Thuringia: the first post-Communist state premier

Bodo Ramelow, a politician from the post-Communist Left Party (Die Linke) was elected minister-president of Thuringia on 5 December. This is the first time a post-Communist has been elected head of a federal state since the unification of Germany. His election was preceded by protests by politicians from various political parties across Germany and associations of victims of the East German Communist regime. Coming less than a month after the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall and less than a year before the 25th anniversary of the unification of Germany, for some this is an event which symbolically rehabilitates the party which is the successor of the SED (Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands, the Social Unity Party of Germany, the party which governed ­­­in East Germany). For others this proves that the German political system has had a positive effect on making the agenda of this radically left-wing party more realistic. Although Thuringia has a population of only 2.2 million, the consequences of Ramelow’s election will reverberate far beyond the borders of Thuringia and changes in the local balance of powers, since this will also have an impact on federal policy.