Tag Archive for: Germany

Two speeches in three days as the world changes

Two speeches given three days apart have delivered the inspiring sense of purpose and unity the world needs as it confronts the twin empowered autocrats ruling Moscow and Beijing. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and US President Joe Biden have both risen to the demands of their time in leadership, overturning reservations many held about each before they took up their roles.

Biden is criticised by a barrage of partisan voices who seem unable to recognise even his hard-to-deny, extraordinary achievements. Right now, none is so obviously manifest and powerful as the broad international unity he has worked to create and is now driving, with partners like Germany’s Olaf Scholz, the EU’s Ursula von der Leyden, Britain’s Boris Johnson, France’s Emmanuel Macron, Japan’s Fumio Kushida, South Korea’s Moon Jae-in, Australia’s Scott Morrison and other leaders of powerful states from Oslo to Tokyo and many capitals in between.

These national leaders are joined by many others: international organisations, financial organisations (SWIFT), oil companies (BP, Shell), investors, reserve bank heads, sporting organisations (football, tennis, basketball, Formula 1 racing), civil rights groups, and even cyber hackers (Anonymous). A common feature of this messy but united international grouping is that they all understand what’s at stake in Ukraine and in dealing with Russian President Vladimir Putin and his shrinking group of international supporters and protectors.

This extraordinary coalition resisting Putin’s attempt to impose his view of world order—which he shares with his ‘no limits’ partner in Beijing, Xi Jinping—would not exist without the leadership of Biden, Scholz and von der Leyden.

Who would have predicted the steely resolve and speed of action of any of these three in the way we’ve seen in recent weeks? Maybe, in Biden’s case, those who noticed him getting trillion-dollar infrastructure spending through a divided Congress while convening the Quad leaders’ group and creating the AUKUS military technology accelerator with the UK and Australia. But certainly not Putin, his foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, or his hybrid warfare theorist and chief of the Russian general staff, Valery Gerasimov. And certainly not Xi, Minister of National Defence General Wei Fenghe and the rest of Xi’s secretive, purge-anxious advisers and acolytes.

This is not the decadent, divided West and declining democratic world that the narratives out of Beijing’s and Moscow’s propaganda machines have led some to believe. It’s not the introspective and self-doubting America Biden inherited, or the fractured and difficult set of transatlantic partnerships that characterised Donald Trump’s term, shown to the world in those surreal meetings with European leaders like Angela Merkel and Macron. And it’s not the Europe that desperately hoped to be able to ‘engage’ Putin and turn a blind eye to his growing belligerence and aggression while opening new gas pipelines to double down on dependency.

Sure, Putin can take much of the credit for galvanising and uniting this international action against him, and for forcing broken assumptions about how the world works and the policies based on them to change. In this way, he has changed the course of history and his place in it.

But the purpose, resolve, clarity and speed of action that Biden, von der Leyden and Scholz have given us in their decisions, their coalition-building and now in these two speeches is profound—steeled no doubt by the extraordinary personal courage, leadership and inspiration of Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky. Let’s manage to bring ourselves to recognise this despite prejudices, differences and partisan perspectives that may be deeply held but now are simply excess baggage to be left behind in the face of a common challenge.

In the first days of Putin’s war, von der Leyden was one of the architects of the rapidly implemented and growing international sanctions against Russia. She led the EU to act on long-debated defence issues, like an independent European defence capability and the use of EU funding to deliver urgently needed military assistance to Ukraine, and she has created momentum for Europe to shift from its dependence on Russian energy towards more diversified supply, along with an accelerated move to renewable energy. One of her insights has been to identify broader trends Europe should be working towards—like renewables—and to accelerate action on them in confronting Putin.

As we heard in his State of the Union address this week, Biden has used his domestic agenda—on innovation, jobs and infrastructure—in the same way, and America’s exit from the dark days of the pandemic is another source of energy and momentum.

The larger sense of purpose and common challenge that began with early sanctions and growing international unity has now been crystallised through Scholz’s and Biden’s words.

Scholz said on Sunday:

We are living through a watershed era. And that means that the world afterwards will no longer be the same as the world before.

The issue at the heart of this is whether power is allowed to prevail over law. Whether we permit Putin to turn the clock back to the nineteenth century and the age of great powers. Or whether we have it in us to keep warmongers like Putin in check.

That requires strength of our own. We fully intend to secure our freedom, our democracy and our prosperity.

Three days later, Biden told us:

Vladimir Putin sought to shake the foundations of the free world, thinking he could make it bend to his menacing ways. But he badly miscalculated …

Throughout our history we’ve learned this lesson: when dictators do not pay a price for their aggression they cause more chaos …

Putin’s latest attack on Ukraine was premeditated and unprovoked … He thought the West and NATO wouldn’t respond. And he thought he could divide us at home. Putin was wrong … We spent months building a coalition of other freedom-loving nations from Europe and the Americas to Asia and Africa to confront him.

When the history of this era is written, Putin’s war on Ukraine will have left Russia weaker and the rest of the world stronger.

Already, word-count analysts have said Biden’s speech contained too little about his major strategic priority—China. That’s a superficial reading. His statement that, ‘In the battle between democracy and autocracy, democracies are rising to the moment’ will be read and understood in Beijing as much as in Moscow. Similarly, the foundational elements of his speech that describe American strategy and domestic and international renewal are formed by the challenge of China, now joined with Russia through their partnership and Putin’s catalytic actions. The message Biden directed straight at Xi was chilling: ‘it is never a good bet to bet against the American people.’

Both leaders are backing their words of resolve and hope with actions. Scholz has reversed decades of concreted-in German policy on defence that constrained its power from playing a positive role in the world and investing €100 billion in new money into military capability, along with overturning the ‘untouchable’ path to growing energy dependence on Russia that he inherited from Merkel.

Biden has been absolute on America’s security commitments to every member of NATO—including Russia’s neighbours Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia and Poland—and every inch of NATO territory. Both Scholz and Biden acted on initiatives to supply Ukraine and provide humanitarian assistance to its people.

The leadership, unity-building, actions and resolve of leaders like Biden, Scholz and von der Leyden has to continue over the months and years ahead and confront more of the ugliness we must expect in the war in Ukraine and the suffering of the Ukrainian—and Russian—people inflicted by Putin.

Internationally, care will be needed to separate the confused and the cowed from those who support and sustain Putin—whether through their carefully chosen language to divide and slow international action, by helping him to subvert international sanctions or by providing him with material and financial support to sustain his war.

But for now, let’s welcome the leadership we see and bend our own will and actions in support.

New government signals a more daring Germany

After eight weeks of negotiations, Germany has a new government. For the Social Democrat Olaf Scholz, who succeeds Angela Merkel as chancellor, the much-anticipated coalition agreement augurs nothing less than a revitalised progressive Mitte, or centre—and a far bolder Germany.

The coalition agreement was drafted behind closed doors, with little news leaking out. But it’s safe to assume that forging it was no easy feat. This is the first national-level three-party alliance since the 1950s, and the Social Democrats, the Greens and the liberal Free Democrats have plenty to disagree about.

Meanwhile, Germany is once again being pummelled by Covid-19—the fourth wave of a pandemic that has been exacerbated by popular complacency, administrative inefficiency and squabbling between state governments and the federal authorities. Add to that a darkening economic outlook and a looming migration crisis, and negotiators knew that they would be presenting the coalition agreement to a weary and wary public.

And yet, remarkably, party leaders produced a distinctly hopeful document. That much is clear in the title: ‘Dare to make more progress’—a clear allusion to Chancellor Willy Brandt’s 1969 speech to the Bundestag, in which he urged Germans to ‘dare more democracy’. But where exactly does Germany’s new government hope to make progress?

On the domestic front, several objectives stand out. Scholz’s government will seek to adopt a more flexible approach to the debt brake, which bars public authorities from excessive borrowing. It also promises to modernise the social security system, by replacing the unpopular Hartz-IV unemployment and welfare program with a less stringent Bürgergeld (citizen allowance) that includes incentives for education and training. And it proposes strengthening support systems for families with young children, raising the minimum wage to €12 ($19) per hour, and allocating €1 billion ($1.6 billion) for one-time payment to reward healthcare workers for their efforts during the pandemic.

Major structural reforms are on the agenda as well. These include phasing out coal and increasing the share of renewable energy from 45% to 80% by 2030, investing heavily in university–industry partnerships to encourage innovation and support start-ups, introducing major tax incentives for businesses investing in digital infrastructure and technologies, increasing the share of women in tech, and rapidly digitising public administration. The coalition agreement also commits the new government to investing in neglected public transportation and removing administrative impediments that slow the acquisition of permits and approvals.

Last but not least, Germany’s new leaders pledge to overhaul Germany’s immigration framework to make citizenship or residency easier to obtain, work to make housing more affordable, including by expanding public housing, and legalise the production, sale and consumption of cannabis.

Beyond Germany’s borders, the coalition agreement makes a full and clear commitment to the European project. For example, it calls for deepening the Economic and Monetary Union, and signals greater flexibility in managing the EMU’s stability and growth pact. It also expresses support for uniform European suffrage, with a binding lead-candidate system (the Spitzenkandidaten process) for selecting the European Commission president, and stresses the need to make it easier for the commission to act decisively when necessary—say, to safeguard the rule of law in member countries.

Similarly, the coalition agreement also expresses a clear commitment to NATO, though it leaves open some issues, such as the government’s commitment to the defence-spending target of 2% of GDP and questions relating to nuclear-arms control.

On foreign policy, the most notable shift relates to China and Russia. Apparently, the world should expect Germany’s new government to replace Merkel’s business-first strategy with a more assertive approach to authoritarian regimes. The future of the controversial Nord Stream II gas pipeline, which would bring gas directly from Russia, bypassing Ukraine and Belarus, may well be on the line.

Within Germany, the coalition agreement has received a predictably mixed reception. Those close to the three coalition partners have mostly welcomed it, though some on the parties’ fringes expressed greater disappointment and even suspicion. The Christian Democrats, preparing for their role as the main opposition party, criticised it severely, while the far-right Alternative für Deutschland and the left-wing Die Linke rejected it altogether.

Surprisingly, however, the German public has largely welcomed the agreement—and the sense of hope and renewal that underpins it. Merkel was known for her ultra-cautious leadership style. During her 16 years at the helm of Germany’s government, few reforms were enacted—and even fewer succeeded. Now, Germans seem to be ready for a more proactive government.

Of course, the coalition agreement is a political and not a legal document. Nonetheless, it is highly consequential as it will guide the efforts of the coalition committee—an informal body comprising ruling parties’ chief emissaries, which has assumed immense importance over the last several decades.

The coalition committee’s role is to ensure agreements’ implementation, including by managing the disputes and conflicts of interest that arise. And tensions are already emerging. For example, the emboldened environmental lobby laments that, despite the participation of the Greens, the agreement falls short on climate policy, and the business lobby, represented by the Free Democrats, fears tax increases and doubts the fuzzy financial projections underlying the agreement.

And an unlikely alliance of unions (demanding job security, higher pay and pensions) and business (applauding Scholz’s fiscal prudence) is wary of increased flexibility on EU budget policies. Finally, while the states support the new government’s promise of a long-overdue reform of Germany’s complex federalist system, some fear a federal power grab.

The bottom line, though, is that Germany’s new ruling coalition has advanced a much-needed vision for the country. But whether it can realise it will depend largely on the coalition committee’s political skill. If the coalition fails, Germany will risk reverting to its old habit of doing too little too late—an outcome that would jeopardise its position in Europe and the world.

Naval deployment shows Germany’s commitment to the Indo-Pacific

In a week when Australia’s relationship with France was left hanging by a thread due to the cancellation of the Attack-class submarine project, Germany quietly doubled the number of upcoming port visits to Australia by the frigate Bayern during its six-month Indo-Pacific tour, the first mission to the region in more than 20 years.

While the timing was certainly coincidental, the significance is unmistakeable: China’s loss has been Australia’s gain. Long before FGS Bayern departed Wilhelmshaven last month, Germany sought permission for a port visit to Shanghai. The request arose not for operational reasons, but from dissent within Germany’s coalition government. The Defence Ministry wished to send a clear message with the deployment, whereas the Chancellery and Foreign Office insisted on appeasing China. The appeasers won.

But the request put China in a position of being able to withhold its consent pending promises of ‘good behaviour’ in relation to the Bayern’s transit through the South China Sea. That China prematurely yielded this card in refusing to grant access far in advance of the Bayern’s arrival might hint at a discreet effort at damage control by German diplomats. Australia was quick to capitalise and roll out a second welcome mat in Darwin, timed to follow the long-planned visit to Western Australia.

Currently in Perth, where strict Covid-19 restrictions remain in place, the crew of FGS Bayern will be officially welcomed to naval base HMAS Stirling with a commanding officer’s luncheon on 30 September—‘VIP attendance is expected’, says the Department of Defence—to be followed by an official reception and wreath-laying ceremony to mark Germany Unity Day at Kings Park on 3 October.

As is typical on a naval diplomatic mission, the German frigate will participate in a number of exercises at sea with the Royal Australian Navy and various other regional navies. Other activities with the Australian Defence Force are also planned. No major announcements have been flagged, but observers will be watching for the possibility discussed earlier this year by German Defence Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer of German officers being deployed within the RAN. ‘Germany is a valued defence partner, and we are pleased to have the opportunity to strengthen cooperation between our navies in this region,’ a Defence spokesperson told The Strategist. It comes after Germany participated as an observer nation for the first time this year at Exercise Talisman Sabre.

Germany and Australia have common interests in a free and open Indo-Pacific. Germany launched its Indo-Pacific guidelines last year, emphasising its concerns about global supply chains and the security of its maritime trading routes. This was followed by the launch of the largely congruent EU Indo-Pacific strategy this month.

In Germany, the deployment is seen as a remarkable gesture, due in part to the society’s general reluctance to deploy military forces and the fact that the Deutsche Marine has only 10 similar ships of various classes, rendering them a scarce commodity with many competing operational demands.

It’s inescapable that one frigate is a modest signal in comparison to the astonishingly high levels of activity in the region, not least the British carrier strike group, comprising aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth with several destroyers, frigates, logistics ships and a submarine. The UK is following this with a five-year Indo-Pacific deployment of two offshore patrol vessels. For its part, Australia is currently conducting Indo-Pacific Endeavour ’21—its premier naval diplomatic activity—across Southeast Asia under the command of Commodore Mal Wise.

The Bayern’s deployment can also be seen in the context of ‘clearing of the decks’ before a seismic moment in German politics: the retirement of Angela Merkel after 16 years in office and the election held on Sunday. In June, before the campaign period, the Germany parliamentary budget committee also approved €19 billion ($30 billion) in long pending and sometimes controversial defence acquisitions, including the P-8 Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft, two new Type 212CD submarines, new fleet oilers and the replacement of the Deutsche Marine’s signals intelligence ships. As a new coalition government is hammered out in the coming months, significant uncertainty about defence policy and procurement priorities will persist.

In any case, some have argued that too much European naval commitment to the Indo-Pacific could also be undesirable, if it comes at the expense of focusing on the increasing security challenges posed by Russia. The point was made by retired Australian rear admiral James Goldrick in a recent publication:

Australia welcomes European powers having an active role in the Indo-Pacific and regular deployments of European naval forces in the region, but a more coherent geostrategic approach would see Europe focus—and increase—its naval and military efforts on Europe, while the United States and other Indo-Pacific powers continue to reorganise to balance China.

US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin echoed that sentiment during remarks at the Fullerton Lecture in Singapore in July.

Accordingly, the modest but important German deployment of FGS Bayern, with its two visits to Australia, may prove to be genau richtig, or just right.

Voters say goodbye to Germany’s status quo

The Greens’ strong performance in Germany’s federal election—though not as strong as the party hoped just a few short weeks ago—offers hope that the country will now finally start moving in a more promising direction. That may mean moving away from outgoing Chancellor Angela Merkel’s authoritarian-friendly positions, not least her support for the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline between Germany and Russia, and her championing of an EU investment agreement with China (which has since been blocked by the European Parliament).

Unlike Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and the Social Democratic Party (SPD)—both of which have exhibited a pro-Russian bias ever since Gerhard Schröder’s chancellorship (1998–2005)—the Greens favour tougher policies towards both Russia and China. And they are now in a position to keep the SPD’s past bias towards Russia in check, since they could join its chancellor candidate, Olaf Scholz, in a new governing coalition that would consign the CDU to the opposition.

During the final television debate of the campaign, Scholz and Greens leader Annalena Baerbock came out in favour of precisely this arrangement. Although forming a new government could be a slow process, and numerous combinations and permutations are possible, the Greens are poised to play a key role in almost all of them. They are the common denominator, and this fact will not have been lost on Russian President Vladimir Putin, whom many Germans believe was active behind the scenes in trying to minimise the Greens’ electoral success.

The problem for the CDU is that even Merkel’s pro-export, pro-job policies have acquired politically unsavoury attributes in recent years. To be sure, in 2020, German trade with China totalled €212.9 billion ($342 billion), compared to €171.5 billion ($275 billion) with the United States, €147.3 billion ($237 billion) with France, €114.4 billion with Italy ($184 billion), and €101.6 billion ($163 billion) with the United Kingdom. Because so much German employment and income depends on trade with China, German leaders have often overlooked that country’s human-rights abuses and challenges to the open rules-based global order. As former German vice-chancellor and SPD leader Sigmar Gabriel put it in a recent interview, ‘Germany has walked a tightrope between condemning Chinese human-rights violations and ensuring access to Chinese markets for German companies.’

Still, I’m sure that many Germans are bothered that their exports have come at the expense of the victims of China’s human-rights abuses. Worse still, Germany’s excessive dependence on Chinese trade has prevented the European Union from establishing a united front against China’s authoritarianism. How can Europe be tough towards China when its largest economy is so soft?

Merkel has been out of step with her EU partners on autocrats. If the Greens have greater influence on German policy, there could be more EU solidarity when it comes to dealing with China and Russia. There would also be more transatlantic solidarity, in line with US President Joe Biden’s United Nations pledge to move from ‘relentless war’ to ‘relentless diplomacy’ with China and Russia.

In any case, what the Greens want most for Germany is a modern economy, not a backward-looking, mercantilist one. Their catchy campaign slogan, ‘Goodbye status quo, hello future’, perfectly captures what sets them apart from both the CDU and the SDP—yesterday’s two main parties.

The Green slogan strongly suggests a new pro-European strategy for German growth. Among other things, this means a redeployment of Germany’s productive resources out of exports (many of which are fossil-fuel-burning vehicles) and into renewable energy, high-tech, digital and other sectors.

Most critics agree that the biggest shortcoming of the Merkel era has been her failure to nurture the industries of the future. ‘Despite the growth and increase in employment’, notes Allianz senior economist Katharina Utermöhl, ‘there has been little modernization’. Under Merkel, low rates of public investment have left the country ill prepared. Economic policy has been to live for today and forget about tomorrow. While Germany has achieved a prosperous economy with many jobs, especially for women, it is an old-fashioned economy that will inevitably stagnate unless policymakers change course.

Merkel has left a big hole for the Greens to fill, and that is what they now intend to do. One promising option is to introduce a tax on exports, with the proceeds going to fund the industries of the future. This would kill two birds with one stone, rolling back Merkel’s mercantilism and investing in the sectors needed to maintain Germany’s global competitiveness.

True, the Greens are not actively advocating an export tax. During the election campaign, they argued for tax increases on the rich, regulatory action to cut greenhouse-gas emissions, reform of Germany’s debt rules, and sterner policies towards China and Russia. But if the idea is to jettison the status quo and pursue economic modernisation, an export tax would establish the party’s credibility and garner substantial media attention. What better way to hasten the demise of Merkel’s mercantilist economic model?

Germany’s status quo has not yet been vanquished. But the Greens’ strong showing in this month’s election should give it a much shorter lifespan.

Merkel’s departure and Russian disinformation weigh on German election

On 26 September, Germans will elect the members of the 20th Bundestag and its new chancellor. For the first time since 2005, Angela Merkel’s name will not be on any ballots, as she is retiring after 16 years in office.

Over the last six weeks, polls have indicated that at least three parties will need to negotiate a coalition to form the next government, with many options open as to which parties they’ll be—and who will appoint Germany’s chancellor.

Merkel’s own party, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and its chancellor candidate, Armin Laschet, have been on a downward trend, with recent polls showing the party at 21.6%, down from the 33% support it received in the 2017 federal election. The Social Democratic Party (SPD) and its chancellor candidate, Olaf Scholz, are leading in the polls with 25.2% approval, a 4.7-point improvement on 2017. The right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) stands at 11.0% compared to 12.6% in 2017, while the Die Linke (literally ‘the left’), lies at 6.5%, down 2.7 points since 2017. The latest opinion poll has shown a substantial increase for the Greens with 15.6% of the vote, a 7.2-point increase on their 2017 performance, which may indicate their best ever federal result.

The rise of the Greens has not gone unnoticed, with the party the subject of numerous negative articles from pro-Russia media outlets such as SouthFront, which labelled the Greens chancellor candidate Annalena Baerbock an ‘American Nazi’, and Rossia 24, which called the party the ‘Green Khmer’, and alleged it was funded by Hungarian philanthropist George Soros.

In June, RT DE (Russia Today Deutsch) published an opinion piece which said Baerbock’s resume was ‘as authentic as the (fake) Hitler diaries’. Another piece claimed her diplomas were bought and labelled her a puppet of World Economic Forum leader Klaus Schwab. The Greens have been vocal opponents of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, which is set to carry natural gas from Russia to Germany via the Baltic Sea. They’ve argued that the pipeline works against the environmental and geostrategic interests of the European Union by strengthening the economic position of the Kremlin.

Merkel and the CDU are no strangers to this style of attack by pro-Kremlin media outlets. The Institute for Strategic Dialogue found that in the three-months before the 2017 election, RT and Sputnik reported overwhelmingly negatively about the German government and the chancellor, while the AfD and Die Linke received extensive positive coverage.

This election cycle has been no different, with RT DE making numerous accusations against Merkel and the German government, including a claim that Berlin supported terrorist groups planning a coup in Belarus and that Merkel and her government were ‘Russophobic’.

As with Baerbock, Merkel has been targeted with disinformation intended to discredit her personally. Covid-19 has also provided fertile ground for disinformation, with the Russian government attempting to discredit the Pfizer vaccine while promoting the Russian-made Sputnik V shot and claiming (incorrectly) that Germany tops the list of countries with Covid infections). The narrative that the poisoning of Russian opposition politician Alexey Navalny was staged by the West, a claim which first emerged in September 2020 from Russian news agency TASS, re-emerged when RT DE picked up the story again in July 2021, portraying the poisoning as a part of a wider anti-Russia campaign.

Since November 2015, the European Union’s database ‘EUvsDisinfo’ has identified 846 cases of international media outlets publishing pro-Kremlin disinformation.  Germany is the main target of Russian disinformation within the EU.

The impact of pro-Russian media outlets is increasing in Germany. The most popular German-language pro-Kremlin news outlet is RT DE, with more than half a million ‘likes’ on Facebook and 47,700 followers on Twitter. It portrays itself as a trustworthy and independent alternative to mainstream media. RT DE has become the third most shared media outlet in German-language news, with only German news outlets Bild and Die Welt ahead of it. RT DE is also attempting to obtain a broadcasting licence to establish a German-language free-to-air television channel, the preferred source of election-related information for more than 50% of Germans.

In contrast to the negative coverage of mainstream political parties like the CDU and the Greens, AfD and Die Linke have received positive coverage from pro-Kremlin outlets. Both parties’ election platforms align more closely to Russian interests than those of the mainstream parties. AfD opposes all sanctions against Russia, advocates for military cooperation with Russia and a finalisation of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, and recognises Crimea as a part of Russia.

Die Linke wants Germany to exit NATO, condemns Berlin’s current approach to Moscow and encourages negotiating a friendship treaty. Pro-Kremlin media outlets portray the AfD as a friend of Russia and the AfD engages positively with news spread by pro-Kremlin media outlets.

When members of Die Linke visited pro-Russian ‘separatists’ occupying regions of Eastern Ukraine, pro-Kremlin news outlets were highly supportive of the trip.

AfD Bundestag member Anton Friesen has been actively posting and reposting articles from Sputnik that praise the AfD’s pro-Russian agenda on Twitter. Die Linke has also cast doubt on Kremlin involvement in Navalny’s poisoning. Gregor Gysi, the former parliamentary leader of the party has suggested that opponents of Nord Stream 2 were responsible for the attack. A speech by Gysi in January n which he further accused Germany of involvement in Navalny’s poisoning was picked up and republished by RT DE and Russian outlet SNA.

Could Russian-sponsored propaganda and disinformation decide the election outcome? This time around, probably not. The German government has been actively attempting to counter disinformation by joining the International Partnership to Counter State-Sponsored Disinformation which shares intelligence about disinformation campaigns.

Fact-checking pages such as ‘Correctiv.Faktencheck’ and NewsGuard’s ‘Misinformation Monitor’ address popular pieces of mis- and disinformation. The challenge lies in piercing the information bubble of people who consume media from alternative platforms and who may not see attempts to counter the disinformation they take in.

Social media algorithms help to push information users agree with, making it difficult to present information outside a reader’s usual interests. The partisan media coverage of Kremlin-sponsored news outlets in Germany could help fuel Politiksverdrossenheit or political disillusionment, undermining people’s trust in government and democratic structures, and possibly elevating fringe political parties even further.

Germany’s patriotism paradox

As Germany prepares for its federal elections in September, many are wondering what will come next. Under outgoing chancellor Angela Merkel, Germany has become an ‘indispensable nation’ in Europe and within the broader rules-based international order. The consensus is that she will be succeeded by someone offering more of the same. Her own anointed successor as leader of the Christian Democratic Union, Armin Laschet, is indeed running on a continuity platform.

And yet, as Merkel prepares to retire, there are signs that Germans are growing tired of their country’s traditional role in the European Union. Although there’s no danger of Germany leaving the bloc or falling into the hands of a Euroskeptic party, polls commissioned by the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) show that German trust in the EU has collapsed during the Covid-19 pandemic.

In 2019 and 2020, Germans expressed much more faith in the EU’s political system than French and Italian respondents did. But the European Commission’s poor performance during the pandemic seems to have changed their view. Some 55% of Germans now think the EU’s political system is broken—a jump of 11 percentage points since last year. Whereas one in two Germans believed that the system was working as of November 2020, only 36% do now, and 49% claim to have ‘less’ or ‘much less’ confidence in the EU as a result of its vaccines policy. Around 33% of Germans now think that EU integration has gone too far, compared to 23% in 2020.

To be sure, these new figures come from just one poll, and sentiment towards the EU may well recover once most Germans are vaccinated. A series of ECFR polls in 2019 and 2020 showed Germans rallying in support of proposals that would remove longstanding hurdles to deeper European integration. But if the recent loss of confidence persists, the long-term consequences could be serious. German leaders could come under increased public pressure to go it alone on policies ranging from vaccine procurement and migration to trade and energy.

After all, the world outside Germany is changing dramatically, bringing new threats to Germany’s status as an Exportweltmeister (‘export world champion’). China and the United States have both recently embraced various forms of protectionism, and other EU member states wear the pursuit of narrow national interests as a badge of honour. With countries like Hungary and Poland openly putting their own interests ahead of European solidarity, German politicians’ rhetoric about Europe risks sounding increasingly out of step. Why should Germany put Europe before itself when no one else is willing to do the same?

Germany’s populist politicians have already seized on this disconnect. Christian Lindner of the Free Democratic Party, for example, has aggressively opposed the mutualisation of European debt, and now says he will not join any putative coalition that puts the pro-EU Greens in charge of the finance ministry.

Although the world outside is changing, German foreign policy elites still tend to look at European and international policy from the perspective of global obligations and the sacrifices needed to maintain solidarity. Given the country’s 20th-century history, it is understandable that its leaders would want to avoid talking about national, rather than European, interests. But this failure to adapt brings risks of its own.

Many Germans have come to see their country’s European policy as a series of sacrifices that are meant to answer for historical crimes, rather than making the country stronger, richer and safer. This resentment eventually could boil over if German elites don’t change their rhetoric. After the disastrous Trump presidency in the US, we all know what a revolt against the mainstream can look like.

Paradoxically, the best way to get Germans to commit to a pro-European cosmopolitanism is to make a patriotic case for it. By avoiding any talk of German patriotism, progressives have left a vacuum that the far right has been happy to fill with ultranationalism and xenophobia. But with an outward-looking patriotic message, a new government could openly embrace the idea that Germany has national interests worth defending. And because those interests inevitably will be best served within a broader European context, such a change need not come at the EU’s expense.

In making the patriotic case for Europe, German politicians can point out that the choice now is between European sovereignty or no sovereignty at all. Germany will need to reorient its economic model to adapt to the ongoing digital and green revolutions. But it also needs to find ways to push back against protectionism, sanctions and other great-power machinations—regardless of whether they come from friendly countries like the US or less friendly ones like China.

From a European perspective, it is essential that Germany undergo this transformation. What is true for the German economy is even more true for smaller economies. Other EU countries should not be threatened by an honest debate about German interests and what they imply for its Europe policy. The alternative, German disengagement, is far more dangerous.

The latest ECFR poll should serve as a warning that the German public may be falling out of love with Europe. An individual who contracts Covid-19 can experience a short, acute phase of sickness but also a wide range of longer-term pathologies. The virus’s political effects should be thought of the same way. In the short term, the pandemic provoked a strong immune response as Germans mobilised behind ambitious pan-European policies. But now the less-understood political effects of ‘long Covid’ are setting in. Unless the German political class finds a new approach to Europe, the EU will likely remain sclerotic and at risk of a protracted malaise.

Germany’s green velvet revolution?

In the last 50 years, Germany has experienced three miracles. The one-time sick man of Europe became an Exportweltmeister (export world champion). It also overcame its past (Vergangenheitsbewältigung). And it built a political and economic union in which its former enemies have become friends. But now the comfortable world forged by these miracles is crumbling, leaving Germany’s governing party, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), acting like a deer caught in headlights.

Rightly proud of what they have achieved, Germans are reluctant to take lessons from other Europeans, particularly those who seem to have mishandled their own affairs. But in this crucial election year, outgoing Chancellor Angela Merkel’s signature method of muddling through is showing signs of strain. With the CDU and its Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union (CSU), divided over who should succeed her, Germany’s Greens suddenly have a historic opportunity.

While the CDU/CSU has overruled its own voters by tapping CDU leader Armin Laschet as its candidate for chancellor, the Greens have nominated their energetic, 40-year-old co-leader Annalena Baerbock for the job. In a country that is deeply resistant to change, Baerbock promises reform without disruption—a velvet revolution. As the Greens put it in their draft election program: ‘We will bring some good traditions to bear in new ways, establish some new things, and replace some familiar things. But we will create security in the transition.’

The Greens party certainly has managed to reform itself. Not too long ago, it was seen as a Verbotspartei (prohibitionist party), most known for shaming and lecturing Germans about the virtues of vegetarianism. Now, it’s the party that most embodies optimism for what Germany could be. Rather than demanding that Germans give up their lifestyles, the Greens are promising to make Germany a better version of itself, by opening up new pathways to prosperity to replace those that are in danger of becoming obsolete.

For example, the party envisions a green industrial policy to reinvent Germany’s economic base so that it will remain competitive in a world that is moving away from fossil fuels. As the Greens’ Franziska Brantner explained to me, this process would have climate and digital strategies at its core. ‘If we don’t take that train’, she warns, ‘we will stand for a lost economic model. The old model was great: it allowed us to trade with everyone, to make a lot of money without making almost any contribution to security. It was great but, unfortunately, it cannot last.’

The Greens recognise that the only way the German car industry can survive is by focusing on emissions-free cars; hence, the party has a plan to make Germany a world leader in energy cell production. The party also wants to reduce Germany’s dangerous dependence on exports to China and imports of hydrocarbons from Russia, and to invest in programs to support high-tech start-ups and cloud-computing infrastructure.

The Greens have also abandoned the traditional leftist scepticism of patriotism. The title of the party’s draft election program can be loosely translated as ‘Germany has it all’. Germany has everything it needs to face the challenges of the future.

In a telephone interview, Cem Özdemir, a former party leader, emphasised the need to engage with debates about national identity. ‘With immigration and globalisation’, he explained, ‘We need to have a discussion about what it means to be German. It was a mistake that progressives largely ignored the discussion during the refugee crisis. It allowed others to take over the territory.’ In a stark departure from the past, Greens today frequently use terms such as ‘Heimat’ (homeland), and openly discuss how the idea of Germanness can be modernised.

When it comes to Europe, the Greens want to move from Merkel’s ‘nein, nein, nein’ policy to one based on proactive engagement. In a recent interview with the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung, Baerbock pointed out that Germany can have a strong foreign policy only if it acts in concert with the rest of Europe. She wants to help build a European Union that is sovereign and committed to acting in line with its values—including in the relationship with China.

For her part, Brantner hopes that Germany can overcome the ‘two generational lies’ underpinning its European policy. The first lie is that Germany can focus merely on the economy, while ignoring investments in security. ‘We cannot continue trading with everyone, making big profits and hoping that others will secure our sovereignty’, she told me. ‘If we don’t agree with everything [French President Emmanuel] Macron says, we should put forward our own ideas.’

The second lie is that Europe can have a joint currency without a joint investment policy or budget, simply by relying on the European Central Bank. Brantner believes that it is time ‘to have a real debate about this in Germany’.

Today’s Greens understand that after decades of remarkable success, Germany’s position has become precarious. As China and America battle it out, globalisation risks being thrown into reverse at a time when the digital revolution is eclipsing Germany’s traditional economic strengths.

Germany’s remarkable engagement with its own history does not offer a model for integrating a more multicultural and religiously diverse population. And the failure of successive governments to acquaint the German public with the details of European policy has made it difficult to secure consent for EU-level measures that would serve Germany’s own interests.

Sigmund Freud offered an apt portrait of today’s Germany when he described patients who were ‘wrecked by success’. In the Greens, however, the country might just have found the cure to this affliction. It may seem strange that a party with revolutionary origins and aspirations would enter the race for the chancellery with promises of prudent, calibrated reform. But that’s what happens when a party gets serious about actually governing, rather than forever campaigning from the sidelines.

Much could happen between now and the federal election in September. But never before have the Greens started a campaign in such a strong position.

Germany plans a greater peace and security role in the Indo-Pacific

As the political and economic centre of the world shifts from the Atlantic to the Indo-Pacific, and geostrategic competition increases, Germany, the EU and NATO want closer defence cooperation with nations such as Australia.

Germany’s defence minister, Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, told an online seminar organised by ASPI that Australia was regarded as a ‘rock of stability’ in the region and had a key role to play in maintaining peace and security.

‘We intend to expand security and defence cooperation with those who share our values in the region, intensify our military contexts and promote dialogue on matters of security.’

Germany planned to send naval vessels to patrol Indian Ocean trade routes next year and it was discussing with the Australian Defence Force the possibility of placing liaison officers aboard Australian naval vessels, she said.

‘This is where the shaping of the future international order will be decided’, Kramp-Karrenbauer told the seminar hosted by ASPI’s executive director, Peter Jennings, and Dr Beatrice Gorawantschy, the head of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation office in Canberra, who were involved in a wide-ranging discussion with the minister and her Australian counterpart, Linda Reynolds.

During their discussion on the ‘Indo-Pacific: Geostrategic challenges and opportunities for Australia and Germany’, the ministers focused strongly on two key documents, Australia’s 2020 defence strategic update and Germany’s new Policy guidelines for the Indo-Pacific.

Jennings said it was clear that Germany and the European Union were intent on stepping up their game in the region. He said the German policy set out an ambitious plan for increased engagement across the economy, security, the climate, the stability of the rules-based international order, digital connectivity, and people-to-people links.

The thrust of the German guidelines was that the Indo-Pacific’s overall structure was in flux in the face of significant shifts in the balance of power and growing differences. That was in accord with Australia’s strategic update’s view that: ‘The rules, norms, and institutions that help maintain peace and security and guide global cooperation are under strain.’

Reynolds welcomed Germany’s intensification of engagement in the Indo-Pacific, saying it was a stark reality that the post-Covid world would be poorer, more dangerous, and more disorderly. ‘I firmly believe that in today’s world, geographical distance is simply a historic mindset, and it doesn’t matter that we’re not in the same time zone. It doesn’t matter that we don’t share physical borders, and, as Annegret said, it doesn’t matter that we live thousands of kilometres away.

‘Together, we must continue to promote peace and prosperity for all towards a region where there is cooperation and healthy competition, not confrontation, coercion or conflict.’

Reynolds said security brought peace and peace brought prosperity. One could not exist without the other. ‘And today, the world’s most populous region, the Indo-Pacific, is facing its most consequential strategic realignment since the end of World War II.

‘We’re seeing increased major-power competition. Nations right across the Indo-Pacific are modernising their militaries and adopting disruptive technologies. In the 2030s, half of the world’s submarines and half of the world’s most advanced combat aircraft will be operating in the Indo-Pacific and coercive tactics, including cyberattacks, foreign interference, and also economic pressure are being increasingly employed.’

Such coercive tactics exploited the grey zone between peace and war and undermined sovereignty. ‘Influence becomes interference, economic cooperation becomes coercion and investment becomes entrapment.’

The pandemic had exposed the need for Australia along with other nations, including Germany, to build stronger, more resilient and more assured supply chains. ‘And as defence ministers, Annegret and I have the job of seeing the world as it actually is, not as we might wish it still was. The region has become less stable and this has significant consequences far beyond our region.’

Kramp-Karrenbauer said peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific were important for Europe and Germany, which wanted to be reliable and stable partners and friends of the region.

‘We want to live up to our responsibility for a rules-based international order, and we want to take an active part in shaping that order. So, we are prepared to defend our interests with active deeds, not just words. And we have to do that more so than in the past.’

She said human rights and democratic standards must be protected and open societies maintained. Sea routes must remain open and trade must be based on fair rules. Intellectual property must be protected. ‘I know that many states in the region such as Australia share these ideas; these are our like-minded partners.’

But these principles were being challenged everywhere because some countries were not prepared to accept them.

Kramp-Karrenbauer said that as a nation with a strong economy and which acted globally, a rules-based international order was absolutely necessary for Germany.

‘And we are also interested in security, stability and prosperity in the Indo-Pacific region. With China and Japan and the United States, these are the three largest world economies and they are all Pacific neighbours. Southeast Asia is turning into a motor for global economic development.’

At the same time, she said, the Indo-Pacific was becoming an arena of global power competition. ‘We can see the increasing rivalry between the United States and China.’ Germany had strong economic relations with China, but also a strong value-based partnership with the US. This was a challenge for Germany as it was likely to be for Australia, she said.

Kramp-Karrenbauer said like-minded countries needed to cooperate more. ‘We need strong partnerships … between Germany and Australia, but we also need an international network that goes beyond that.’ She added that the relationship with Australia was all-encompassing and not just about security and defence.

The planned naval deployment in the Indian Ocean was postponed because of the pandemic and pressing operational needs in the Mediterranean but it was likely to take place next year, she said. ‘That is an important signal to send.’

‘We are intensifying our talks about new ways of cooperation, such as in the field of cyber and information and space.’

Kramp-Karrenbauer said Germany wished to increase cooperation with ASEAN, which played a central part in the intensification and promotion of multilateral activities and in the promotion of peaceful ways of settling conflicts. ‘We want to show more presence. We want to send out a signal of solidarity with our partners that share the same values.

‘A strong regional security architecture has a direct bearing on the international security architecture. For me, this means that EU and NATO must play a more active role here. We want to intensify the strategic dialogue with our partners that share the same values. We want to extend our partnership and support each other.’

Reynolds said that Australia, too, was seeking to advance its shared interests with ASEAN ‘and we continue to resolutely support ASEAN’s centrality’.

‘Earlier this year in Hanoi, I presented Australia’s vision for the future of our defence partnership with ASEAN. Two weeks ago, I visited three ASEAN partners, Singapore, Brunei and the Philippines, to further our bilateral defence engagements and also to further discuss shared regional security challenges. I also visited Japan to meet with the new defence minister, Kishi [Nobuo].’

Jennings said there were many points of commonality about risks and necessary responses, and many opportunities for cooperation. ‘From an Australian perspective, I think that increased German and EU engagement in the Indo-Pacific is an unalloyed good.’

1919: The triumph of Billy Hughes

Prime Minister W.M. (Billy) Hughes spent several months in England in 1916 getting to know the wartime decision-makers, attending British cabinet meetings, lobbying for Australia’s trading interests, seeking a greater voice for Australia in future planning, and crisscrossing the country as a public speaker where his vigorous style and independent ideas brought him wide media attention.

In April 1918 he was off again, assuring the governor-general, ‘I am sorrier than I can say to leave Australia. I love this country but I feel it is my duty to go.’ He was away for 16 months. Travelling by way of the United States, where he clashed with Woodrow Wilson over the president’s ‘Fourteen Points’ for peace, Hughes arrived in London in August 1918 to attend the Imperial War Cabinet meetings for dominion prime ministers. As others departed, he stayed on, determined that Australia’s voice would be heard at the Paris Peace Conference.

His immediate priorities were threefold: to represent the case for an independent voice for the dominions in the peace negotiations, to argue for strong reparations for Germany, and to ensure that Germany could never return to its former territories in the Pacific.

Frustrated by Prime Minister David Lloyd George’s exclusion of him from the British War Council’s meeting to discuss peace aims in October, and critical of the Welshman’s readiness to accept Wilson’s memorandum as the basis for discussions on peace, Hughes took his public protest to the Times. In Australia, the view was more constrained. There, his deputy William Watt and the cabinet signalled their view that, while it was essential for Australia to be consulted on peace terms, the country’s best interests ‘should be left in British hands’.

In the event, Hughes stood for Australia at the peace conference in France in February 1919 in a dual capacity, representing a dominion as a delegate of the status of a lesser ally like Belgium, and as an alternate member of the British delegation. In the latter role, he served as one of three representatives for Britain on the Reparations Commission and chaired the subcommittee assigned the task of determining how Germany would be compelled to meet the reparations. He publicly crossed the lofty Wilson in an exchange seen by observers as the ‘little David facing the American Goliath’. Chided later by Wilson in the debate on the German Pacific colonies because Australia represented only a small country of five million people, Hughes replied simply: ‘I speak for 60,000 dead.’ As the story of the confrontations spread around Paris, Hughes became something of a folk hero.

It was, however, as an independent representative that, with support from Canada’s prime minister, Robert Borden, he had his most conspicuous success. Fiercely rejecting all compromise arrangements proffered by the central negotiating powers at the conference (Britain, France, Italy, America and Japan) for the dominions to act in rotation or to be represented by one dominion, or for one only to present on a subject of direct interest to them, Hughes, with Lloyd George’s final consent, established the dominions’ rights to full independent participation.

He was equally intransigent in his demand for settlement of the fate of Germany’s territories in the Pacific. Eager initially for Australian annexation of Papua New Guinea, he accepted the compromise decision for a special mandate giving Japan administrative control of the German islands north of the equator, New Zealand the mandated territory of Samoa, and Australia administrative control (the so-called ‘999 years’) of mandated Papua New Guinea and adjacent islands. He also insisted successfully that the phosphate-rich island of Nauru not be mandated to Britain alone but be jointly controlled by Britain, Australia and New Zealand.

Wary, too, of Japan’s long interest in the Pacific and its possible threat to Australia on questions of immigration and ‘white Australia’, Hughes’s key accomplishment was in blocking Japan’s attempt to secure a clause affirming racial equality in the covenant of the League of Nations.

The Paris Peace Conference was the first major international conference at which Australia was represented independently from Britain. There, impatient of British and foreign opposition, his style spirited and unorthodox, Hughes emerged as a formidable player who took advantage of his principal delegate status to push the Australian barrow.

It was an outstanding culmination of his tenacity in which, as analyst W.J. Hudson concludes, Hughes had ‘taken Australia from almost anonymity in an imperial chorus to a centre-front role on the international stage’, and to a foundation membership of the League of Nations. With the subsequent parliamentary ratification of the Treaty of Versailles in the House of Representatives in late September 1919, Hughes himself recorded, ‘Australia became a nation’.

Hughes left the conference early to join the 1,200 troops returning to Australia on the Friedrichsruh, a former German transport. For the soldiers, he was always ‘the little Digger’, a living symbol of a confident Australia. At London’s Victoria station, a lively crowd of soldiers hoisted his small figure onto their shoulders, crammed an Australian slouch hat on his head, and paraded him down the street.

In his homeland, he received a welcome described as ‘unsurpassed in the history of Australia’. Berthing at Fremantle on 23 August, his arrival set off celebrations that resounded across the country: at Perth and Kalgoorlie and at little wayside stations on the transcontinental line at Port Augusta and Adelaide, and on to Melbourne. Essentially personal, Australia’s response marked the highpoint of William Morris Hughes’s career.

Germany’s populist temptation

Because populism is not an ideology in itself, it can easily appeal to mainstream political parties seeking to shore up flagging electoral support. There are always politicians willing to mimic populist slogans and methods to win over voters, even if doing so divides their own party. This has been proven by Republicans in the United States, Conservatives and Labourites in the United Kingdom, and Les Républicains under the new leadership of Laurent Wauquiez in France.

But the most ominous manifestation of this tendency can be found in Germany’s Christian Democratic Union/Christian Social Union. The CDU/CSU’s weak showing in last year’s parliamentary election, combined with the unprecedented gains by the populist Alternative für Deutschland (AfD), has created new schisms within the party grouping.

Other than in the former communist states of East Germany, the AfD’s strongest performance was in the CSU’s stronghold of Bavaria, which will hold local elections in October. Defending its right flank against the AfD has thus become the CSU’s foremost concern.

To that end, the CSU’s longtime leader, Horst Seehofer, has already set a new populist tone for the party. He recently ceded the post of Bavaria’s minister-president to an ambitious, younger populist rival, Markus Söder. And as the recently instated interior minister in Chancellor Angela Merkel’s new grand coalition government, he has sought to burnish his own populist credentials, including by restoring the word Heimat (homeland) to the ministry’s name.

But Seehofer has always come across as something other than a German conservative. In fact, he has served as a sort of political godfather to Hungary’s authoritarian prime minister, Viktor Orbán. And now he sees his own opportunity.

Since the day the new German government was sworn in, it has been clear that Merkel’s trademark tactic of neutralising potential critics by including them in her cabinet would no longer work. Seehofer immediately launched a cold war within the governing coalition.

In a March interview with the tabloid Bild, Seehofer declared, in perfect populist fashion, that, ‘Islam does not belong to Germany.’ The purpose of such statements is to draw lines within the government and place himself on the side of the anti-immigrant voters who turned out for the AfD last year. Merkel, together with almost all of Germany’s political class, has had no choice but to push back. At the same time, the AfD has lost political ground on which to criticise Seehofer and the CSU.

And Seehofer has remained on the offensive. He seems to make public comments on just about everything, and always in a way that leaves the AfD with nothing to add and undermines Merkel without striking at her directly.

But, again, Seehofer’s ‘Eastern European’ behaviour does not come as a total surprise. In March 2017, while Merkel was preparing for her first meeting with US President Donald Trump, Seehofer went to Moscow to cosy up to Russian President Vladimir Putin. Since then, he has consistently opposed all sanctions on Russia on any grounds.

Seehofer has also spoken warmly of Poland’s populist Law and Justice (PiS) government, while criticising the European Union for its supposed affronts to Polish dignity. He congratulated Orbán for his overwhelming electoral victory earlier this month, and his CSU colleague Alexander Dobrindt openly refers to Orbán as ‘our friend’.

Under Seehofer’s leadership, the CSU is shifting its focus from economic to cultural disputes. This is in keeping with the larger populist trend in Europe, evident not just in Hungary and Poland, but also in the Czech Republic, Austria, the Netherlands and Italy, where the populist Five Star Movement and the right-wing League are vying to lead the next government.

One result of Seehofer’s pitched struggle with Merkel and the German political establishment is that the other government party, the Social Democrats (SPD), has all but disappeared from view. But, whether he realises it or not, the AfD will be the natural beneficiary of any government blunders, given that it is now the largest opposition party in the Bundestag.

Still, even if Seehofer’s populist gambit fails, he has already succeeded in pulling the government to the right. Germany is clearly acting to ease EU pressure on Poland, Hungary and other Eastern European countries that are flouting the rule of law and undermining European solidarity with respect to migrants and refugees.

Moreover, Germany will likely block any substantive reform of the eurozone, thus squandering the opportunity offered by French President Emmanuel Macron. At this point, Financial Times columnist Wolfgang Münchau suggests, the best scenario could well be another economic crisis in the eurozone, simply because that might finally knock some sense into Germany.

Seehofer is bad news for Germany, which is in greater need of dynamism, openness and courage than any other European country. Germany’s limited military capacity, over-regulated service sector and lack of infrastructure investment all indicate that it is lagging a decade behind Eastern Europe on some key development metrics, even if it is Europe’s foremost economic power.

In Eastern European countries, one can pay by credit card at any street market, whereas in Germany, that is often impossible even in the best restaurants. Likewise, Germany ranks 42nd in the world in terms of internet speed, and its broadband infrastructure would be embarrassing even to a Ukrainian. For a country that has made a fortune investing in Eastern Europe, Germany’s relative backwardness in these areas is stunning.

The fact that Seehofer is embracing his inner populist does not necessarily augur what Dobrindt has described as a European ‘conservative revolution’. But it does suggest that Orbán and PiS leader Jarosław Kaczyński’s ‘illiberal counterrevolution’ is gaining momentum.