No 53 - The dynamics of German public opinion (March – April 2011)

Institute for Western Affairs releases a series of Bulletins under a joint title "The dynamics of German public opinion". The subject of the series is a course of debates in a German public sphere. The studies are carried on under the research project in co-operation with Konrad Adenauer Foundation.
By spring, the observers of German politics paid attention to election to land's parliaments: Saxony-Anhalt (20th March), Baden-Wurttemberg (27th March) and Rhineland-Palatinate (27th March). The election was supposed to be this year most important test of popularity of German political parties and provide evaluation of Angela Merkel government's policy. The results, favourable for CDU-FPD coalition could have caused their retrieval of majority in the upper house of the parliament.
The failure of nuclear power plant in Fukushima had unexpectedly strong repercussions on German political scene. The Green Party (traditionaly against the development of nuclear power engineering) was the main beneficiary of the change of social opinion.
The opening (from 1st May 2011) of German labour market (to which access of the workers from the new EU countries was limited so far) is an issue of German public discussion to a moderate extent.