A potential AfD Minister-President at the helm of Thuringia could single-handedly shut down public broadcasting. Tobias Mast and Lennart Laude explain how this could be prevented as part of the "Thuringia Project" of the Verfassungsblog. An amendment to the state constitution would make sense.
If the AfD succeeds in appointing a Minister-President after the Thuringian state parliament elections in fall 2024, this could single-handedly decide the future of public broadcasting. Media law in Germany is not regulated by laws, but by "state treaties", i.e. agreements between the federal states. This gives the executive a stronger role than is the case with normal legislation. According to state constitutional law, the termination of the Interstate Broadcasting Treaty is the sole responsibility of the Minister-President. Even a possible coalition partner could not stop him.
"The idea of a prime minister proudly holding his signature under the termination of state treaties in front of the cameras of those media whose activities he wants to restrict should give reason to strengthen the role of parliament," write Tobias Mast and co-author Lennart Laude in their article "Termination of Diversity - Without Discussion: Polish-style Broadcasting in Thuringia, Saxony and Brandenburg?" on the Verfassungsblog. "Now is the time to discuss changes to the relevant state constitutions."
The Thuringia project examines the (still) hypothetical case in which the AfD emerges victorious from the Thuringian state parliament elections in autumn 2024 and forms the government. This example will be used to investigate what scope an authoritarian populist party would have at state level to use its power to the detriment of democracy. The project not only aims to educate the public about the possibilities and probabilities, but also to raise awareness of the problem among local officials. The aim is to prevent the public from being taken by surprise and not being able to defend themselves or being able to do so too late. The resilience of the democratic federal constitutional order should be strengthened overall.
In the fall of 2024, a new state parliament will also be elected in the federal states of Saxony and Brandenburg. In Thuringia itself, however, the situation raises particularly urgent and largely unexplored legal and political science issues in view of the fragile party landscape and the processes involved in the last government formation.
The Verfassungsblog is a non-profit and academic open access forum on current developments in constitutional law and politics in Germany and abroad.
(Hamburg, 29 January 2024)
