Exploratory paper
Traffic light parties want to lower the voting age to 16 years – but can they even do that?
Young people during the climate protest in Berlin: The traffic light parties want to lower the voting age to 16. But that is not easily possible.
© Jens Schlueter / Getty Images
Not only Fridays for Future shows it: The political awareness of young people is great, perhaps greater than ever before. Lowering the voting age to 16 seems logical to many. The traffic light parties want to realize this – but it is nothing more than a promise.
“We want to lower the voting age for elections in the German Bundestag and European Parliament to 16 years.” So it is on page ten of the exploratory paper of the traffic light parties SPD, Greens and FDP under the point “Freedom and security, equality and diversity in modern democracy”. The statement has its permanent place among lists of the most important points of the declaration of intent of the future federal government-designate. And the topic has picked up speed – not least because the climate movement “Fridays for Future” has made it clear how great the political awareness and commitment of young people is. In addition, surveys show that young people currently do not feel sufficiently represented by politics – a problem especially when it comes to questions about the future.
The traffic light parties obviously want to change this. According to the exploratory paper for the tripartite alliance, lowering the voting age to 16 is part of the realization of a modern democracy. But anyone who now believes that the corresponding decision is only a matter of time is wrong. Because the statement in the exploratory paper cannot be more than a promise. The future governing coalition simply lacks the majority required to lower the voting age.
Elective age 16 – amendment to the Basic Law necessary
The reason: The voting age is stipulated in the Basic Law – more precisely in Article 38, Paragraph 2. There it is clear and clear: “Whoever has reached the age of eighteen is entitled to vote”. So if you want to change that, you have to change the constitution. And a two-thirds majority in the Bundestag is necessary for changes to the Basic Law – the desired traffic light coalition does not have such a large majority. In plain language: In order to actually lower the voting age by two years, the SPD, Greens and FDP needed votes from the other parliamentary groups. But it looks rather bad there.
Although the traffic light parties could rely on the support of the left, which last May already supported a corresponding entry by the Greens and FDP in the Bundestag, their 39 seats in the newly elected parliament are not enough to get the necessary two-thirds majority together. The AfD strictly rejects such considerations, but support can hardly be expected from the CDU either.
Union parliamentary group vice: “I do not see a two-thirds majority”
Union vice-parliamentary group leader Thorsten Frei (CDU) made it clear just this Sunday that, from his point of view, there was no majority in the Bundestag for the prospect of lowering the voting age. “This would require a two-thirds majority to change the constitution. I don’t see that,” said Frei of the “Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung” (NOZ), according to a preliminary report. Anyway, he sees the right to vote at 16 “very skeptical”. There are “undoubtedly many young people with a strong political interest”. However, rights and obligations must also be compatible with one another. “Is it therefore sensible if, on the one hand, one could have a say in the future of our country, but not conclude a mobile phone contract or even watch every film in the cinema without the consent of the parents? I have my doubts.”
Combining voting age and majority has always been the position of the CDU and CSU. This was also the case with the lowering of the voting age from 21 to the current 18 years around 50 years ago. The debate took off in the 1960s – similar to the climate protests today – through student protests. At that time the arguments were quite strong: 18 to 20-year-olds were often already in professional life; In addition, 18-year-olds could be drafted into the armed forces in an emergency. The insight that the state could not deny these young people the age of majority or the right to vote was becoming more and more popular. So far that in June 1970 there were only a few abstentions in the Bundestag, but no votes against the amendment to the Basic Law. In time for the 1972 Bundestag election, the Federal Election Act was finally changed.
The SPD voted against it in May
It is far from that far in the upcoming Bundestag. The traffic light parties would have to convince a good 40 CDU MPs to vote with them for lowering the voting age. According to parliamentary deputy Frei, this is not to be expected. Also spicy: When the Greens and the FDP once introduced a bill to lower the voting age in the Bundestag in May, the SPD voted against it. Apparently the Social Democrats did not want to let the grand coalition break up on the issue at the time. However, the SPD votes were not enough for a two-thirds majority.
So does the sentence from the exploratory paper remain a mere promise? That is not said. Austria could serve as an example in this case, where 16-year-olds have been able to vote since 2007. Ultimately, it is a question of faith, estimates the Passau political scientist Michael Weigl. He believes “that it is only a matter of time – at some point we will get the voting age from 16,” he told Bayerischer Rundfunk before the election. Or it is a question of persuasion – if the future governing parties do not want to stop at an announcement.
Sources: Exploratory paper; German Bundestag (draft to lower the voting age to 16 years); German Bundestag (Basic Law); Federal Agency for Civic Education (Youth Study); Federal Agency for Civic Education (voting age); Bavarian radio; DPA news agency