The Myth of a Self-Confident Germany
By Gunther Hellman

In order to become successful again in foreign policy, Germany must return to its strength as a mediator.

There are not many political fields on which the gap in expertise seems to be as clear between the red-green coalition and the CDU/CSU and FDP as in the field of foreign policy. Chancellor Gerhard Schröder addressed his government's success with regard to foreign policy in the lead-up to the vote of confidence by saying that his politics had made Germany "outwardly more self-confident, more free and more respected." In the eyes of the German public, the evaluation is, however, substantially more critical. Polls of the Institute for Public Opinion at Allensbach showed, for example in 2002, that 50 percent of Germans polled viewed German foreign policy as successful; today only 24 percent agree. In contrast to this, the percentage of those who see the German position in the world to have become worse tripled from 9 percent to more than 31 percent.

Even in Europe, Germany's position has declined in the past few years. In the spring of 2005, only 35 percent of Germans polled thought that Germany played a large role in world politics, but 61 percent felt that Germany held a very large influence (at least) in the European Union. In the last full government year under Chancellor Kohl (1997), this value was 76 percent, clearly higher than at present.

With this background it is not surprising that in spring 2005, the number of those who thought that Germany should "accept more responsibility in the world" (instead of "restraining itself") decreased for the first time since beginning of the 1990s.

This trend reversal now shows, also in public opinion, something the world's political situation and polling data have proved for a long time - the unreasonableness of the spread of the "Beckenbauer syndrome" in foreign policy. In 1990, after Germany had won the soccer World Cup, the coach (Franz Beckenbauer) believed that Germany could lose no more, saying that "if, after the reunification, all the soccer players from the east are added to the current team, then Germany will be unbeatable for years." This optimism has emerged, not only in soccer, but also in politics, as an illusion in two different regards.

On the one hand, the finally repacified Germany after 1990 was gradually pushed aside from the world political center into a peripheral location - and was thus made objectively insignificant. On the other hand, also its weight in political-power - measured in modest numbers - decreased constantly, so that today even a united Germany is weaker than the West German partial-state before alone. For instance, the old Federal Republic's percentage of the world gross national product in 1981 was 4.8 percent, compared to united Germany's 4.0 percent in 2001. The numbers are similar for development assistance and the military expenditure. The German expenditures for development assistance increased from 0.0112 percent of the world gross national product in 1981 for the West German partial-state to 0.0156 percent in 1991, only to drop in 2001 to 0.009 percent. The decreases were even more drastic with the proportionate military expenditures; expenditures fell from 0.23 percent in 1981 to 0.15 percent in 1991 and further to 0.05 percent in 2001.

In short, not only has Germany's political importance constantly decreased, but also its weight and ability in international politics. Nevertheless the red-green government has pursued an ambitious prestige project with regard to foreign policy with its striving for a permanent seat in the UN Security Council. But even the last observer would have to see that this goal is not an expression of a self-confident Germany, but that of a descending power trying to pursue disproportionate ambitions.

In objective data as well as the mood of the German public, a clear message is sent to any new federal government: instead of pursuing high-cost international prestige projects, it should concentrate on the substantial challenges in closer proximity. This is very urgent in particular because the two most important traditional action-areas of German foreign policy, the European Union and NATO, have to overcome not only serious institutional problems, but also alarming lagging confidence from the German public. While almost 50 percent of Germans polled in spring 2005 had substantial or very substantial confidence in the UN, confidence in the European Union and NATO, which had almost identical ratings in 2002, has noticeably declined. Only 38 percent, even before the failed referenda in France and the Netherlands, had substantial or very substantial confidence into the European Union (in contrast to 51 percent of the population who had little-to-no confidence in the European Union). NATO is only a little better, receiving only 42 percent confidence and 45 percent little confidence.

However, if a new federal government under Bundeskanzlerin Angela Merkel makes its platforms true and imparts new impulse to the traditional relations with France and the U.S., it will not be easy to master both the institutional crises of the European Union and NATO, as well as to strengthen the confidence of Germans in these institutions. This is, above all, because Germany does not have, in view of its current socioeconomic crisis, the economic resources with which it, in the heydays of the Federal Republic, was able to make German aims politically palatable to rather reluctant coalition partners. Therefore, a mentality change is necessary for an urgently needed change of course in foreign policy. The self description of Germany as a "middle power," which in recent times even Gerhard Schröder struggled to maintain, is not a bad start. If German foreign policy concentrates again on what it did so well in the past, mediating between the tension-rich "national" interests of its partners in European Union and NATO, then it will be able to again reap the successes of the old, composed, self-confident Federal Republic.

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Gunther Hellman is Professor of Political Science at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University, Frankfurt am Main, and a frequent contributor to AICGS.
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This essay originally appeared in the September 8, 2005 Süddeutsche Zeitung.

To read this essay in the original German, please click here.

This essay was translated by Matthew Wiggins and appeared in the September 16, 2005 AICGS Advisor.