GER: No State Funding for Right-Wing Foundations under New Bill

Nov 24, 2023 Benn-Ibler Rechtsanwälte

Anti-constitutional foundations shall no longer be funded by the state according to the will of the German government coalition. A corresponding bill, the Foundation Financing Act (Stiftungsfinanzierungsgesetz, StiftFinG), is now to be discussed in the German Bundestag. The aim of the law is to define when political foundations can be in receipt of state funding and when they cannot. Up to now, there has been no legal regulation of this kind in Germany.

In the Federal Republic of Germany, the activities of political foundations have a long and successful tradition. In terms of socio-political work and democratic education, such foundations make important contributions. Hence, the German federal government provides financial support to enable such organisations to continue to be involved.

However, the German Federal Constitutional Court has recently ruled that previous allocation of global grants to political foundations did not comply with constitutional requirements, in its decision of 22 February 2023. Rather, a separate parliamentary law is required to regulate state funding in view of the right of political parties to equal opportunities in political competition.

In order to promote the democratic and socio-political work of political foundations in accordance with the German constitution, a separate law shall abstractly and generally regulate the criteria for recipients of state foundation support and the standards for the amounts of such support.

Political foundations can apply for funding from the relevant ministries. The Federal Ministry of the Interior then decides whether conditions for funding are met. The background to this is that all questions relating to the examination of whether political foundations are based on Germany’s free democratic constitutional order and actively stand up for this societal order are to be dealt with by a central body in order to avoid contradictory judgements.

Bundestag document 20/8726 (10 October 2023)