It is difficult to remain optimistic these days when you follow the news. It seems as if the world is upside down and things we have been able to rely on for decades are shaky. To name just a few of these certainties that are at risk: international alliances, federal majorities, a steady merging of East and West Germany, driven by a new generation that did not experience the division.
Many women also expect steady progress in the question of equal participation in public, professional and political life. But here too, the trend seems to be declining.
In the newly elected German Bundestag, women make up just under a third. In fact, the proportion of women has even fallen: “Women remain in the minority in the new parliament too. Of the 630 MPs entering the 21st Bundestag, 204 are women. Their share is 32.4 percent, which is 2.3 percentage points lower than after the 2021 election (as of 2021: 34.8).” (Statistics of the German Bundestag)
With a voter turnout of 82.5 percent (2021: 76.4), the highest since reunification, one would have hoped for a better result in the representation of women in parliament. In fact, the decline has been more or less continuous since 2013, when the previous high of 36.3 percent was reached. In addition to the electoral reform, the election victory of the CDU and the gains in votes for the AfD have contributed to the continued decline in the representation of women.
It is not surprising that the proportion of women is highest in the parties that consciously promote women, namely Alliance 90/The Greens (Bündnis 90/Die Grünen) with 61.2 percent (2021: 58.5) and The Left Party (Die Linke) 56.2 percent (2021: 53.9). The figures for the other parties represented in parliament are as follows:
– SPD 41.7 percent (2021: 41.8)
– CDU 22.6 percent (2021: 23.8)
– CSU 25 percent (2021: 22.2)
– AfD 11.8 percent (2021: 13.3).
In international comparison, Germany is not doing particularly well either. After the 2021 election, Germany ranks 45th (out of 190) in terms of the proportion of women in parliaments worldwide, behind countries such as Rwanda (1st place), the United Arab Emirates (6th place) and South Africa (14th place). It is of little consolation that Canada (69th place) and the USA (81st place) perform even worse (as of 2/2025).
The question arises as to why women are generally less represented in public office. As the politikorange.de project of the Jugendpresse Deutschland reports, citing the Federal Returning Officer, “a total of 4,506 candidates ran. Of these, only 1,422 were women – that’s just under 31.6 percent. That’s 0.4 percentage points less than 4 years ago in the 2021 federal election.”
Lack of role models for young women?
They actually do exist, the so-called role models for young women who are successful in their careers and politics. But they have to put up with a lot and many pay a high price for their public appearance. The criticism of women is personal and harsh, and that from both women and men. Think of Germany’s first foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock, who is about to leave office and who, to put it politely, is described as a “political lightweight”. Her colleague Ricarda Lang, who was co-federal chairwoman of the Alliance 90/The Greens party from 2022 to 2024, had to endure constant malice because of her weight. Her conclusion from this time: she tried to be “as serious, smooth and perfect as possible”, but in doing so gave other people “the power to interpret her”. But even older colleagues like the hapless former Minister of Defense Christine Lamprecht (SPD) have had to endure a lot. Her “pumps in the desert sand” caused tsunami waves in the German media landscape. Political leaders like Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, former Federal Chairwoman of the CDU and Federal Minister of Defense, or Andrea Nahles, former SPD Party Chairwoman and Minister of Labor and Social Affairs, were literally bullied out of politics.
You can take whatever political stance you want on these female politicians and they certainly haven’t always made the right decisions, just like their male colleagues. Nevertheless, it is a loss for our society when talented young women give up and experienced women are unable to share their wealth of knowledge with the next generation of politicians. The Berliner Morgenpost rightly complains that the withdrawal of young people (women AND men) from politics is not promising for the future.
The normal everyday life of women and families
An underrepresentation of women in parliaments has an impact on decisions and topics. Their perspective is taken less into account. This has an effect on our everyday lives. Just think of the failure to decriminalize the right to abortion, because abortion is still fundamentally illegal in Germany. However, it remains unpunished if it is carried out in the first twelve weeks of pregnancy and the women have undergone prescribed counseling. A clear regulation, as proposed by an expert commission in February 2024, has not been achieved in this legislative period either and is not to be expected under the new CDU-led government. We can already see in the USA that the issue of abortion is potentially explosive for the right-wing camp.
Many women still complain about the incompatibility of family and career. The part-time rate among women is at a record high of 50 percent (men 13%). 27 percent of women have reduced their working hours to look after their families, but often have to justify not working full-time. The untapped potential of women in times of a shortage of skilled workers should actually lead to a massive expansion of childcare and qualified childcare professionals. Not to mention more flexible working models.
One person who juggles two part-time jobs at once is Julia, married, 35. She has two children (4 and 8) and describes her everyday life like this:
“… society should be more advanced when it comes to women. . . . the modern image of women (career plus children plus household) in combination with the crisis facing men (cannot work less, should do more family and household) [cannot] work. Families cannot meet this demand on their own, daycare centers and schools do not help, are underfunded. Care work is not paid and nothing works without the grandparents anyway. But they can’t manage it either, or it is the grandmothers who, first and foremost, steps in.”
What has actually changed for women and families in the last thirty years?
Promoting young women
On the occasion of International Women’s Day, I asked female students from three countries in Berlin whether they see progress compared to their mothers and how they assess their future. Two of them have consciously decided to study in Germany because they feel that the situation of women in their home countries is very restrictive.
Li* from China asked her mother if she would choose a different path today than the one planned for her:
“She answered ‚absolutely‘ . . . Then my mother told me about her time. She’s the second child in her family, between two sisters and a little brother. As we say in China, the second is the mildest one, just like my mom. Luckily my grandparent never preferred my uncle to his sisters, which is prevalent in China, but the bad thing is, my grandfather never got involved in their growth equally. So my mom went to a teacher-training school, something like Fachhochschule, as everyone expected. Back then, being a teacher was the ideal goal for girls. It means they would have more time and capability to nurture kids, thanks to the summer and winter break. I cannot remember how many times she said how smart she was in high school and how bad she wanted to be a lawyer when she was still young. But after all, she surrendered to that seemingly promising future.”
Li has many more opportunities compared to her mother, but she ultimately had to muster the courage to leave her parents and her country to pursue her dreams: “I am privileged, compared to my mom. Due to the One Child Policy, I am the only one carrying all of my parents’ hope and love. Even though she feared for me, she still packed my backpack full and sent me off, flying across the continent alone. ‚See the world for me,‘ she said.”
Dina*, in her early 20s, has clearly decided that she can only follow her own path through a solid education. But she wonders whether this path will lead her back to her home country of Uzbekistan via studying abroad:
“I view my future as something complicated but not unattainable. Global and local politics, especially, make me wonder whether I have a chance at a bright future in a country that can’t envision its own. . . . I believe that access to a better standard of education has been my biggest opportunity. And with that comes the chance to open even more doors for myself—politically, socially, culturally, and economically.”
Her friends at home, as Li confirms for China, are encouraged to marry early and already have children. Both young women know that in their mid-twenties they are no longer “marriage material” in their home country. Both are pinning their hopes on an education in Germany. They are well educated and ambitious. We should make it easier for them to stay, but both of their student visas will expire in a year.
Alicia, 23, does not have to bear the burden of exile and the uncertainty of the future as far as her home is concerned. She was born in Germany and is studying in Berlin. But like many young women, she struggles with the expectations that are placed on her or that she places on herself. She has internalized the doubt that people might trust her abilities less because she is a woman, that the road to a fulfilling life could be rocky.
“I try to always stay positive, no matter what the situation. I don’t always succeed, but I will always try. That’s why I actually see a bright future for myself. I have to – that’s just the way I am. But I also know that when reality hits, I have to be prepared to see a different future. One where I’m disadvantaged in the workplace because I’m a woman. One where I have to work twice as hard to get half as much. One where the light at the end of the tunnel isn’t so bright anymore.”
Fortunately, Alicia is surrounded by women who encourage her and recognize the young woman’s great potential: “A few weeks ago, I told my grandma that I had applied to a museum. I told her about my fears that I wasn’t good enough for the job and that they probably wouldn’t even consider me. She then looked me straight in the eye and said: ‘You can do anything. You can learn anything. Never let anyone tell you otherwise!’ … A week before I applied, one of my professors gave us some advice that she had once received: ‘Never say no to yourself!’ And when I sent in my application, I actually didn’t say no to myself and thought I could do anything. Even a job that I wasn’t quite qualified for…”
Dina, the young Uzbek woman, draws strength from role models and sums it up like this:
“My greatest source of hope and inspiration is other women, women who live their lives confidently, even when it means going against long-standing cultural and social norms. The biggest change I see for the future of women is our refusal to back down and our commitment to staying true to ourselves. Historically, we have been denied autonomy over our lives and bodies. Reclaiming that autonomy, pursuing our own goals rather than the ones assigned to us, is key to building a better future.”
We can dismiss all this as “pep talk”, but words have their effect. We should not be sparing with them. They encourage the young to dream, the older ones to persevere or to take new paths. Let’s share our experience, our knowledge and our networks. So let’s ask ourselves at the end of the day: “Have you encouraged a girl or a woman today or simply listened to her? Did you give her the sentence ‘Never say no to yourself!’ on the way to a self-determined life or even in the middle of it?”
___________
* This is a pseudonym. The real name is known by the author.
Notes
https://www.bundestag.de/dokumente/textarchiv/2025/kw09-wahlergebnis-statistik-1055550
https://www.bundestagswahl-bw.de/frauenwahlrecht
https://www.eaf-berlin.de/was-uns-bewegt/news/artikel/frauenanteil-im-bundestag-sinkt
https://data.ipu.org/women-ranking/?date_month=2&date_year=2025
https://www.zdf.de/nachrichten/politik/deutschland/ricarda-lang-gruene-rueckzug-100.html (referencing an interview with Ms. Lang in Die Zeit)
https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/abtreibung-schwangerschaftsabbruch-paragraph-218-100.html
https://www.destatis.de/DE/Presse/Pressemitteilungen/2024/04/PD24_N017_13.html (labor statistics)
