It is the closest thing to a referendum on mass migration, in a country where referendums are not condoned by the constitution. The parties that advocate the end of immigration from the Global South and of Multikulti — multiculturalism — are clearly the winners in yesterday’s German general election. 

Alternative for Germany, known as the AfD, the stridently nationalist party led by Alice Weidel and Tino Chrupalla, comes first in this respect, with 20.8 percent of the popular vote — twice as much as in the previous election. 

Likewise, getting tough on immigration, in a complete reversal of Chancellor Merkel’s stance a decade ago, was an important factor for the return of the Christian Democratic Union, Friedrich Merz’s classic conservative bloc, as the country’s main party, with 28.6 percent of the vote: a 4.4 point increase.

No less significant is the surge of a political UFO — the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance, which combines a leftwing platform with a rejection of immigration. With 4.97 percent of the vote, it almost reached the 5 percent threshold needed for being represented in the Bundestag. 

All in all, the explicitly anti-immigration parties get 54.37 percent of the popular vote. It may be reckoned that many of the voters who cast their ballots for other parties are equally concerned by the demographic, social, and cultural challenge of the recent wave of mass migration. 

According to a poll published by Die Welt a month ago, 57 percent of all German citizens were willing to take steps against illegal immigration. While the trend was more marked among conservatives, with 71 percent in favor, it was still significant among the left-of-centre leaning social-democrats, 52 percent of whom support such steps. Moreover, 68 percent of all German citizens supported a more restrictive policy towards “asylum seekers” who, more often than not, are just illegal immigrants in thin disguise.

Naturally, the question is how yesterday’s political turn will translate in terms of politics. Under Germany’s electoral law, control of the Bundestag is determined by two parallel votes: One is based on a first-past-the-post system, while the second relies on proportional representation. These provisions were designed by the fathers of the Constitution, in the late 1940s, to ensure both working majorities in parliament and a fair expression of public opinion. 

It worked quite well for most of the Federal Republic’s history — enabling moderate conservatives and moderate socialists to alternate or set up coalition cabinets — before and after the country’s reunification in 1990. What, however, if the traditional parties fade away and new ones emerge? 

As of yesterday, the Bundestag has no clear-cut majority. It is dominated by the Christian Democrats, with 208 seats out of 630, and the AfD, with 152 seats. The social-democratic party, or SPD, has fallen to third place, with 120 seats, for the first time ever. The liberal party, a crucial partner in coalition-building, either right or left, since the founding of the Republic, did not make it to the 5 percent threshold and has been wiped off the political map. 

The decline of the social democrats is largely due to the rise of a neo-Marxist Left Party, with 64 seats, and of the Greens, with 85 seats, who may be slightly less radical in Germany than elsewhere but still can prove difficult to work with. 

Both the Christian Democrats and the SPD are the parties of the older generations. They are overwhelmingly favored by citizens older than 60, but only by one-third of the voters under 34. Voters below the age of 24 lean decisively towards AdD, the hard Left and the Greens.

When the Christian Democrats and the AfD united in the former Bundestag in January to require a more restrictive handling of asylum seekers, the prospect of a broad right-wing coalition became a real possibility. 

While fiercely condemned by the former Christian Democrat chancellor, Frau Merkel, and the outgoing SPD chancellor, Olaf Scholz, it could have boosted both the AfD and the Christian Democrats’ votes. AfD was suddenly looking like an acceptable partner at the federal level. The Christian Democrats was looking like a truly conservative, no-nonsense, party again.

On the face of it, a Christian Democrat-AfD coalition would provide a stable majority in the Bundestag, with 360 seats, well ahead of the 316 seats absolute majority. However, the fact remains that most Germans feel uncomfortable with such an outcome. 

Whatever its rhetoric, AfD passes less for an all-German nationalist party than for a more narrowly-focused East German or “Prussian” party. It won more than 25 percent of the vote in most formerly East German constituencies, and in only a handful of constituencies in southern or southwestern Germany. 

Despite Ms. Weidel’s valuable efforts to give the party a clean face, it is still problematic when it comes to some issues related to the Third Reich. Finally, AfD politicians were rocked by unsavory scandals, including one case of cooperation with Communist Chinese agents.

Moreover, a rejuvenated Christian Democrat party may be more interested in the AfD voters than in providing the younger rightist party an opportunity to grow even stronger as a junior partner in a conservative coalition.

So what is left? 

A coalition between the Christian Democrats and the SPD, known in the past as a “great coalition,” would barely pass the absolute majority threshold, with 316 seats. It may garner 392 seats with the Greens. However, what platform will glue the various groups together? Herr Merz cannot look weak on immigration, nor on the economy. Will he be able to impose his will on these issues ? A matter of political life or death, indeed.