How to watch the German election like a pro

Germans head to the ballot boxes on Sunday to pick a new parliament, the Bundestag, which will then elect the chancellor — almost certainly Angela Merkel once again.

But the Bundestag will also have to perform another crucial task: forming a coalition government between at least two parties. And that’s where things can get messy.

Here is POLITICO’s guide to all you need to know about the election.

What happens on election day?

More than 61 million Germans are eligible to vote on September 24 when polling stations across 299 constituencies open at 8 a.m. The last ballots must be submitted by 6 p.m.

In the last election, in 2013, there was a voter turnout rate of 71.5 percent — less than 1 percentage point more than the record low of 70.8 percent in 2009.

The roughly 73,500 polling stations will typically be set up in public buildings, such as schools or town halls. But there are also some unusual locations: a hospital in Hanau, a fire station in Neuenburg and even one inside the basement of a house in Buchholz, normally used as a home gym.

Across Germany’s 16 regional states, more than 600,000 volunteers signed up to help count votes, which will be cast by old-fashioned pen-and-paper: In 2009, the Constitutional Court ruled that an electronic voting system used in the 2005 general election was unconstitutional after a father and son argued that it was not transparent enough.

Parties and voters will also have to abide by election day rules: campaign posters are not allowed by polling centers and no campaigning is allowed nearby. Selfie-taking or any other photography while voting is also a strict no-no.

Who’s going to win?

Polls in recent weeks have consistently shown Merkel’s conservative CDU/CSU bloc with a big lead. While the CDU/CSU currently sits at between 34 and 37 percent support, the Social Democrats (SPD), led by Martin Schulz, are polling at between 20 and 22 percent.

Surveys show the SPD could only be part of a stable majority in the Bundestag as a junior partner to the CDU/CSU, so Schulz has almost no chance of being chancellor. Merkel, on the other hand, will probably have at least a couple of ways of commanding a majority in parliament.

What’s still not clear?

While Merkel’s victory seems almost inevitable, the composition of her next government is far from clear. That’s because, if the polls are right, Merkel’s CDU/CSU group will have to team up with at least one other party to form a majority — and this will shape the government’s policies over the next four years. In some ways, the race for the third biggest party is much more important than the one for first.

There could be a continuation of the current "grand coalition” with the SPD, or the conservatives could team up with the Greens and liberal FDP to form a "Jamaica” coalition (so-called because the parties’ colors match those of the Jamaican flag). If the CDU/CSU and FDP score a bit better than the polls suggest, they may even be able to form a "black-yellow” coalition — a formation which governed the country during Merkel’s second term as chancellor.

If Schulz’s SPD performs far better than the polls suggest, he could try to form a coalition without Merkel’s bloc, teaming up with the far-left Die Linke and the Greens (known as red-red-green), or form a "traffic light” government with the FDP and Greens (red, yellow, green). But both of these options seem extremely unlikely.

How does voting work?

The German voting system is a little complicated, so buckle up for this part.

Each voter gets two votes: one for their local representative and the other to choose a party. Each candidate who wins in their district automatically gets a seat. But the parties’ overall share of seats in parliament is determined by the percentage of second votes they win, so this is the number most widely reported on election night. The parties fill up the seats they win through second votes based on regional candidate lists.

The minimum number of seats in parliament is 598, but this can grow through something called "overhang seats.” These are allocated when, for example, a party wins 10 districts in a region through the first votes, but only earns enough of the second votes to earn eight seats. Since anyone who wins their district through first votes is entitled to a seat, that party gets to keep the extra — or "overhang” — seats.

But this would mean the party would be over-represented in parliament. To fix this, other parties get additional "balance seats” to even things up. Ultimately, the Bundestag could, in theory, swell to have 800 members. The current one, though, has 630.

When will we know the results?

On election night, and probably not late. Germany’s public broadcasters release their first predictions of the result, which tend to be pretty accurate, at 6 p.m. as the polling stations close. These are based on exit polls. In the 2013 election, this prediction was just a fraction of a percentage point off from the final results for all parties. Not long after, the broadcasters’ statisticians will publish their initial projection — Hochrechnung — based on results reported by a select number of voting districts that reflect the country’s overall voting behavior. In 2013, the first Hochrechnung was out by 6:15 p.m.

The projection will become more and more accurate as further results are factored in. But even the initial one tends to be fairly accurate. The first one in 2013 showed Merkel’s CDU/CSU at 42 percent, the SPD at 26 percent and the leftist Die Linke in third place with 8.3 percent of the vote. The final results differed only a little: the CDU/CSU won 41.5 percent, the SPD got 25.7 percent and Die Linke scored 8.6 percent.

What’s the best way to follow the action?

POLITICO will run a live blog from 10 a.m. until late on election day. The main election TV coverage will not start before 5 p.m. on polling day. As soon as voting centers close, broadcasters will reporting on the exit polls and projections.

The traditional TV program to watch after the results roll in is the so-called Elefantenrunde — the "Elephants’ Roundtable,” so-called because political heavyweights from all the parties elected to parliament take part. Normally, the parties send their lead candidates from the election. Formally called the Berliner Runde, this show will air at 8:15 p.m. on public broadcasters ZDF and ARD. This is typically the moment when the politicians declare victory or admit that they lost — but that’s not always the case.

During a now-famous Elefantenrunde following the 2005 election, then-Chancellor Gerhard Schröder insisted that he could still lead a government after his Social Democrats came in second with 34.2 percent of the vote — compared to the CDU/CSU’s winning score of 35.2 percent under Merkel.

In the end, Merkel did become chancellor and did form a coalition with the SPD, while Schröder stepped down from politics.

What comes next?

The next step is to form a coalition, which can take weeks. After the last election in 2013, it took 86 days before Merkel’s current Cabinet was formed. The parties involved will also draw up a coalition agreement, which lays out what policies and reforms they will pursue in the next four years.

Then it’s the role of the German president — currently Frank-Walter Steinmeier — to propose a chancellor candidate after consulting with the parties. The candidate must be at least 18 years old and be a German citizen, but it is not necessary for them to be a member of the Bundestag themselves.

After the president’s proposal, the candidate must then receive an absolute majority of votes in the Bundestag — that means half the members plus one, also referred to as the "chancellor majority.” The president then officially appoints the chancellor within a week of the vote.

Why does the coalition matter?

It doesn’t just determine which policies a government will pursue. It also decides which parties take charge of powerful ministries — like finance and foreign affairs. These ministers can have a major impact on global politics, and especially on the European Union.

As the most populous country in Europe, and home to the Continent’s largest economy, Germany plays the leading role in determining the future of the EU. Its influence will be even greater after Brexit in 2019.

That means Germany’s next chancellor and Cabinet members will have a big say in the future of the euro, European defense policy, transatlantic relations and many other issues. And while all of the parties that could end up in a government run on pro-EU tickets, there are still differences. Schulz’s SPD and the Greens are, generally speaking, more keen on deepening European integration — particularly when it comes to the eurozone — than Merkel’s CDU/CSU and especially the FDP.