Germany’s left-wing party Die Linke won Berlin’s state election on September 20, with lead candidate Elif Eralp poised to become Berlin’s next mayor. But less than two years ago, Die Linke was perceived to be in decline, making its decisive victory particularly stunning as the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) prevailed in other parts of the country. Eralp’s triumph demonstrates that Berlin voters are unsatisfied with the center, especially as a housing crisis grips the city, and have an appetite for unyielding resistance to the AfD.
“Until the federal elections in 2025, the conventional wisdom was that [Die Linke] was on the way out,” said Jan-Werner Müller, a German political philosopher and Professor of Politics at Princeton University. “But if your number one concern is to keep as far away from the far right as possible, Die Linke is all of a sudden a plausible option.”
Die Linke’s triumph can’t solely be ascribed to establishment parties’ increasingly conciliatory approach to the far right. Eralp campaigned relentlessly on Berlin’s housing crisis, a winning message as advertised rents in the city have more than doubled since 2014 and many landlords seek to subvert rent control laws. “Opinion polls suggest that the voters for each party were concerned in particular about one key issue,” noted Maria Mitchell, a professor of Modern European History at Franklin & Marshall College. “For voters supporting Die Linke, it was housing.”
Germany’s mainstream parties maintain a “firewall,” or informal consensus to avoid collaboration with the far-right. Motivated by a desire to safeguard democracy from extremist elements, the tradition has endured since the end of World War II. However, the demarcation has been tested recently by growing willingness from the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the center-right party leading Germany’s governing coalition, to cooperate with the AfD, especially on migration matters. In January 2025, CDU leader and current Chancellor Friedrich Merz introduced an anti-immigration bill in the Bundestag, relying on AfD support in a vote that failed by only a small margin. And on October 6, Tobias Rausch of the AfD was elected parliamentary speaker of Saxony-Anhalt – the first time since World War II that a far-right party garnered such an influential post – with four votes from the CDU.
Müller attributes Die Linke’s success at least in part to their status as the most uncompromising bulwark against the AfD. Although the CDU and the center-left Green Party have long been considered rivals, Greens leaders have made overtures to the CDU this year. Greens co-leader Felix Banaszak told Deutsche Welle that the rise of the far right, unprecedented in postwar Germany, calls for a “union of the political mainstream.” But some voters, Müller believes, may interpret the openness to compromise of conventional left-leaning parties such as the Social Democrats and the Greens as an indirect concession to extremism.
“Even though the Greens would never collaborate with the far right, if the Greens are willing to work with the Christian Democrats and the Christian Democrats increasingly go soft on the far right, it can look like they’re legitimating something deeply problematic,” he said.
As the AfD banks its political fortunes on a xenophobic platform, mainstream parties have responded by veering rightward on migration. Müller described a trend of Germany’s centrist parties “copying elements of far-right rhetoric on migration.” Although they are known for pro-migration policies, even the Greens have recently expressed a hardened position on issues such as deportations. “It’s understandable that people might want a choice that’s uncompromising in this regard,” Müller said of Die Linke.
In this increasingly anti-migrant political milieu, Die Linke’s welcoming posture was attractive to Berlin’s diverse population. “About ¼ of Berliners are not German citizens, and almost one-third have immigrant backgrounds,” said Mitchell. “Die Linke’s pro-immigrant stance appealed to those voters.”
But Eralp’s rise is also symptomatic of a broader trend. The German electorate is increasingly spurning centrist parties and gravitating towards both the far right and left, Mitchell explained. “In the Berlin elections, the establishment parties…all lost votes compared to the last election,” she said. “The only parties to increase their results were those on the far right (the AfD) and far left.”
The turn to Die Linke suggests a possible ideological realignment on Berlin’s left. Early data from ARD’s tagesschau, a public television news program, shows that Die Linke gained an estimated 57,000 votes from the Greens and mobilized an additional 75,000 former nonvoters. Although these figures are preliminary, left-leaning voters’ disillusionment with traditional center-left parties indicates an enthusiasm for bolder proposals.
With its left-leaning voter base, Berlin can’t be interpreted as a microcosm for Germany writ large. The left may be on the rise in Berlin, but the far-right is also ascendant, with a historic victory for the AfD in Saxony-Anhalt. “It is unlikely that Die Linke will dominate elections in other Bundesländer,” said Mitchell, “but its national fortunes are rising as support for establishment parties declines.”
