Party of the Week: Pirate Party of Germany

This week's Pirate Party of the Week is the Pirate Party of Germany.

Will the Pirate Party of Germany participate in any upcoming elections? Please tell us about your expectations for the next elections you will participate in.

Germany is having a strong federative structure and it is said that it has more elections than any other country. This means that there are 7 to 8 elections on average in a given year. Plenty of opportunities for us to participate and build up experience. After a tremendous success with 2 % of the votes in the federal elections in 2009 the next elections for the German Pirate Party are on the state level. In March 2011 there will be the elections in the states of Baden-Wuerttemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate and Saxony-Anhalt. During the year there will be three more states to vote and several local elections.

Since there is no 5% election threshold on the local level we've got a good chance to win some seats in the municipal parliaments as we already managed to in Munster and Aachen. For state elections a minimum of 5% is required to get into the parliament. The best chances to enter a state parliament are within the urban states of Bremen or Berlin whose elections dates are in May and September 2011. A notable advantage could be Berlin lowering the age for voting to 16 years, which is discussed in many of the big parties at the moment. Since our voters are typically quite young, this might boost our elections result. But still a 5% result is a major challenge and we'll have to reach out to many more people.

What are the core topics of the Pirate Party of Germany? Are there topics that are unique to the Pirate Party of Germany, something that distinguishes them from other Pirate Parties?

The German Pirate Party started off with most of the typical pirate topics. These were summarized under the two main subjects "free information" and "transparent government instead of transparent citizens". Education was declared a core topic in the founding assembly, but was not filled with content before the general assembly in Hamburg 2009. In May 2010 in the general assembly in Bingen we decided on "Free Software" and "More Democracy" to become additional new key topics. A lot more proposals were made but couldn't be voted on for time reasons. There is an ongoing discussion on whether to separate the party platform in core topics and an extended basic program. Working Groups on various issues apart from the core topics have been founded. This might be special about the German Pirate Party. Some single state parties have also begun to adopt completely new topics for their state election campaign, which is still widely argued in the party.

During the beginning of the German Pirate Party the most important political issue was the data retention law.

The German Pirate Party got most of its attention and members during the campaign against the so called "Zensursula law" (blocking of websites in the name of the fight against child pornography). Zensursula is a wordplay on Zensur (censorship) an the name of the federal minister for family affairs at that time at that time, Ursula von der Leyen, CDU.

Tell us more about the inner structure of PP-Germany.

The German Pirate Party was founded on the federal level in Berlin in 2006. In the wake of the founding Pirate Parties on the state level emerged and by July 2009 right before the German federal elections we had a party structure in all 16 states. State parties are free in their decisions in politics on the state level and on further structural design. The states of Bavaria and Baden-Wuerttemberg have founded party structures on region and district level. Several other states have skipped the region level but founded on the district level.North Rhine-Westphalia and Berlin are using a "Crew" concept for their structure. Crews consist of approx. 5-12 pirates which are free to meet and act as they please, as long as they stick to the rules of transparency, for instance they have to publish protocols of their activities.

All in all nearly 100 sub divisions have been founded so far, not counting crews and task forces.

If you think 5 years ahead, what will be different compared to today's situation?

We are currently in a process to improve our structures. This, along with ongoing internal debates on the expansion of our program, will prepare our party for the elections in the years to come. The federal elections in 2013 and the EP elections in 2014 will show if we were able to raise the bar and gain seats in parliaments. Public funding and seats in municipal parliaments should provide the possibility for the first full-time party employees. This might even be necessary because of laws complicating our administrative work.

A completely unknown variable for our future is the reaction of the established parties to counter our efforts. Another "Zensursula" effect and we will be in parliament.

How do you manage to keep your financial balance? Do you have any special fund-raising methods? How can people support PP-Germany?

We have a membership fee of 36€ per year which finances most of the big basic spending (assemblies, financial audit, technical infrastructure). Many members donate additional money during the year.

We often use fund raising campaigns for specific topics (most often election campaigns) which sometimes generate a large amount of funds if the topic is appealing to the public.

Since 2009 we get public funding. It is notable that public founding is capped by the party's own income of the last year and paid in the following, e.g. funds paid in 2010 are capped by the income in 2008. In 2010, 31.500 € of public funding where paid to the state parties of Saxony and Schleswig-Holstein. We expect public funding in a lower to mid-range six-digit amount in 2011.

How many members does PP- Germany have at the moment? Can foreigners become members of PP-Germany?

There are currently over 12.000 members. If you are really interested, the latest figures can be found in our Wiki. The German Pirate Party is the biggest German party (by members as well as by federal election results) which is not represented in the Bundestag (national parliament).

Because of the party statutes foreigners can become members, if they have a residence in Germany. A notable fact is that according to federal law the Germany Pirate Party would lose its status as a political party if there would be more than 50% of foreigners in the party or in the board.

Something else?

After fighting against ambitions to install mandatory internet filters and the blatant ignorance of policymakers on a national level, we are now facing the very same discussion with spurious arguments driven forth by EU Commissioner Cecilia Malmström. The strife for a free internet and against censors off- as well as online is a core topic common to all pirate parties. PPI already maintains a censorship task force and we want to internationally step up efforts to tackle the curtailment of civil liberties.

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• Pirate Party of Germany Website: http://web.piratenpartei.de/
• Pirate Party of Germany on Twitter: http://twitter.com/piratenpartei
• Pirate Party of Germany on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=19095902528

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