The 2018 Bavarian state election took place on 14 October 2018 to elect the 180 members of the 18th

Landtag of Bavaria The Landtag of Bavaria, officially known in English as the Bavarian State Parliament, is the unicameral legislature of the German state of Bavaria. The parliament meets in the Maximilianeum in Munich. Elections to the Landtag are held every f ...

.Wahltermine
/ref> The outgoing government was a majority of the

Christian Social Union in Bavaria The Christian Social Union in Bavaria (German: , CSU) is a Christian-democratic and conservative political party in Germany. Having a regionalist identity, the CSU operates only in Bavaria while its larger counterpart, the Christian Democratic ...

(CSU), led by

Minister President A minister-president or minister president is the head of government in a number of European countries or subnational governments with a parliamentary or semi-presidential system of government where they preside over the council of ministers. I ...

Markus Söder Markus Thomas Theodor Söder (born 5 January 1967) is a German politician serving as Minister-President of Bavaria since 2018 and Leader of the Christian Social Union in Bavaria (CSU) since 2019. Background, education and military service Söde ...

. The CSU recorded its worst result since

1950 Events January * January 1 – The International Police Association (IPA) – the largest police organization in the world – is formed. * January 5 – Sverdlovsk plane crash: ''Aeroflot'' Lisunov Li-2 crashes in a snowstorm. All 19 ...

with 37% of votes, a decline of over ten

percentage points A percentage point or percent point is the unit for the arithmetic difference between two percentages. For example, moving up from 40 percent to 44 percent is an increase of 4 percentage points, but a 10-percent increase in the quantity being me ...

, although it remained by far the largest party in the Landtag. The SPD, which had previously been the second largest party, fell to fifth place with just 10%.

The Greens The Greens or Greens may refer to: Current political parties *Australian Greens, also known as ''The Greens'' *Greens of Andorra * Greens of Bosnia and Herzegovina *Greens of Burkina * Greens (Greece) * Greens of Montenegro *Greens of Serbia *Gree ...

gained 9 points and emerged as the second strongest party with 17.5%. The

Free Voters of Bavaria The Free Voters of Bavaria (German: ''Freie Wähler Bayern'') is a conservative political party in Bavaria. It has served as part of the governing coalition there since the 2018 state election under the leading Christian Social Union. The term ...

(FW) gained 2.6 points and finished third with 11.6% of the total vote. The

Alternative for Germany Alternative for Germany (german: link=no, Alternative für Deutschland, AfD; ) is a right-wing populist * * * * * * * political party in Germany. AfD is known for its opposition to the European Union, as well as immigration to Germany. ...

(AfD), which ran in Bavaria for the first time, placed fourth with 10%. The Free Democratic Party (FDP), which failed to enter the Landtag in 2013, narrowly re-entered with 5.1%, becoming the smallest party. Turnout rose to 72%, up 9 points from under 64% in 2013.Landtagswahl am 14. Oktober 2018
. ''Der Landeswahlleiter des Freistaates Bayern''. Retrieved 1 December 2018. The election was influenced by the condition of the federal CDU/CSU–SPD government following two crises in the preceding months: the so-called asylum quarrel in June and July followed by the controversy around

Hans-Georg Maaßen Hans-Georg Maaßen (born 24 November 1962) is a German civil servant and lawyer. From 1 August 2012 to 8 November 2018, he served as the President of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, Germany's domestic security agency a ...

in September. CSU leader Horst Seehofer played a major role in both events. Four days before the Bavarian election, federal SPD leader

Andrea Nahles Andrea Maria Nahles (born 20 June 1970) is a former German politician who has been the director of the Federal Employment Agency (BA) since 2022. Nahles is best known for having served as leader of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) from April ...

criticised Chancellor

Angela Merkel Angela Dorothea Merkel (; ; born 17 July 1954) is a German former politician and scientist who served as Chancellor of Germany from 2005 to 2021. A member of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), she previously served as Leader of the Opp ...

, accusing her of a "lack of leadership". As a result of the election, the CSU lacked a majority and formed a coalition government with the Free Voters.

Election date and preparation deadlines

According to the Bavarian Constitution, the election must be held on a Sunday "at the earliest 59 months, at the latest 62 months" after the preceding state elections which took place on 15 September 2013. This would theoretically allow an election date between 19 August and 11 November 2018, but in practice the elections since 1978 have always taken place between mid-September and mid-October. The Bavarian state government proposed 14 October 2018 as the election date on 9 January 2018 and officially set it on 20 February after hearing the parties to the state parliament. The deadline for determining the population figures, which are decisive for the distribution of the 180

Landtag A Landtag (State Diet) is generally the legislative assembly or parliament of a federated state or other subnational self-governing entity in German-speaking nations. It is usually a unicameral assembly exercising legislative competence in non ...

mandates among the seven Bavarian administrative districts and a possible new division of the constituencies, was 15 June 2016 (33 months after the election of the previous Landtag). On this basis, the Bavarian Ministry of the Interior had to submit a constituency report to the Landtag until 36 months after the election This was done on 6 September 2016. Delegates to the internal constituency meetings could be appointed at the earliest 43 months after the preceding election, i.e. since 16 April 2017. The actual district candidates had been eligible since 16 July 2017. The parties and other organised electoral groups which had not been represented continuously in the Bavarian Land Parliament or in the German Bundestag since their last election on the basis of their own election proposals ( CDU,

CSU CSU may refer to: * Channel service unit, a Wide area network equivalent of a network interface card * Chari Aviation Services, Chad, by ICAO airline code * Christian Social Union (UK), an Anglican social gospel organisation * Christian Social ...

, SPD,

Alliance 90/The Greens Alliance 90/The Greens (german: Bündnis 90/Die Grünen, ), often simply referred to as the Greens ( ), is a green political party in Germany. It was formed in 1993 as the merger of The Greens (formed in West Germany in 1980) and Alliance 90 (for ...

, FDP,

Die Linke The Left (german: Die Linke; stylised as and in its logo as ), commonly referred to as the Left Party (german: Die Linkspartei, links=no ), is a democratic socialist political party in Germany. The party was founded in 2007 as the result of th ...

, AfD) had to notify their intention to participate to the State Election Commissioner by the 90th day before the election, i.e. by 16 July 2018 at the latest. The actual election proposals and any necessary signatures had to be submitted by 2 August 2018.

Electoral system

DE-BY Landtagswahl 2018 SK 104 Stimmzettel Zweitstimme

Bavaria, in line with the rest of the country, uses

mixed-member proportional representation Mixed-member proportional representation (MMP or MMPR) is a mixed electoral system in which votes cast are considered in local elections and also to determine overall party vote tallies, which are used to allocate additional members to produce ...

to elect its members of the Landtag. Party representation is not apportioned statewide, the distribution of seats takes place separately within the seven administrative districts (), which are referred to in the electoral law as constituencies. The constituencies are divided into districts in which one member is directly elected. The number of single member districts is about half the number of seats in the constituency. In contrast to the

Bundestag The Bundestag (, "Federal Diet") is the German federal parliament. It is the only federal representative body that is directly elected by the German people. It is comparable to the United States House of Representatives or the House of Comm ...

election law, the distribution of seats by proportional representation takes into account the parties' aggregate first (district) votes combined with their second (constituency) votes, i.e. both the first and second votes affect the distribution of seats in the Landtag, as opposed to just the second votes, which is the norm elsewhere in the country. If a party wins more district seats in a constituency than it would be entitled to based on a strictly proportional system (these extra seats are termed

overhang seat Overhang seats are constituency seats won in an election under the traditional mixed member proportional (MMP) system (as it originated in Germany), when a party's share of the nationwide votes would entitle it to fewer seats than the number of ...

s), this seats are added to the constituency. To compensate the other parties for the overhang,

leveling seat Leveling seats ( da, tillægsmandat, sv, utjämningsmandat, no, utjevningsmandater, is, jöfnunarsæti, german: Ausgleichsmandat), commonly known also as adjustment seats, are an election mechanism employed for many years by all Nordic countrie ...

s are added at the constituency level too. There is no statewide adjustment of the seats. Only parties and groups of voters who obtain at least 5% of the total votes (sum of first and second votes) in

Bavaria Bavaria ( ; ), officially the Free State of Bavaria (german: Freistaat Bayern, link=no ), is a state in the south-east of Germany. With an area of , Bavaria is the largest German state by land area, comprising roughly a fifth of the total l ...

participate in the distribution of seats. This threshold also applies to winning single-member districts; a party will forfeit all its district seats that it won if the party did not meet the 5% statewide threshold, with the forfeited district seats going to the second-place candidate. Unlike the other German states (and also countries using MMP), Bavaria uses an open-list system for its party-list seats. Voters not only cast a vote for a candidate in their district, but they also cast a vote for a list candidate in their region. For the distribution of list seats, all district candidates are also constituency candidates with their parties. The party may also nominate regional-only candidates. To prevent double voting, the constituency ballots in each district omit the candidates running in that district. A candidate (if he or she did not win his or her district) is ranked within his or her list by the number of first votes he or she receives within the district plus the number of second votes he or she receives from voters elsewhere in the region. In this manner, voters collectively can produce a list that is different from what the party submitted, which can result in the defeat of candidates that would have been elected (and vice versa) had the election taken place under a

closed-list Closed list describes the variant of party-list systems where voters can effectively only vote for political parties as a whole; thus they have no influence on the party-supplied order in which party candidates are elected. If voters had some in ...

system.

Boundary changes

In the statutory constituency report of September 2016, the state government stated that the numerical distribution of the 180 state parliament seats among the constituencies would have to be changed due to changes in the number of inhabitants. It was recommended that a seat previously to be awarded in the

Lower Franconia Lower Franconia (german: Unterfranken) is one of seven districts of Bavaria, Germany. The districts of Lower, Middle and Upper Franconia make up the region of Franconia. History After the founding of the Kingdom of Bavaria the state was totally ...

constituency be allocated to the

Upper Bavaria Upper Bavaria (german: Oberbayern, ; ) is one of the seven administrative districts of Bavaria, Germany. Geography Upper Bavaria is located in the southern portion of Bavaria, and is centered on the city of Munich, both state capital and seat ...

constituency. Within

, the additional seat was used to reshape the single member districts in the state capital of

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and ...

, as two of them —

Giesing Giesing (formerly Kyesinga) was a Bavarian town founded in 790 (older than Munich). The town was incorporated by the city of Munich in October 1854. Since then, it is a borough of the metropolis. Giesing is located south-east of Munich and has a ...

and

Milbertshofen Milbertshofen (Central Bavarian: ''Muibatshofa''), Am Riesenfeld and Am Hart (Central Bavarian: ''Am Hoart'') are three boroughs situated in the north of Munich in Germany. Jointly, they form the city district 11 Milbertshofen-Am Hart. , t ...

— exceeded the average population by more than 15 percent. Upper Bavaria now has 31 single member districts for the 2018 elections, nine of which are accounted for by the state capital. Seats and single member districts are distributed as follows:

Gerrymandering

In March 2017, the CSU used the mandatory redistricting to redraw Munich's electoral districts. In this, they were accused of gerrymandering; redistricting created a new ''Stimmkreis München-Mitte'' that was ''packing'' all parts of Munich that at the time favored the SPD. The Greens eventually won the district by a huge margin. The CSU was only partly successful in their gerrymandering, as they still lost four districts in Munich that were drawn to their advantage.

Starting position

Großnöbach (Fahrenzhausen) Anti-Wahlplakat 563

Since the state elections in Bavaria in 2013, the CSU has again had the absolute majority of seats, as it did from 1962 to 2008. In December 2017, however, Minister President of Bavaria Horst Seehofer (CSU) finally declared his renunciation of the top candidate in the state elections in Bavaria 2018, partly due to the poor performance of the CSU in the 2017 Bundestag elections. In March 2018, he also resigned from his office as Minister President of Bavaria before the end of the parliamentary term. The former Bavarian Finance Minister

was elected as the new top CSU candidate and later also as Minister President of Bavaria in the state parliament.

Campaign

CSU

In 2018, the CSU

's government enacted the '' Kreuzpflicht'', an obligation to display

cross A cross is a geometrical figure consisting of two intersecting lines or bars, usually perpendicular to each other. The lines usually run vertically and horizontally. A cross of oblique lines, in the shape of the Latin letter X, is termed a s ...

es at the entrance of public buildings. Söder has stated that the crosses are not to be seen as Christian symbols, but as symbols of Bavarian cultural identity. Some observers have described the ''Kreuzpflicht'' as a measure to appeal to voters deserting the

Christian democratic Christian democracy (sometimes named Centrist democracy) is a political ideology that emerged in 19th-century Europe under the influence of Catholic social teaching and neo-Calvinism. It was conceived as a combination of modern democrati ...

conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...

for the right-wing nationalist AfD party. Also the CSU interior minister Horst Seehofer has taken a harder line on immigration.

Parties

The table below lists parties represented in the 17th Landtag of Bavaria.

Leaders' debate

Leaders' debate A leaders' debate or presidential debate is a public debate held during a general election campaign, where the candidates expose their political opinions and public policy proposals, and criticism of them, to potential voters. They are normally ...

between Minister President

(CSU) and Ludwig Hartmann (Alliance 90/The Greens) took place on 26 September 2018. The

Bayerischer Rundfunk Bayerischer Rundfunk (BR; "Bavarian Broadcasting") is a public-service radio and television broadcaster, based in Munich, capital city of the Free State of Bavaria in Germany. BR is a member organization of the ARD consortium of public broadcas ...

justified the party selection with the result of the ''Bayerntrend'' of September 12, 2018, according to which CSU and Greens can hope for the most votes in the election. SPD Secretary-General Uli Grötsch described this decision as "completely absurd". A programme with representatives of the other five parties, whose survey results were above or close to the five percent hurdle, followed on 28 September 2018:

Natascha Kohnen Natascha Kohnen (born 27 October 1967) is a German politician of the SPD who has been a member of the Landtag of Bavaria since 2009. From 2017 until 2021, she served as chairwoman of the SPD Bavaria. Political career Kohnen has been a member of ...

(SPD), Hubert Aiwanger (Free Voters), Martin Sichert (AfD), Martin Hagen (FDP) and Ates Gürpinar (The Left). The first programme was moderated by BR

editor-in-chief An editor-in-chief (EIC), also known as lead editor or chief editor, is a publication's editorial leader who has final responsibility for its operations and policies. The highest-ranking editor of a publication may also be titled editor, managing ...

Christian Nitsche, the second by Ursula Heller.

Opinion polling

Policy areas relevant to elections

On behalf of the RTL/

n-tv n-tv is a German free-to-air television news channel owned by the Bertelsmann Media's RTL Group. n-tv broadcasts news and weather every hour and half-hour in the morning. It also broadcasts magazine shows and documentaries. History n-tv beg ...

''Trendbarometer'',

Forsa Institute The forsa Institute for Social Research and Statistical Analysis (german: forsa Gesellschaft für Sozialforschung und statistische Analyse mbH), forsa for short, is one of the leading market research and opinion polling companies in Germany. It wa ...

interviewed the survey participants about the "biggest problems at state level". In Bavaria, 34 percent of those surveyed named the CSU and Prime Minister Markus Söder, 28 percent named

refugees A refugee, conventionally speaking, is a displaced person who has crossed national borders and who cannot or is unwilling to return home due to well-founded fear of persecution.

, and 26 percent named "the situation on the housing market". Infratest dimap asked respondents to the ARD primary election survey which topic is very important for their election decision. In the order of most percentage points these were school and education policy (55%), nature conservation in Bavaria (46%), creation of affordable housing (45%), reduction of injustice in society (41%), security and police (40%), regulation of immigration (39%), the behaviour of Horst Seehofer in the federal government (26%), the cooperation of CDU, CSU and SPD in the federal government (21%).

Voter turnout

The voter turnout in the city of

remained high. Until 2 p.m. it was 54.6 percent including the postal voters. In 2013, the turnout at that time was 49.7 percent. The final total turnout was recorded as 72.3% of eligible voters.

Election result

, - bgcolor=#E9E9E9 , - , colspan=9, , - ! colspan="2" , Party ! Ideology ! Votes ! colspan="2" , Votes % (change) ! colspan="2" , Seats (change) ! Seats % , - , style="width: 1px" bgcolor= align="center" , , align="left" , Christian Social Union (CSU) , align="left" ,

Christian democracy Christian democracy (sometimes named Centrist democracy) is a political ideology that emerged in 19th-century Europe under the influence of Catholic social teaching and neo-Calvinism. It was conceived as a combination of modern democratic ...

, align="right" , 5,046,081 , align="right" , 37.2% , align="right" , , align="right" , 85 , align="right" , , align="right" , 41.5% , - , style="width: 1px" bgcolor= align="center" , , align="left" ,

Alliance '90/The Greens Alliance 90/The Greens (german: Bündnis 90/Die Grünen, ), often simply referred to as the Greens ( ), is a Green politics, green List of political parties in Germany, political party in Germany. It was formed in 1993 as the merger of The Greens ...

(Grünen) , align="left" ,

Green politics Green politics, or ecopolitics, is a political ideology that aims to foster an ecologically sustainable society often, but not always, rooted in environmentalism, nonviolence, social justice and grassroots democracy. Wall 2010. p. 12-13. It be ...

, align="right" , 2,392,356 , align="right" , 17.6% , align="right" , , align="right" , 38 , align="right" , , align="right" , 18.5% , - , style="width: 1px" bgcolor=#007E82 align="center" , , align="left" ,

Free Voters Free Voters (german: Freie Wähler, FW or FWG) in Germany may belong to an association of people which participates in an election without having the status of a registered political party. Usually it involves a locally organized group of voters ...

(FW) , align="left" , Regionalism , align="right" , 1,572,792 , align="right" , 11.6% , align="right" , , align="right" , 27 , align="right" , , align="right" , 13.2% , - , style="width: 1px" bgcolor= align="center" , , align="left" ,

(AfD) , align="left" ,

German nationalism German nationalism () is an ideological notion that promotes the unity of Germans and German-speakers into one unified nation state. German nationalism also emphasizes and takes pride in the patriotism and national identity of Germans as one n ...

, align="right" , 1,388,622 , align="right" , 10.2% , align="right" , , align="right" , 22 , align="right" , , align="right" , 10.7% , - , style="width: 1px" bgcolor= align="center" , , align="left" ,

Social Democratic Party The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology. Active parties For ...

(SPD) , align="left" ,

Social democracy Social democracy is a political, social, and economic philosophy within socialism that supports political and economic democracy. As a policy regime, it is described by academics as advocating economic and social interventions to promote s ...

, align="right" , 1,309,078 , align="right" , 9.7% , align="right" , , align="right" , 22 , align="right" , , align="right" , 10.7% , - , style="width: 1px" bgcolor= align="center" , , align="left" , Free Democratic Party (FDP) , align="left" ,

Liberalism Liberalism is a Political philosophy, political and moral philosophy based on the Individual rights, rights of the individual, liberty, consent of the governed, political equality and equality before the law."political rationalism, hostilit ...

, align="right" , 690,499 , align="right" , 5.1% , align="right" , , align="right" , 11 , align="right" , , align="right" , 5.4% , - ! colspan=9, , - , style="width: 1px" bgcolor= align="center" , , align="left" , The Left (Die Linke) , align="left" ,

Democratic socialism Democratic socialism is a left-wing political philosophy that supports political democracy and some form of a socially owned economy, with a particular emphasis on economic democracy, workplace democracy, and workers' self-management within ...

, align="right" , 437,888 , align="right" , 3.2% , align="right" , , align="right" , 0 , align="right" , ±0 , align="right" , 0% , - , style="width: 1px" bgcolor=#386ABC align="center" , , align="left" ,

Bavaria Party The Bavaria Party (german: Bayernpartei, BP) is an autonomist, regionalist and conservative political party in the state of Bavaria, Germany. The party was founded in 1946, describes itself as patriotic Bavarian and advocates Bavarian independenc ...

(BP) , align="left" , Bavarian nationalism , align="right" , 231,731 , align="right" , 1.7% , align="right" , , align="right" , 0 , align="right" , ±0 , align="right" , 0% , - , style="width: 1px" bgcolor= align="center" , , align="left" , Ecological Democratic Party (ÖDP) , align="left" ,

Green conservatism Green conservatism is a combination of conservatism with environmentalism. Environmental concern has been voiced by both conservative politicians and philosophers throughout the history of modern conservatism, with Edmund Burke (the philosophi ...

, align="right" , 211,951 , align="right" , 1.6% , align="right" , , align="right" , 0 , align="right" , ±0 , align="right" , 0% , - , style="width: 1px" bgcolor= align="center" , , align="left" ,

Pirate Party Pirate Party is a label adopted by political parties around the world. Pirate parties support civil rights, direct democracy (including e-democracy) or alternatively participation in government, reform of copyright and patent law, free shari ...

(Piraten) , align="left" ,

Pirate politics Pirate Party is a label adopted by political parties around the world. Pirate parties support civil rights, direct democracy (including e-democracy) or alternatively participation in government, reform of copyright and patent law, free s ...

, align="right" , 59,145 , align="right" , 0.4% , align="right" , , align="right" , 0 , align="right" , ±0 , align="right" , 0% , - , style="width: 1px" bgcolor=#db296a align="center" , , align="left" , Party for Franconia (Die Franken) , align="left" , Regionalism , align="right" , 31,453 , align="right" , 0.2% , align="right" , , align="right" , 0 , align="right" , ±0 , align="right" , 0% , - , style="width: 1px" bgcolor= align="center" , , align="left" , Others , align="left" , , align="right" , 193,151 , align="right" , , align="right" , , align="right" , 0 , align="right" , ±0 , align="right" , 0% , - ! align="right" colspan=2, Total ! align="right" , ! align="right" , 13,564,747 ! align="right" , 100.0% ! align="right" , ! align="right" , 205 ! align="right" , +25 ! align="right" ,

Aftermath

Polls on a favorite coalition

The percentages indicate the proportion of respondents who would most like the particular coalition available for selection. The missing values to 100% made no statement.

State government formation

Before the election, CSU faction leader Thomas Kreuzer declared that the CSU would not form a coalition with the AfD or the Greens after the election. The CSU agreed on a coalition deal to govern with the Free Voters of Bavaria on 4 November 2018.Bavarian conservatives and Free Voters reach coalition deal
POLITICO (Europe edition). Author - Joshua Posaner. Published 4 November 2018. Updated 5 November 2018. Retrieved 1 December 2018.

References

External links

{{2018 elections in Germany 2018 elections in Germany 2018 in Bavaria

2018 File:2018 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2018 Winter Olympics opening ceremony in PyeongChang, South Korea; Protests erupt following the Assassination of Jamal Khashoggi; March for Our Lives protests take place across the United ...

October 2018 events in Germany