With Macron’s victory and Merkel’s likely re-election, the centre seems to have regained the initiative but it must not be complacent, writes Jürgen Krönig.
“The Establishment strikes back” would be an apt title for a movie about the latest twist in the long drawn out European crisis. From Paris to Brussels and Berlin, governments breathed a sigh of relief. A few months ago the worst seemed possible: A win of right-wing populists, first in Holland, then in France. Angela Merkel, under pressure since her ill-advised unilateral decision to invite Syrian refugees into Europe, might be dethroned in the autumn. And, who knows, the collapse of the EU might follow.
These fears seem now if not rather absurd then at least far-fetched. All signs are that significant majorities across Europa may be deeply unhappy about their governments, about mass immigration and economic policies, especially in southern Europe, but the revolt against the elites is taking a less frightening course.
The fear of a takeover of the Front National plus a possible Frexit was strong enough to drive more than two thirds of French voters into the arms of Emmanuel Macron. The new president of France is really a faux outsider, a former Rothschild banker, made from the cloth of the French Elite. He was for two years an unremarkable minister in a hapless Socialist government but was clever enough to recognise that France needed something fresh, even if a bit of “consumer deception” was required to pull it off successfully.
The moderate left, retreating for quite a while in Europe, is especially enthusiastic about Macron. He is evidence that there is life left in the liberal centre ground, even something like the revival of the “Third Way” could just be beginning.
This might be too optimistic. Macron may be the French Blair but there was no Thatcher preparing the ground for him. Tough and difficult reforms, of job markets, Trade Union laws plus drastic public spending cuts were pushed through in the UK by the Iron Lady, for which both “third way” protagonists, Blair and Brown, expressed admiration and gratitude.
France is not in much better shape than Britain was in the seventies. It would be a near political miracle if the young president of France without a party of his own was able to pull off the painful reforms that his country needs against bitter resistance from the left and right.
One of the lessons of the recent elections across Europe is the demise of the left. From Britain to Holland and France to Germany, the left is in retreat. Wherever they had vacated the centre ground over the last ten years, like Labour in the UK or the SPD in Germany, distancing themselves from what left-wing intellectuals had dismissed as “neoliberalism”, decline had set in early and was significant. Nothing illustrates this process better than the German example after Gerhard Schröder’s “Red – Green” coalition that came to an end in 2005. After the defeat Social Democrats had given in to the lure of “the opposition mode”, no compromises, no realism or pragmatism, the party wanted to create the best possible world.
Under Gerhard Schröder’s version of the Third way the SPD achieved at least more than 35% of the national vote in 2005, a respectable result if not enough to defeat Merkel’s Christian Democrats. In opposition the SPD distanced itself quickly from the moderate reformist course of Schröder, including vital job market and welfare reforms. As a consequence the party lost four years later another 10% and ended with 25%. But the party did not learn the lesson, continued with its disastrous course and ended for a while below 20% in opinion polls.
Its new party leader, Martin Schulz, seemed to be able to turn the fortunes of the SPD around, helped by media hype and the unpopularity of Angela Merkel. But the revival was short-lived. The SPD is falling back, as the recent results in State elections have demonstrated. The Social Democrats might even lose power this weekend in Nordrheinwestfalen, the old industrial heartland of Germany, where they were ruling together with the Greens. The Green Party, having drifted to the left over the last decade, is on a downward spiral, its main figures look old and staid. Most of its policies, reasonable as well as silly ones, have been widely accepted by the other parties; its raison d’etre, “saving the planet”, is not any longer a sufficient and exclusive selling point. Voters are only prepared to stick with them where they present themselves as a reasonable and pragmatic party, as in the South West in Baden Württemberg or in Schleswig Holstein.
The winners in Germany are besides the “untouchables” of the AFD, (the right-wing Eurosceptic and anti-immigration party “Alternative für Deutschland” with which no other party wants to work) the Liberals of the Free Democratic Party, who are more centre right and economic liberals than their British counterpart, and the Christian Democrats themselves. The Free Democrats have recently taken a much more critical position towards Merkel’s policy on immigration and refugees. They were rewarded with remarkably good results in the last few state elections, in Saarland and Schleswig Holstein. They are offering themselves as a civilized form of protest against “Mutti” Merkel, without intending to rob Germany of its powerful Chancellor but intending to form a coalition with her. This is a wise strategy. Angela Merkel remains the most trusted politician in the country, she is seen as a safe pair of hands, despite her miscalculations and mistakes in the past. She secured her position by taking great care throughout the last decade to outmanoeuvre all potential rivals in her own party. There is nobody there at present who could replace her. Furthermore, Merkel secured her position by having shifted slightly to the right too, like Rutte in Holland; she talks tough, spoke out publicly against the Burka, she emphasises the need for Muslims to integrate and accept western laws and values. She even repeated her statement from the early 2000s, long forgotten and never repeated since then, that multiculturalism has failed.
The hopes of Schulz and the SPD to form a coalition with Greens and the post-communist “Left” have been dashed. The best the Social Democrats can hope for after the national elections in September is that they might just be able to form another grand coalition with Merkel’s Christian Democrats.
After fears of populist takeovers and political chaos the elites can breathe more freely. But for how long? The establishment has won time but cannot be complacent. They need to get their act together quickly. Dramatic challenges are waiting around the corner: Brexit might turn ugly and trigger unrest. The crisis of the Eurozone is waiting in the wings, a Euro exit of Greece remains a possibility. The public is fearful of more Islamic terrorism across the continent and the latent threat of “slow Jihad”, the growing presence and demands of fundamentalist, nonviolent Islam in Europe, widely ignored by the liberal elites, but widely felt in the wider population. Last but not least – the age of mass immigration, foremost from Africa and Islamic Asia, will continue to cast a shadow over Europe, will increase tensions and the chances of radical parties if the existing governments, formed mainly by the moderate right, will be unable to find the necessary answers. The first and most serious test will be France.
Jürgen Krönig is a publicist and commentator for German, Swiss and British media and former UK Editor of the German weekly Die Zeit.
Published in May 2017