The Bundestag (German for "Federal Assembly") is the parliament of Germany. It was established with the 1949 constitution (the Grundgesetz) and is the successor of the earlier Reichstag.
Since 1999, the Bundestag assembles in the Reichstag building in Berlin, which underwent a significant renovation under the lead of architect Sir Norman Foster.
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Together with the Bundesrat, the Bundestag forms the legislative branch of the German political system; Germany does not have a bicameral parliament in the strict sense though (see Bundesrat for details).
Although most legislation is initiated by the executive branch, the Bundestag considers the legislative function its most important responsibility, concentrating much of its energy on assessing and amending the government's legislative program. The committees (see below) play a prominent role in this process. Plenary sessions provide a forum for members to engage in public debate on legislative issues before them, but they tend to be well attended only when significant legislation is being considered.
The Bundestag members are the only federal officials directly elected by the public; the Bundestag in turn elects the Bundeskanzler and, in addition, exercises oversight of the executive branch on issues of both substantive policy and routine administration. This check on executive power can be employed through binding legislation, public debates on government policy, investigations, and direct questioning of the chancellor or cabinet officials. For example, the Bundestag can conduct a question hour (Fragestunde), in which a government representative responds to a previously submitted written question from a member. Members can ask related questions during the question hour. The questions can concern anything from a major policy issue to a specific constituent's problem. Use of the question hour has increased markedly over the past forty years, with more than 20,000 questions being posed during the 1987-90 term. Understandably, the opposition parties are active in exercising the parliamentary right to scrutinize government actions.
One striking difference when comparing the Bundestag with the United States Congress is the lack of time spent on serving constituents in Germany. In part, that difference results from the fact that only 50 percent of Bundestag deputies are directly elected to represent a specific geographic district; the other half are elected as party representatives (see below). The political parties are thus of great importance in Germany's electoral system, and many voters tend not to see the candidates as autonomous political personalities but rather as creatures of the party. Interestingly, constituent service seems not to be perceived, either by the electorate or by the representatives, as a critical function of the legislator. A practical constraint on the expansion of constituent service is the limited personal staff of Bundestag deputies.
Members serve four-year terms; elections are held every four years (or earlier if a government falls from power). All candidates must be at least twenty-one years old; there are no term limits. The election uses the additional member system, a hybrid of the first-past-the-post election system and party-list proportional representation. In addition, the Bundestag has a minimum threshold of either 5% of the national party vote or three (directly elected) constituency representatives for a party to gain representation. The additional member system results in a varying number of seats; since the 2002 elections, there have been 603 seats. The distribution of the seats is calculated by the Hare-Niemeyer method. The overhang seats are distributed according to the vote count separately for each state.
Election results 2002:
| Party | percent of vote | Seats |
|---|---|---|
| SPD | 38.5% | 251 (incl. 4 overhang seats) |
| Bündnis '90/Grünen | 8.6% | 55 |
| CDU/CSU | 38.5% | 248 (incl. 1 overhang seat) |
| FDP | 7.4% | 47 |
| PDS | 4.0% | 2 |
Most of the legislative work in the Bundestag is the product of standing committees. Although this is common practice in the United States Congress, it is uncommon in other parliamentary systems, such as the British House of Commons and the French National Assembly. The number of committees approximates the number of federal ministries, and the titles of each are roughly similar (e.g., defense, agriculture, and labor). Between 1987 and 1990, the term of the eleventh Bundestag, there were twenty-one standing committees. The distribution of committee chairs and the membership of each committee reflect the relative strength of the various parties in the chamber. In the eleventh Bundestag, the CDU/CSU chaired eleven committees, the SPD eight, the FDP one, and the environmentalist party, the Greens (Die Gr�nen), one. Unlike in the United States Congress, where all committees are chaired by members of the majority party, the German system allows members of the opposition party to chair a significant number of standing committees. These committees have either a small staff or no staff at all.