Demographic portrait of the Germans
Germany today has a population of 83.8 million, far ahead of France, Europe's second most populous country with 68 million. Today, the country's largely positive migratory balance explains why its population resumed its growth in the 2010s, despite a significant ageing of the population. Indeed, in the early 2000s, the country experienced its first demographic decline, from 81.6 million in 2002 to 80.2 million in 2011, before rebounding thanks to immigration. Today, people aged 65 or over account for 22% of the population. In 1991, they accounted for just 15%. At the same time, the number of people under the age of 25 continues to fall. Whereas they represented 30% of the population in 1991, they now account for just 24%. The average German household now comprises just 2 people, one of the lowest rates in the European Union, where the average is 2.3 people per household.
This significant ageing of the population can be explained by a number of historical, economic and social factors. Firstly, in the aftermath of the Second World War, while other European countries such as France and the UK were experiencing a baby boom, Germany was defeated and undergoing a very difficult period of reconstruction, with the result that the number of births fell drastically. The German baby-boom did not begin until 1952, and ended just a dozen years later, when births began to fall again. A second drop occurred in the early 1990s, after reunification, when family policies in the former East Germany came to an abrupt end, leading to a sharp fall in the birth rate in the region.
It is estimated that Germany could lose its status as Europe's most populous country to France by 2055. For a long time, the country was very reluctant to adopt any measures to encourage births, as they reminded it too much of the Nazis' natalist policies, as well as those applied in the GDR. Since 2005, under the impetus of Ursula von der Leyen, then Minister for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens and Youth (who later became President of the European Commission), the country has been doing an about-turn, openly declaring its willingness to encourage births. To this end, it has increased its social benefits for families and built a large number of crèches. Indeed, the lack of childcare facilities is a factor weighing on the birth rate, driving many German mothers to work part-time to look after their children. German family policy is now one of the most expensive in the world.
The country ranks 23rd in the world for longest life expectancy. This is 83.4 years for women and 78.7 years for men. In 1950, it was 68.5 for women and 64.6 for men. According to the Swiss Federal Statistical Office, life expectancy could reach 88.2 years for women and 84.6 years for men by 2070. This increase in life expectancy also plays a role in the aging of the population.
In terms of population distribution, there is a relatively even, decentralized distribution across the country. The country boasts no fewer than 15 cities with more than 500,000 inhabitants, compared with only 4 in France, and 4 cities with more than one million inhabitants, compared with only one in France. Most of these cities are located in the west of the country, where strong industrialization has led to a high concentration of population, particularly in North Rhine-Westphalia. The Ruhr region and the banks of the Rhine are particularly densely populated, with many large cities, such as Cologne, Düsseldorf and Dortmund, often without distinct boundaries. But it's Berlin, with 3.7 million inhabitants (4.4 including the conurbation), that has the largest population, followed by Hamburg (1.8 million), Munich (1.5 million), Cologne (1 million), Frankfurt am Main (775,000), Stuttgart (632,000) and Düsseldorf (630,000). The country boasts more than 80 cities with more than 100,000 inhabitants, twice as many as France. Indeed, Germans are a particularly urban population, with almost 80% living in cities and a third of the total population living in towns with more than 100,000 inhabitants.
The family continues to play an important role in Germany, and according to a survey by the Allensbach Institute, more than three-quarters of the population place the family at the top of their list of priorities. The marriage rate (number of marriages in relation to the population) is above the EU average, at 4.3 marriages per 1,000 inhabitants, compared with just 2.3 in France, the country with the lowest rate. By the same token, around a third of marriages end in divorce, whereas in France, half are dissolved. Although, as in all developed countries, the traditional family structure is in decline, married couples with children still account for almost 70% of German family configurations, followed by single-person households. Since 1999, the proportion of unmarried couples with children has doubled. Single-parent families are also on the increase.
Finally, Germany has a highly educated population overall, 96% of whom have completed high school. Most of them attend public schools, while 9% are enrolled in private schools. According to the OECD, by 2023, one-third of the population aged 25-34 will have attained a higher level of education, compared with 46% in France. This is due to the fact that almost half of Germans attend or have attended vocational school, with a technical or craft apprenticeship, which far exceeds the European average. This is also the reason why women have more university degrees than men, who are more represented in technical training.
The origin of Germans
The Germans are descended from the Germanic peoples, who themselves came from northern Europe in the 1st century B.C. They were not in fact a united community, but various barbarian tribes, which the Romans included under the name of "Germans". These included Saxons, Franks, Bavarians, Cheruscians and Batavians. In the Middle Ages, these tribes organized themselves into various autonomous territories, forming the beginnings of the German federal tradition. Today, some German states still bear the names of the Germanic tribes who populated them: the Bavarians in Bavaria, the Thuringians in Thuringia, the Saxons in Saxony and Lower Saxony, the Westphalians in North Rhine-Westphalia..
Their unification to form the Germans took place in many stages, from the formation of a confederation of Germanic nations under the name of Alamanni in the 1st century, to the Napoleonic wars of the 19th century, which first gave rise to the idea of founding a German nation. The nation was not actually founded until 1871.
In 1913, the German Nationality Code established that the only way to be a German was by blood. You had to have at least one German parent, regardless of your place of birth. Since January1, 2000, this right of blood has been joined by a right of soil, now recognized under certain conditions: a child born on German soil can obtain German nationality, provided that both parents have lived in the country for at least 8 years, with unlimited residence authorization. Since 2014, dual nationality has also been permitted under certain conditions.
A multicultural population
Germany has always been a destination for immigrants. Today, 22.3 million people living here have an immigrant background, representing a quarter of the population. Around half of them now hold a German passport. Germany is also the world's second-largest recipient of migrants. It does not carry out ethnic censuses, so it is difficult to assess the share of each population in society.
Slavic immigration is one of the country's oldest. As early as the5th century, Slavic peoples migrated to eastern Germany. They settled in the regions corresponding to the present-day Länder of Saxony, Brandenburg and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. In the Middle Ages, they even established independent territories, such as that of the Obodrites in present-day Mecklenburg. Even today, some towns in western Germany bear names of Slavic origin, such as Dresden, which means "swampy forest", Leipzig, which in Slavic means "city of lime trees", or Zwickau, named after an ancient Slavic sun god. Over the centuries, however, the conquests of the Holy Roman Empire gradually assimilated these Slavic peoples. The Sorbs succeeded in resisting this Germanization, and have maintained a cultural unity in the Lusatian region. This region stretches along the Polish border, east of Saxony and southeast of Brandenburg. During the Cold War, the Sorbs were even supported and protected by the GDR. Although they are now a minority within Lusatia, to the point of being the smallest of all Slavic peoples, they have retained a strong socio-cultural cohesion. The Sorbs speak the Sorbian language, which is close to Polish, and have their own flag, officially recognized anthem, books, schools, films... They are now considered a national minority under German law. An estimated 70,000 Sorbs live in Germany, mainly in Lusatia.
However, the Sorbs are not the only Slavs in Germany, even if they are the ones who have retained the strongest cultural cohesion. In the 19th century, many Poles joined the country to work in the Ruhr coal mines. Germans referred to them as Ruhrpolen, or "Ruhr Poles". In 1910, they accounted for 30% of the population of this industrial region in western Germany. Today, there are an estimated 800,000 Poles of Polish nationality, and between 2 and 3 million of Polish origin, mainly concentrated in the Ruhr area. Other Slavic immigrants were brought to the country by the wars in Yugoslavia, which shook the Balkan peninsula in the 1990s. Many of the country's citizens are of Serbian, Montenegrin or Bosnian origin.
In 1992, as part of the European directive on the protection of national minorities in Europe, Germany declared 4 minorities officially recognized by law. So, in addition to the Sorbs, the country also recognizes the Frisians, Danes and Gypsies, themselves made up of the German Sinti and Roma.
The Frisians are a Germanic people who have inhabited the North Sea coast since Roman times. Over the centuries, they have retained a strong cultural identity and their own language. They are still found in the historic region of Friesland, extending into the Netherlands and Germany, in the present-day Länder of Schleswig-Holstein and Lower Saxony, mainly on the islands of Friesland. Today, Schleswig-Holstein is home to around 10,000 speakers of the Frisian language, and there are around 50,000 people in the country who identify themselves as Frisian.
Schleswig-Holstein is also home to another of the four national minorities: the German Danes. They are simply an indigenous population, who have lived here since the region was Danish. Their community has been recognized by Germany since 1955 under a binational agreement, which implies that Denmark also recognizes the German minority on its territory. It is estimated that there are around 50,000 Danes in Germany.
Finally, the Sintés and Roma are peoples who are thought to have left India during the High Middle Ages, and integrated into Germany around 600 years ago. Persecuted and executed by the Nazis during the Second World War, these populations had to wait long after the war for their rights to be recognized, due to persistent anti-Gypsyism. Today, Germany is working to make this memory known, and in 2012, for example, inaugurated a memorial in Berlin to the European Sinti and Roma murdered during the Nazi era. Today, the country is home to around 70,000 Roma, who are officially recognized as one of the four national minorities.
Although Germany has long been a host country, mass immigration only began around 1950, to provide the country's booming industrial sector with the manpower it lacked. The Germans referred to these immigrant workers as Gastarbeiter, literally "guest workers". Initially Polish and Italian, this mass immigration became mainly Turkish from 1960 onwards. In 1961, Germany and Turkey signed a labor recruitment agreement. Today, almost 3 million people of Turkish origin live in Germany, making them the country's largest foreign community. Like the Polish community, which also arrived in the 20th century to lend a hand to the country's flourishing industry, Turks are mainly settled in the industrial regions of North Rhine-Westphalia, Baden-Württemberg and Bavaria. The Turkish population is much less concentrated in the east of the country, except in Berlin, notably in the district of Berlin-Neukölln. Since their arrival, the Turkish population of Germany has left a considerable imprint on the cultural landscape. Turkish is now the country's second most widely spoken language, while Turkish specialties have become an integral part of popular culture. The famous kebab served in a loaf of bread was invented in the 1970s by a Turkish immigrant living in Berlin.
Since 2015, new profiles have been arriving in Germany. Indeed, during the European migration crisis, Angela Merkel advocated a no-holds-barred welcome policy, once again to cope with labor shortages, but also in a humanistic spirit, so much so that it is the European country to have received the most migrants. In 2015 alone, the country welcomed 1.1 million immigrants, an absolute record in its history. These are mainly war refugees from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan. They mainly came to the federal states of Baden-Württemberg and Bavaria, but also to Berlin. Germany, through its public services and private sector alike, is making great efforts to improve their integration. To date, around 50% of those of working age have been integrated into the job market.
Since February 2022, Germany has seen more migrants fleeing war, this time from the Ukraine. By 2023, some 1.1 million Ukrainians were living in Germany. Along with Poland, Germany is Europe's leading host country for this population. Here too, the government is trying to facilitate their integration into the job market.
Germans in the world
Germans are a particularly mobile population. Between 2009 and 2024, the country lost an average of 25,000 of its nationals per year. Today, their profiles are mainly those of young, often highly qualified graduates. Switzerland is their country of choice, followed by the USA, then Austria, Poland, the UK, Spain and France. There are estimated to be between 100 and 150 million Germans in the world, of either nationality or origin. If the United States is today the main non-European country of emigration for Germans, it's because the country has always been a land of welcome for them. In the 17th and 18th centuries, many Germans crossed the Atlantic to escape poverty and religious conflict, and established communities in North America. In the United States, no less than 15% of the population is of German origin, making it the country's second largest European community. In 1873, North Dakota named its capital city Bismarck, after the Chancellor of the German Empire, in the hope of attracting new German nationals. Indeed, even today, the North American states are those with the strongest German communities. Indeed, many American specialties were brought over by Germans, such as the hamburger, which originated in Hamburg, or the hot dog, originally topped with frankfurter. Not to mention American personalities of German descent, such as Donald Trump. In the aftermath of the Second World War, a significant number of Germans also turned to another country on the continent: Canada. According to the 2011 Canadian census, some 3.3 million Canadians claim German origins.
Latin America is also home to a large number of German descendants, estimated at 15 million. In the 19th century, many German peasants migrated to the country to provide labor for the plantations. Between 1824 and 1960, 350,000 of them moved to Brazil, particularly to the southern states of Rio Grande do Sul and Santa Catarina, where the largest community remains today. Their descendants still retain a strong German cultural identity, to the extent that a German dialect persists in these states:Hunsrückisch. This dialect, which is older than modern German, originated in Rhineland-Palatinate. It is also spoken, on a lesser scale, in certain regions of Argentina, where German immigration has also been significant. This was particularly rich at the end of the 19th century, and took a dramatic turn following Germany's defeat in the Second World War, when a number of Nazi leaders fled to Argentina. Today, Argentina is home to 3 million Germans of German origin or nationality.
