The Governing Mayor of BerlinOffice of the Governing Mayor - The Governing Mayor, Senate ChancelleryConstitution of Berlin: Section IV: The Government - The Governing Mayor, Senate Chancellery () is the mayor, head of state, and head of government of Berlin, presiding over the Berlin Senate. As Berlin is an independent city as well as one of the constituent states of Germany (), the office is the equivalent of the ministers-president of the other German states (except those of the other two city-states, Hamburg and Bremen, where the heads of government are called "First Mayor" and "President of the Senate and Mayor", respectively). The official title Governing Mayor was introduced in Berlin's 1948 constitution to distinguish the governing mayor from their two deputies, who are simply called "Mayor" () in German, as well as the borough mayors.
According to the Berlin Constitution, the governing mayor is member and head of the executive branch, the Senate. The Senate consists of ten senators appointed by the governing mayor, with two of them designated as deputy governing mayors. The twelve boroughs of Berlin are also headed by borough mayors, although they do not actually preside over self-governmental municipalities.
The governing mayor of Berlin is elected by the city-state's legislature, the Berlin House of Representatives, which also controls policy guidelines and is able to force the governing mayor's resignation by a motion of no confidence. The governing mayor is empowered to appoint and dismiss the senators.
The seat of the Senate is the city hall, Rotes Rathaus, in the borough Mitte.
History As capital of the Kingdom of Prussia, Berlin received its first mayor () in accordance with the Prussian reforms approved by King Frederick William III after the retreat of the Napoleonic occupation troops in 1809. The mayor of Berlin was the head of the city council, called the . The two-stage administration and the office of the borough mayors were implemented in the course of the wide-ranging incorporations under the 1920 Greater Berlin Act.
During the Allied occupation after World War II, the city assembly () elected the Social Democratic politician Ernst Reuter as mayor on 24 June 1947, who, however, was not confirmed by the Allied Kommandatura of BerlinThe Allied control body for Berlin corresponding to the Allied Control Council for the rest of Germany. due to Soviet reservations. After the Communist putsch in Berlin's city government in September 1948, a separate city parliament (still named ), de facto only competent for the Western occupation sectors (which would become West Berlin), was elected on 5 December 1948, and two days later a separate city government was elected with Ernst Reuter as governing mayor of West Berlin. The Soviet administration had officially deposed the previous elected government of all of Berlin – effectively, only in the eastern sector — and had installed the SED mayor Friedrich Ebert, Jr., in East Berlin on 30 November 1948.
West Berlin introduced its own constitution (), accounting for the changed facts, as of 1 October 1950. This constitution provided renamed the city's parliament "House of Representatives of Berlin", the city's executive government "Senate of Berlin", and the head of government "Governing Mayor of Berlin" ().Articles 25 and 40 of Die Verfassung von Berlin (Constitution of Berlin [West]), Berlin (West): Landeszentrale für politische Bildungsarbeit Berlin, 1982, pp. 34 and 37. Under the new constitution, representatives were elected on 3 December 1950, and the new parliament re-elected Ernst Reuter governing mayor on 18 January 1951. From 1951 to 1990, during the Cold War, the governing mayor was the head of government in West Berlin with his seat at Rathaus Schöneberg, while East Berlin de jure remained under Soviet occupation and de facto became a part, and the capital, of East Germany — a status not recognized by NATO members, but condoned by the 1971 Four Power Agreement on Berlin and the German Basic Treaty of 1972.
The government of West Berlin claimed to be the legitimate government of all of Berlin within the borders established by the 1920 Greater Berlin Act until the Peaceful Revolution of 1989. In 1990, even before German reunification on 3 October 1990, the mayors of West Berlin and East Berlin held common cabinet meetings, until Berlin-wide elections took place on 2 December 1990.
List PortraitNameTerm of officePolitical partySenateTook officeLeft officeTime in office 1 Ernst Reuter(1889–1953) 1 February 1951 29 September 1953died in office SPDI 2 Walther Schreiber(1884–1958) 29 September 1953 11 January 1955 CDUI 3 Otto Suhr(1894–1957) 11 January 1955 30 August 1957died in office SPDI Mayor Franz Amrehn (CDU) served as acting Governing Mayor 30 August to 3 October 1957. 4 Willy Brandt(1913–1992) 3 October 1957 1 December 1966resigned SPDIIIIII 5 Heinrich Albertz(1915–1993) 1 December 1966 19 October 1967resigned SPDIII 6 Klaus Schütz(1926–2012) 19 October 1967 2 May 1977resigned SPDIIIIII 7 Dietrich Stobbe(1938–2011) 2 May 1977 23 January 1981resigned SPDIII 8 Hans-Jochen Vogel(1926–2020) 23 January 1981 11 June 1981SPDI 9 Richard von Weizsäcker(1920–2015) 11 June 1981 9 February 1984resigned CDUI 10 Eberhard Diepgen(born 1941)1st term 9 February 1984 24 January 1991CDUIII 11 Walter Momper(born 1945) 16 March 1989 3 October 1990 SPDI 12 Eberhard Diepgen(born 1941)2nd term 24 January 1991 16 June 2001voted out of office bya voteof no confidenceCDUIIIIVV 13Klaus Wowereit(born 1953) 16 June 2001 11 December 2014resignedSPDIIIIIIIV 14Michael Müller(born 1964)11 December 201421 December 2021SPDIII 15Franziska Giffey(born 1978)21 December 202127 April 2023SPDI 16 Kai Wegner(born 1972) 27 April 2023 IncumbentCDUI
See also Politics of Berlin History of Berlin Timeline of Berlin List of people from Berlin List of mayors of Berlin
Notes and references
External links
Governing Mayor of Berlin