Talk:Minister-President

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in interpreting we have these discussions all the time, and as for the interpreters "minister-president" seems inadequate, i have to agree on that. As mentioned below, appropriate translations are "state premier" or "premier", a "prime minister" is the head of a federal government, e.g. Tony Blair, and therefore should not be used to describe the head of a state government. I cannot imagine a native speaker outside of Germany would understand the term "minister-president". One has to be careful with using plausible translations like "governor" in a US-context, even though it probably describes best what is meant, but i guess a governor has slightly different functions than a state premier in Germany and thus could add to the confusion. Imagine Henry Kissinger at a meeting asking: "Since when do they have governors??" "The Hessian Minister-President" sounds like if a German native had translated it into English using the Langenscheidt.

Why aren't they called Prime Ministers? I haven't read the term Minister-president anywhere outside Wikipedia in an English language text.

to answer your question, actually they are sometimes, which just adds to the confusion. The homepage of the government of Brandenburg clearly states the Ministerpräsident as "Prime Minister of Brandenburg", whereas Bavaria uses "Minister-President". I will try to find out the correct usage..

ps: I have just received an email from the Hessian State Chancellery. I will quote: "Nach nochmalieger Nachfrage in der Abteilung Protokoll in der Hessischen Staatskanzlei wurde mir mitgeteilt, dass die offizielle englische Bezeichnung für Hessischer Ministerpräsident wie folgt lautet: "The Hessian Minister-President"." So I hope this clears some confusion. Gryffindor 21:02, 13 September 2005 (UTC)

For the German "Ministerpräsident" I really find "Minister-President" in English hard to swallow. It may be acceptable, but to me, "Premier" seems the best translation, as it avoids confusion with "Prime Minister" (often head of a whole country, e.g. the British Prime Minister). "Premier" is also used to describe similar positions in English-speaking countries, e.g. state Premiers in Australia. Is "Premier" okay too? It seems to be common enough in English-language reports about Germany, e.g. at Deutsche Welle. --Geoffrey Miller 01:59, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Contents 1 Plural 2 on plurals 3 on correct translation of political terms 4 Minister-President of the Netherlands

[edit] Plural

Shouldn't the plural be "Minister-Presidents", because of the hyphen? EVen if it doesn't, it sounds better and makes more sense than, "Ministers-President"... -Alex 12.220.157.93 03:37, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] on plurals

No, I think it should be Ministers-President, just as we have Governors-General and Attorneys-General. "General" is adjectival here. We pluralise the noun (Governor) and do not decline the adjective (General), hence "Governors-General". I would say that "Minister-President" represents a similar grammatical structure, so on this view "president" is adjectival, that is to say it carries the meaning of "presiding" or "first" (prime / premier!).

• since when exactly is President a adjective? If you are right theres a big need in fixing the english language due to lack of semantic logic. This would totally mess up the rules of word allocation.

German: ONE Minister, TWO Minister English: ONE Minister, TWO Ministers

So taken correctly you would have to call the function Ministers-President(singular) and Ministers-Presidents(plural).

Don't take your language poorer then it actually is.

• I have to agree that Ministers-President is, if you want to translate the singular with Minister-President in the first place, just wrong as a plural. The word Ministerpräsident is a compound. As such, it is short for Präsident der Minister (president of the [council of] ministers). "Presiding Minister" would be Vorsitzender Minister.

[edit] on correct translation of political terms

A number of things complicate the matter of translation of the German term "Ministerpräsident" into English.

One is the difference between the German political system and the political systems extant in the countries of the English speaking world. A second factor is the differences in terminology that exist within English, even when describing roughly the same office (in this case the head of government). Drawing an analogy with US practice, an American would tend to use the term "Governor" when talking about the "Ministerpräsident" of a German (or the "Landeshauptmann" of an Austrian) "Bundesland" whereas an Australian or Canadian would use the term "Premier". (The same problem probably applies in reverse: an Austrian talking about politics in English-speaking countries might naturally refer to the "Landeshauptmann" of an Australian state or Canadian Province, while a German would say "Ministerpräsident"). So the translation depends very much on your target audience. The same problem applies when translating "Bundesland". An Australian or American would probably refer to the "state" of Saxony while a Canadian would probably call it a "province".

In answer to the question of why it's not (always) appropriate to refer to "Minsiterpräsidenten" as "prime ministers" in English: In English speaking federal polities the term "prime minisiter" is really only used to refer to the head of the federal government and not the head of a state/provincial government. To speak of the "prime minsiter" of Saxony, Alberta or Queensland sounds as if you are talking about an independent country when in fact you are referring to a subunit of a country. So I would go for "premier" over "prime minister" when talking about the "Minsiterpräsident" of a "Bundesland" etc. But if you're using "Ministerpräsident" in German to refer to the head of government of a country (eg France, Italy) then you *would* say "prime minister" in English.

My inclination is to say that "Minister-President" is acceptable as a *term of art* in English but for most purposes you would use the word "premier" [or perhaps "governor" if you are talking to a US audience] when describing this office. The term "minister-president" would, however, still be useful in some circumstances. After all we still say "Bundestag" and "Bunderat" in English as terms of art. And although we can translate "Kaiser" as emperor, we often refer to the "Kaiser" as a term of art.

• Pro: only because a bavarian source calls it Minister-President does not mean that term is applicable somehow. The bavarian government and bavarian politicians are the worst source refering to english correctness. Besides, I think "Presiding Minister" would be a well explaining term.
• Contra: We do not need to distinguish between English Latin (Prime Minister) and German Latin (Minister-President). This article should be deleted. Ulf-S. 14:23, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

A Ministerpräsident most certainly is no "governor", as a governor is elected by the people while a Ministerpräsident is elected by a majority of the Landtag. In theory, the Landtag can replace the Ministerpräsident at any time. This prevents populists and political outsiders from reaching the highest government office. A Schwarzenegger would never have been possible in Germany. Reibeisen 16:16, 14 May 2008

[edit] Minister-President of the Netherlands

It should be noted, though, that the tilte of "Minister-President" is neither uniquely German nor confined to heads of government of sub-national entities: The Netherlands also have an "Minister-President", and the German terms has its origin in a time where Germany consited of several independent states.