British Prime Minister David Cameron has strongly opposed the nomination of Jean-Claude Juncker as the next President of the European Commission and has called for a formal vote to be held on the topic if no consensus can be reached. Imke Henkel writes on the broader relationship between Cameron and Angela Merkel. She notes that while Merkel also has reason to oppose Juncker, the UK’s opposition has made it increasingly difficult for her to back another candidate without seeming to give in to British demands. Ultimately Cameron must display a better appreciation of Merkel’s political approach if he is to avoid alienating her from his proposed plan for EU reform.
Is Angela Merkel good for David Cameron?The British Prime Minister certainly seems to think so. Cameron has pinned his hopes for European reform on the German Chancellor. But is he right to do so? In answering this question, their obvious and often quoted common interests – completion of the single market, less red tape, more subsidiarity – will be less relevant than the question of whether Merkel will actually deliver what Cameron hopes to achieve.
For an answer, it is helpful to look at the German Chancellor in comparison to her erstwhile mentor, the former German Chancellor Helmut Kohl. When she arrived in West German politics after 1989, Merkel studied Kohl closely for years. Her political education took place within the “system Kohl”. Eventually it was her who ended it when Kohl became embroiled in a disastrous scandal about illegal party donations that nearly destroyed the CDU.
There are two main commonalities between Merkel and Kohl, and one crucial difference. The first commonality is an extraordinary capability for shrewd political operation, especially in dealing with opponents. The second commonality is that both at one fateful moment forfeited their political goal for short term tactical deliberation.
The crucial difference is their view of the European Union: Kohl was a European romantic, who dreamed of a United States of Europe that the European people would see as their common fatherland, a matter of heart and soul – as he recently stressed again in a meeting with the candidate for Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker. Merkel has no idealistic vision of Europe. She sees the EU as a means to achieve prosperity, freedom and peace for the European people. It is most certainly Merkel’s approach that Cameron finds closer to home.
Merkel’s extraordinary capacity for political tactics, however, should serve as a warning to Cameron. Merkel acts as Kohl’s disciple in power politics. Like her mentor – and in marked difference to the British Prime Minister – she dealt with and often ousted any competitor who threatened to hinder her ascent to power, including eventually Mr Kohl himself. Merkel rose on being underestimated. For Kohl, she was “the girl” or “my girl”, until it was her who defenestrated the powerful party chief through a well calculated letter that she placed in the “Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung” in which she called for an end of the ‘Kohl era’ and a fresh start for his scandal ridden party.
Cameron tasted Merkel’s deftness during the infamous evening on 9 December 2011, when he, having misread his conversation with the German Chancellor only days before, tried to veto a treaty change on fiscal regulation and ended up being isolated in Europe. Typically, the German Chancellor managed to leave the acrimonious utterances afterwards to the French president Nicolas Sarkozy, whereas she herself kept to conciliatory tones.
Merkel has an exceptionally safe position at home. Around 85 per cent of 18-29 year olds, as well as those over 60, are content or very content with the present state of Germany; while this rating never sinks below 70 per cent in any age group, according to a recent “Spiegel”-poll. After nine years as Chancellor, 66 per cent of Germans are still happy with her work, the best result for any German politician, according to an ARD-Deutschlandtrend poll in early July.
The tactics that Merkel has employed to maintain this support are worth studying because they are the same tactics that currently shape European politics. The main ingredients are at least in part close to what Merkel observed and learned over ten years by working for and watching Helmut Kohl: keeping her options open as long as possible by a policy of wait and see; sensing and following the public mood; watching closely and analysing the political opponent and embracing his/her ideas; being thus seen as the one who establishes consensus in the interest of the people and the common good.
It is precisely these tactics Merkel uses currently for negotiating who will be the next President of the European Commission. Merkel has good reason to oppose Juncker’s candidacy. It was Juncker who during the Eurozone crisis called for the introduction of Eurobonds, a financial instrument that Merkel strictly opposes because she fears that it will lead to Germany paying Europe’s bills. Merkel as well has grown cool on the idea of an ever closer union, the founding ideal of the Rome treaty that Juncker still passionately believes in.
Cameron’s early and vociferous objection, however, obstructed her likely intention to arrive at a more appropriate candidate than Juncker by forcing her, together with her coalition partner at home and with the public mood in Germany, to declare herself earlier and clearer than she probably intended. Her statements concerning Juncker should be heard and read very carefully. They are aimed at winning time for a solution. Her reported backing of Juncker plays to the public mood in Germany, but does not exclude the search for a better candidate. Cameron’s continuous belligerent opposition to the former Luxembourg prime minister, though, makes it increasingly impossible for Merkel to not support Juncker, otherwise she will risk being seen as giving in to British blackmail.
The tactics of ‘wait and see’, and especially of riding the public mood, have their obvious dangers. It led both Merkel and Kohl into grave mistakes. When Helmut Kohl promised to soon turn the newly joining East-German Länder into “blossoming landscapes” he hoped to create an optimistic mood in the run-up to the general elections. Kohl managed to get re-elected, but when his promise did not come true, the resulting frustration poisoned the relationship between East and West for years to come.
Similarly, at the beginning of the Eurozone crisis Merkel played to the German public mood and encouraged the Germans to believe that they should not pay for the presumed mistakes of other member states, instead of stressing how much Germany had in fact profited from the common currency. This again poisoned the tone of the debate for years to come and consequently significantly limited Merkel’s options. In addition, the rise of the anti-euro Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) has its roots here.
Merkel’s crucial difference to Kohl, her lack of any romantic vision for Europe, may suit Cameron, but he should be careful to regard this trait as running unambiguously in his favour. Merkel is neither an integrationist nor an “inter-governmentalist” and has indeed vacillated between both positions during the past crisis years. Her penchant for power tactics can lead to sudden abandonment of previously cherished policies – as famously happened with her policy on nuclear power.
Cameron would be ill advised to rely on Merkel’s sympathy for his ideas for a reform of Europe. He needs to study her tactics rather more closely and learn to build on it much more adroitly than he has managed until now. Although Cameron’s government has intensified the exchange with the German government on various ministerial levels to an extent that has not been seen before, there is a growing hostile mood against Britain in Germany and indeed within Merkel’s own party. Cameron cannot ignore this because Merkel won’t. Otherwise Merkel may turn out to be far more of a danger to Cameron than he has so far anticipated.
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Note: This article gives the views of the author, and not the position of EUROPP – European Politics and Policy, nor of the London School of Economics.
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Imke Henkel
Imke Henkel is a German journalist based in the UK. She is the former UK and Ireland correspondent for German news magazine Focus.
Merkel couldn’t give a fig about our interests so lets not worry what our actions may or may not do to keep her happy or otherwise. The only thing on her mind is security & defense & the budget black hole that will be left when we leave. Priorities dear lady, Priorities.
The Greek bailout alone was worth hundreds of billions of euros – why would Merkel care about the paltry sum we pay into the EU budget? The budget is a largely irrelevant issue that tends to be brought up by people who like to spit fury about giving other countries money rather than looking at the broader picture. It has no sizeable impact on our economy and the EU would survive perfectly well if we left.
Of course Merkel does want us to stay in the EU – and you’re right to bring up foreign policy/defence as that’s a key issue (the EU’s defence co-operation is still largely driven by the UK and France because they have by far the greatest capacity of any EU state on a diplomatic/military level). But if Cameron wants to implement the reform package that he’s all but pinned his next government to then he has to offer Merkel something more than blackmail. It’s that kind of bluster that’s put him on the backfoot in the first place – he’s tried to take an overtly hardline on every issue and it’s reached the point at which nobody takes it seriously anymore.
The money “Loaned” to Greece will be gotten back with interest just like the money doled out to Ireland, Cyprus, Spain & Portugal, the German government is not going to be taking a hit & nor are its banks. When the UK has upped & left (Which for both parties is the best way forward) the Germans will have to fill the funding gap which wont be filled by any of the other 26 broken economies
The UK’s contribution to the EU budget is absolutely tiny in comparison to the scale of the EU economy. If you think the entire enterprise is going to grind to a halt simply because the UK is no longer paying the 4-8 billion pounds net into the budget that it paid in the last MFF, for instance, then we’re living in cloud cuckoo land.
This is another in a long line of arguments that Eurosceptics come out with to the effect that “the EU needs us more than we need them”. The idea is supposedly that because we make a net contribution to the budget we’re the ones capable of calling the shots. The same argument is made with respect to our trade deficit with the rest of the EU – as if having a worse trade balance gives you influence (a principle that would mean many of the poorest countries in the world, who have horrendous trade balances, would paradoxically be the most powerful on the global stage).
This is just rhetoric and bluster. In the real world – the one Cameron actually exists in, whether he likes it or not – you have to negotiate and compromise with other states if you want to get what you want. Inventing random reasons why we’re supposedly capable of dictating terms to states like Germany is a nonsense – the sort of thing that sounds great when we’re arguing in an internet comment section like this, but which has absolutely nothing to do with how politics actually works in the real world.
That’s like saying we should have all Rolls Royce’s for government cars because in comparison to the UK economy the amount is tiny. We cant afford a fleet of Aircraft carriers yet we are paying twice the cost of 2 carriers fleets every year in contributions to the EU. The number one priority of any government is the security & defense of its people & not to subsidise other inept countries. Luxembourg has been a net recipient of EU funds for what seems like forever yet it is the home for many of the continents largest corporations they should tax companies & their population to pay its way in the world anything else is communism
Joe Thorpe
again with sidestepping the issue and utter dishonesty
1) the estimated cost of ONE aircraft carrier is north of 6 billions pounds, which is around the net contributions of the UK (http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-26292274)
2) who do you want to use that aircraft carrier against ? who is threatening the very security of the British isles ? … on the other hand, if you do want to parade your warmongering around the world, then sure go for it … not like it helped the UK cause much in the past 10 years
3) UK contributions to the EU are an investment for full access to the markets of 550 millions Europeans, enabling political influence beyond the mere embassy circles and contributing to faster prosperity in ex-communist countries.
Without it, you would still have all the regulatory costs of complying EU rules, but none of the privileged access (most, if not all, trade barriers in advanced economies is regulatory in nature and not covered by International Trade agreements)
4) an aircraft carrier, like a car, is a sunken cost : it keeps costing money in maintenance but never earns any (unlike you practice piracy).
EU membership provides easy travel, work and residency to over 3 millions Brits. more than 1 million have jobs directly dependent to EU trade, with an additional 1 million indirectly (business doing 20% or less of their activity with European markets).
over 100 billions pounds of export to the EU.
(http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/itis/international-trade-in-services/2011/sty-international-trade-in-services.html)
……. and all this (peace and prosperity) for a bargain price of 4 to 6 billion pounds every year.
your militarism jingoism led to Iraq and Afghanistan cost the UK north of 37 billions pounds (and the final bill will be much more). what did you get for it ?
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Financial_cost_of_the_Iraq_War)
Security is an ongoing issue what do you suggest we do to rid the problem of Islamic terrorists? Would you like us to Nuke them? No I didn’t think so. You are talking about super carriers, I am talking about invincible class carriers & they are needed to maintain shipping lanes around the world so that we can trade safely buying & selling goods, services & energy. If we relied on Europeans for defense we wouldn’t have any security your obviously blindly slaving of the EU mantra, good luck
Joe Thorpe,
if you can agree that Germany was able to lend around a hundred billion euros for all the periphery countries (total around 400 billions, but Germany’s share is around 20%), then why do you think she can’t fund the UK yearly EU contributions ? let alone other EU countries who despite the financial crisis have not missed a single payment …
here are some figures for you :
the yearly UK net contributions is around 4 to 8 billions euros (gross contributions minus rebates and transfers)
that’s between 4% and 6% of the EU yearly budget
that’s around 0.24% of Germany’s GDP and 0.06% of EU countries GDP (excluding the UK)
like Alan Merton said, it’s peanuts.
it’s around half of the entire UK’s yearly international aid budget of 10 billions pounds (which is paltry at 1% of GDP)
in comparison, the UK spend EVERY MONTH more than 10 billions euros to fund its budget deficit (the gap between tax receipts and government expenditures is between 100 and 120 billions pounds every year since 2010).
40% of that funding gap is for paying the interests on previous borrowings, thus the public debt increases.
if you really think that a UK exit will cause a funding crisis for the EU, you are sorely deluded …
Best regards,
Because that is money that she wont get back. EU donations to subsidise the inept nations are not loans they are gifts. I assume you are aware that most of Germany’s international aid is made as a reduced rate loan & not a gift they wont get back like UK overseas aid? The Germans like their money & they dont part with it unless they know they will get it back.
@Joe “That’s like saying we should have all Rolls Royce’s for government cars because in comparison to the UK economy the amount is tiny.”
You’re trying to shift the argument. We’re not discussing whether paying x amount into the EU budget is a good thing or not. You were trying to argue that the UK leaving the EU would create a black hole in the budget and that therefore Germany and the rest of Europe would bend over backwards to accommodate us. That simply isn’t credible when you consider the size of our contributions.
Of course it will create a black hole, it’s dead money & will have to be found from elsewhere to continue the spending programs