M.A. / Although the Free Democratic Party's (FDP) best performance at the polls was 12,8% of the votes in 1961, the party has played a far more significant role in postwar German politics than its electoral strength would suggest. Due to its participation as junior partner in coalitions with the Christian Democratic Union (1949-1956, 1961- 966) and the Social Democratic Party (1969 to present), the FOP has been represented in the Federal German Government longer than either the CDU or SPD. As it is exceptional for a single party to gain an overall majority in German politics, the two major parties are dependent on the FDP, as the only other party represented in the Bundestag, for the formation of a coalition government. Thus, in a certain sense, the FDP "determines" which of the major parties is to form the government. The purpose of this study is to analyse the development of the FDP from 1945 to the present, whilst emphasizing variations in the party's political role. To provide a sufficient background, the development of German liberalism from the nineteenth century up to 1945 has also been taken into consideration. The German liberal movement has, since Bismarckian times, been divided into two rival sections, namely "national liberalism" (right wing) and "progressive liberalism" (left wing). After the Second World War it seemed that for the first time in nearly a century both wings were to be united in one political structure namely the FDP. It seemed as if the rapid decline of' Liberalism since the turn of the century had at last been checked, factionalism eliminated and greater unity achieved. Factional rivalries, however, reappeared and caused serious strains on the FDP's internal unity and political efficiency. Basically it was a struggle to achieve an exact position for the FDP in the political spectrum: right of the CDU by uniting all nationalistic forces or as a middle party between the CDU and SPD. The first alternative ruled out the possibility of a coalition with the SPD, while the second kept...

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The main focus of this study is on the question of why political institutions change. By extension, the study is also about explaining and predicting the direction of change. Put simply, the study postulates that political institutions will change in order to be congruent with the society. / Change is analysed within the context of two federal structures, the Federal Republic of Germany and Belgium. During the same time period from 1949 to 1993, one transformed from a unitary state into a loose federation while the decentralised federation consolidated and became central. The puzzle which the research project deals with is about this change: Why did the institutions of 1949 fail to survive? / The prevailing institutionalist logic in comparative politics would suggest that once in place, institutions would have socialised the political actors into the existing structure by providing veto points in such a way that institutions would have been reproduced over time, but this has not been the case. Furthermore, why has change come about in two opposing directions, centralising and decentralising, despite many common characteristics between the two cases? / This study is based on a theory of congruence which argues that political institutions change in order to reflect underlying societal structures. More specifically, the argument is that political institutions in federal structures change to correspond to the ethno-linguistic make-up of the country. Accordingly, the unitary state of Belgium has changed its political institutions in order to accommodate the Flemings, Walloons and Bruxellois; while Federal Germany has centralised many issues despite explicit constitutional clauses against such changes. / According to the theory of congruence, when confronted with an ethno-linguistic structure that does not match the political one, the political structure changes; not automatically, but through the pressure of public policy concerns pursued by political actors. The ethno-linguistic community is the primary collectivity for which public policy decisions are made. The choices available to political actors are constrained by the demarcations of this societal composition. Decision makers might disagree over the substance of the policies, but they share the choice of venue in the form of the ethnolinguistic 'nation'. In case of a discrepancy between the ethno-linguistic societal structure and the political structure, public policy concerns wold exert a pressure towards congruence by demarcating a social collectivity for which policies are made different from the one set up by the political institutions. Thus, if the 'nation' is bigger than the unit that marked off by political institutions, the tendency would be towards amalgamation with the other subunits of the 'nation' and centralisation. If, on the other hand, the 'nation' is smaller than the unit defined by the political institutions, there would be devolutionary pressures on the unitary institutions. / The empirical research was carried out on two policy areas, education and mass media, through a paired comparison of Flanders and Wallonia in Belgium and Baden-Wurttemberg and North Rhine Westphalia in the Federal Republic of Germany.

This study uses sociology of time theories to determine the inner-structure of a social movement: the vest German Green Party. The data used in this study were obtained from a content analysis of articles found in the New York Times and the Washington Post from 1982 through 1985. Patterns of political/temporal perspectives, described by Mannheim, were explored. In this study, it is determined that a pattern of political/temporal perspectives exists in the Green Party. A close look at these political/temporal perspectives revealed that over time some change occurred in the pattern. Thus, some support for Michels' Iron Law of Oligarchy which predicts change in a social rnove..rnent's orientations once that movement gains a political office was found. / M.S.

Studies of political culture have often focused on the impact of political institutions on political culture in a society. The scientific community has accepted the position that institutions shape beliefs and attitudes among the citizens towards the system they live in. This study tests this hypothesis by using survey data collected during the fall of 1990 in the United States, Great Britain, Italy, West, and East Germany.

The social and economic structures in western societies are changing and with them are the political values of their citizens. This study investigates the nature of post-materialist value orientations in the United States and West Germany. The research aimed at determining whether the indicators that Ronald Inglehart developed almost twenty years ago for explaining value-shifts are reliable tools to predict the nature of post-materialist values. These factors are: rising levels of education, a distinct cohort experience, and increased levels of economic security.With the help of mass-survey data from 1974 and 1980 that were collected in the United States and west Germany it was shown that there are other factors that are more powerful for predicting post-material values than the ones specified in Inglehart's theory. Moreover, the predictors are of a different explanatory power in the two countries under consideration. A preliminary attempt was made to find the reasons for the phenomenon of national differences. / Master of Arts

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[Truncated introduction] This thesis will introduce Petra Karin Kelly, former Green politician and campaigner for social justice and environmental issues to an English-speaking audience as an important figure in the development of ideas relating to ecofeminism, nonviolence, and Green politics and utopias. Kelly, born in 1947 in Germany, spent the latter half of her childhood in the United States, and attended university there before returning to Europe. While working with the European Community in Brussels, Kelly became involved in grassroots politics in Germany and was one of the co-founders of the German green party, Die Grunen, (literally: the Greens) in 1979. She was to become a formidable politician through her passion for grassroots politics, nonviolence and feminism and her excellent leadership skills. Later ostracised by the party, due in part to her inability and unwillingness to conform to party rules, Kelly worked independently, giving speeches and promoting peace and the importance of human rights. However, at the age of 44, she was murdered by her partner, Gert Bastian, who then shot himself. It should be noted that texts so far written on Petra Kelly have been essentially biographies, which, while encompassing much of her academic and political life, focus heavily upon her personal life, in particular her relationships with married men, and her long term relationship with former NATO General Gert Bastian ... Therefore, the aim of the dissertation is not to ignore the importance of personal matters, rather to ensure a professional approach towards them. For this reason, the focus of this sociopolitical and sociohistorical thesis is upon the elements of ecofeminism, nonviolence and utopia as they relate to Petra Kelly’s politics, both within her role with Die Grunen and in her political life outside of German parliament.

This thesis analyzes the published commentary of editorial journalists regarding the division of Germany in twelve major newspapers of the Federal Republic of Germany in a period spanning from the final years of division to the immediate aftermath of the unification of the two German states. The study tracks editorial advocacy in response to East German leader Erich Honecker's Bonn visit in 1987 coupled with the intra-German policy efforts of the Social Democratic Party in opposition, which seemed to edge towards two-state neutralism; the wave of repression in the German Democratic Republic from late 1987 onward in the wake of Mikhail Gorbachev's reform programme, and the June 1989 visit of Mikhail Gorbachev to Bonn. Journalistic commentators' propagation of a form of constitutional patriotism as a Federal Republican identity will be examined. Responses to the East German Revolution as it developed in late 1989 are analyzed in detail, followed by an account of journalistic efforts to define the political-cultural parameters of united Germany between March 1990 and June 1991. After four decades, the post-war division of Germany had acquired a degree of normalcy. Journalistic commentators argued against any acceptance of division that also accepted the existence of the party-state dictatorship in the German Democratic Republic, insisting that the German Question was 'open' until self-determination for East Germans was realized. Nevertheless, throughout the period journalistic commentators argued in unison against solutions to division which would alienate the Federal Republic from its western alliance or put its established socio-political order at risk. Contemporary journalism propagated an image of the Federal Republic that was thoroughly defined by its post-war internalization of 'Western' value norms. This was most evident during the East German Revolution and the immediate aftermath, ostensibly the moment of greatest uncertainty about Germany's future path, when commentators became champions of continuity within the western alliance.