Berlin Mitte (electoral district)

Location of constituency in Berlin

Berlin Mitte or Berlin Central is one of the 299 single member constituencies used for the German parliament, the Bundestag. Located in central Berlin, it was created for the 2002 election and all elections to date have been won by the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD). In the 2009 election, the SPD lost five of their seven seats in Berlin, leaving this constituency and Berlin Charlottenburg – Wilmersdorf as the only Berlin constituencies to be represented by the party.

History and boundaries

The constituency, numbered constituency 76 by the German electoral authorities,^[1] was created for the first time for the 2002 election when the number of constituencies in Berlin was reduced from 13 to 12. It contains the whole of the Berlin borough of Mitte. This borough, a merger of three former boroughs, was created by a 2001 administrative reform. Most of the constituency was formerly part of the Berlin Tiergarten - Wedding - North Charlottenburg constituency, taking in all of that district except for the North Charlottenburg section. To this was added the former borough of Mitte which had previously been associated with Prenzlauer Berg in the Berlin Mitte - Prenzlauer Berg constituency. It is one of two constituencies together with Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg - Prenzlauer Berg East which currently include parts of the former East Berlin and West Berlin. The constituency contains a number of Berlin landmarks such as Museum Island, Brandenburg Gate, Unter den Linden and the Reichstag.

In 1998, of the two predecessor constituencies, Mitte - Prenzlauer Berg had been narrowly won by Left Party.PDS (PDS) who had finished 283 votes (0.2%) ahead of the SPD. Whereas Tiergarten - Wedding - North Charlottenburg had been the safest SPD seat in Berlin at the 1998 election, as they had beaten the CDU by 32000 votes (23.9%) with the PDS achieving only 2.9% of the votes. The current seat has been a safe SPD seat and produced their largest percentage majority in Berlin at the 2005 election, although the party had higher vote shares in the constituencies of Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf and Pankow.

Profile

The district has a large foreign born population of 27.7%, the highest figure for any Berlin constituency^[2] The district of Wedding had the highest foreign born population in all of Berlin.^[3] 29.3% of the population had qualifications which met the requirements for University entry.^[4]

Electoral system

Elections in Germany take place using the Additional Member System. Voters have two votes, one for a constituency MP and one for a regional list to elect representatives for the whole of Berlin city. Elections for the Mitte constituency take place using the First past the post system.

2009 election

Confirmed candidates for 2009 are:-

• Eva Högl, SPD
• Christian Burholt, CDU
• Wolfgang Wieland, GRÜNE
• Klaus Lederer, Die Linke
• Kurt Lehner, FDP
• Ralph Boes, Unconditional basic income

Results

2005 election

Out of a total electorate of 192,321 the total number of votes cast was 142,190 (73.9%) of which 2,829 where invalid.

2002 election

Out of a total electorate of 201,240, the total number of votes cast was 150,464 (74.8%) of which 2,393 votes were invalid.

References