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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 06 March 2019
Germany is currently in a deep structural crises which has been furthered by the combination of ongoing economic stagnation and a desolate situation of state finances. That these circumstances are due to—according to a widespread opinion—not just the failure of political leadership in the Federation and Länder during the last decades, but also, and especially, the German system of federalism in its current form, is anything but evident. It has become commonplace to hear that the German federal state is in the throes of a serious legitimacy crises and is in need of fundamental structural reform, if the current federation is to have any future. Advocates of reform claim the process needs to result in a widespread disentanglement of powers, so that responsibility can once again be clearly attributed to its proper bearers. Meanwhile, criticism continuously takes on an ever stronger tone: Germany is supposedly to have fallen into the “trap of federalism”. As Klaus von Dohnanyi stated: “If, as in our German Bund-Länder-consensus-system of the so-called ‘cooperative federalism', one level can always interfere with the other level even into details—and that is now the case in almost every aspect— immobility and stagnation, irresponsibility and chaos appear. It would have been better, if we had chosen a centralistic organization. Centralism is better than halfhearted decentralism. A well-lead central state is better than an undecided federalism.”
1 Huber, P.M., Deutschland in der Föderalismusfalle? (2003).Google Scholar
2 Ein gut geführter Zentralstaat ist besser als ein unentschiedener Föderalismus, 4 Neue Gesellschaft/Frankfurter Hefte (NG/FH) (2004).Google Scholar
3 Address on TV by the German President on 21 July 2005, available at: www.bundespraesident.de/Reden-und-Interviews.11057.625010/Fernsehansprache-von-Bundespra.htm.Google Scholar
4 For a version of this skeptical position, see Franz-Xaver Kaufmann, Wege aus der Reformblockade, 4 NG/FH (2004).Google Scholar
5 Additionally proposals have been made for the Bundesrat to be turned into a senate similar to the US and/or a change of procedures (see Huber, Föderalismusfalle?, supra, note 1, 21, 33). These suggestions are not convincing. The direct democratic legitimacy of this senate due to elections in the Länder would not make the simultaneously demanded repression of the participation of the Länder in the federal legislation possible because of the “further approximation of Bundesrat and Bundestag“ (Rudolf Dolzer, Das parlamentarische Regierungssystem und der Bundesrat – Entwicklungsstand und Reformbedarf, 58 Veröffentlichungen der Vereinigung der Deutschen Staatsrechtslehrer (VVDStRL) 7, 31 assumption 26 (1999)). The (compelled) “participation” does not prohibit abstentions from voting by the representatives of one of the Länder. The need for absolute majority to take a decision likewise hampers objections and approvals by the Bundesrat and would – if abstention was prohibited – not play any role; for then the majority would always also be the absolute majority. If a different vote among representatives of one of the Länder was made possible, the objective attribution of a vote to this Land as responsible entity would be impossible.Google Scholar
6 Klein, H.H., Diskussionsbeitrag, in Die Erneuerung des Verfassungsstaates. Symposium aus Anlass des 60. Geburtstags von Paul Kirchhof, 137 (Rudolf Mellinghoff/Gerd Morgenthaler/Thomas Puhl Eds., 2003)Google Scholar
7 An exception can be found in the first cautious attempts at reform during the late period of the Kohl government which failed due to the resistance of the majority in the Bundesrat which was dominated by the Social Democratic Party and lead by the clandestine opposition leader Lafontaine. Even in this case though the term “blockade” – which suggests obstruction for obstruction's sake – cannot be used, because Lafontaine rejected the reform proposals out of inner convictions which, unlike his comrades-inarms, he has not yet abandoned. Additionally the Kohl government did not fail in 1998 because of this blockade, but because of their reform plans which were unpopular and depicted as unsocial and unnecessary by the opposition.Google Scholar
The general assumption of Huber: “it is generally the politically controversial and fundamental projects of the federal government which cannot muster the hurdle of the Bundesrat“ (Klarere Verantwortungteilung von Bund, Ländern und Kommunen?, Gutachten, erstattet für den 65. Deutschen Juristentag 35 (2004) [Huber, Gutachten] is not attested. Most likely it is neither attestable.Google Scholar
8 See Huber, Föderalismusfalle?, supra, note 1, 14.Google Scholar
9 See the statement of the member of Parliament A. Süsterhenn at the main board of the Parliamentary Assembly, JöR 1 n.F. (1951), p. 582: To the nature of a federal state also belongs “the participation of the Länder in the formation of the federal will”.Google Scholar
10 The fact that this means the basic participation of the Länder in the federal legislation and is therefore out of reach for the legislator amending the constitution, is attestable by the history of the provision (see FN 9) and they only explanation having semantic and teleological value. The Länder do not just participate in their own legislation; this legislation is their proper responsibility and is therefore respective to its use not a topic for the federal constitution. This is different for the distribution of legislative powers between the Federation and the Länder. See Karl-Eberhard Hain, Die Grundsätze des Grundgesetzes 413-415 (1999) (with further references in footnote 103). For an alternative view, see J. Isensee, Der Bundesstaat – Bestand und Entwicklung, in FS 50 Jahre Bundesverfassungsgright (BVerfG), Bd. II, 2001, pp. 719–770, 743; Bruno-Otto Bryde, Art. 79(5) in: Kommentar zum Grundgesetz (Grundgesetz) (Ingo v. Münch/Philip Kunig, eds., 2003), margin number 32.Google Scholar
11 See Hillgruber, Christian/Goos, Christoph, Verfassungsprozessrecht 190 (2004), Rn. 504,Google Scholar
12 Also Dolzer, supra, note 5, 32, 38 assumption 27; Markus Möstl, Neuordnung der Gesetzgebungskompetenzen von Bund und Ländern, 4 Zeitschrift für Gestzgebung (ZG) 297, 299 (2003). For a different perspective than the one offered by Möstl, see differing Henrich Wilms, Überlegungen zur Reform des Föderalismus in Deutschland, Zeitschrift für Rechtspolitick (ZRP) 86, 88 (2003)Google Scholar
13 See also for the following part Hain, supra, note 10, 415Google Scholar
14 Möstl, supra, note 12, 297, 311.Google Scholar
15 See in view of the areas of media (press) and assembly Möstl, supra, note 12, 297, 312, 314; Huber, Gutachten, supra, note 7 66, 73.Google Scholar
16 BVerfGE 105, 313, 339.Google Scholar
17 BVerfGE 105, 313, 341.Google Scholar
18 Huber, Gutachten, supra, note 7, 80.Google Scholar
19 Contrary Huber, Gutachten, supra, note 7, 79.Google Scholar
20 Huber, Gutachten, supra, note 7, 58-60, 70-75,140 assumption 16 (proposal of a new Art. 72 a Basic Law) therefore calls this “Auffanggesetzgebung mit Zugriffsrecht“ (of the Länder).Google Scholar
21 Möstl, supra, note 12, 297, 303; still skeptical is Huber, Föderalismusfalle?, supra, note 1, 35Google Scholar
22 See BVerfG, 1 BvR 636/02, – Ladenschluss (9.6.2004), § 105. The Constitutional Court expands that Art. 125 § 2 Basic Law leads to the reverse “that the Länder are prohibited from to change single regulations in case of continuity of the federal law. The otherwise occurring mixture of federal law and law of the Länder for one and the same matter in the same application area would be a debris in the current system.” (emphasis added)Google Scholar
23 Huber, Gutachten, supra, note 7, 59.Google Scholar
24 This was approved by the FDP in their paper Motor für Wettbewerb und Subsidiarität; see “FöderalismusKommission legt erst im November Reformvorschläge vor”, in: FAZ No. 129 (5 June 2004).Google Scholar
25 Differing view: Huber, Gutachten, supra, note 7, 54.Google Scholar
26 Conflicts cannot be completely avoided though. If different matters are concerned which fall partly under federal legislative powers and partly under those powers of the Länder, the competent powers will need to be determined by looking at the main focus of the planned regulation.Google Scholar
27 See a doubtful Möstl, supra, note 12, 297, 310.Google Scholar
28 See Volkmann, U., Art. 91a in: Grundgesetz (Hermann von Mangoldt/Friedrich Klein/Christian Starck, eds.), 4. Aufl., Rdnr. 1.Google Scholar
29 See Huber, Föderalismusfalle?, supra, note 1, 9.Google Scholar
30 Kirchhof, Ferdinand, Grundsätze der Finanzverfassung des vereinten Deutschlands, 52 VVDStRL 71, 80 (1993).Google Scholar
31 See BVerfGE 55, 274, 300; 86, 148, 214 with further references.Google Scholar
32 BVerfGE 86, 148, 264; also BVerfGE 72, 330, 383.Google Scholar
33 See Vogel/Wiebel, Art. 109 in: Bonner Kommentar Grundgesetz, (Zweitbearbeitung), margin number 37; J. Wieland, DVBl 1992, 1181, 1187.Google Scholar
34 Wilms, supra, note 12, 86, 89. The FDP also approves of a “as far-reaching tax autonomy of the Länder as possible” (see FN 24).Google Scholar
35 See Jachmann, M., Art. 105 in: Grundgesetz, supra, note 28 margin note 21, 46. See BVerfGE 86, 148, 265.Google Scholar
36 See Wilms, supra, note 12, 86, 89.Google Scholar
37 20 der Spiegel 34, 38 (2003).Google Scholar
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