Electoral campaign in Germany: the polls with the surprise SPD that overtook the Greens and reached CDU-CSU, the two souls of the Social Democrats and the role of the FDP. The article by Pierluigi Mennitti
In the last week, the opinion polls have been consolidated that could determine a sensational outcome of the German electoral campaign and determine an unexpected political picture for Germany and Europe just a month ago. The comeback of the Social Democratic candidate Olaf Scholz is complete, his consensus towards his opponents is further increased but, more importantly in the German proportional system, his popularity has dragged the SPD from third to first place, albeit still in cohabitation with the union led by Armin Laschet.
The latest poll by the Forsa institute, published in the Sunday edition of Bild, confirmed the trend that began in the aftermath of the flood that devastated Rhenish Germany: the SPD suddenly overtook the Greens and reached the ‘Union at the top of voters’ approval with 22%, gaining two percentage points compared to the previous survey. Important changes compared to the poll of 14 August: Spd +2, Unione -3, Verdi -1. Ecologists have slipped to 17% and now occupy the third position. Not far behind are the liberals of the FPD at 13% (+1), who are on the way to being the needle of the balance of future government balances, and the Afd nationalists at 12% (+1). Closes the left of Linke, unchanged at 7%.
As for the competition between the three candidates, a real shrimp competition, from which the protagonist of the post-Merkel will emerge, the numbers are even clearer, even if they must be taken with great caution since the German voters do not elect. the Registrar directly. Compared to a week ago Olaf Scholz has gained 5 points, reaching a consensus of 34%, the green Annalena Baerbock is nailed at 13 and the Christian Democrat Armin Laschet has slipped by 3 points to 12%, last place.
In the Union there is red alert, also because there is no more time to change the running horse and the regret for the lost alternative of Markus Soder, the president of Bavaria who enjoyed greater support, is worth nothing. For the political scientist Jurgen Falter, interviewed by the state radio Deutschlandfunk, “Laschet may also be underestimated by pollsters, but the current numbers are so worrying that it can no longer be ruled out that the Union will end up in opposition”. Even a month ago, the Union enjoyed almost 15 points of advantage over the SPD: here we are no longer dealing with individual voters on the run, the problem – adds the expert – is that “Laschet does not bring any added value in the electoral campaign and the voters regret a firm guide and clear programmatic points “.
Five weeks after the vote of 24 September, one of the most important for Germany of this beginning of the century, Olaf Scholz managed the miracle to put himself and his party back in the running for the chancellery. But the situation is so fluid and volatile that anything can still happen. It is true that many voters (many more than usual due to the pandemic) are voting by mail these days, presumably reflecting current polls, but most of them will choose who to vote only at the last moment, a trend that has consolidated in recent years. as a consequence of the weakening of the membership vote.
In the press, which wonders what obstacles an experienced and rational politician like Olaf Scholz may now encounter in his race, the authoritative Neue Zurcher Zeitung (Nzz) has perhaps found the right answer: his own party. The Swiss newspaper, one of the most authoritative German-language newspapers with a conservative orientation, warns: Scholz is not today’s SPD. It is a little bit true. If the finance minister interprets a moderate and institutional vision of social democracy, in the wake of that government wing that Gerhard Schroder had expressed in the pre-Merkel era, the party leadership is instead entirely shifted to the left.
With Norbert Walter-Borjans and Saskia Esken in the presidency and the young Kevin Kuhnert behind them, the SPD had chosen to respond to its crisis by wearing a more combative and maximalist suit, in the belief that it had lost votes following the compromises made in the long run. season of government (with the exception of the four-year period 2009-2013, the SPD has been in government since 1998). Too many concessions to neoliberal fashion in Schroder’s years (Agenda 2010), too many yields to Angela Merkel in the Grosse Koalition governments, with the aggravating circumstance of having contracted out traditional social reforms of the SPD to the Chancellor: this was Walter’s assessment. Borian and Esker, two rear-facing Forrest Gumps, who emerged at the last congress as an expression of rebellion against the party’s elite, embodied by Olaf Scholz.
The horizon of the “new” SPD was that of an ideological regeneration in the quiet bay of the opposition. Now she finds herself catapulted to the forefront by an exponent who also appeals to industrialists like Scholz. “Although the candidate is moderate and bourgeois, with the executive staff behind him, an economic agenda based on redistribution and re-education would enter the government”, attacks the Nzz, “the ambitions of the left SPD do not match at all with the good-natured image of the anxious Scholz “. It may be the Achilles heel of the new front-man of the electoral campaign. And in any case, the controversial track on which Armin Laschet has already thrown himself, who has relaunched the slogan of the “red danger”: a future government in which the SPD embarks not only the Greens but also Linke, anti-Atlanticist and alien to the German “magic circle” of the social market economy. But Scholz has another alliance in mind, more moderate and “bourgeois”, with the Greens and the liberals of the FDP.
The work of seduction towards the Fdp leader Christian Lindner began some time ago, precisely on the economic and fiscal issues dear to the liberals, and now rests on concrete numerical hypotheses. Between alarms about the red danger and social-liberal suggestions, the pendulum of the electoral campaign will move in the coming days, with all due respect to environmental issues and the ambitions of the Greens. But everything can suddenly change in the competition of the ten little Indians who will compete for the destinies of the largest European economy after Merkel.
