Caroline Eichhorn, a 27-year-old grassroots cadre, witnessed the magnificent turn of the German Social Democratic Party (SPD). "Less than a year ago, many people tried their best not to have anything to do with the Social Democratic Party, and they were all afraid of getting our’ political poison’." Caroline laughed at herself to The Paper (www.thepaper.cn) recently. "Now we can meet people from all walks of life and basically see smiling faces."
On September 27th, 2021, in Berlin, Germany, Scholz, leader of the Social Democratic Party and candidate for prime minister, accepted flowers. Pengpai image map
On the evening of September 26th, local time, the German Bundestag election ended, and the 16-year Merkel era was about to come to an end. The Social Democratic Party won a slight lead in the election.
Since joining the Social Democratic Party in 2016, Caroline has never seen such a "grand occasion": crowded local party departments, fresh young faces and relaxed expressions of party member people. These are long-lost sights, which seem to only appear in the history of the party. "For colleagues whose party age is similar to mine, everyone’s mood is similar. These days are a bit like a holiday." Caroline told The Paper.
Her words are not exaggerated in general, and the Social Democrats do have reason to rejoice. In the second half of Merkel’s period, this old-fashioned political party, which once represented the European social democratic movement, has almost been concluded by public opinion: if we search the media reports of the past few years, in addition to the German media themselves, the mainstream English media often rudely evaluate the Social Democratic Party as a "dying political antique".
After winning the election, public opinion was decisively reversed. The British "Guardian" even talked about the overall rise of the European Social Democratic Party after the German election. This old party, which was born in 1863, has a "second spring" for a time. Although its advantages are weak and the future of forming a cabinet is not clear, it has not prevented Caroline and her colleagues from entering the celebration mode.
"political antiques" turn over
When she first joined the Social Democratic Party, Caroline felt that she might be a minority among her peers. At that time, she had just finished the Erasmus exchange program in Rennes, a small town in western France, and returned to Mannheim to finish her last year of college.
"Why do you want to join such a doddering party? This is the question I was most often asked by my friends at that time. " Caroline recalled, "I was advised that if I have a sense of mission to environmental protection, I should not hesitate to join the Green Party with a bright future, and that is where future leaders gather; If I am obsessed with social justice, I can consider the Die Linke, which keeps refreshing my sense of existence. Why do you want to tie your personal future to the dying Social Democratic Party? "
The Social Democratic Party suffered a crushing defeat in the 2009 federal parliamentary election. In 2013, it won 25.7% of the votes, and the election rebounded slightly, but it was still firmly suppressed by the 41.5% of the votes of the Alliance Party. Shortly after Caroline joined in 2017, the Social Democratic Party won only 20% of the votes in the general election. It can be said that during the entire Merkel era, the Social Democratic Party was deeply in the shadow of the Coalition party.
Traditionally, the Social Democratic Party and the CDU are two major competitors in German politics. In Merkel’s current government, the Social Democratic Party and the Coalition Party (CDU/CSU) were in power together out of helplessness. However, this does not prevent Scholz, the candidate of the Social Democratic Party as prime minister, from portraying herself as some kind of successor to Merkel’s legacy in her campaign strategy.
Zheng Chunrong, director of the German Studies Center of Tongji University, told The Paper that Scholz just enjoyed the "ruling bonus" of Merkel’s government. As a member of the cabinet, he faced major challenges such as the epidemic together with Merkel. If voters think that Merkel’s government has any ruling achievements, it is also due to Scholz. In addition, the Social Democratic Party has long recommended Scholz, who is not even the leader of the Party, as the candidate for prime minister. No matter how low the polls were, the Social Democratic Party did not split and fight, which also helped Scholz to build his steady image.
For the sake of public relations, Scholz also imitated some behaviors of Merkel, such as the common diamond gesture. This was immediately dismissed by the German media as a poor imitation, and was also accused by Merkel herself. However, in addition to his superficial actions, the strategy of forcibly getting involved with Merkel did have a certain effect. After all, the Social Democratic Party has worked with Merkel for many years, and some Coalition party voters have less doubts and strangeness. They can abandon the Coalition party for change, but they will not give their votes to the Green Party or the radical left party for prudent reasons.
Scholz imitates Merkel’s gestures.
Unexpected votes
Caroline was very impressed by a voter who worked for Daimler. His name is Constantine and he works as an engineer in Daimler’s factory in Mannheim. Constantine is over 40 years old and has long been accustomed to the stability and comfort of Merkel’s era. In the past few elections, he voted for the CDU.
"When I visited him a few months ago, I thought it was just a routine, and he would definitely continue to vote for the CDU." Caroline said, "I didn’t expect him to catch me that day and ask a series of questions, from industrial policy to employee welfare to energy transformation, for an hour and a half." Caroline’s interviewee lives in a three-story villa with a small garden, which is furnished with a sense of design and has a corner dedicated to collecting various classic models of Daimler’s cars.
Constantine has been engaged in the development and improvement of fuel engines in the factory for many years. As the technical backbone of a century-old factory, he told Caroline that he can earn more than 5,000 euros a month, and he also has more than 40 days of paid holidays every year, and he can take his wife and three children to Australia, Iceland and Turkey for holidays abroad. Therefore, for Constantine, Daimler provides not only a job opportunity, but a lifelong career. But in the second half of Merkel’s era, he saw the outline of the crisis looming.
"Before showing his interest in the Social Democratic Party, Constantine told me his worries." Caroline recalled that the mainstream consensus in German society today is to phase out fossil fuels, and the differences between various parties are only a matter of timetable, not necessity. If the transformation must come, as a practitioner in the automobile industry, he hopes that the change will not be too radical, and that engineers and senior skilled workers can live under a government that pays attention to protecting the rights and interests of employees. "
Daimler factory in Mannheim in the 1920s.
Daimler company is not a wave in the tide of green energy transformation in Germany. According to The New York Times, Daimler didn’t release its first car that uses electricity completely until this year, and in order to conform to the industry trend, the company has set a grand plan to eliminate internal combustion engines in 2030. A senior engineer named Alexander hinted at the pessimism about the employment prospects in an interview with the US media. "An internal combustion engine needs 1,200 parts, and 200 is enough if electricity is used."
As Constantine told Caroline, all the major political parties in Germany, except the Choice Party, said that climate and energy transformation should be the priorities of the next government, and they all promised voters a timetable to achieve carbon neutrality. The center-left Social Democratic Party and the Coalition Party have been in power for many years, and like the CDU, they all advocate carbon neutrality by 2045 at the latest. In Germany, where green issues have swept public opinion, this is a relatively satisfactory formulation. In contrast, the Green Party calls for carbon neutrality within 20 years, and renewable energy will replace all fossil fuels and nuclear power generation by 2035, for which the sales of new internal combustion engines will be gradually stopped around 2030.
Like most of his colleagues, Constantine is a member of Daimler’s trade union. According to Deutsche Welle, most employees of Daimler have joined trade unions, and half of the company’s supervisory board are members of trade unions. In the eyes of those who admire "Made in Germany", strong trade unions, favorable treatment, stable security and sufficient vocational skills training opportunities have maintained the long-term loyalty of outstanding engineers and workers to the company.
It is not difficult to understand that Constantine, who is tired of the CDU, has few choices left. The Social Democratic Party is the only option that does not pursue too radical energy transformation, emphasizes the welfare protection of employees and brings its own "stable old party" color. The Social Democratic Party has been called the "guardian" of national economic security by the German media, and Scholz belongs to the slightly right wing of the party, which is closer to the economic line of former Chancellor Schroeder with a slightly neoliberal color.
"This is an unexpected ticket." After harvesting Constantine’s vote, Caroline commented, "To some extent, it is also the legacy left by Merkel to our Social Democratic Party."
Fragmentation and "Introversion to Germany"
Not only the Social Democratic Party, but also the Merkel era left an indelible mark on the entire German political arena. Since the parliamentary elections in 2017, there has been a further fragmentation of "the big party is not big and the small party is not small" in German politics. This election has not changed the overall situation. It is even more and more clear that the biggest winner of the election is not the Social Democratic Party, which won the most votes, but the small parties, the Liberal Democratic Party and the Green Party, which cannot be bypassed in forming a cabinet.
Following the development of the situation two days after the election, Caroline’s joy gradually faded. "How can there be an atmosphere in which the Liberal Democratic Party and the Green Party are really in power now?" Caroline said. This statement may be exaggerated, but it accurately reflects the reality that both the Social Democratic Party and the Coalition Party want from them.
On September 29th, Social Democratic Party Secretary-General Klinebel announced that negotiations on the formation of a cabinet would be officially started on October 3rd. Klinebel, Scholz and others will hold consultations with the leaders of the Liberal Democratic Party and the Green Party. The Social Democratic Party also said that there was "no plan B" for forming a cabinet, which meant that the Social Democratic Party would no longer form a cabinet with the Coalition party, and almost regarded the "traffic light" cabinet (Social Democratic Party, Green Party and Liberal Democratic Party) as the only option.
On the other hand, Sheila Schet, the prime minister candidate of the Coalition party and the leader of the Christian Democratic League, and Xizede, the leader of the Christian Social League, also announced on the same day that they had reached an agreement within the Coalition party and would strive for leadership to form a cabinet. They also sent letters to the leaders of the Liberal Democratic Party and the Green Party to congratulate the election results, in order to win the support of the two parties for the Coalition party’s cabinet formation plan.
As the fragmentation of political parties intensifies, the aging population in Germany is also accelerating: compared with the 2017 election, the gap between the number of middle-aged and elderly voters eligible to vote and young voters has further widened, and more than half of the voters are over 50 years old. This voter structure also affects the weight of the election results determined by grand issues such as climate change.
Although climate change has become one of the top topics of public concern in Germany in recent years, there are signs before the general election, and people’s interest in grand narrative may not be as high as public opinion expected.
According to Politico, a political news website, German voters’ general concern about climate reached its peak during the flood in July this year, but it failed to become the key to the direction of votes. Many voters have different opinions. According to a poll before voting, more than half of the voters claimed that environmental protection and climate change were the most important issues, but in fact, less than a quarter of them used them to decide the ownership of their votes.
According to an online survey conducted by German media "German Editorial Network" (RND) and research company YouGov, Germans aged 18-29 are most concerned about environmental issues (53% of respondents choose), while those aged 30-54 (63%) and those aged 55 and over (79%) are most concerned about pensions. In addition, half or more respondents aged 18 to 29 are concerned about health, pension and education.
Two weeks before the general election, polls showed that environmental climate and energy transformation surpassed the COVID-19 epidemic and became the most concerned topics for German voters. However, this unprecedented concern has not brought direct benefits to the Green Party, which holds high the climate banner. When the Green Party announced in April this year that it had elected 40-year-old Anna Lena Berber as the candidate for prime minister, it caused a heated discussion, and the support rate once rushed to the first place, but when the voting approached, Berber’s popularity had fallen back to the third place.
Another surprising thing is that European issues are almost ignored by all parties. Caroline, who studied European politics, admitted that she felt that European issues were "left out" in the process of contacting voters. First of all, many elderly voters are not very interested in this. "As an individual, the European issue is certainly not the most concerned thing, and I understand the voters." Caroline explained that a large number of elderly voters are first concerned about pensions and social security, and what they are looking for from the Social Democratic Party is more certainty than a revolutionary narrative of European integration.
On September 26th, 2021, local time, Berlin, Germany, after the election, candidates from all parties participated in the TV debate. Pengpai image map
This phenomenon has also been captured by the keen French media. To the great embarrassment of European neighbors, in the public TV debate, none of the candidates of the major parties systematically and comprehensively expounded their views on EU construction. The French media le figaro commented that this was very difficult to understand, because Germany, as one of the pillars of the EU, had many reasons to think carefully about where the EU would go in the future general election.
The French media commented with some regret that the German election paid too much attention to domestic issues. The German media "Sü ddeutsche Zeitung" also admitted that at such a crucial election campaign moment that all of Europe paid attention to Germany, the Germans "did not bother to cast a glance at Europe". Of course, there are factors that voters care more about daily life. But at a deeper level, le figaro commented that it also reflected that after the EU experienced many crises (debt, refugees and COVID-19), ordinary people realized that the nation-state was back, and the governments of member countries were often able to respond to crises more quickly than transnational institutions.
"My major in France is European studies. I still remember how this experience shaped me and my classmates into Europhile. Another reason for choosing the Social Democratic Party is that I believe in a more United Europe. " Caroline recalled in French, which is still fluent today, "With rich experience of studying and traveling in many countries, I returned to my hometown of Mannheim. It didn’t take long for me to find out that the imagination of politics in my student days may be a little too romantic. At that time, I had to talk to my classmates about the grand propositions of Britain’s Brexit and the EU’s climate response. In my hometown, I found that I still had to face daily necessities in politics. "
"Besides, after the baptism of the COVID-19 epidemic, the actual side of people’s mentality is also revealed. Perhaps it is not just myself that has changed. Compared with a few years ago, Germany seems to have become more introverted. " Caroline said.
(At the request of the interviewee, Caroline and Constantine are pseudonyms.)
