GERMANY’S CONSENSUAL political culture has combined with the constraints imposed by the outgoing coalition between its two major parties to produce a notably undramatic general election campaign. Many voters are bored with it, although that will probably not affect the turnout on September 27th.
This has given an opportunity to the three smaller parties, the Free Democrats, the Greens and the Left party to inject some real debate and controversy into the campaign, in an effort to gain support for alternative governing coalitions. They are thereby doing Germany’s democracy a considerable service by ensuring issues like economic competitiveness, nuclear energy and Afghanistan are properly aired.
It is very much Angela Merkel’s election to lose – so much so that one commentator said this would only happen if she was caught stealing from a supermarket. Her cautious pragmatism and capable practice of government explain much of her deliberately low-key campaigning style. It attracts widespread support, not only within her Christian Democrat party but among Germans more generally.
The grand coalition with the Social Democrats since 2004 has accentuated these traits, but also reduced the visible differences between the two parties. The widespread structural reforms she advocated five years ago were moderated or postponed by the need to find common ground between them.
Her preferred coalition with the Free Democrats on this occasion would resurrect them, but voters may act tactically to prevent her having that opportunity. Polls show the CDU has an 11-14 per cent lead over the SDP, so that is a feasible outcome, since the Free Democrats have an average 13 per cent level of support. But so do the Greens and the Left party.
Possible coalition alternatives might conceivably include the Greens in a hard-bargained CDU-FDP government; but most observers dismiss as politically impossible an SDP-Green-Left alignment, even though the SDP and the Left have formed administrations at regional level, and the issue is increasingly discussed within the SPD, and despite the manifest competition between the two parties.
Last night’s disappointing television debate between Mrs Merkel and Social Democrat leader Frank-Walter Steinmeier illustrated many of these political realities. It was more a duet than a duel, since both leaders were heavily constrained by the need to defend their record in office. Mr Steinmeier failed to deliver a lethal blow, largely because the two parties are defending their consensus on contentious economic, social and foreign policy issues, which he was not prepared to upset in a public debate.
There is likely to be much continuity in its policies no matter who is elected, reflecting a centrist consensus that pervades German life, based on a well-established socio-economic model. But there are real alternative policies on offer, even if the political debate so far has not adequately reflected them.