In Germany, 10 million people excluded from upcoming vote

The Federal Republic of Germany is organized as a federal state and parliamentary democracy, and the German constitution or "Basic Law" is clear: "the people vote" ("das Volk wählt"). But who are "the people"? 

Around 59.2 million Germans in Germany will be eligible to vote in the upcoming federal election on February 23, according to the Federal Statistical Office.

However, around 10 million people living in Germany will be unable to have their say at the ballot box because they are not German citizens. In total, about 14% of the adult population in Germany — just under 60% of the adult population with an international background — will be excluded from voting on account of their nationality.

British-born activist Phil Butland used to be one of them. He moved to Germany back in the 1990s and first got involved in politics as part of the anti-globalization movement ATTAC, and until recently was a member of the Left party.

"For a long time my permanent residence has been Germany, my life has been in Germany, everything I do is in Germany and it was a bit of an anomaly not to be able to take part in elections there," he told DW.

After living outside of the United Kingdom for over 15 years, Butland lost his right to vote there. But he was reluctant to apply for German citizenship because he was unemployed at the time, and was told that German citizenship was only issued if he was earning above a certain amount.

"They have relaxed the rules now but if you don't have a job or you have a low-paying job the rules are still a lot harder than if you've got a well-paying job there. There is exclusion of poor people in most of these rules," he said.

'Democratic deficit' poses problems for Germany

The German government eased its rules around the granting of citizenship in January 2024, in an attempt to make Germany more attractive to skilled workers internationally and help to ease labor shortages.

Under the new law, international residents are able to apply for German naturalization after five years, in exceptional cases three years, instead of eight years of living in the country. They can possess dual nationality, a privilege previously reserved for citizens of other EU countries or Switzerland.

"The citizenship reforms mean that, even in the best-case scenario, if we include the administrative time, then we are talking about a period of at least four to six, seven years during which the people cannot have their say and that is, of course, not good for the quality of a democracy," said Özgür Özvatan, CEO of the political consultancy Transformakers and the author of a forthcoming book on the political impact of Germans with an international background.

Obtaining German citizenship isn't easy, not least because of the associated costs of applying, including fees to have documents such as birth certificates translated by an officially authorized translator, and German language proficiency and proof of earnings requirements.

The "democratic deficit" in Germany, as Özvatan describes it, is especially problematic for a country with a particularly high need for immigration to offset the labor shortages caused by an aging and shrinking population — and highlights an obvious disconnect in German politics.

"At the policy level, there were reforms that the government introduced that meant there was a liberalization [of citizenship rights], but at the rhetorical level there was a very hard regression," said Özvatan, referring to the intensification of anti-immigration rhetoric used by German politicians and parties across the political spectrum.

"This naturally raises the question: Do I want to stay in this country at all? And if I don't want to stay in this country, do I even want to apply for citizenship or do I not need it at all?"

Who can vote in Germany?

The debate over whether to enfranchise international citizens living in Germany has dragged on for decades. It began in the 1970s amid rising controversy over the rights of what are referred to in German society as "guest workers" ("Gastarbeiter") — migrant workers recruited from countries such as Italy, Greece and Turkey from the late 1950s — to acquire residency and citizenship rights.

Reforms to the Citizenship Act that came into force on January 1, 2000, extended the right to German citizenship previously based exclusively on the principle of descent (jus sanguinis or "right of blood" where nationality is inherited through parents) to include the principle of place of birth (jus soli or "right of soil").

The reforms meant that children born in Germany to foreign parents could also acquire German citizenship, but only under certain conditions.

Under the Federal Election Act, all German citizens who have reached the age of 18 on election day and have lived in Germany for at least three months or are resident in the country on a regular basis are eligible to vote in federal elections and state elections. This includes German citizens living abroad, provided they register in time.

European Union citizens who are resident in Germany are able to vote at the municipal level and in EU elections.

The right for non-German citizens to vote at municipal level was introduced in the northern state of Schleswig-Holstein and the neighboring city-state of Hamburg. However, this was ultimately declared unconstitutional by the Federal Constitutional Court in 1990 after it ruled that while all state authority emanates from the people, this specifically refers to the people of the state, meaning German citizens. 

No plans to reform voting or citizenship rights

"In most cases it is easier to change access to citizenship rather than voting rights, because voting rights are part of the constitution. But nothing is likely to change after the next election," said Tobias Spöri, a senior researcher at d|part, a think tank focusing on the issue of political participation.

He said the fact that the political climate in Germany has shifted so heavily to the right in recent years means none of the mainstream political parties running for election in February are talking about a more inclusive electoral system — and are in fact moving in the opposite direction.

"[Christian Democrat leader] Friedrich Merz has already said that even if people have received German citizenship years ago you can also take it away," Spöri told DW.

The issue of voting rights also has an impact on who is sitting in parliament and who is represented there, Spöri explained.

In Germany, around 11% of members of the Bundestag federal parliament have an international background. In the parliaments of each of the 16 federal states the proportion is only around 7%, and in some parts of eastern Germany less than 1%.

"It's important to give people the prospect of getting voting rights independent from their citizenship," he said. "What you can see in our research is that the possibility of access to voting rights empowers people, because then they feel really politically integrated and there's also more political participation independent from elections."

While changes to who has the right to vote in Germany are unlikely to happen anytime soon, international citizens living in the country can still exert political pressure in other ways, for example by joining a political party or campaign group and participating in demonstrations and strikes — rights Phil Butland values highly.

"I'm an old-fashioned believer in demonstrations, in strikes even, in putting pressure on politicians so that even if you can't vote for them then at least you can make them aware of your presence and of your demands, and that's something where there isn't an exclusion based on nationality," he said.

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