The recipe for the rise of the German Greens: centrism and climate

The candidate for Chancellor of the Greens, Annalena Baerbock, last April in Berlin.

As if the polls did not give enough clues, the leaders of the two majority parties in Germany have been in charge in recent days to point out who they fear, which is the enemy to beat in the upcoming general elections in September, the first in 16 years to which Angela Merkel does not appear. By criticizing their lack of management experience, magnifying each inconsequential slip, they are helping to place Annalena Baerbock, the candidate of Los Verdes, at the head of the electoral race.

Maybe they just go with the flow.

The 40-year-old environmental leader monopolizes covers, is the subject of conversation in political gatherings, gives interviews that are analyzed under a microscope.

With whom will you agree?

What will you include in your electoral program, now only a draft?

Will it hold the pull of the polls?

The rise of the Greens worries conservatives (CDU and its Bavarian sister party, CSU) and Social Democrats (SPD) - who rule in coalition - both in the doldrums, and fascinates analysts.

The party triples in voting intention the votes it won in the last elections, in 2017, and for the first time consistently surpasses Merkel's party.

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More information

• The CDU suffers a severe setback in two regionals that propel the Greens in a key election year in Germany

• German Social Democrats struggle to rally the progressive vote

Several factors explain the phenomenon that has turned Los Verdes into the fashionable party. Svenja, Johanna and Eva, three friends in their thirties who share a bottle of rosé wine sitting on a bench in Hasenheide Park - the hotel business has been closed in Berlin since last November - explain it in their own way, which largely coincides with expert analysis. “I consider myself on the left, but I do not feel represented by the SPD. It seems like an old game to me. Not because of Die Linke [The Left], too radical, ”says Johanna, who works in a consultancy and lives in Kreuzberg, a Berlin district where the Greens have always had good results. The difference is that now they are no longer targeting the urban class, on the left, young and of a certain socioeconomic level that made up - broadly speaking - the bulk of their electorate.They go for the center, that immense container of millions of votes that decide the elections.

The pandemic has displaced climate change from the main concerns of the Germans, but with the advance of vaccination other horizons are opened. Now the challenge is to reactivate the economy, digitize and modernize the country and make progress in cutting greenhouse gas emissions. What the Greens propose. Their push (around 27% of the vote, with Merkel's CDU at 24% and the SPD at 15%) forces the other parties to react. Merkel's government has approved to toughen the Climate Change Law just 15 days after the Constitutional Court overthrew it in a historic ruling. Among other things, it advances the zero carbon footprint target by five years to 2045 and places Germany at the head of the EU in climate ambition.

But environmentalism explains only part of the success of Los Verdes, who drink from the crisis of the traditional parties. Their voting intention comes from both Merkel's Christian Democrats and Social Democrats, somewhat more than the latter, says Peter Matuschek, a researcher at the Forsa Democracy Institute. "Since 2017, the Greens have shifted towards more pragmatism," he says. From being a highly ideological party, which for years housed two opposing currents - the

fundis

(fundamentalists) and the

realos

(moderate and pragmatic) - has become a "cohesive and pacified formation with strong and stable leadership," says Matuschek. Neither the SPD nor the union of CDU and CSU are managing to connect with that large part of the electorate that does not think in categories of left or right. Los Verdes take advantage of that hole. "If they continue like this, they could be the new center party that the others have ceased to be," he says.

The center was the one that gave the victories to Angela Merkel, agrees Franco delle Donne, doctor in Political Communication from the Free University of Berlin and host of the podcast

The end of the Merkel era

, who believes that if the chancellor ran again, I would win again. But the conservatives no longer have Merkel, but Armin Laschet, 60, president of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia and leader of a party that last month publicly aired its dispute to choose a candidate and that carries recent scandals of commission collection. The Social Democrats count on Olaf Scholz, 62, Merkel's finance minister, who also does not enjoy popular pull.

The public seems to trust Baerbock even though they have not met her as a minister or regional president. The last barometer of Forsa asked with which politician the country would be “in good hands”. Merkel got 63%. Among the candidates, Baerbock, with 51% appears the first. Scholz got 42%. Laschet, 37%. “The Greens have chosen very well. At the same popularity of their leaders [Baerbock has co-chaired the party since 2018 with Robert Habeck], they present a counterweight to the other two candidates, older men who boast of political experience, ”says Matuschek. Perhaps not having it, coming from outside, is what benefits her, he adds. The challenge for the Greens is not to make mistakes, to speak positively - "negative campaigns do not work in Germany," says the expert - and to avoid extreme proposals. Do not leave the center.

"Laschet and Scholz are the

status quo

”, Says Sven Giegold, member of Los Verdes and MEP. "Society perceives climate change as the main problem, despite the pandemic, and its parties have failed to address it," he says. Baerbock, whom she describes as "very talented and intelligent," offers change but from a positive message. "Although we come from the social movements, we are an anti-popular party," he says, and distances himself from formations such as Podemos in Spain. "We have not lost idealism, but we have combined it with realism and reaching agreements and getting projects to go ahead." In a country accustomed to coalitions, the Greens are part of 11 of the 16 regional governments, where they have 40 councilors. In federal politics they have been “constructive opposition”, Giegold emphasizes. Without your votes in the Bundesrat,the territorial Chamber, "many important laws would not have been approved," he assures.

The example of the 'green baron' Kretschmann

If Winfried Kretschmann has succeeded in Baden-Württemberg for more than 10 years, why shouldn't the Greens be able to lead a coalition at the federal level? The example of Kretschmann, who won his third regional elections last March, comes up frequently these days when talking about possible government deals in Berlin. The 72-year-old former biology professor is the first and only president of a German state of the Greens. In the first legislature, the junior partner was the SPD. In the second, the CDU, with which he repeats now. Kretschmann, who has managed to combine environmentalism with the defense of economic interests, is the most outstanding success story of the training. At the federal level,the only responsibility of the Government of the Greens was the coalition with the Social Democrats of Gerhard Schröder between 1998 and 2005. The environmental leader Joshka Fischer was Foreign Minister and Vice Chancellor.