Like all other advanced Western societies, Germany is coming to terms with the phenomenon of an ageing population. The demographic challenge posed by population ageing is generally seen in terms of potential crisis in the funding of health and social programmes. Some social scientists have even suggested that the early decades of the next century will be marked by conflict between the generations, with young and old competing for increasingly scarce resources. This is the first book written in English to address comprehensively ageing policies in Germany and the contribution of older...

This expert analysis -- the sequel to Dalton's The New Germany Votes -- looks at how unification is affecting German electoral politics, and focuses on the 1994 Bundestag elections. The unsettling process of Unification affected voters and parties in both East and West Germany and made it very difficult for the main parties to offer coherent programmes that addressed the nation's needs. Particular attention is paid to the problems of recreating the party system in a unified state and the voters' responses to unification. In addition, the book analyzes the political and partisan...