Color: Black

Chairpeople: Friedrich Merz (CDU), Markus Söder (CSU)

Parliamentary leader: Friedrich Merz (CDU)

Party Secretary General: Carsten Linnemann (CDU), Martin Huber (CSU)

Membership: CDU 363,100 (2024), CSU 131,000 (2024)

Voter base: The center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and its regional Bavarian "sister party,", the Christian Social Union (CSU), are popular with people over the age of 60, churchgoers, and more with those living in rural rather than urban areas. The CDU has also traditionally done well among industry leaders, small-business owners and people with lower or medium education levels.

2021 Bundestag election result: 24.1% (2017: 32.9%)

History: The CDU was founded in West Germany in the aftermath ofWorld War II seeking to attract all of Germany's Christian conservative voters. The CDU/CSU became the most dominant political force in the postwar era, leading the government for most of that time.

CDU Chancellor Konrad Adenauer, who governed from 1949 to 1963, is the closest modern Germany has to a founding father. It was Adenauer and his economy minister (and successor as chancellor), Ludwig Erhard, who presided over West Germany's "economic miracle." The party's reputation as Germany's rock of moral and economic stability continued under another long-time CDU chancellor, Helmut Kohl (1982-1998), who drove German reunification in 1990 — a key historic moment important in understanding today's politics. Chancellor Angela Merkel (2005-2021) positioned the party towards the center-left.

Platform: The CDU/CSU pledge to reduce corporate taxes and benefit high-income earners.

On migration, the CDU/CSU stresses its commitment to the fundamental right to asylum, but the bloc wants tighter restrictions on who can apply for asylum and stresses the need to deport refugees who have committed crimes in Germany.

The CDU/CSU wants Germany to play a leading role in world affairs. The parties see Europe and the United States as Germany's traditional partners.

Preferred coalition partner: FDP

Color: Red

Chairpeople: Saskia Esken, Lars Klingbeil

Party General Secretary: Matthias Miersch

Parliamentary leader: Rolf Mützenich

2021 Bundestag election result: 25.7% (2017 20.5%)

Membership: 365,000 (2024)

Voter base: The center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) has traditionally been the party of the working classes and the trade unions. Like the CDU it has an aging voter base. The SPD's most fertile ground in Germany was traditionally the densely populated industrial region of western Germany, particularly the Ruhr region in North Rhine-Westphalia, as well as the states of Hesse and Lower Saxony.

History: The SPD was founded in 1875, making it Germany's oldest political party. In the tumultuous first decades of the 20th century, the party acted as an umbrella organization for a number of leftist movements, trade unionists, and communists. But with the founding of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) in 1919, the SPD became the permanent home of the social justice reformers, rather than the revolutionaries — though that didn't stop its politicians from being sent to concentration camps during the Third Reich.

The SPD's first postwar chancellor, Willy Brandt, governed West Germany from 1969 to 1974. He earned an international reputation for reconciliation with Eastern Europe. He was succeeded by Helmut Schmidt(1974-1982), an SPD icon until his death in 2015. Both remain hugely respected figures in German politics. SPD Chancellor Gerhard Schröder headed a government with the Greens from 1998 to 2005. The SPD spent years in coalition with CDU Chancellor Angela Merkel before taking over the reins in 2021 under Chancellor Olaf Scholz forming Germany's first-ever federal three-way coalition with the Greens and the FDP.

Platform: The SPD's........

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