Politics of Hesse

The politics of Hesse takes place within a framework of a federal parliamentary representative democratic republic, where the Federal Government of Germany exercises sovereign rights with certain powers reserved to the states of Germany including Hesse.

The state has a multi-party system where, as in most other states of former Western Germany and the federal level, the three main parties are the centre-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), and the centre-left Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD).

The governments and ministers-President (Ministerpräsidenten) of the People's State of Hesse during the time of the Weimar Republic were: The governments of the National Socialist era: The governments and minister-Presidents of Hesse since the establishment of the Federal Republic of Germany: Since 1950, the SPD has been in the Hesse government 45 years, the CDU for 28 years; the FDP acted as coalition partners with either CDU or SPD for 21 years (13 with SPD, 8 with CDU).