Federal Study 2005

Political attitudes and behaviour. Assessment of parties. Opinion on politics and society.

Topics: Intention to participate in elections (Sunday question); party preference (first and second vote); sympathy scales for the parties CDU, CSU, SPD, FDP, Bündnis90/Die Grünen, Linkspartei.PDS, right-wing parties such as Republikaner/DVU/NPD; confidence or fears about the future; future expectations for Germany in the next ten years (pensions will only provide basic security, statutory health insurance will only guarantee basic care, social benefits will be reduced to American conditions, tensions between people with and without children, tensions between old and young people, the integration of immigrants will not be successful, the alignment of living conditions in East and West Germany, Christian customs and Christian beliefs will become more important in the future, freedom and freedom of expression will become more important again); frequency of the feeling of political failure; personal meaning of different terms (e. g., political failure, social justice, equality, humanity, etc.); party most closely associated with these concepts; social order fairer or more unfair; membership of a more disadvantaged or more favoured population group; social market economy (social responsibility of entrepreneurs, state can only support people when they are in distress, economy is not responsible for social compensation, state should comprehensively cover all life risks, trade union influence on companies is too great, only economic growth can create jobs, state competence for job creation); personally important characteristics of democracy; knowledge of the European Constitution; assent to the European Constitution; EU membership of Turkey: privileged partnership vs. full-fledged EU membership; opinion on an eastward enlargement of the EU; opinion on various statements about politics and society (e. g. trust that the state is doing the right thing for citizens, fundamental political change is necessary despite financial losses of the individual, etc.).

Demography: sex; age (birth year); confession; church attendance; church affiliation; education; employment status; current or former occupational group and position; union member in the household; union affiliation; marital status; number of persons contributing to household income; net household income; household size; number of persons aged 18 and over; children under 18 years in the household.

Additionally coded was: questionnaire number; federal state of eligibility; size of locality; weight; respondent´s age estimated by the interviewer.