Grüne on democracy and the state

The Greens want everyone aged 16 and over who lives permanently in the state to be allowed to vote. People with a migration background should also be adequately represented in public institutions, and their self-run organizations should receive funding.

The Greens want voting rights for everyone aged 16 and up. This should apply to all who live here permanently. Groups run by immigrants should get money. More people with immigrant roots should work in the police, schools and parliaments.

The platform derives a right to self-representation and participation from a history of flight or immigration. The state's Integration Act is to be developed further for this purpose. The party names parliaments, the police, the judiciary and teachers as examples of institutions that should be representative. In addition, the causes of the high poverty risk among people with a migration background in the state are to be studied scientifically, with policy measures drawn from the findings.

The Greens want to anchor children's right to participate and the priority of the child's best interests in the state constitution. According to the program, children and young people should be better represented in politics and public life because decisions affect them too.

The Greens want to strengthen children's rights. Children should have a say. The well-being of children should come first. Both should be written into the state constitution.

The program describes childhood and youth as formative stages of life that need special political attention. Political decisions also affect young people, so their wishes and needs should be given more weight. To that end, two principles are to be added to the state constitution: the right to participation and the priority of the child's best interests.

The Greens want children and young people to be consistently involved at all political levels as well as in daycare, school, youth work and youth welfare. To that end, a state youth council and a state commissioner for children and youth are to be created.

Children and young people should have a say everywhere. This covers politics, daycare, school and youth welfare. The Greens want a youth council for the whole state. A commissioner should look after participation.

Participation opportunities are to be easy to access and tailored to each target group. Setting up student councils and child and youth advisory boards is to become more binding, and the party considers professional pedagogical management necessary for this. Advisory boards are to get more options within schools, and student councils better access to local political bodies. For this, the codes governing municipal offices, municipalities and counties are to be aligned with the school law and the youth promotion law, and a model statute for advisory boards is to be issued. The state commissioner is to evaluate and further develop participation.

The Greens want to cut the state administration's office space by one fifth by 2035. Working from home and coworking spaces would make up an appropriate share of work. Buildings would be designed to allow flexible ways of working.

The Greens want less office space for the state administration. By 2035 it should be 20 percent less. More staff should work from home or in shared offices. New buildings should fit flexible work.

In new construction and renovation, room designs would promote cooperation and communication and include recreation areas and childcare rooms. The current allocation of square meters by pay grade would be replaced with criteria such as innovation, knowledge transfer and flexibility. The program points to saved commutes as well as the job ticket and leased bicycles. Parking and bicycle storage would be adapted to changed needs.

The Greens want to make planning procedures faster while keeping them legally sound. They justify this with the energy transition, infrastructure and business settlement. At the same time, participation rights for citizens and associations are to be strengthened.

Planning for building projects often takes a long time. The Greens want it to go faster. The rule of law should still apply. Citizens and associations should have a say early on.

The Greens back federal initiatives to this end. Participation rights for citizens and associations are to be strengthened and made more professional. Environmental groups are to have enough resources for expert reports and for taking part in procedures. As a general rule, the platform favors involving the public early.

The Greens want state parliament committees and local councils to be able to meet digitally or in hybrid form even outside emergencies. This is meant to make participation easier for people who, for example, have childcare duties.

Committees and local councils should be allowed to meet online. This should not only apply in emergencies. Then more people can take part. For example, parents who look after children.

The bodies would decide for themselves whether to meet digitally. Hybrid meetings combining in-person and online participation would also be allowed. Decisions made in such meetings would be legally valid. The platform justifies this with better compatibility with care duties.

The Greens want to make the state administration more citizen-friendly and modern. A new Public Innovation Agency is to help the state and municipalities solve problems and draw on ideas from society.

Public offices should become more modern. Letters and forms from offices should be easier to understand. A new agency should help offices solve problems. Ideas from citizens should help with this.

Official letters and forms are to become easier to understand, and agencies are to share information better with one another. Pilot projects are to test agile working with team-based leadership and cross-departmental teams. Planning is to extend beyond single budget years, and appraisal procedures are to become more motivating. For staff, the platform foresees incentives for sabbaticals, further training and family part-time, plus better digital work based on open standards.

The Greens want the state parliament and local councils to be made up equally of women and men, while also taking into account people who are neither male nor female. In addition, civic education, online citizens' initiatives and the right of petition are to be strengthened.

The Greens want equal numbers of women and men in parliaments. People of other genders should be considered too. Children and adults should learn more about democracy. Online citizens' initiatives should become easier.

A parity rule for directly elected seats is to be examined. On ballots, a contact address and postal code should suffice in the future, to protect candidates' privacy. The platform for online citizens' initiatives should become easier to use. Civic education is to be expanded from daycare to university and in adult education, and the state parliament should receive adequate funding for its operations.

The Greens want a mandatory lobby register for Schleswig-Holstein and stricter disclosure duties for members of the state parliament. According to the program, politics should be transparent and free of economic conflicts of interest.

The Greens want a lobby register. That is a list of groups that try to influence politics. Lawmakers should make all side jobs and donations public. This should help people trust politics more.

Lawmakers would have to publish unpaid and paid side activities, donations and other benefits from the first cent. Every outside organization that seeks influence would have to sign up in the lobby register. For each legislative process, the influence of third parties is to be disclosed. The program stresses that the mandate must be at the center of a lawmaker's work.

The Greens want to establish citizens' assemblies by law at state and municipal level in order to involve citizens more directly in politics and lawmaking on selected issues. The results must be debated but need not be adopted.

The Greens want citizens' assemblies. In them, ordinary people discuss a topic. Politicians must deal with the results. But they do not have to carry them out.

Citizens' assemblies could be convened by a decision of the state parliament or municipalities, or by a citizens' initiative or local petition. Government, parliament or the local council must address the results. If they reject the proposals, the initiators of a preceding citizens' initiative or local petition can demand a popular vote on the assembly's results. Participation is meant to be open regardless of age and citizenship.

The Greens want children, young people and people with disabilities to be involved in municipalities on a binding basis. Volunteer local politics is to be made easier through digital meetings and training, and the division of tasks among local levels is to be reviewed.

Children and young people should have a say in their town. The same goes for people with disabilities. Volunteer local politicians should be able to join meetings online. The Greens also want to check who should do which tasks.

Participation would run through advisory boards or designated representatives attached to local councils. Digital attendance and voting are to be possible everywhere. Because small municipalities hand tasks to administrative offices or special-purpose associations whose members are not directly elected, the Greens want to work with municipalities on a structure that is democratically legitimate and efficient. Municipal mergers would continue to be supported, and volunteers would get easily accessible training.

The Greens want everyone in the state to be able to assert their rights easily. They want to examine whether statewide public legal advice can be set up, because the platform says the existing legal aid advice system no longer works well, especially in rural areas.

Everyone should be able to get their rights easily. The Greens want to look into public legal advice across the state. People with little money should learn more about the help they can get. The information should be easy to understand.

People who cannot afford to go to court are to be informed proactively and in plain language about legal aid for advice, proceedings and trials. Following Berlin's example, a project called "Wir im Rechtsstaat" is to start, with judges and prosecutors giving half-day courses in clubs, schools and refugee housing. Low-cost out-of-court mediation is to be offered as part of public legal advice to relieve the courts. An individual constitutional complaint to the state constitutional court is to become possible for basic rights guaranteed only by the state constitution. A justice project on anti-racism and human rights is to be developed further.

The Greens want to give courts and prosecution authorities more staff and modern technology. The platform says proceedings take too long, and processes are to become faster and closer to citizens.

Courts have a lot of work. Cases take a long time. So the Greens want more staff for the justice system. Courts should get modern technology.

Federal money from the extended Pakt für den Rechtsstaat (pact for the rule of law) is to reach the courts quickly. The federal digital pact for the justice system is to take effect locally, and all courts are to get modern technology. Improvements are to be identified and implemented in a broad process involving lawyers, associations and citizens. To stay attractive as an employer, the justice system is to allow more part-time work, including in leadership roles. Courts are to explain their rulings more often and get more public relations staff for this.

The Greens want to change how judges in the state are elected and promoted. This is meant to strengthen trust in the rule of law after the current procedure, according to the platform, drew repeated criticism.

The Greens want new rules for electing judges. The rules for promoting judges should change too. The process should be open and easy to follow. People should be able to trust the courts.

The new model is to be developed in an open-ended process involving judges, lawyers and civil society from the start. The Greens want it to become a model for all of Germany. The procedure is to be transparent, build trust and secure the quality and pluralism of the judiciary.

The Greens want to give civil society organizations working against right-wing extremism a long-term outlook. Civic education is to be funded permanently, and democracy education is to reach people of all ages.

Many groups work against right-wing extremism. The Greens want to pay for this work over the long term. Jobs there should be permanent. People of all ages should be able to learn about democracy.

Fixed-term jobs in this field are to be made permanent because, according to the platform, short contracts lead to insecure work. Funding is to be secured even when political majorities change. Beyond school and youth programs, there are to be more training options on group-focused hostility. Teachers are to learn in university and in further training how to spot antisemitism and far-right tendencies early.

The Greens want closer cooperation with Hamburg and the other northern German states. Plans include a joint innovation agency, coordinated spatial planning, bike highways and better-aligned public transit fares. The party points to an OECD report on the Hamburg Metropolitan Region.

Schleswig-Holstein should work more closely with Hamburg. Other northern states should join in. A shared agency should support new ideas, especially in clean energy. Fast bike routes should be built. Bus and train fares should fit together.

Joint working groups of the northern states and the metropolitan region would develop goals and measures. Spatial planning would be coordinated mainly with Hamburg, protecting green corridors and limiting land use for new settlements. An innovation agency would carry a joint strategy for renewable energy and climate adaptation. Construction of the bike highway network is to start in the next term, with at least one route finished together with Hamburg; the state would provide funding. The joint committee of the Schleswig-Holstein and Hamburg parliaments would continue, and other state parliaments are invited to join.