There's no way of stopping the rise of the far-right AfD in Germany - yet

(23 January 2025) With four weeks left until Germany's general election, there’s a political algebra problem to which everyone in Berlin discreetly trying to find the answer. Let x be the number of deadly attacks, y be the number of people killed, and z be the rise in support for the AfD...

No-one is going to admit in public that they're working on this equation, but that is bare bones of the matter. For now, none of the parties of government have credibility on the issues of immigration and asylum. Changes to the system and improvements in how potential perpetrators with psychiatric disorders are managed will take years to show. As I explain for The Local, in this election, the mathematical rule is immutable.

Five things to expect in Germany's snap elections

(6 January 2025) The Christmas trees are coming down - and the gloves are coming off in Germany's general election campaign. Not that the parties have been exactly courteous to each other thus far (see the Olaf Scholz/"Fritze" Merz spat late last year...), but as of today, with Christmas past and sufficient distance to the Magdeburg murders observed, expect the real campaigning to start ahead of 23 February. Here are a few other things to expect over the coming eight weeks - written up for The Local.

Germany’s coalition lost its way and the path forward is unclear

(8 November 2024) It set out three years ago to be "more than the sum of its parts", but Germany’s three-party coalition soon proved considerably less. In fact, barely a year into its term, it had nothing left but the lowest common denominator. Now it has failed. 

In some ways, this wasn't a surprise: internal strife was constant, rumblings about the FDP leaving frequent. Yet precisely because of this consistent low-level noise, few observers were expecting the big bang on Wednesday night - all the less so since the Trump victory ought to, by rights, have galvanised the administration and given it renewed common purpose. Now, its failure leaves behind a fractured political landscape with no obvious path forward at the worst conceivable moment.

Why did this happen? Who is to blame? And what comes next? Read my analysis for The Local to find out more.

The state of healthcare in Germany has become worryingly frail

(18 October 2024) To anyone who has been following the debate in recent years, it's nothing new: Germany spends a higher percentage of its national income than its European neighbours for worse health outcomes. What has changed of late, though, is that the actual availability of basic provision is declining: doctors' appointments are like gold dust and pharmacists are having to mix their own medicines. Why this is now happening, why things won't change any time soon - and why we can no longer afford to let private patients game the system - is the subject of my latest analysis for The Local.

Attitudes to foreigners in Germany are hardening and should concern us all

(27 September 2024) Readers of The Local are primarily people from abroad living in Germany, either temporarily or permanently. And these readers are worried. After three regional elections in which the far-right AfD won (Thuringia) or came second (Saxony, Brandenburg), rendering all three states near-ungovernable, they are now looking ahead with trepidation to the next general election, scheduled a year and a day from now.

While the AfD is unlikely to head the polls nationally, it could well become the second or third-largest party in the next Bundestag. And the next government will almost certainly be headed from the right by Friedrich Merz's CDU. Although Merz and his party are by no means a clear and present danger, he has none the less made no bones about his own xenophobic attitudes and an administration with him at the helm will represent the hardening of Germany's attitude towards immigration. Read how I reach these conclusions in The Local. 

After UK and French elections, Germany's headaches this summer lie at home

(08 July 2024) Gambling is dangerous - which is why I don't do it, especially on politics. This isn't because, like certain British Conservatives or coppers, I could cost someone their seat or be hauled up in front of a disciplinary, but because no-one is as clever as they think (and definitely not cleverer than the bookies). 

Indeed, the last few days have been proof that I, too, can get it wrong. Usually, my generally pessimistic outlook is justified: "What can go wrong, will go wrong." Yet in both the UK and France, things have gone surprisingly well - especially the French elections, where a far-right victory was odds-on. What is more, I didn't think the Berlin coalition would manage to agree on a budget for 2025 - but it did late last week.

So is all well in the Ampel? Only time will tell... (And I'm not placing any bets.) Here's my assessment of the what the last week mean for Germany, as ever for The Local.

A Prussian officer: Conscription in Germany from Scharnhorst to Mann—and back

(01 July 2024) While Rishi Sunak floundered around looking for a campaign issue and alighted on national service, leader of the opposition centre-right CDU Friedrich Merz also prodded the dormant issue of conscription: yes, in these worrying times, Europe's (just about still) centre-right is rediscovering the draft as a comfort-blanket electoral issue.

In Germany, the history of conscription stretches back almost uninterrupted to the early 19th century, when it was as much an expression of Enlightenment values and the promise of citizenship as an obligation to military service. In this essay for The Irenaut, I trace the contrasting values behind the draft - and the various ways German men have attempted to evade it. Read my thoughts - and those of many others - in this issue on conscription. 

French elections: The roar from below

(15 June 2024) Following Emmanuel Macron's bold move to dissolve parliament and call parliamentary elections (What's the French for "Who governs…?" again? Asking for a historical comparison), Christophe Guilluy has written an engaging piece for the New Statesman looking at why this gamble - in his view, just the latest in a series of questionable bets made by the French governing class - may backfire. As ever, a pleasure to translate.

What we can learn from Germany's contrasting election results

(10 June 2024) Last weekend saw the European Elections and, in several German states, ballots for local authorities, too. At EU level, while far-right parties increased their share of the vote, the centre held - and looking at Germany's results in the European Elections, the same is (just about) true, despite a drubbing for the SPD and good results for a motley crew of the weird-and-wonderfuls. Yet at local level in the states of the former East, things are looking bad. Read my analysis of what this set of elections tells us about German politics here.

Why it's becoming harder to get a doctor's appointment in Germany

(17 May 2024) For all of its quirks and inefficiencies, Germany's health systems remains ones of the world's best. In few countries is it as easy for somebody paying according to their income (not their condition) to access a broad range of high-quality medical services. However, as the years go by, doctor's retire or go part-time, and private patients get preference, it is getting slightly less easy. Here's my analysis of why in the The Local.

Navigating human landscapes: From Rungholt to Miniaturwunderland

(8 April 2024) The Irenaut is a new magazine with a bold mission: to explore the human genius for peace and chart the violence that stifles it. In its second issue, it focusses on anthropodicy - the question of whether humans are fundamentally good and, by extension, whether our existence as a species can be justified.

In an essay I've contributed on this theme, I approach the concept by looking at the human geography of Germany - a country on which, especially in the north, we as a species have left a particularly indelible mark, and about the landscapes of which we have spilled no shortage of ink.

What do Germany's literary (and not-so-literary) landscapes and places say about the human relationship to the natural environment? What, in turn, does this say about us? And what do we say about ourselves?  Read my essay: 'Navigating human landscapes: From Rungholt to Miniaturwunderland'.

Germany's new cannabis law isn't dangerous - it's common sense

(1 April 2024) Every country which legalizes cannabis goes about it in its own characteristic way - so in Germany, that means endless angst-y debates, federal-state media-grandstanding, and a hellishly complex end result. As such, it will, as of today, be legal to own up to three cannabis plants and possess 50g of dried weed at home (25g on your person when you're out) and you will be able to buy it, but only through registered cannabis associations which will have to conform to eingetragener Verein standards...

You get the picture. Yet the law is, while typically tricky, broadly sensible, in the spirit of public health and harm prevention, and a boon to everyone who just wants a puff every now and then. Put my opinion on it for The Local in your pipe and smoke it!

Even with German citizenship reform foreigners must be wary of lurch to the far-right

(25 January 2024) Two weeks on from the Correctiv exclusive about right-wing extremists meeting in Potsdam to discuss mass deportations from Germany (including of German citizens) it's all had some time to sink in. In my analysis (for The Local), there is no immediate danger either of the far-right AfD getting into power or of this party enacting the kind of plans discussed; there is, however, a serious medium-term risk of a political spectrum weighted ever more towards the right in which UK/US-style 'hostile environment' policies leave foreign-born German citizens vulnerable. Those of us who could be sent 'back' somewhere need contingency plans.

Germany faces a hellish year in politics amid rise of far-right

(4 January 2024) No-one likes being the purveyor of terrible news, but the outlook for Germany in 2024 is... well, terrible. Our government has now irrevocably disappointed even those few of us who still saw some potential in it - and is facing a drubbing in a range of elections which will be read as plebiscites (and may lead to its premature end). Meanwhile, everyone from train drivers from farmers is on strike and the economy is still anaemic. Fun times, as I explain for The Local.

Does Emmanuel Macron understand France?

(22 November 2023) I've just translated a think-piece written for the New Statesman by geographer and essayist Christophe Guilluy. In it, he argues that France's various rebellious movements of recent decades - the Non! to a European constitution, the surges for Le Pen candidates at presidential elections, the gilets jaunes - are all part of a wider, grass-roots-and-common-sense groundswell against a predatory capitalist system. Read his point of view here.

Political analysis on the Germany in Focus podcast

(12 October 2023) After sizing up the situation - and the beer tankards - in Bavaria for The Local ahead of the state elections on 8th October, I delivered post-election analysis on the results there and in the state of Hesse for the outlet's Germany in Focus podcast. Listen in here.

Oktoberfest revelry reveals the political storm brewing in Bavaria

(28 September 2023) As anyone who has had me on the phone in the last couple of days will have heard, I've been at the Oktoberfest. *croak* In my capacity as regular of around 15 years standing and frequent visitor to Germany's self-proclaimed Promised Land, Bavaria, it's my pleasure to unpick for The Local what is at stakes in the state's upcoming regional elections - due the weekend after this year's bumper 17-day Fest ends and guaranteed to make Munich's lingering collective hangover worse.

Is Germany really the sick man of Europe?

(5 September 2024) It seems I'm now getting to that age where revivals start to concern styles I remember well the first time round: the current trend for cargo trousers and crop-tops in female fashion is straight out of the "Y2G" years, for instance, when I was in my mid-teens. Around that time, Germany was, according to The Economist, 'The Sick Man of Europe', its industry outdated and services sector sclerotic, with low growth and high unemployment as the inevitable consequence.

Back then, this description - Der kranke Mann Europas - sent shockwaves through the country, giving Schröder the political momentum to push through the highly unpopular Hartz IV reforms in an effort to give Germany an economic reboot. From 2005 onwards,  growth duly picked up, unemployment went into rapid decline, and then we weathered the Financial Crisis better than most other major economies. What many see as a correlation may well have been more of a coincidence - how setting up a low-wage sector in an economy dependent on premium exports was responsible for our golden 2010s is beyond my comprehension - but one lesson was learned: when the gloom descends and the vultures start circling, eye-catching reforms can change the economic discourse and improve the mood. In economics, it's often a question of psychology.

Now we have once again been named The Economist's 'Sick Man of Europe' and indeed our economy is in the doldrums. Here's me in The Local on how to deal with this less enjoyably nostalgic part of the current turn-of-the-Millennium revival. Sneak preview: yes, we need an ambitious package of reforms to revivify business confidence and kick-start the economy; no, we don't need fiscal austerity and lower wages.

German impatience: more haste now, less speed later

(24 May 2023) A recent news story about slow-lane check-outs in German supermarkets for the lonely got me musing on German impatience. As anyone who has been shopping here will know, cashiers at the major chain stores scan items so fast over the till that no even the swiftest customer can put them away and pay as fast: the illusion of speed actually leads to slower check-outs, if anything. Then again, our national urge to do things as quickly as possible can, well-applied, have positive effects. Read me on German impatience in The Local.

I became a German citizen to vote, but paying taxes should have been enough

(20 April 2023) Germany is reforming its laws on obtaining citizenship (and on maintaining dual nationality) - and this is good news. Then again, German citizenship requirements are not, even as they stand now, excessively onerous. In my view, the real issue is that most countries - not just Germany - take income tax from immigrants, sometimes for decades, without offering them the right to have their say in how this money is used. Read my unpopular opinion - No taxation without representation! - in The Local.

Germany's ruthless housing market is tough on new tenants - but there are winners

(26 January 2023) In the mid-2000s, one of the most attractive things about Germany was the ease of finding a flat - and the cheap rents that went with it. Germans themselves were (not so) blissfully unaware of how good a deal they had.

Since then, things have changed. New-contract rents in Germany's major cities now equal those of neighbouring countries and good lettings are scarce. Yet this is not, as some think it is, a housing market in crisis. Germany retains admirable rental protections from which existing tenants benefit. Owners and landlords, too, are in a strong position. It's just not that great anymore if you're looking for a flat... Here's my analysis of the German housing market in The Local.

Archive

Older news here.