On Sunday, Germany will hold an election that contains at least five unknowns. If it were an equation, it would be impossible to solve. Fortunately, politics is not mathematics though, unfortunately, this means that there are no clear solutions. Indeed, even in the opaque terms of contemporary politics, the German case is particularly vexing.
The first unknown is why the election is taking place at all. Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder had another 15 months to go before the end of the electoral term and it seemed that he had no difficulty mobilizing his admittedly slender majority in parliament.
To be sure, the big issues that the Federal President listed when he dissolved the Bundestag are real. The fiscal position is, by German standards, unacceptable, and public debt at current levels is contrary to the EU's Stability and Growth Pact and a burden on future generations. Demographic developments alone require major reforms of social policy. Moreover, the institutions of the federal system do not permit decisions to be made either expeditiously or clearly.
None of this is new, nor will it be changed by an election. So it is not obvious to many people why they are voting.
The second unknown concerns what, exactly, separates the major parties in this contest. The Social Democrats (SPD) and the Christian Democrats (CDU) are both committed to the "social market economy," to the essentials of corporatist economic management, to maintaining the entitlements of the welfare state, and to the EU and NATO.
True, the campaign has brought out nuances that may turn out to be important. Schroeder's SPD uses the word "social" a little more emphatically than it did in the last seven years. The opposition CDU leader, Angela Merkel, has linked its program to the ambitious ideas of an outsider, former constitutional court judge Paul Kirchhof, seeking a dramatic simplification of the tax system.
In international affairs, Merkel is more skeptical about European enlargement, notably to include Turkey, than Schroeder. Merkel, an East German by background, is also more cautious in her approach to Russia. But these are nuances, not fundamental differences.
The third unknown is the performance of the Left Party, a new formation positioned to the left of the SPD and built on East Germany's ex-communist PDS, with the addition of a significant number of dissident Social Democrats in the West who proclaim themselves to be defenders of the welfare state.
The Left Party is led by two talk-show politicians, Gregor Gysi, the former PDS leader, and Oskar Lafontaine, the ex-leader of the SPD, who do not have much more in common than a record of political failure and a talent for populist speeches. But this clearly appeals to those who feel that they have been neglected and forgotten. The popular vote for this party -- which could be 10 percent -- may well determine what kind of coalition is formed after the election.
The fourth unknown is therefore what the next government will actually do. It will clearly be a government without the new Left Party. It will also be a government without the Greens, who continue to have a devoted, if limited, clientele, but are now regarded by many as a luxury that Germany can no longer afford. This leaves two possibilities: a coalition between the CDU, its Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union, and the liberal Free Democrats, or a grand coalition between the SPD and the CDU.
The latter is what most Germans want; the former is what they are most likely to get. But most people doubt whether it even makes a difference, and they are probably right. There is a widespread desire for change, including a change of government, but there is an equally widespread belief that nothing momentous will happen.
This underscores the final, and deepest, unknown concerning the upcoming election: Who will put a confused and directionless Germany back on a road to initiative and growth? Who will make Germany an engine of Europe again rather than a gloomy passenger?
What Germany needs is, in fact, fairly clear. It needs to accept that globalization is above all an opportunity, one that must be grasped by confident, innovative, and entrepreneurial people. Germans need to understand again -- as they did so well after 1945 -- that their future lies in their own hands, as citizens, rather than in the power of some remote State.
Above all, Germany must appreciate that the changes it needs are improvements that would guarantee its future security. Perhaps what it requires most is a touch of former UK prime minister Margaret Thatcher's policies of the 1980s, combined with incumbent British Prime Minister Tony Blair's rhetoric of today. But it remains to be seen whether, or when, that might be on offer.
Ralf Dahrendorf, author of numerous acclaimed books and a former European Commissioner from Germany, is a member of the British House of Lords, a former rector of the London School of Economics and a former warden of St. Antony's College, Oxford.
Copyright: Project Syndicate/Institute for Human Sciences
The return of US president-elect Donald Trump to the White House has injected a new wave of anxiety across the Taiwan Strait. For Taiwan, an island whose very survival depends on the delicate and strategic support from the US, Trump’s election victory raises a cascade of questions and fears about what lies ahead. His approach to international relations — grounded in transactional and unpredictable policies — poses unique risks to Taiwan’s stability, economic prosperity and geopolitical standing. Trump’s first term left a complicated legacy in the region. On the one hand, his administration ramped up arms sales to Taiwan and sanctioned
The Taiwanese have proven to be resilient in the face of disasters and they have resisted continuing attempts to subordinate Taiwan to the People’s Republic of China (PRC). Nonetheless, the Taiwanese can and should do more to become even more resilient and to be better prepared for resistance should the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) try to annex Taiwan. President William Lai (賴清德) argues that the Taiwanese should determine their own fate. This position continues the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) tradition of opposing the CCP’s annexation of Taiwan. Lai challenges the CCP’s narrative by stating that Taiwan is not subordinate to the
World leaders are preparing themselves for a second Donald Trump presidency. Some leaders know more or less where he stands: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy knows that a difficult negotiation process is about to be forced on his country, and the leaders of NATO countries would be well aware of being complacent about US military support with Trump in power. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would likely be feeling relief as the constraints placed on him by the US President Joe Biden administration would finally be released. However, for President William Lai (賴清德) the calculation is not simple. Trump has surrounded himself
US president-elect Donald Trump is to return to the White House in January, but his second term would surely be different from the first. His Cabinet would not include former US secretary of state Mike Pompeo and former US national security adviser John Bolton, both outspoken supporters of Taiwan. Trump is expected to implement a transactionalist approach to Taiwan, including measures such as demanding that Taiwan pay a high “protection fee” or requiring that Taiwan’s military spending amount to at least 10 percent of its GDP. However, if the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) invades Taiwan, it is doubtful that Trump would dispatch
RSS