For those who are undecided - and there should be a lot of them - Wahl-O-Mat offers a guide to the upcoming federal election.
A political scientist explains what is important.
Munich - The Wahl-O-Mat for the federal election 2021 has been online since Thursday, September 2nd.
How helpful is the tool anyway?
We spoke to the political scientist Stefan Marschall from the University of Düsseldorf.
How helpful is the Wahl-O-Mat?
Stefan Marschall:
It can certainly help to form an opinion about the parties and the topics of the election.
In the last few weeks and months this may have been neglected.
But it's mostly about programs, not people.
Marshal:
Right.
The Wahl-O-Mat is a pure topic tool, people are irrelevant, so of course it can only make a contribution to a decision.
Wahl-O-Mat for the federal election: Important aspects could be missing
What remains of the programs in the negotiations is also open.
Marshal:
That is the other.
And only 38 theses are covered.
Of course, that is not all there is to a topic.
It may be that something is not included that is important to someone.
Therefore, the result can only represent a first introduction on the basis of these 38 theses.
What role does the question play?
Marschall:
You have to be careful that the theses are formulated in such a way that they do not guide you in any way.
Which words you use, which formulations you choose - this is a very delicate process.
In the end, however, something comes out that is thoroughly serious.
Wahl-O-Mat for the federal election - There is an extremely interesting alternative
There was once the accusation that Wahl-O-Mat preferred the big parties.
Marshal:
There used to be the option of choosing eight parties.
But that was canceled in 2019, since then you can click all of them at the same time.
Are there any worthwhile alternatives to Wahl-O-Maten for you?
Marschall:
Very interesting, also because it's a different approach, that I find tools that not only look ahead, but also backwards.
How did parties in the Bundestag react in the last electoral term after the Bundestag election *?
There is the deinwal.de tool, which focuses more on this.
That is quite exciting.
However, only the parliamentary parties can take it up.
Only a few weeks until the federal election in 2021. If you are undecided, Wahl-O-Mat can help you with your decision. Here you can find information about the background and how it came about.
* tz.de is part of IPPEN-MEDIA