The News
Germany’s Chancellor Olaf Scholz has formally requested a confidence vote following the November collapse of his governing coalition.
Germany’s government has largely stalled since Scholz fired the country’s finance minister last month, precipitating the breakup of his fragile center-left three-party coalition. Scholz is widely expected to lose the vote, setting the stage for a general election in the first half of 2025 that could see his party’s power eroded even further.
“Our country needs stable majorities and a government capable of action,” German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, who is largely a figurehead, told Deutsche Welle.
The collapse of Germany’s government, as well as that of France last week, has left a “vacuum of leadership” across Europe, The New York Times wrote.
SIGNALS
Germany’s economic woes likely pushed Scholz out
The coalition collapse — a relative rarity in Germany compared to other European nations — reflects the difficulties facing Europe’s largest economy, which only just avoided recession this year. Having enjoyed stability for years, the government became “too comfortable,” Deutsche Welle argued, and has struggled to revive the economy post-COVID-19 amid industrial production declines and the Ukraine war. Germany needed a chancellor who acted “like a captain, not a referee,” Reuters’ former Germany correspondent said, adding that “80% or 90% of the government’s problems came down to Scholz’s leadership style.”
Political instability is sweeping European Union
Germany’s vote combined with the French government’s collapse has left the European Union rudderless at a critical moment, with Russia threatening the bloc’s security and US President-elect Donald Trump’s return to the White House. Germany has fallen victim to “the same forces of fragmentation” that have swept Europe, The New York Times argued, in particular, the rise of the far right. Though national polls show the conservative Christian Democratic Union ahead of the pack, the far-right Alternative for Germany could see the greatest electoral gains in a general election.