At the beginning of the coronavirus crisis, it seemed as if Germany was coping better than the United Kingdom, the United States, and many other countries. In recent months, the exact opposite has been the case: the United States and the UK have two of the world’s most successful vaccination campaigns while Germany lags far behind. The deeper reason for Germany’s failings is its dysfunctional relationship with everything “national.”

Even the word “nation” is frowned upon by many members of Germany’s political class, intellectuals, and media outlets. Anyone who insists that the government should put the interests of their own people first—for example in the procurement of vaccines—is immediately branded a “nationalist.” Angela Merkel’s government was very clear that it delegated vaccine procurement to the EU because of the almost paranoid fear of being labeled a “vaccine nationalist.” Governments in the UK and United States have no such fear.

The result: although one of the first coronavirus vaccines was developed by the German company BioNTech and funded with hundreds of millions of euros by German taxpayers, there is now less vaccine available in Germany than in many other countries.

The problems Germany faced during the refugee crisis of 2015–2016 had the same cause. Here, too, Merkel’s government’s actions (or failures to act) were strongly determined by its disturbed relationship with the nation. This went so far that Angela Merkel publicly declared that she could not even protect the borders of her own country.

The fight against organized crime, too, has frequently failed because of the paranoid fear that anyone who takes a tough line could be branded “xenophobic” and, thus, a “nationalist.” As a result, the crimes committed by large Arab clans, who seem to dominate organized crime in many German cities, were largely hushed up for many years. This has only changed more recently—but decades have been lost in the fight against organized crime and that is why Germany is struggling to get to grips with the problem today.

German Megalomania

At the same time, this German complex is linked to a distinctly German megalomania, an almost grandiose hubris. This is evident in the fight against climate change. Although Germany is responsible for only 2 percent of global CO2 emissions, you could be forgiven for thinking that what Germany does will determine the fate of the entire planet. Many German politicians explicitly declare that Germany should be the role model for all other countries on the globe.

This all has echoes of the old slogan “Am deutschen Wesen mag die Welt genesen,” which means “By German values shall the world be healed.” This phrase was originally coined in a poem, Deutschlands Beruf, by Emanuel Geibel in 1861. The slogan “am deutschen Wesen soll die Welt genesen” was later employed by Germany’s political leaders, including Kaiser Wilhelm II.

The German claim to be a role model for the whole world in energy policy is all the more ridiculous because, from an outside perspective, Germany has adopted the “world’s dumbest energy policy.”

Germany is proud of its program to decommission both nuclear and coal-fired power plants, even though nuclear energy is one of the most climate-friendly energy sources and many renowned scientists are convinced that climate change cannot be solved without more nuclear power plants. As a result of irrational energy policies, electricity prices in Germany are now the highest in the world. In Germany, for example, one-kilowatt hour costs 31 cents, while in neighboring Poland the price is just 13 cents. This makes Germany a cautionary tale at best.

The refugee crisis also confirmed Germany’s missionary claim that “By German values shall the world be healed.” Merkel sincerely believed that she could get the whole of Europe to agree to open its borders. That, of course, was not the case. Like dominoes, one country after another closed its borders to illegal immigrants, and Germany was left entirely isolated with its refugee policy.

The naive expectation that other countries would follow the same maxims as Germany has also been evident throughout the coronavirus crisis. German EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen was deeply disappointed to realize that the UK and U.S. governments put the interest of their own countries first, which is a dangerous manifestation of unbridled “nationalism” from the German point of view. In life, however, disappointment is often preceded by self-deception. And in this case, it was recklessly naive to assume that the governments of other countries would also put protecting their own people at the bottom of the agenda.

Rainer Zitelmann is a German historian and sociologist.

Source: https://nationalinterest.org/feature/fear-nationalism-germany-killing-its-people-181737

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STORY HIGHLIGHTS
Merkel’s party now has a new leader — Armin Laschet — who will lead the charge of the Christian democratic union in the September polls.

It’s the end of an era as later this year, the German Chancellor Angela Merkel will step down from her position after serving the country for 15 long years, and as one of the de-facto leaders of Europe, now her party has appointed a new leader.

Only a few leaders can boast of a track record that can match Angela Merkel’s record.  Severing as the german chancellor for 15 years and counting, she has worked with five British prime ministers, four French presidents, seven Italian prime ministers, and once Joe Biden takes oath, four American presidents.

Now, one of the world’s most successful politicians is stepping down. She is keeping the promise she made in 2018.

Her party now has a new leader — Armin Laschet. He will lead the charge of the Christian democratic union in the September polls.

Merkel’s exit from the Chancellor’s office will be the end of an era as she was the first woman to take Germany’s top job in 2005.

When Merkel rose to power, many had dismissed her as inexperienced and uncharismatic. However, during her 15-year reign, Merkel has proved herself time and again.

Merkel’s achievements

Three years into office, Merkel faced her greatest challenge in form of the 2008 financial crisis that shook entire Europe. However, not only did Merkel steer Germany during the meltdown, but she was at the heart of the response to the eurozone debt crisis — one that could have led to the economic collapse of Greece, Portugal, Ireland, Spain, and Cyprus.

Merkel held her own in front of adversaries, even when they tried to overpower or humiliate her. One famous instance of this is when Vladimir Putin brought a dog into a meeting with Merkel. It is quite popularly known that Merkel is afraid of dogs. However, the leader handled the situation with the utmost grace and confidence.

Hard days

Her last years in office, however, were upended by a refugee crisis. More than one million refugees arrived in Germany in 2015. Not only did Merkel welcome them, but she even convinced some European allies to accept some of them.

In 2018, she was elected for a record fourth term in office, but her party lost votes which forced Merkel to form a grand coalition to keep power. Realizing the end of the road is near, Merkel decided she will not run for a fifth term.

Her departure might trigger uncertainty as Germany hasn’t been immune to the rise of the right. Parties like the alternative for Germany ate into the votes of established players in the last election.

The European Union remains a divided bloc, especially after the UK’s exit from the EU. The coronavirus has also widened the differences, with authoritarian leaders in Hungary and Poland often rejecting the proposals laid out by their European partners.

So far, Merkel has managed to keep key allies together. However, both at home, and in the continent, the next leader of Germany has some big shoes to fill.

Her party now has a new leader — Armin Laschet. He will lead the charge of the Christian democratic union in the September polls.

Merkel’s exit from the Chancellor’s office will be the end of an era as she was the first woman to take Germany’s top job in 2005.

When Merkel rose to power, many had dismissed her as inexperienced and uncharismatic. However, during her 15-year reign, Merkel has proved herself time and again.

Source: https://www.wionews.com/world/end-of-an-era-german-chancellor-angela-merkel-prepares-to-step-down-after-15-years-357816

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An election campaign event by Germany’s far-right Alternative for Germany party in Cottbus on July 13.Hannibal Hanschke / Reuters

Andreas Hollstein says he receives at least two death threats a month by mail or by phone. Though they are scary, they don’t compare to the night 18 months ago when a man approached the major of Altena, in the west of Germany, at a kebab shop.

The man asked if he was the mayor and said, “You let me die of thirst and let 200 refugees into Altena,” Hollstein recalled at the time. Then the man plunged a knife into Hollstein’s neck.

Hollstein, who ended up with a 6-inch gash, had become nationally known during the refugee crisis for welcoming migrants to his city. Authorities believed there was a political motive behind the attack and arrested a suspect.

Since then, Hollstein has been outspoken about the need to tackle right-wing extremism in Germany. Yet last month another politician who spoke out in defense of migrants, Walter Lübcke, was fatally shot in the head on the terrace of his home. A man with far-right views was arrested and confessed, though he later recanted.

Lübcke’s death reignited a debate about whether Germany, long praised for confronting the ghosts of its extremist past, is in fact doing enough to combat far-right groups in the 21st century. Like Hollstein and Lübcke, politicians and public figures in Germany who speak out about far-right extremism, migration, and anti-Semitism are often on the receiving end of both threats and violence.

According to data released in a report last month by Germany’s domestic intelligence agency, there are 12,700 “violence-orientated right-wing extremists” in the country — which is more than half of the number of all right-wing extremists.

“Given the high affinity for carrying weapons in the far-right extremist spectrum, those numbers are extremely worrying,” Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said in presenting the report. “The risk of an attack is high.”

The issue is especially resonant in Germany, given its Nazi past. In the decades after World War II, West Germany, in particular, pushed an education program that attempted to confront the country’s history, the Holocaust and the need for democracy. Seven decades later, far-right extremism is a topic that many thought had been vanquished, but some experts say that misperception may have led to a more lax approach than is now necessary.

“I think it is because of our Nazi past that people don’t want to recognize the threat of the far-right today,” said Anetta Kahane, who heads the anti-racism group, the Amadeu Antonio Foundation. “Like an evil child, it reminds society of other evil members of the family.”

Though the numbers in the recent report haven’t changed much since last year, the right wing’s slant toward aggression has increased, according to Kahane, who said that she receives attacks daily on social media.

“It is becoming more aggressive because they don’t feel enough resistance by the population or by the government,” Kahane said.

Her foundation has also received bomb threats, a fake anthrax letter, and a fake explosive device, and right-wing extremists entered or tried to enter the foundation with video cameras three times, according to the foundation.

“There is a direct relationship between the high amount of hatred online and people who are willing to attack others in real life,” she added.

It was precisely because of an increase in right-wing sentiment in Berlin that Ferat Kocak became active in Die Linke, a left-wing party, in 2016. But because of that activism, he believes he became a target of right-wing extremists: His car was torched in the middle of the night in January 2018 as it sat parked next to his parents’ home, where he lived at the time.

Police said there were two suspects in the attack, but investigations are ongoing and nobody had been charged.

Kocak now regularly receives emails and messages on social media from people telling him “you should have been shot,” and “you should have been burned, too.”

“I am afraid. I can’t sleep at night. When I hear noises in the middle of the night, I get up. I check behind me when I walk on the street. But I won’t stay still, I talk about it,” said Kocak, 40, who now serves as vice speaker of Die Linke in Neukölln, a borough of Berlin.

Though the official figures show that extremist sympathizers comprise a tiny part of the population, Andreas Zick, who studies extremism at the University of Bielefeld, estimates their reach is much deeper thanks to social media sites where others can watch and read about the topic.

“There has been a normalization of right-wing attitudes in society,” said Zick, who studies such attitudes in Germany. “The extreme right-wing has been more successful in creating a movement which has strong links into the middle of society.”

Zick and other experts said that normalization has been helped by the presence of the right-wing political party Alternative for Deutschland, or AfD, which has a strong anti-immigrant stance and holds 91 out of 709 seats in the German Parliament. The party has found a strong following, especially in the east.

Last month, Chancellor Angela Merkel’s party ruled out any form of cooperation with the AfD, saying its rhetoric had contributed to an atmosphere of hate that encouraged political violence.

In Berlin alone, requests on how to handle threats by right-wing extremists by both individuals and organizations have roughly tripled since 2012-13, according to the organization Mobile Counselling Against Right-Wing Extremism.

“We see that the AfD in Parliament is very confident. That also gives right-wing extremists the confidence to threaten people who stand for democracy and human rights,” said Bianca Klose, who leads the organization. “That is a new development.”

For Hollstein and other politicians, the antidote to extremism is awareness. They are now pushing for greater openness and education around the issue.

“It’s not enough to make laws, but we need to educate children and parents,” said Mirjam Blumenthal, the leader of the Social Democratic Party in the Neukölln Parliament.

Two years ago, her car was also torched by right-wing extremists. She is unable to speak about more recent incidents because of ongoing police investigations.

“Our democracy is strong. But our democracy is in danger,” Blumenthal said.

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