For example, in the past the Free Democratic Party (FDP) has often not been represented in Länderparlamente (federal state governments), but they are not classified as APO.
The most cited form of student-led APO was headed by the Sozialistischer Deutscher Studentenbund (the socialist German student group).
[1] The APO was formed through the opposition mounting against the "grand coalition" government in power since 1966, which united the CDU and the SPD under the Chancellor Kurt Georg Kiesinger (CDU) and its proposed German Emergency Acts (emergency laws), which would maximise governmental control in case of a public dispute, allowing them to restrict civil rights such as privacy and freedom of movement.
Among other protagonists, the movement idolised Cuban guerilla fighter Che Guevara and the founder of the Vietnamese Communist Party Ho Chi Minh.
[citation needed] The APO also found support and theoretical guidance from intellectuals and philosophers such as Ernst Bloch, Theodor W. Adorno, Herbert Marcuse and Jean-Paul Sartre.
Their solidarity was found between the unions and the student activists, which led to a near-revolutionary situation and much disruption, street fighting and mass strikes in May 1968, culminating in a state crisis.
One of the protagonists of the German and French APO, activist and later Green Party politician Daniel Cohn-Bendit was refused reentry into France on the initiative of president Charles de Gaulle.
[citation needed] A watershed in the history of the West German APO commenced on 2 June 1967, during demonstrations against the official visit of the Iranian Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi when student Benno Ohnesorg was shot by a policeman.
[2] Dutschke suffered health problems from the shooting for the rest of his life, including an epileptic condition that caused his death by an accidental drowning in 1979.
The "Marsch durch die Institutionen" (march through the institutions) propagated by Rudi Dutschke was embarked upon, resulting in the formation of the Green Party 11 years later.
A small number of APO activists such as Andreas Baader, Gudrun Ensslin, journalist Ulrike Meinhof resorted to arson in department stores and illegal underground work.