ABSTRACT
Coalition agreements have become a focus for the study of coalition governance. Formalized theories of coalition formation have largely neglected issues of coalition governance. Martin and Vanberg argue that legislative institutions such as plenary debates and the legislative process can provide coalition government MPs with information about the intentions and policy proposals of their coalition partners. It could be argued that portfolio allocation is the most important parameter of coalition governance. Most formal theories of coalition formation assume that parties will form coalitions that maximize their expected utility, although there is no agreement what, precisely, the 'currency' of their expected utility is. It is generally assumed that parties care about office payoffs, policy payoffs and their partie's chances at the next elections. The election of 2013 brought a radical change to the German postwar party system as the FDP disappeared from the Bundestag.
