The Office of the Federal President

Misinterpretations in the Parliamentary Government System

Summary:
In surveys regarding institutional trust, the Federal President consistently ranks alongside the Federal Constitutional Court with top scores. It’s a paradox: institutions that citizens can hardly influence directly, and whose decision-making processes are rarely transparent and tend to be more authoritative and top-down, are admired in a democracy. The introduction provides a lexical overview of the legal and political foundations of the office of the Federal President. Five selected aspects illustrate the misinterpretation in state theory and political practice, advocating for an alternative understanding of the office from a constitutional political science perspective.

Author: Ooyen, Robert Chr.
From the author:
Dr. Robert Chr. van Ooyen teaches political science and sociology at the Federal University, is a lecturer at FU Berlin and TU Dresden (Master's program in Politics and Constitution), and is a co-editor of RuP.