Editing Primary election (section)

===Germany===
In Germany, top candidates for the federal election can be selected in primaries. For party leaders, however, the selection at delegate conferences is required by law. It is, nevertheless, possible to hold a non-binding primary.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Küppers |first=Anne |date=2022-05-11 |title=The Occasional Democratisation of Leadership Selection in Germany |url=https://osf.io/ys3r9 |doi=10.31219/osf.io/ys3r9}}</ref> 

====Top candidates====
The Greens nominated their top candidates for the 2013 federal election (election of [[Jürgen Trittin]] and [[Katrin Göring-Eckardt]]) and for the 2017 federal election (election of [[Cem Özdemir]] and Katrin Göring-Eckardt) in a primary election by all party members (closed primary).

Primary elections are used much more frequently by parties at the regional than at the federal level.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Küppers |first=Anne |date=2021-04-03 |title=Effects of Party Primaries in German Regional Party Branches |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09644008.2020.1748602 |journal=German Politics |language=en |volume=30 |issue=2 |pages=208–226 |doi=10.1080/09644008.2020.1748602 |s2cid=216491161 |issn=0964-4008}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Detterbeck |first=Klaus |date=2013 |title=The Rare Event of Choice: Party Primaries in German Land Parties |url=http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/09644008.2013.794451 |journal=German Politics |language=en |volume=22 |issue=3 |pages=270–287 |doi=10.1080/09644008.2013.794451 |s2cid=153409906 |issn=0964-4008}}</ref>

====Party leaders====
The first party to use a (non-binding) closed primary to select its party leader at the federal level was the SPD in 1993.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Decker |first1=Frank |last2=Küppers |first2=Anne |date=2015 |title=Mehr Basisdemokratie wagen? Organisationsreformen der deutschen Mitgliederparteien im Vergleich |url=http://www.nomos-elibrary.de/index.php?doi=10.5771/1610-7780-2015-3-397 |journal=Zeitschrift für Staats- und Europawissenschaften |volume=13 |issue=3 |pages=397–419 |doi=10.5771/1610-7780-2015-3-397 |issn=1610-7780}}</ref> After the surprising resignation of [[Andrea Nahles]], the SPD held another party primary [[2019 Social Democratic Party of Germany leadership election|to determine her successor in 2019]]. A dual leadership of [[Saskia Esken]] and [[Norbert Walter-Borjans]] was elected. The CDU used the procedure for the first time in 2021.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2021-11-02 |title=Germany's CDU opens up leadership vote to all members in bid to start 'afresh' |url=https://www.politico.eu/article/german-elections-germanys-christian-democratscdu-armin-laschet-angela-merkel-berlin/ |access-date=2022-07-29 |website=POLITICO |language=en-US}}</ref> [[Friedrich Merz]] prevailed against two competitors [[Norbert Röttgen]] and [[Helge Braun]] in an online ballot of all CDU party members.