@article{2015:oppelland:die_thri,
title = {Die thüringische Landtagswahl vom 14. September 2014: Startschuss zum Experiment einer rot-rot-grünen Koalition unter linker Führung},
year = {2015},
note = {After 24 years in power, the CDU was replaced by a new coalition
composed of The Left, the SPD and the Greens and led by Prime Minister
Bodo Ramelow, a member of The Left party . This constellation is
entirely new in Germany . Although the CDU remained the strongest
party (33 .5 percent) for several reasons (a non-polarized campaign,
issues that had been reduced in salience, and a decline of the state
Prime Minister Christiane Lieberknecht’s reputation) the party
failed to win the votes necessary to come into a position where no
politically viable coalition could be formed without it . The Left‘s
strategy of personaliza- tion, on the other hand, proved successful to
moderately improve its good result of 2009 . The SPD had made the
wrong strategic decision of keeping all coalition options open be-
fore the election and thus experienced not only another debacle but,
with 12 .4 percent, an all time low . Yet, after the election the SPD
found itself in a pivotal position and could de- cide which coalition
would form the next government . In the face of electoral defeat it
set- tled for the new coalition with The Left and the Greens who
barely managed to pass the five-percent threshold . The SPD-party
members voted to approve this choice . That the FDP failed to surmount
the five-percent threshold can be attributed to Germany-wide trends
[ZParl, vol . 46, no . 1, pp . 39 - 56]},
journal = {ZParl Zeitschrift für Parlamentsfragen},
pages = {39--56},
author = {Oppelland, Torsten},
volume = {46},
number = {1}
}