by Maria Skóra
Donald Trump has been re-elected in the United States, and Germany is preparing for snap elections in February 2025. Both countries are likely to face political changes as they are witnessing the rise of anti-establishment movements. How resilient is democracy in Germany and the United States? Should we worry?
Germany and the United States Through a Comparative Lens
At first glance, comparing Germany and the United States might seem an unusual idea. Both countries have historically developed unique systemic and structural frameworks. Germany is a parliamentary republic with a government led by a Chancellor, while the indirectly elected President holds a largely ceremonial role. In contrast, the U.S. features a President as head of the executive and a bicameral Congress as the legislature. Although strong federalism is a common denominator between the two countries, the organization of their judiciary and party systems could not be more different.
However, what the two countries have in common is the rise of radical anti-establishment movements and parties that capitalize on the momentum that nationalist authoritarian forces are enjoying the world over to ascend to positions of power.
Although fueled by different circumstances, these movements embark on similar mobilization strategies, such as using social and alternative media to disseminate xenophobic narratives targeting migrants, and conspiracy theories related to wars, health, and climate.
To do this they combine the thin ideologies of illiberalism and populism with the thicker anti-pluralist doctrines of ultraconservatism and ethno-nationalism. In November this year, Donald Trump, the Republican candidate and the leader of the MAGA (Make America Great Again) wing of the party, won the U.S. presidential race for the second time. In September 2024, Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) achieved significant success in three regional elections in Germany. The party is now bracing for the upcoming snap Bundestag elections early next year, hoping for a strong second place on the podium.
There is a strong bond between these two countries, manifested most visibly in close ties in trade and security architecture. Germany and the U.S. are both having to face the decline of manufacturing jobs in their former historical industrial heartlands and increasing competition from China within a globalized economy. These parallels have inspired research, and the exchange of lessons learned in pursuit of a just economic transition of former industrial regions. In today’s context, it is worth expanding this comparative perspective to address the question of democratic resilience.
Assessing Democratic Resilience
Democratic resilience refers to the ability of a democratic system to prevent or react to external and internal challenges, stresses, and assaults while maintaining its democratic qualities. It is rooted in a nexus of democratic structures and practices, relying on two axes: institutional and socio-cultural. The institutional dimension is more stable and reflects the system’s performance, encompassing codified mechanisms of power control and the type of the political regime. The socio-cultural dimension is defined by values and norms, making it more dynamic over time. Both dimensions also include formal and informal accountability mechanisms that can sanction actors displaying disloyalty to democracy. Examples of such mechanisms include competitive popular elections and candidate selection processes within political parties.
Democratic structures embodied in institutions seem to be more resilient in Germany than in the U.S.
Recently, however, Germany has faced criticism by international watchdog and advocacy organizations for measures such as increased surveillance powers of law enforcement, preemptive arbitrary bans of pro-Palestinian protests, and preventive detention of climate activists. Yet, without inner challengers, the rule of law continues to prevail in Germany, supported by an impartial and independent state bureaucracy and judiciary. In comparison, the U.S. has exhibited more pronounced weaknesses. Donald Trump’s time in office was marked by executive aggrandizement, including the instrumentalization of justice against his political opponents and assaults on state bureaucracy, best illustrated by the attempts to reorganize it around loyalty rather than merit. He also consolidated the conservative majority in the increasingly partisan Supreme Court by appointing three Conservative judges. Some of the Court’s most controversial decisions in recent years have concerned affirmative action, the constitutional right to abortion, partisan gerrymandering, and stricter migration policy, including upholding the notorious “Muslim ban.”
Meanwhile, threats testing democratic resilience are emerging on both sides of the Atlantic. Partisan polarization is on the rise, though it follows different patterns. In Germany, it is asymmetric, juxtaposing the political mainstream against the far-right AfD, in contrast to the two-party Partisan conflicts, both within and between parties, severely affected the legislative performance of the 118th Congress in 2023, which struggled for an extended period to elect a Speaker of the House or pass bipartisan bills, for example, on immigration. In Germany, politicians of all parties have pledged not to cooperate with the far-right, creating a “fire wall” (Brandmauer). However, it remains to be seen how this stance will affect local and possibly federal politics in Germany, should the AfD become strong enough to block legislative processes requiring a qualified majority in regional legislatures.
When it comes to the electoral process, the Bertelsmann Sustainable Governance Indicators rank Germany highly, placing it 4th in the world, compared with the U.S., which is ranked 30th. The volatility of the electoral process in the U.S., where elections are administered at the state level, presents the biggest risk. Not to be confused with voter fraud, strategic manipulation has become a recurring feature in the U.S.. According to the Brennan Center Voting Laws Roundup, between the 2020 and 2024 presidential elections, at least 30 states enacted 78 restrictive laws, while at least 15 states passed 33 election interference laws. Restrictions include, for example, limited access to mail voting or ballot drop boxes, reduced assistance with absentee voting, harsher ID requirements, and restrictions on voter registration.
The evolution of political competition has shifted from economic towards cultural cleavages, fueling political polarization, as demonstrated by increasingly radical party manifestos.
Affective polarization, building on emotions and identities rather than policy proposals (also known as spatial polarization), has become an effective tool for voter mobilization. Simultaneously, eroding accountability standards have neutralized the inner-party filtering function. Donald Trump created the MAGA movement as a parallel to the Republican Party and then successfully brought it into the political mainstream. Despite his questionable ethical record (promoting private business while in office, resorting to conspiracy theories, and allegations of sexual abuse) and inner-party opposition, he secured for the third time the GOP’s presidential nomination in 2024. The Republican Party failed to produce any viable alternative.
The AfD has similarly crossed the thin line of civility in the public space. Key AfD politicians have expressed previously untenable extreme opinions. Despite allegations of espionage and corruption allegations as well as comments whitewashing the Waffen-SS, Maximilian Krah, the party’s Spitzenkandidat at the 2024 European elections, was not thrown out of the party and remains a non-attached MEP. Furthermore, using a forbidden Nazi slogan in public did not stop Björn Höcke from leading the party in the Thuringian regional election. The AfD exercises political accountability only nominally.
Cracks Visible on Both Sides of the Atlantic
The repeated victory of Donald Trump raised eyebrows in Europe, echoing the famous thesis about the paranoid style in American politics. Indeed, politics in the U.S. is exceptional in its performative dimension and rhetorical tradition, exacerbated by constant campaigning within a practically two-year electoral cycle and the relentless fundraising imperative. However, looking at the situation in Europe, there is no reason to feel complacent.
Fatigue with partisan polarization and disaffection with mainstream politics among the electorate pave the way for opportunistic political actors in many seemingly consolidated European democracies, including Germany.
According to institutional measures, Germany is better suited to withstand potential assaults on the rule of law and the electoral process than the U.S. Indeed, post-1945 Germany has been remarkably stable, perhaps because it hasn’t yet faced its “Trumpian moment.” As Wisława Szymborska wisely noted, “We know ourselves only as far as we’ve been tested.” Meanwhile, AfD leader Alice Weidel praised Donald Trump as a “role model” after his victory, stressing ideological proximity. Autocrats learn from each other, adapting successful strategies for both campaigning and governing.
Although they threaten democracy, the MAGA movement in the U.S. and the AfD in Germany are not the root causes of democratic decline. Rather, they amplify it by undermining trust in the democratic system or even attempting to dismantle it when in power. They are a product of latent deficiencies, particularly the erosion of democracy’s social and cultural foundations. The ability of the polity to withstand autocratic initiatives does not only require a solid legal framework and institutional design. A lack of grassroots commitment to democratic values, reflected in citizens’ tolerance of anti-democratic politicians, can create pathways for democratic backsliding.
Given their size and leverage, domestic developments in the U.S. and Germany may have destabilizing effects beyond their borders. The former has already held presidential and general elections resulting in a Republican trifecta, including the reelection of Donald Trump. His second term is anticipated to be more radical than his first and driven by political revenge. In the latter, three months before snap elections, opinion polls confirm the probability of the AfD coming in second.
In the short-term,
evaluating the strength of German and American democracy benefits academic research on the different origins of democratic erosion and patterns of backsliding.
Despite systemic and structural differences, mirroring political developments showcase what some researchers have red-flagged as the fourth wave of autocratization. In the long-term, monitoring these developments may help anticipate possible disruptions of the democratic process, which may begin materializing as early as the inauguration of the second Trump administration.
Dr. Maria Skóra is a Research Fellow at the Institut für Europäische Politik and Policy Fellow at Das Progressive Zentrum in Berlin. In the 2024/5 fall semester, she is a DAAD Research Fellow at the American-German Institute at Johns Hopkins University, analyzing the German and U.S. political systems from a comparative perspective.
This piece builds on research conducted as part of the DAAD/AGI Research Fellowship Program, funded by a generous grant from the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD).
