In Berlin: Government …parliament, on the central, or Land (state), level, and district mayors, district councils (governments), and district assemblies on the local level. The city has various local and state courts, including a constitutional court. The constitution of former West Berlin, amended in 1990, served as the transitional constitution of the state… Read More
civil service and administrative courts
In civil service: Appointment …as well as the German Länder, or states. In the Länder the qualifications and references of all candidates are compared, whereupon the most eligible are interviewed by a departmental board. Candidates are expected to have completed a lengthy program of academic work for professional qualification and a period of subsequent… Read More
In administrative law: The German system In the states, or Länder, there are lower administrative courts and superior administrative courts, and for the federation there is the Federal Administrative Court, which acts mainly as a court of appeals from the superior administrative courts in the Länder and even from the lower administrative courts in certain… Read More
German government
In Germany …government powers to its constituent Länder (states). Before unification there were 11 West German Länder (including West Berlin, which had the special status of a Land without voting rights), but, with the accession of East Germany, there are now 16 Länder in the unified republic. The largest of the states… Read More
In Germany: Constitutional framework …of the parliaments of the Länder (states) to form the Bund (federation). West Germany then comprised 11 states and West Berlin, which was given the special status of a state without voting rights. As a provisional solution until an anticipated reunification with the eastern sector, the capital was located in… Read More
In Germany: Regional and local government …expressly the responsibility of the states, yet there is an attempt to maintain a degree of uniformity among the 16 states through joint consultative bodies. The state governments are generally parallel in structure to that of the Bund but need not be. In 13 states the head of government has… Read More
postwar Germany
In Germany: Allied occupation and the formation of the two Germanys, 1945–49 …governmental units called Länder (singular Land), or states. By 1947 the Länder in the Western zones had freely elected parliamentary assemblies. Institutional developments followed a superficially similar pattern in the Soviet zone, but there the political process remained less than free because of the dominance of the Soviet-backed SED. Read More
