable energy and a comprehensive program of energy conservation.

In 1986, large parts of Germany were covered with radioactive contamination from the Chernobyl disaster and Germans went to great lengths to deal with the contamination. Germany's anti-nuclear stance was strengthened. From the mid-1990s onwards, anti-nuclear protests were primarily directed against transports of radioactive waste in "CASTOR" containers.

After the Chernobyl disaster, the Greens became more radicalised and resisted compromise on the nuclear issue. During the 1990s, a re-orientation towards a moderate program occurred, with concern about global warming and ozone depletion taking a more prominent role. During the federal red-green government (1998–2005) many people became disappointed with what they saw as excessive compromise on key Greens policies.

Environment and climate policy

The central idea of green politics is sustainable development. The concept of environmental protection is the cornerstone of Alliance 90/The Greens policy. In particular, the economic, energy and transport policy claims are in close interaction with environmental considerations. The Greens acknowledge the natural environment as a high priority and animal protection should be enshrined as a national objective in constitutional law. An effective environmental policy would be based on a common environmental code, with the urgent integration of a climate change bill. During the red-green coalition (1998–2005) a policy of agricultural change was launched labeled as a paradigm shift in agricultural policy towards a more ecological friendly agriculture, which needs to continue.

The Greens have praised the European Green Deal, which aims to make the EU climate neutral by 2050. Climate change is at the center of all policy considerations. This includes environmental policy and safety and social aspects. The plans of the Alliance 90/The Greens provide a climate change bill laying down binding reductions to greenhouse gas emissions in Germany by 2020 restricting emissions to minus 40 percent compared to 1990.

European Union

Alliance 90/The Greens supports the eventual federalization of the European Union into a Federal European Republic (German: Föderale Europäische Republik), i.e. a single federal European sovereign state.

Transport

A similarly high priority is given to transport policy. The switch from a traveling allowance to a mobility allowance, which is paid regardless of income to all employees, replacing company car privileges. The truck toll will act as a climate protection instrument internalizing the external costs of transport. Railway should be promoted in order to achieve the desired environmental objectives and the comprehensive care of customers. The railway infrastructure is to remain permanently in the public sector, allowing a reduction in expenditure on road construction infrastructure. The Greens want to control privileges on kerosene and for international flights, introduce an air ticket levy.

Fossil fuels such as heavy oil or diesel shall be replaced by emission-neutral fuels and green propulsion systems in order to make shipping climate-neutral in the long term.

Social policy

For many years, the Green Party has advocated against the "Ehegattensplitting" policy, under which the incomes of married couples are split for taxation purposes. Furthermore, the Party advocates for a massive increase in federal spending for places in preschools, and for increased investment in education: an additional 1 billion Euros for vocational schools and 200 million Euros more BAföG (Bundesausbildungsförderungsgesetz in German, approximately translated to "the Federal Law for the Advancement of Education") for adults.

In its 2013 platform, the Green Party successfully advocated for a minimum wage of 8.50 Euro per hour, which was implemented on 1 January 2015. It continues to press for higher minimum wages.

The Greens want the starting retirement age to remain 67, but with some qualifications – for example, a provision for partial retirement.

The party supports and has supported various forms of rent regulation. During the 2021 election, the party called for rent hikes to be capped at 2.5% per year.

The Greens support progressive taxation and is critical of FDP efforts to cut taxes for top earners.

Women and LGBTQIA+ rights

The Green Party supports the implementation of quotas in executive boards, the policy of equal pay for equal work, and continuing the fight against domestic violence. According to its website, the Green Party "fights for the acceptance and against the exclusion of homosexuals, bisexuals, intersex- and transgender people and others".

In order to recognize the political persecution that LGBT+ people face abroad, the Green Party wants to extend asylum to LGBTQIA+ people abroad. The policy change was sponsored primarily by Volker Beck, one of the Party's most prominent gay members. Because of the extensive support the Green Party has given the LGBTQIA+ community since its conception, many LGBTQIA+ people vote for the Green Party even if their political ideology does not quite align otherwise.

Drug policy

The party supports the legalization and regulation of cannabis and was the sponsor of the 2015 proposed iteration of the German cannabis control bill. Furthermore, the Greens support research on the drug and the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes.

Electorate

A 2000 study by the Infratest Dimap political research company has suggested the Green voter demographic includes those on higher incomes (e.g. above €2,000/month) and the party's support is less among households with lower incomes. The same polling research also concluded that the Greens received fewer votes from the unemployed and general working population, with business people favouring the party as well as the centre-right liberal Free Democratic Party. According to the Infratest Dimap political research company for the ARD, the Greens received more voters from the age group 34–42 than any other age group and that the young were generally more supportive of the party than the old.

The Greens have more support concentrated in metropolitan areas rather than rural areas, except for a small number of rural areas with critical local environmental concerns, such as strip mining or radioactive waste deposits. The cities of Bonn, Cologne, Stuttgart, Berlin, Hamburg, Frankfurt and Munich have among the highest percentages of Green voters in the country. Large towns with Green mayors as of March 2026 include Hanover, Kassel, Munich and Münster. The party has a lower level of support in the states of the former German Democratic Republic (East Germany); nonetheless, the party is currently represented in every state Landtag except Brandenburg, Saarland, and Thuringia.

Election results

Federal parliament (Bundestag)

a Results of Alliance 90/The Greens (East) and The Greens (West)