Friday 3 February 2012

Profile: The Pirate Party

Pirate Party of Germany / Piratenpartei Deutschland

Over the past 10 years, internet law has moved from being a fringe interest to relatively mainstream. After all, ever-greater numbers of people spend significant proportions of their life online. You are, in all probability, on the internet right now (unless someone printed out this article and sent it to you via post). The disruptive nature of the internet and the new legal issues it has brought – and still brings – has encouraged a new generation of political activists, particularly so in Germany.

This has been reflected in the Pirates’ meteoric rise – from foundation in 2006 as a single issue internet party to hitting 6-8% in the most recent opinion polls. If a federal election were to be held tomorrow, it would be the 4th or 5th largest party in the Bundestag. The Pirates would then have a real chance of entering government, if it made a deal with the centre-left SPD and Green parties.

Having grown beyond being a single-issue party, the German Pirate Party’s own position is somewhat difficult to pinpoint on the traditional political spectrum. In many senses, they hold libertarian ideals – including, among others: scaling back government patent protection, severely limiting the ‘surveillance state’ and decriminalisation of drug possession. But the pirates are certainly not laissez-faire capitalists; they endorse strict regulation of telecoms providers (providing services according to need rather than ability to pay), rigorous data protection controls and the prohibition of anti-copying technology. The main thrust: Move the centre of power away from large companies and governments towards individual consumers.

Playing an anti-government and anti-corporation role has won them support from the left and their liberal credentials have certainly played a role in the collapse of the FDP. However, with more than a year to go until the federal elections, a low profile and relatively inexperienced leadership as well as the slight taint of extremism*, it is not yet clear if the Pirates can be anything more than a flash in the pan. 

*There have been at least two cases of middle-ranking Pirates resigning due to past membership of the far-right NPD.

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