Some context about the election results from someone who actually lives in Germany (and y'all already know my biases and personal views on sociopolitical topics, so take everything with the appropriate amount of grains of salt). You can skip to the end of the post if you don't care about the individual parties:
The results aren't pretty, but they are surprisingly good. Better than anticipated even.
CDU/CSU, our regular conservative party, got by far the most votes, which was expected. They didn't manage to get the 30% that they hoped for. It was basically guaranteed that they'd be in the ruling coalition with Merz as chancellor, so no surprises there. We had 16 years of CDU at the helm which caused a lot of stagnation and "stability", in turn being responsible for a lot of the current issues in Germany. Merz will probably fail a lot, lacking the finesse required for the things he'd like to accomplish, but it's what we have to deal with now.
FDP, our center-right liberal/libertarian party (as in hyper-capitalist, everything is to be decided by supply and demand of the market, "der Markt regelt") failed to reach 5% and didn't get into parliament. They were part of the failed government we had these past 4 years and are responsible for the downfall of said government. Not only did they spend months and years actively sabotaging their coalition partners to block anything that would "hurt the market" (the investors and lobbies), they literally conspired on how to break up the coalition, calling it the D-Day, which is the reason the government fell apart in November. They absolutely deserve the election losses they got and we are finally rid of Christian Lindner, the face of the party, after all this BS. Good riddance.
BSW is technically a left-wing party newly formed by Sahra Wagenknecht, a former member of Die Linke (our actual left wing party). Despite that, the BSW adopts a lot of far-right ideas and is pretty popular with people who vote for the AFD. Oh, did I fail to mention that the BSW parrots Russian talking points and is an asset of the Russian propaganda machine? My bad. That explains their connection to the AFD though. They also barely failed to reach the 5% required to enter parliament, which will make the forming of a ruling coalition for the CDU a much more stable undertaking (more on that once I'm done with the main parties).
Die Linke is, as previously mentioned, our actual left wing party and one of the surprise winners of the current election. They had massive gains, eclipsing what most polls predicted, with almost 9% of the votes (last time they failed to reach 5%). They have great ideas for domestic politics, but despite being a leftist my main issue with them is their approach to foreign politics, in particular Russia/Ukraine. They have some very naive and idealistic views on pacifism, which if enacted in reality would benefit Russia and allow them to take over all terrotories they are invading. None of that is relevant at the moment, since they are not in a position to even discuss any of that; they will be a very welcome and valuable part of the opposition for the upcoming governing coalition.
SPD, the social democrats and the party that "won" the previous election, suffered historic losses with their worst result in 138 years. Their candidate was our chancellor (Scholz) and they were part of the failed government, so it was clear that they'd see number like that, but the actual result is still worse than they had hoped for. Nonetheless, they are essentially guaranteed to be part of the governing coalition with the CDU (as they were during large parts of the Merkel years). They went with Scholz as a candidate again, despite having Pistorius who is one of the most popular politicians in Germany, which I assume was done to not "burn" Pistorius as a candidate on an election that was unwinnable for the SPD. I believe they'll send him to try to win the next election in 2029, where the chances for (center-)left parties to gain will be much higher.
Grüne, the Greens, are the third party that was part of the failed government (with SPD and FDP). They also had a worse result than the previous election, but compared to the other two coalition partners, they had the least amount of losses. Fascinating, considering that they had to endure attacks both from other parties and from the right wing propaganda press machine (our equivalent of Fox News and Murdoch-led networks/press) all the time. They were painted as the boogiemen solely responsible for any bad thing that ever happens. Yet, if the BSW had reached 5% the CDU and SPD would have to form a coalition with the Greens to get enough seats (since a coalition with the AFD is a no-go and political suicide). That didn't come to pass though. They get to spend 4 years in opposition, building up their image and striking back in the next election where they'll have the chance to gain a lot of seats.
AFD, the fascist elephant in the room, got 20% of the votes in an election with historic turnout (84%). Yet, no one is willing to form a coalition with them. Thankfully that is still one taboo that the CDU, despite trying to emulate Trump and MAGA more and more, is not willing to break. These numbers are obviously incredibly concerning and we need to find a way to combat their rise and success, but you'll often see posts online by people who pretend that the AFD has the potential for unlimited growth; that is very obviously not the case. Yes, 20% are scary but that also means that 80% are still opposed to fascist ideas in an election cycle dominated by immigration and racism.
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So, with all that said, what's next? A governing coalition has to be formed. Had the BSW and/or FDP gotten into parliament, the numbers of seats required would've increased, changing the potential combinations for coalitions. The CDU and AFD have the numbers to rule together, but Merz, as slimy and untrustworthy as he is, has denied this as a possibility, because he understands that this is still frowned upon (and the AFD is incredibly volatile, losing members left and right during legislative periods, which could jeopardize their majority when voting for certain bills). A three-way coalition of CDU/SPD/Greens could be formed, but with BSW/FDP failing to reach 5% it isn't necessary anymore. Such a coalition (dubbed Kenya because of their colours, black red and green) would've been unstable, ineffective and would lead to a lot of infighting.
So, we're probably going to get another "Great Coalition", CDU and SPD. In a sense, given the predictions and previous polling numbers, this is a best case scenario. We've had this combo before and they are known for forming a stable but also stagnant government. The voters want change, the problems we are facing require change, the CDU even campaigned on change (as in, "get rid of wokeness and shift from the left to the right" lol ); yet this coalition is known to historically hold onto the status quo, desperately so. Why is this a "best case" scenario given the circumstances? Unlike the US, who also saw the right wing win, the new government won't have the power to do what it wants. It won't have the power to fuck up future elections and interfere with the future transfer of power. Despite flirting with "anti-woke" talking points, unlike the US and UK the CDU seems to have no desire to actively go against the LGBTQ community and especially the trans community, silver linings and all that.
We are going to see four years of time being wasted, setting up the chance to change things in a major way in 2029. People will see that voting for CDU once again won't lead to the current problems being meaningfully addressed. Depending on how things will play out and what will happen with the AFD in the meanwhile, this has the potential for the SPD and especially the Greens to claw back influence and power.
In summary: I'm not happy with the overall results, which were expected, but I'm hopeful for the future and things could've been much worse.