Annegret
Kramp-Karrenbauer said she would quit after her conservative party
voted with the far right in one German state. Her decision leaves the
race to succeed Angela Merkel wide open, and the country in deep
disarray.
BERLIN
— Germany is troubled. Its democracy is being tested. Its two big
traditional parties, right and left, are shrinking fast. Angela Merkel,
its powerful chancellor of 14 years, is a lame duck.
So
when her chosen successor, Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, announced on
Monday that she would step aside, it was Ms. Merkel’s defeat, too. And
perhaps one for her country and all of Europe.
Monday’s
announcement reinforced a profound sense of malaise and political limbo
in Germany at a time when neighboring capitals are impatiently looking
to Berlin for leadership in a post-Brexit Europe.
Now
faced with a difficult succession struggle, the country is grappling
with an uncomfortable sense of déjà-vu, as the growing power of the far
right echoes the rise of the Nazis in the last century.
“We
desperately need vision, we need a grand strategy, we need leadership,”
said Andrea Römmele, professor of politics at the Berlin-based Hertie
School of Governance. “But Germany is going to be busy with itself for
the next year — it will be navel-gazing.”
“It’s dangerous,” she added.
But what was a defeat for Ms. Merkel and Ms. Kramp-Karrenbauer was a triumph for the far right.
Last Wednesday, a local chapter of their Christian Democratic Union voted with the far-right Alternative for Germany in electing the governor of the state of Thuringia, violating a policy of not allying with the far right.
The
vote defied Ms. Kramp-Karrenbauer, national leader of the Christian
Democrats, and exposed her lack of authority over her center-right
party. It set off five days of political turmoil, culminating in
Monday’s surprise announcement that she would step down as the party’s
chief and its candidate to succeed Ms. Merkel as chancellor.
It
also revealed the creeping influence of Alternative for Germany, known
by its German initials as AfD, on the political direction of the
country.
One way of looking at it, Ms. Römmele said, is: “The AfD has ousted the leader of the Christian Democrats.”
Ms. Kramp-Karrenbauer acknowledged as much on Monday.
“Any
form of rapprochement with the AfD weakens the C.D.U.,” Ms.
Kramp-Karrenbauer said in a news conference announcing her decision.
“We
currently feel strong centrifugal forces in our society and in our
party,” she warned. “We have to be strong, stronger than we are today.”
As
events unfolded in recent days, that sense of urgency was shared by
many Germans, who staged protests in major cities across the country
where demonstrators chanted anti-fascist slogans. Newspaper headlines
bemoaned “a coup,” commentators warned of a “pact with fascism” and a
former interior minister spoke gravely of “a whiff of Weimar” hanging
over the republic.
The Weimar
Republic, Germany’s first, short-lived experience of democracy until it
was abolished by the Nazis, has become a popular reference point in the
current Germany.
Prosperous, powerful
and respected, the Germany of the 2020s is not the Germany of the 1920s,
but some parallels are noteworthy. Then as now, democracy came under
attack from far right terror and political assassinations; last year’s attack on a synagogue in Halle and the murder of a regional politician, Walter Lübcke, by a right-wing extremist, carried dark echoes from a century ago.
The
vote in Thuringia carried its own historic analogy: It was there, in
the dying days of the Weimar Republic more than 90 years ago, that the
Nazis first won power locally, before going on to win nationally.
And they did so with the help of conservative parties.
That
is also why the decision by Ms. Kramp-Karrenbauer, 57, to step aside
raised uncomfortable questions about the direction the Christian
Democrats will take after Ms. Merkel, 65, leaves power next year.
For
now, the party is seriously divided between its more conservative
members who want to join forces with the far right, and those like Ms.
Kramp-Karrenbauer who want to draw a red line against any collaboration.
At
a local level there is increasing pressure on Christian Democratic
leaders to cooperate with the AfD. Not doing so, the AfD argues, ignores
the will of the people.
Alternative
for Germany was quick to hail Ms. Kramp-Karrenbauer’s resignation as a
victory. Alexander Gauland, a senior party leader, welcomed the
announcement as a sign that there was no longer a consensus inside the
Christian Democrats on isolating the AfD.
“It
is completely nonsensical and delusional not to want to work with the
AfD in the long term,” Mr. Gauland said. “Her party grass roots have
long understood this.”
More liberal
voices argue that the country’s traditional parties, left and right,
need to find common cause to protect democracy, rather than sparring and
playing politics for short-term gains as they seek to hold on to power.
Even temporary alliances with the far right have the effect of legitimizing and empowering it, they argue.
“The
conservatives of the Weimar Republic thought they could use Hitler. In
truth, he was using them,” said a recent editorial by the weekly
magazine Der Spiegel.
“They were in
the final stage of democracy’s demise without even realizing it,” it
continued. “Comparisons like this are inherently imperfect, but it can’t
hurt to view the current situation as an early phase like the one
experienced a century ago.”
Adding
to the dangers is the vacuum of authority that is taking shape as
traditional parties weaken. Paradoxically, early elections, ahead of
next year’s scheduled ballot, look less likely in the wake of the
current upheaval.
Both Ms. Merkel’s
Christian Democrats and her coalition partners, the left-wing Social
Democrats, are so feeble that they would stand to lose, potentially
dramatically, if elections were held now.
But a drawn out political limbo carries risks, too.
“There
is a danger that an even bigger power vacuum is forming,” said Annalena
Baerbock, co-leader of the progressive Greens, which have been rising
in the polls as a clear counterweight to the AfD. The conservatives, she
said, “need to clarify how they can ensure a stable government.”
Some of the Christian Democrats’ problems were self-inflicted.
Ms.
Kramp-Karrenbauer, who will remain defense minister, was chosen as
leader of Ms. Merkel’s conservative party in December 2018 and had been widely expected to succeed her as chancellor.
Her
victory at the time, over two more conservative men, had been seen as
an endorsement of Ms. Merkel’s liberal legacy — and a mandate to
preserve it.
But it was a very narrow
victory, and in the 14 months since, Ms. Kramp-Karrenbauer has not only
failed to win over skeptics in her party, she has also lost the support
of some erstwhile allies and has seen her popularity in opinion polls
erode.
In a series of gaffes she managed to offend many people, including the transgender community and YouTube-watching youths.
She
said Monday that she would remain party leader until a replacement —
and candidate for chancellor — can be chosen at a party congress in
December.
Several potential candidates
are waiting in the wings, chief among them Friedrich Merz, who narrowly
lost to Ms. Kramp-Karrenbauer in 2018 but is popular with the Christian
Democrats’ conservative wing.
Mr.
Merz, who once voted against criminalizing rape within marriage, said
this month that he would step down from his job in finance to “serve the
country” more fully.
Another
potential contender is Armin Laschet, the centrist leader of
North-Rhine Westphalia, who is seen as the candidate of continuity and
someone who would find it easy to cooperate with the Greens, a possible
coalition partner.
In the more conservative wing of the Christian Democrats, Ms. Kramp-Karrenbauer’s resignation was welcomed.
Hans-Georg Maassen, a former chief of the intelligence service who resigned in 2018 after his far-right sympathies became known, was among those who celebrated her move.
“The right decision,” he wrote on Twitter. “The C.D.U. now needs a chief who solves problems and isn’t part of the problems.”
Christopher F. Schuetze contributed reporting.
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Wolfgang Hampel's very witty book 'Satire ist mein Lieblingstier' ( Satire is my favourite animal ) is No 1 Buecher de TOP List.
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Satire ist mein Lieblingstier
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