Berlin’s mock U16 election produced a much more left-wing city than the adult polls

In Berlin’s non-binding U16 election, 39,374 children and teenagers voted at 301 polling stations between September 7 and 11. Die Linke won 32.8%, the Greens 20.9%, SPD 11.9%, CDU 8.3%, the animal-welfare party 7.7% and AfD 5.8%; FDP, Volt and BSW stayed below 5%.

This is a civic-education exercise, not a representative poll. Participation is voluntary, polling places are concentrated in schools and youth centers, and German citizenship is not required. It should not be used to forecast Sunday’s adult result. Its value is the contrast: current adult polling shows Linke, CDU and AfD in a tight three-way contest, whereas younger participants produced a clear left-green majority and especially weak results for CDU and AfD.

The result probably captures both life-stage and cohort effects. Young voters are more exposed to housing, school and climate issues, and less attached to the parties that have governed Berlin for decades. How much of that preference persists as this cohort ages is unknowable, but it is a useful map of the electorate the city’s parties will inherit.

Berlin’s immediate election may be decided by older voters and coalition arithmetic, but the U16 result shows a sharply different political center of gravity forming underneath it.