It is a curious business when a government deliberately loses a parliamentary vote. But under the German constitution, this was the only way beleaguered German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder could produce a general election in advance of the due date next year. After Schroeder’s Socialists were heavily defeated in May local elections, the chancellor vowed to seek an early general election. A similar confidence vote loss maneuver was used in 1972 by Willy Brandt and ten years later by the Christian Democrat leader Helmut Kohl. But on both those occasions the governments were working from a position of electoral strength. The position of Germany’s Socialists would seem to be the absolute opposite. They trail the Christian Democrats, under new leader Angela Merkel, in the polls. Many commentators already assume Merkel will win. More ominously, an opinion poll this week reported that 70 percent of Germans want early elections. This would indicate that many Germans are itching for the opportunity to get rid of the Socialist government.
The suggestion is that Schroeder, exasperated by constant divisions within his party and frustrated by the difficulties of a Socialist government trying to introduce relatively tough market-oriented reforms, wants to go out in a political blaze of glory, dragging his squabbling party down with him in an electoral defeat which would hurt them even more than it would hurt him. This may however be a serious misjudgment of a man who has in the past showed himself to be an extremely adroit political operator. Germans may be angry at the reforms that Schroeder has been forcing through to the generous welfare fabric that they take for granted. But if they choose Ms. Merkel and the Christian Democrats they will be voting for more reforms, not less.
An election in September could give Schroeder the opportunity to highlight the options starkly. Germans will have to accept that changes to their comfortable lifestyle, in unemployment, sickness or retirement are inevitable. What they will have to decide is whether they stick with a Socialist government that will continue to introduce these reforms gently and sensitively or chose the right of center Christian Democrats, who are likely to drive through change faster and more painfully. There is an argument that the quicker the process of economic reform is undertaken, the less discomfort it will cause. It is the would-be emollient tentativeness with which the Schroeder administration has introduced changes that has strung out the pain and angered voters. It will be for the German voters to decide. The consummate politician in Schroeder will enjoy the hurly-burly of the electoral stump. The chancellor is a great performer and probably relishes the battle ahead, even if he fears the final outcome. Maybe he is calculating that even if he loses, history will rapidly restore his reputation. If the general election is held in September — and there may yet be legal challenges to the premature dissolution of Parliament — and Schroeder loses, the Christian Democrats will take over the reform agenda. Within the year many Germans may be feeling the economic pinch even more sharply and be looking back fondly and regretfully to the gentler pace of Schroeder’s reforms.
