German election 2025

Generation Angst: Why young voters vote extreme

Election campaign finale in Germany: the AfD is targeting young people in particular.(Bild: AP)

Around 60 million citizens are eligible to vote in the German federal election on Sunday. 2.3 million of them will be going to the polls for the first time. The extreme left and right are particularly popular with young voters. Why this is the case - and why 2033 could be a fateful year for Germany.

The year 1933 changed world history. When Adolf Hitler's NSDAP - democratically elected - became the strongest force in the German elections. Aided by the economic crisis and the turmoil of the post-war period of the First World War. "Never again" was the motto after 1945, after twelve years of Nazi terror and another war, the Holocaust and a total of almost 50 million deaths. Renowned German generational researcher Rüdiger Maas has played out a scenario that shows how the AfD, which has been classified by the German constitutional court as right-wing extremist in parts, could become the strongest force in Germany by 2033 - exactly one hundred years after the Nazi party came to power.