It is a feature of the franchise process that is counterproductive in practice and repels investors and citizens. In the last ten years, the polynomial has increased significantly. According to statistics from the German government, both the number of federal-level legislation and individual regulations has skyrocketed. While on 1 January 2014 there were 1,671 pieces of legislation with 44,216 individual provisions, at the beginning of 2024 there were 1,792 laws consisting of a total of 52,155 individual provisions. However, the legislative overregulation of everything occurs not only at the level of laws passed in the German parliament, but also at the level of decrees, with which the executive power regulates the details. According to the government, on 1 January 2014 there were 2720 federal decrees with 38,192 individual circulars. Ten years later, the 2,854 federal decrees consisted of 33,273 circulars.

“We have a lot of legislation in Germany”

A spokesman for the Ministry of Justice tried to explain that the number of laws does not automatically mean a bureaucratic burden. He also argued that laws are also needed to reduce red tape. Like not every decree or every law triggers bureaucratic costs. However, the Ministry of Justice’s aim is to contain the further increase in the number of individual decrees by “making the legislation simpler and easier to understand”, as it said. When asked if it is possible for ordinary people, craftsmen, private owners, volunteers and others, without legal training in Germany, to be able to easily comply with the law, Sonya Eichwende, K.O.’s legal representative. of the Social Democratic Party, admitted the problem. “We have a lot of legislation in Germany,” he said. “It is also not good if one has to pay an expert or a lawyer to deal with the many procedures. However, the situation is not hopeless,” adds the MP. “We have a polynomial in some places, but we also have an opportunity to change that.” But “reducing red tape should not lead to the abolition of legal protection interests”.

In addition to high energy prices, too many bureaucratic requirements and extensive reporting obligations were particularly burdensome. Easements proposed by the German government in 2023, including shorter retention periods for tax-relevant receipts and the ability to arrange certain matters by email instead of a signed letter, were welcomed but criticized overall as insufficient. Bureaucracy reform measures recently presented by Justice Minister Marco Busman are expected to be approved by the cabinet in March. Under the one-in, one-out rule that has been in place since 2015, every burden introduced by law must have the same level of relief by the end of the legislative period at the latest. It is something like a brake on legislative power. However, there are exceptions, for example for effects due to EU law.

The path of least risk…

Changing from requiring a written form to a text form, for example, is not desirable in every case, says SPD politician Sonia Eichwende. An email is not enough to terminate a residential tenancy agreement. “For a commercial lease, for example, it’s different because one would assume that the person concerned is constantly checking their emails.” The Greens in particular are often said to favor overly complex regulations in the service of individual justice. Driven by the desire not to leave any situation out of control, they sometimes lead to arrangements that are almost impossible for ordinary citizens to understand. “The desire for laws that are as easy to understand as possible, that leave some room for manoeuvre, is understandable,” says Marion Gedges, Baden-Württemberg’s justice minister.

Unfortunately, this reflects two “rather very German concerns”, as he says: On the one hand the great desire to regulate each individual case as precisely as possible in the law, where of course the question arises as to whether this is really justice. On the other hand, the pursuit of as much security as possible. Breaking away from this blanket mindset can be difficult not only for some citizens, but also for those working in public administration. She herself would welcome a cultural change and a new culture in management. “Over the decades we have tended to train administrations not to exercise discretion as widely as possible, but to take the path of least risk.” Minister of Justice Bushman has a similar opinion. He said in an interview last December: “Many citizens and businesses are not only upset with what the law says, but also with how the laws are being implemented by the authorities. We need more speed and maybe we should let things go.” to pass unnoticed, when it comes to small things”.