Chance of liberalism when forming a government

• When the FDP started a process of renewal eight years ago, it was all about survival. Today, on the verge of government participation, it has to reinvent itself again.
• A return to liberal roots can help. Either way, however, the FDP will also have to address issues that it has so far paid little attention to: social affairs and ecology.
• Political professor Hans Vorländer explains the strength of the FDP and why looking into the past can help with a traffic light coalition.
• In an interview, FDP leader Christian Lindner speaks about the tasks of his party, the importance of a liberal constitutional state and freedom as the cheapest form of economic development.

The reinvention of the FDP began with a phone call almost exactly eight years ago. Karl-Heinz Paqué, at that time the former group chairman of the FDP parliamentary group in Saxony-Anhalt, was walking his dog in the forest when his cell phone rang.