Frauke Brosius-Gersdorf: Anatomy of a scandal

Frauke Brosius-Gersdorf is the most famous justice Germany never had. Had events followed the expected course, the Potsdam law professor would now be working at the Federal Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe and might, within a few years, have become only the second woman to lead it.

Instead, the nomination of the professor put forward by the SPD became one of the ugliest political episodes of the summer of 2025. Brosius-Gersdorf says she was caught completely unprepared and without having done anything herself. She describes the episode as a “stress test for democracy.”

The dispute brought Germany close to a coalition breakdown. It ended only when Brosius-Gersdorf gave up her candidacy, spectacularly preventing her election to the court.

Now she looks back on that period in a book and argues for reform of the way constitutional court justices are chosen. Her account presents the failed nomination as a sign of how quickly disorder can erupt in what the article calls an increasingly nervous republic.

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stress test for democracy