Determinants of Cooperation Potentials in the German Bundestag

The working relations among parliamentary parties have become a focus of parliamentary research in recent years. Due to the erosion of traditional cleavages, the fragmentation of the party systems has increased. This was accompanied by a broadening of the political spectrum resulting from the entry of smaller parties with more radical positions, as well as moves of established larger parties toward the right or the left, as for instance in the American two-party system. Moreover, the rise of populist parties has added a conflict dimension that had ceased to play a relevant role by the 1960s. Populist parties are not necessarily ideologically more extreme, but they sharply criticize established patterns of legislative bargaining and denounce the members of the established parties as ignoring issues of major political relevance for the citizens. This has promoted the development of affective polarization and personal hostility among the MPs of different parties. Parliamentary debates have become more acrimonious and the search for compromises more cumbersome. These developments have brought back the old question of how much elite consensus is required for securing the functioning of democratic institutions. It is obvious that democracies have to balance value consensus and policy conflict. Political parties need to sharpen their profiles to secure sufficient electoral support on the one hand, but to remain open for compromises on the other hand. The paper will discuss the importance of factors that have been found to influence inter-party relations in the German Bundestag, among them policy polarization, value orientations, conceptions of democracy, ideological thinking, and affective polarization.