All or Nothing for Angela Merkel
By Christoph Nesshöver
 

Federalism is great. There are years in the German political calendar when it seems like elections are the country's main occupation: Federal election, regional elections in sixteen states, and local elections. Since every election tends to be interpreted as a national affair, all governments in Berlin tend to put unpopular decisions off again and again - to not threaten the perspectives for the next election day.

2010 differs in one important aspect from this eternal scheme of postwar German politics: It only offers one single election to hide behind. But this one election is a really big one: On May 9, voters in North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) will choose their representatives for the next five years to come. With 18 million inhabitants, NRW is by far Germany's biggest state. Its economy is bigger than Belgium's or Greece's. So if there is one state election that needs to be very closely watched in Berlin, it's NRW's. And there are plenty of reasons for Chancellor Merkel to be nervous this time around. Even her foreign policy may be affected by the election's outcome in the region between Bonn, Münster, Aachen, and Dortmund.

One fact is particularly touchy for the chancellor: The ruling coalition in Düsseldorf, NRW's capital, is the same as the one that took over in Berlin last fall. Jürgen Rüttgers of Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU) rules the state with the Free Democrats (FDP). Merkel's first six months with the coalition of her dreams has been tumultuous. The CDU has been constantly quarreling with foreign minister Guido Westerwelle's FDP over taxes and health care; not much has gotten done. So the election in NRW becomes a sort of referendum on the so-called "black-yellow" coalition in Berlin.

Things aren't looking good for Chancellor Merkel. The latest polls predict that the CDU and FDP will lose their majority, mainly because the Free Democrats (who scored a historic high of 14.6 percent in the federal election in September) are about to collapse, possibly even missing the 5-percent-threshold necessary to enter parliament. So if the CDU still finishes as number one, as all polls assume, Minister-President Rüttgers will need to find himself a new partner.

Merkel's first choice would most likely be the Greens. They're in for a strong showing well above ten percent. A "black-green" coalition would be a nationwide premiere on a big state level (Hamburg is governed by the same coalition but appears way too small to serve as a model). If it works out in NRW, it would open the door for Merkel to go with the Greens in Berlin after the next federal elections in 2013. She would win another strategic option to retain power.

But she would also lose her ability to exercise power for the next three and a half years. If the CDU loses the FDP as a partner in NRW, the Christian Democrats will lose control of the Bundesrat, the upper chamber in Berlin. (By tradition, a ruling state coalition which unites parties who are on opposite sides at the federal level tends to abstain from many votes in the Bundesrat if partners disagree on the issue in question.) And the Social Democrats will just love it. A good number of laws passed by the Bundestag have to pass the Bundesrat as well; the SPD could block many of Merkel's initiatives.

It's been done before: In Helmut Kohl's last years as chancellor in 1997-1998, the Social Democrats controlled the upper chamber and played it out as well as they could. Kohl looked like a king without a kingdom. The mastermind behind the SPD's tactics back then was, by the way, a certain Gerhard Schröder. Merkel's CDU paid back in kind when they retook the Bundesrat while Schröder was chancellor.

The second possibility for the CDU in NRW would be a "grand coalition" with the Social Democrats. Merkel's problem: this option is extremely unpopular within the CDU. The four years in Berlin between 2005 and 2009 have been painful for the Christian Democrats - even though their suffering had the welcome effect of nearly destroying the SPD, which fell to an all-time low of some 23 percent at the federal elections.

Should the "grand coalition" turn out to be the only way for the CDU to stay in power in NRW, Merkel may also find her margin for maneuver in foreign politics reduced. With a resurrected SPD back on board again, the chancellor will likely face fierce debates over the German commitment to the mission in Afghanistan.

Under its new chairman Sigmar Gabriel, the SPD has moved to the left. Some of its traditional pacifist reflexes seem to have regained momentum as more than 60 percent of Germans oppose the Bundeswehr's mission in Afghanistan - and the opposition grows by the day. The death of seven German soldiers in Afghanistan within two weeks in April (carrying Germany's death toll in Afghanistan to 43) has further fostered the hostility of wide parts of the German public against the ISAF mission against the Taliban. For the first time ever, Chancellor Merkel recently attended a funeral ceremony and thus appeared in press pictures together with coffins wrapped in black, red, and gold. As the war in Afghanistan grows increasingly unpopular, the SPD is likely to put more pressure on the Merkel government to prepare for a retreat. If both parties find themselves in cohabitation in NRW, it may become harder for Merkel to withstand such calls.

Of course, things could still turn out a lot worse for Angela Merkel. The SPD may even come out victorious in NRW, dealing a devastating blow to the CDU - and its chairman, Angela Merkel. A poll last weekend indicated that the Social Democrats and Greens could even win a majority in NRW. If her "black-yellow" model suffers such a disaster in Düsseldorf, Merkel would find herself questioned from inside the CDU. She may even be forced to leave the party's chairmanship to someone else. The same happened to Chancellor Schröder in 2004 - and it turned out to be the beginning of his demise: Subsequently, his leadership was more and more attacked from within his own party and beyond.

In NRW, voters will not only decide who governs them for the five years to come; they will also decide whether they want Angela Merkel to remain a strong chancellor in domestic as well as foreign affairs or whether they choose to set May 9, 2010, as the beginning of her decline. Ten days before the election, the latter outcome appears slightly more likely.

Christoph Nesshöver is senior editor of Handelsblatt, Germany's business and financial daily, in Düsseldorf, and a regular contributor to the Advisor.

This essay appeared in the April 29, 2010, AICGS Advisor.