“There is so much good in our country. For Germany, I will give my all every day. And for that I ask you, dear citizens, for your trust.”
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz let his gaze wander around the room, which hosted 717 of 733 German MPs. In front of a packed auditorium and with the grey light of a December afternoon coming through the glass roof of the building, the German chancellor had asked “the question of confidence” in his government.
Barely 30 minutes later, the result was in: 717 voting cards cast. 207 voted yes, 394 voted no, and 116 abstained, meaning that Scholz had not attained the majority of at least 367 votes in favour. As a result, the 205th session of the German Bundestag, the nation’s parliament, closed with the de facto dissolution of a government consisting of the Social Democratic Party (SPD), Scholz’s Party, the Free Democratic Party (FDP), and Alliance 90/The Greens (Greens).
The result was validated by the dissolution of the Bundestag by Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier a few days later.
According to Article 68 of the German constitution, the federal chancellor can request the Bundestag to give him a vote of confidence. He can link the vote of confidence to a specific legislative project. This instrument is intended to help a chancellor to close ranks and consolidate his power base. A vote of confidence can also be called with the aim of not gaining a majority, but to pave the way for an early general election.
“This time – and this is new – it was a real vote of confidence, as there was no longer a majority, and in this respect the federal president had little choice but to call new elections at short notice,” said veteran political scientist Ulrich von Alemann in a telephone interview.
“This is ultimately due to a special feature of the German constitution: the Bundestag cannot dissolve itself – a lesson learned from the politically unstable Weimar Republic (1918 to 1933) and unlike in England, for example, where the prime minister can call new elections at his discretion without any other ties.”
The 80-year-old von Alemann has lectured at various German universities and remains an important political commentator.
The reason for the collapse of the German government and thus the reason for the German elections on 23 February is a dispute over whether or not to take on new debt. To find a way to deal with the burden of additional spending caused by the costs of the Covid-19 pandemic, the Ukraine conflict, and the war in the Middle East, the German government has been looking at raising the country’s debt ceiling.
“But the conflict between neoliberal and Keynesian economic models, which remains unresolved, will burden the new government,” von Alemann said.
The dissolution comes against a background of economic crisis in Germany. According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Germany is at the bottom of the list of industrialised countries with a forecast economic growth rate of 0.3 per cent for 2025.
The list is headed by China (4.6 per cent), followed by the USA (2.7), Spain (2.3), the United Kingdom (1.6), Russia (1.4), Japan (1.1), France (0.8) and Italy (0.7), followed by Germany. With the exception of Saudi Arabia and Egypt, the IMF has not had to cut its forecasts for any other country to such an extent. It expects the global economy to grow by 3.3 per cent this year and next.
“We are in our third year of stagnation, which has several causes. For many years we have benefited in terms of exports from the fact that China is building up its economy, and investment goods and equipment were needed. In the meantime, however, the Chinese economy is not only able to produce for itself alone, but also to serve the global market and thus compete with German exporters, which have slumped significantly,” said Peter Hohlfeld, head of the economic analysis department at the Hans Böckler Foundation’s Institute for Macroeconomics and Business Cycle Research (IMK).
In addition, Germany has been suffering higher energy prices owing to the war in Ukraine. “We simply passed on all the higher energy costs, so that we had six to seven per cent inflation over two years,” Hohlfeld continued.
As a result, consumers have become more cautious about spending, with exploding prices and hardly any wage increases at the same time. In the construction sector, in particular, significantly less has been spent.
“Private consumption accounts for a good 50 per cent of Germany’s GDP, but under these circumstances, the hope of salvation from this sector has been dashed,” Hohlfeld said.
When forecasting economic growth for 2025, Hohlfeld even assumes a lower figure than the IMF. “We don’t know what initiatives the new government will take with regard to the economy. And beyond that, Trump – will he really put his announcements into practice and impose massive tariffs, not only on China, but also on Europe? We therefore expect mini-growth of 0.1 per cent in Germany for the time being.”
The internal crisis is being compounded by foreign economic and security policy challenges for which Germany is not prepared. The country is trying to find answers to these challenges by realigning and redefining its foreign policy.
“German foreign policy cannot be understood without World War II. After that, the country had only limited sovereignty in foreign policy until 1990. The only goal of German foreign policy up to this point was reunification; otherwise, Germany sailed under the umbrella of the four Wartime Allies,” said Andreas Reinicke, director of the German Orient Institute and former ambassador to Tunisia (2014 to 2020).
According to Reinicke, Germany has only slowly begun to define its own foreign policy in line with German interests over the last 15 years. “This may seem strange for such a large and influential country, but it was long frowned upon in Germany, as a legacy of the Third Reich,” he said.
Reinicke formulates today’s interests as a security interest in the context of the Ukraine war, an interest in the free movement of goods, an interest in peace, and, in this context, a need for political advances in the Middle East.
“I believe that the first step for German foreign policy under the new government will be to define our interests in the southern Mediterranean region independently. Up to now, we have mainly seen the Israel-Palestine conflict from an Israeli perspective, due to our historical ties with that country. But now we see that there is an Israeli government that is dominated by right-wing radicals,” Reinicke said.
“Therefore, we should have said much earlier, ‘stop, this is going too far.’ We failed to recognise that 100 per cent support for Israel without any ifs and buts has massively undermined a number of our own moral standards in terms of human rights and humanitarian action.”
This has led to protests within Germany and criticism of the current government and Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, especially after the German minister of justice made a distinction in the handling of two international arrest warrants – between those issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for Russian President Vladimir Putin and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
For Reinicke, the case is clear. “We are a member of the International Criminal Court. We support the rule of law worldwide, and there is no other solution for Germany than to execute an arrest warrant, whether it is against Putin, Netanyahu, or the two now deceased Hamas leaders. Otherwise, we could close down the International Criminal Court.”
Double standards and unclear communication – there is a lot to improve in German politics. Von Alemann advocates lowering the voting age nationwide from 18 to 16 in order to introduce people to the possibility of reshaping politics at an earlier age.
He also remains optimistic despite the strengthening of the far-right in Germany. “This is a completely normal democratic crisis: the government loses a majority, the cards are reshuffled, and there is a new chance for change,” he said.
* A version of this article appears in print in the 6 February, 2025 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly
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