If Germany wishes to truly move forward, it must abandon the convenient illusions of simplistic solutions and start addressing the structural issues at play

After months of anticipation, the time has finally come. The German federal elections, held on February 23, have sparked significant public interest, not only for their domestic implications but also for their impact on international politics, leading to Germany’s highest voter turnout since 1990. While the strong electoral participation reflects the public’s engagement in shaping the country’s future, mainstream media are now preoccupied with speculating about the composition of the next government, which is likely to see CDU’s Friedrich Merz become the new Chancellor.

Amid post-election analyses and vote distribution breakdowns, one fundamental element has been largely overlooked: the crucial role played by those who, despite lacking the right to vote, have indirectly shaped the success of the Union and the AfD. Within these right-wing forces, the figure of unrepresented individuals and communities without German citizenship has emerged as a strategic element in conservative election campaigns. Both parties have sharpened their aim on framing immigration as Germany’s most pressing challenge, echoing the dominant 21st century Zeitgeist. In the lead-up to the election day, alt-right nationalism, Islamophobia – manifested as blindness towards the Palestinian genocide – and broader hostility toward migrant and refugee minorities have heavily influenced the political landscape.

As a result, the unrepresented now face growing anxiety about the future, as their lives have been further politicised and weaponised without any means of participating in the democratic process. Such non-representation, excluding entire communities from electoral participation while simultaneously casting them as central figures in xenophobic propaganda has been a defining feature of the 2025 German elections. This serves as a clear sign of the failure to learn from contemporary politics, unable to move beyond oversimplified, fear-driven political programs, which not only offer easy answers to complex topics but also deliberately ignore the consequences for those silenced by the very system deciding their fate.

A lesson unlearned from contemporary politics

A lot has been said and much is still being discussed in the aftermath of the elections. From Elon Musk’s public endorsement of the AfD, boosting Alice Weidel’s party to an extraordinary 20.8% share, to the significant decline in support for former Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s SPD, the results follow global trends of rising polarisation and rightward shift of the electorate. While the German political landscape has its own specificities, a broader international lens reveals a recurring tendency: an ongoing effort to coercively place the unrepresented at the centre of political discourse. These are asylum seekers and permanent residents who, despite lacking the right to vote, are simultaneously stigmatised and instrumentalised to promote nationalist agendas.

Contemporary politics shows that elections are often won by leveraging the unrepresented as a political tool. The rhetoric adopted by right-wing parties consistently focuses on immigration, using those without a voice at the ballot box as scapegoats to galvanise voter support. This strategy is not unique to Germany. Take, for instance, Italian prime minister and Donald Trump’s most powerful European ally, Giorgia Meloni. She secured victory in the 2022 general elections by vowing to halt illegal immigration at all costs. Yet, three years into her term, her heavily publicised border control plan has failed to deliver. Practical and economic constraints have made impossible to deploy coast guard units across Italian maritime borders, all while disregarding European regulations. More recently, the delays and legal uncertainties surrounding the establishment of detention centres for migrants in Albania further expose the empty promises of her propaganda. By placing the unrepresented at the heart of Italian politics,

Meloni’s government has directly collided with the complex reality of migration, an issue no single state can resolve alone.

The consequences of using marginalised communities as political pawns are not confined to continental Europe, as post-Brexit United Kingdom offers another striking example. The 2016 ‘Leave or Remain’ referendum was framed less as a domestic political choice and more as a debate over immigration. Years later, the true complexity of Brexit is still unfolding, but one outcome is clear: UK’s stricter immigration policies have disrupted the labour market and undermined economic stability. The very people scapegoated during the referendum are now conspicuously absent from the workforce, deepening the measurable economic struggles.

Despite the emergence of such a pattern, Germany has yet to grasp the centrality of non-representation in its political crisis. The majority of the electorate persists in not recognising how easy it is to speak over unheard voices, addressing intricate structural problems through simplistic narratives. This failure to acknowledge the weaponisation of the unrepresented reveals a worrying complication: an unwillingness to move beyond the repeatedly discredited approaches of individualism and isolationism, instead of seeking proactive international cooperation. As the 2025 elections have highlighted how xenophobic discourse and exclusionary politics continue once again to dominate national debates, the lesson remains unlearned.

Easy solutions to complex problems

The strategy is clear, whether enacted by Meloni, Farage, Trump, Merz, Weidel, or other political leaders worldwide: reducing one of the most pressing global challenges of our time, locally regulating migration, through theoretically easy solutions that ignore both the voices and the agency of the marginalised who cannot vote.

A modern paradigm can be found in the US president’s “no-brainer” masterplan to resolve the Palestinian struggle for peace and recognition. How could one of the most ruthless massacre sites of our era ever be transformed into a luxury resort, as grotesquely depicted in an AI-generated video shared on Trump’s official social media channels? The “Riviera” chimera is, indeed, the latest and simplest solution for the unrepresented, who are both excluded from the exercise of democracy and violently forced into the political spotlight as a winning condition for electoral consensus.

Germany’s anti-immigration shift, framed as a matter of social security and national identity, must be understood within this global dynamic. By stoking fears around immigration, German conservative elites are employing a classic Divide et Impera strategy, sowing divisions within the electorate to consolidate their own political power. This tactic redirects public frustration away from systemic inequalities and towards marginalised communities, allowing the ruling class to maintain control while evading accountability for broader economic and social issues. The 2025 elections became a race to offer the easiest answers, gaslighting the electorate into believing in elitist interests that push for deeper socio-economical fractures within Germany’s diverse society.

Beyond provocative slogans and catchy buzzwords, fundamental questions remain: How can “Remigration” genuinely solve the country’s troubles when its practical implementation is enormously flawed? Will everyone with a non-German last name suddenly receive a plane ticket in the mail, sending them “back” to wherever they are from? It is evident that Germany cannot afford such a policy, neither logistically, nor economically. Yet this empty rhetoric provides an escape from confronting the reality of migration. Ultimately, it disregards the very real consequences for those who have no right to participate in the democratic process but continue to be the target of these exclusionary narratives.

The consequences on marginalised people

Migrant and refugee communities, though denied the right to vote, have become central figures in the German mainstream political narrative, portrayed as both threats to national security and symbols of societal decline. Their presence has been exploited by right-wing parties to rally support, using fearmongering tactics that frame these marginalised groups as the root cause of economic hardship and social instability. This manufactured crisis not only shifts the public’s focus away from systemic failures but also empowers nationalist agendas, making the unrepresented pivotal to the political strategies of those in power. Essentially, their forced visibility in xenophobic propaganda grants them an unsettling influence, rooted not in their own agency but in their exploitation as political tools. Hence, the paradox unfolds: those who arguably have had the most influence on voting intentions are simultaneously excluded from and instrumentalised within the political debate that has characterised Germany’s 2025 elections.

Non-representation fosters a concerning shared prejudice, which translates into tangible and visible standardised practises of discrimination towards groups that not only exist but actively contribute to German society. Whether we refer to people risking their lives for a better future or having greater freedom of movement, Germany exists and can only exist with its minorities. The country has always been defined by its migrants, and undermining its multicultural and globalised reality is both misleading and absurd.

Since the formation of the new government will inevitably impact millions, it is now more crucial than ever to actively push for a more equal system of representation. Let’s imagine having to leave your entire life behind, desperately chasing survival and new opportunities. Imagine escaping war, domination, and oppression, embarking on a journey with no guarantee of a safe arrival, as lived daily by many. Picture the struggle to settle, integrate, and become part of German society, to then face the ongoing consequences of marginalisation, while paradoxically being invisible yet dragged to the very centre of politics. These are the stories, both recurrent and exceptional, that should capture public attention and demand action, urging those with privilege to amplify these voices louder than ever before.

If Germany wishes to truly move forward, it must abandon the convenient illusions of simplistic solutions and start addressing the structural issues at play. This means recognising the unrepresented not as scapegoats but as essential contributors to society: individuals with agency, dignity, and the right to be heard.

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