TNAG-2217-FCO40-3184-Constitutional-development-in-Hong-Kong-1991 — Page 46

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forty-five, rather than the tradition itself, that is an aberration in German history.

So perhaps the principal observation to be made this afternoon is that the survival of the German Parliament is not and has not been seriously questioned, nor has any alternative political institution ever been seriously considered. The Bundestag is, after two generations, demonstrably institutionalized, in the sense that its existence does not depend on the particular men and women belonging to it, on a particular configuration of political parties, or on a particular set of political issues. It is a distinctive political organization that acts in a reliable, predictable fashion. Furthermore, the Bundestag is a central institution in the political system of the Federal Republic, recognized as such both by political elites and by the mass public. It is also an indigenous German institution, rooted in the German parliamentary tradition. And it is, finally, a vital institution, capable of adapting itself to the characteristic influences of the contemporary world that similarly affect parliaments in all the western democracies.

When I wrote about the Bundestag twenty years ago the signs of its institutionalization were not yet so clear. There was still apprehension that it was the idiosyncratic product of its founders, dependent on their personal style of politics, on the absence of close party competition, on economic affluence, on the lack of critical foreign policy issues, and on public apathy toward politics. In fact some skeptical observers regarded the German Bundestag as a mere facade behind which an unholy alliance of party leaders and interest groups decided all the issues.

Today it is no longer justifiable to view the German Parliament so conditionally. There have been two generational turnovers in the membership of Parliament so that today's Bundestag is populated by the grandchildren of the founding generation. There have also been two major alternations of the major parties in power. A new political party with a radical agenda has entered Parliament and has taken its place as one of four parliamentary parties. Governments have confronted substantial economic, social, and foreign policy problems. There have been moments of passionate public involvement in politics, sometimes outside of Parliament but at least occasionally focussed on parliamentary proceedings. Yet despite these changes in the conditions in which the Bundestag functions, its institutional characteristics, its centrality in the political system, its distinctive attributes as a product of German history, and, yes, its liabilities, are little changed over what they were twenty years ago. That means that it has proven to be adaptable to an ever changing political environment, welcome evidence of its vitality.