Astrid Lund - Betty MacDonald fan club organizer: "I am so relieved. Finally, the ever-annoying giant baby and his obese, meaningless companion will disappear into oblivion. They both belonged there for a long time!"

Astrid Lund - Betty MacDonald fan club organizer: "I am so relieved. Finally, the ever-annoying giant baby and his obese, meaningless companion will disappear into oblivion. They both belonged there for a long time!"------------------------------ FOCUS online Commentary by Andreas Herteux - The Greens' downfall: From highs to crash landing Article by FOCUS online expert Andreas Herteux • 9 hours • 5 minutes reading time The upcoming state elections and the 2025 federal election will show whether the party is able to free itself from its crisis or whether it will continue to slide. In 2021, the Greens still dreamed of becoming a people's party. Now they are threatened with total collapse. How did this happen? But are they really at the end? Social researcher Andreas Herteux comments on what can now be expected and what the party's prospects are. The Greens faced a historic moment in 2021: With poll ratings of over 25% and the prospect of taking on a key role in the federal government, the dream of finally becoming a people's party seemed within reach. In the 2019 European elections, two years earlier, it had already reached 20.5%, and in all subsequent state elections, the Greens not only entered the respective parliament, but were even part of the government in seven out of eight cases. The Greens were a firmly established power factor in Germany, and the chancellorship was not unrealistic at the time, no, even within reach. It was to be the beginning of a new era. A high on the wave of post-material ideals such as climate protection, open borders, identity politics, post-colonialism, a social-ecological transformation and global justice, which since the 2010s, spilling over from universities, have determined the course of the media, but also partly - and this is proven by many surveys, even if this is now somewhat negated - the course of society. The time seemed ripe. Green was no longer only voted for in the post-material milieu (approx. 12% of the population), those well-off people who can afford to look beyond everyday worries and devote themselves to higher ideals, or the relatively young neo-ecological reality of life (approx. 8% of the population), which places great value on multiculturalism, diversity and political correctness, but finally also in parts of the middle. The federal election was disappointing, despite a record result of 14.8%, but this could still be blamed on the failed election campaign and the counterproductive choice of the candidate for chancellor. Nevertheless, the Greens were now the governing party. But then something changed. First slowly, then ever faster. At first there were continued successes, and by October 2022 the Greens had gained ground in all state elections. From the end of 2022, however, the effects of the planned or practical implementation of post-material ideals became increasingly visible and viewed more critically. Animal welfare cents, heating law, rejection of previous forms of energy, combustion engines, energy costs, a failed democracy promotion law, failure in the area of ​​migration and integration - not all of this was the Greens' responsibility, but everywhere the imprint of the post-material stamp could be found, which this party knows how to wield with verve like a club. The subsequent elections were consistently marked by losses. But how did it come to this? The reasons are manifold. On the one hand, the party has not been able to live up to its claim to a pragmatic and at the same time idealistic policy. It has not succeeded in transforming the post-materialist ideals into reality. Sometimes these attempts - just think of feminist foreign policy - were absurd from the start and doomed to failure; in other cases, just think of the heating law, the design proved to be unrealistic, socially cold and unworkable. In addition, in cases of doubt, the ideal, some would say ideology, was obviously given priority over pragmatism; an interesting example here would be migration policy. On the other hand, social priorities have shifted. While the Greens continued to focus on post-materialist issues such as climate protection and social justice, for many voters material concerns such as the rising cost of living, the aforementioned migration and internal security came to the fore. This would not have had to happen if the Greens and thus also the traffic light government had striven for balance and attempted to accommodate the different needs of the diverse and fragmented social groups in Germany. But they were just as unsuccessful in doing so as the previous government.