Fdp

Thursday

Bill Wirtz

Greta Thunberg didn’t win the German elections

From our US edition

Greta Thunberg is back in business. Previously slowed down by European pandemic restrictions, the Fridays For Future movement has now hit the streets, starting in Berlin. 'We must not give up, there is no going back now,' Thunberg told thousands of local protesters. The appeals and influence of her movement have translated, at least somewhat, into a stronger climate-focused youth vote in last month's German elections. The Green party has made significant advances in Parliament, becoming one of the kingmakers in upcoming coalition talks. Yet Germany’s environmentalists aren’t the only ones who outperformed their previous results. The liberal-democrat FDP scored 23 percent of Germany’s first-time voters, the same amount as the Greens.

greta

Wednesday

Carlo Moll

How Germany’s Free Democratic party capitalised on the AfD’s misfortunes

One of the most remarkable stories to come out of Germany in the last year has been the rise of the Free Democratic Party (FDP). Having struggled for relevance in 2020, the party has transformed itself into a political force that could decide the makeup of the next government – and maybe even anoint Angela Merkel's successor as Chancellor. The FDP's success follows an almost eight-year long self-reinvention in which the party has sometimes resembled a cult of personality centred around its charismatic chairman, Christian Lindner. It was Lindner who began the party's revival after a shattering 2013 defeat led to the loss of all its seats in the Bundestag, Germany's highest parliament, and a phase of intense soul-searching and rebranding.

Thursday

Matthew Lynn

Could the Green party revive Germany’s fortunes?

The BMWs and Mercs will be banned from the autobahns. People will only have electricity when there is enough of a breeze to keep the windmills turning. And the factories will be on a three-day week, while the airports will be converted into organic farms. Most businesses, and of course conservatives of any sort, will be nervous at the increasingly likely prospect of the Greens taking charge in Berlin later this year. But they shouldn't be. In fact, they would be a huge improvement on Angela Merkel’s chaotic twilight years. As she heads towards retirements, Merkel’s legacy is looking very tarnished. The CDU is slumping in the polls. It has made a mess of Covid-19, imposing a botched vaccine procurement programme on the whole of Europe that has come badly unstuck.