On Monday, Olaf Scholz was the first of the amassed European leaders to leave the emergency Paris meeting on the rapidly escalating situation surrounding Ukraine. Unlike the other leaders, Scholz is under remarkable pressure as Germany’s federal election approaches on Sunday. Scholz knows that he will lose his chancellorship, but the complexity of the German electoral system and the guarantee of a coalition means that the divisions in the country are likely to continue, especially under the shadow of the AfD, American tariffs and interference, and now Ukraine.
Who will be the next German Chancellor?
When the votes have been counted following the election, it seems most likely that the centre-right Christian Democrats (CDU - polling at ~30%) will be the largest party in the Budestag, Germany’s parliament. It then seems likely that the far-right party, Alternative for Germany (AfD - polling at ~21%) will be the second largest party, with the Social Democrats (SPD - polling at ~16%) and the Greens (polling at ~13%) making up the majority of the rest of the seats.
As has historically been the case in German politics, current polling suggests that no party will secure the 316 seats needed to form a majority government. If the CDU retains its current poll advantage, that means CDU leader Friedrich Merz will need to negotiate with the other parties to form a coalition before he can officially become Chancellor.
Which parties could form a coalition?
There's a long-held understanding within German politics that far-right parties like the AfD are to be excluded from the political process in what is known as ‘a firewall’. While the CDU and AfD did recently collaborate on a migration bill, Merz, during a television debate over the weekend, categorically ruled out including the AfD in any coalition, but opened the door to possible collaboration with the SPD and Greens.
Angela Merkel, during her long tenure as Chancellor, favoured an alliance between her CDU party and the SPD in what is known as the ‘Grand Coalition’ in German politics. As the German electoral system requires that smaller parties must gain over 5% of the vote to enter the Bundestag, larger parties gain a slightly larger share of seats compared to their vote share. Due to this, current projections of seat totals have a CDU-SDP coalition as commanding a slender majority of 322 seats. In the case that two parties cannot form a majority coalition, more parties may be invited to join the government. However, such 'traffic light' governments - such as the previous coalition of the SDP, Greens and FDP - can be precarious, and potentially unsuited to a time of such geopolitical instability.
American interference
Merz’s rebuttal of the advancing far-right party came days after the U.S. Vice-President JD Vance endorsed the AfD during his speech to the Munich security conference. During his speech, Vance criticised Europe for what he saw as a suppression of free speech, claiming that the continent's biggest threats came not from Chinese or Russian aggression but from within.
In a speech that has shocked the European political establishment, Vance referenced the cancelled Romanian election, downplaying Russian interference in the result, and lambasted Germany’s post-war firewall tradition against the far-right. It was also revealed that Vance had breached a longstanding protocol by meeting the leader of the AfD, Alice Weidel, but had turned down the opportunity to meet Chancellor Scholz. Vance also took the opportunity to stoke the fires of division by arguing that mass migration was Europe’s gravest challenge.
Vance’s comments have been met with concern across Europe. A concern worsened by the revelation last week that President Trump had called Vladimir Putin and offered key concessions to the Russian dictator. Trump and Putin agreed to reciprocal visits and the two sides have embarked on 'peace talks' that exclude Ukraine, whilst the new U.S. Defense Secretary, Pete Hegseth, has claimed that any peace will not include a plan for Ukrainian accession to NATO.
It is in such volatile circumstances that the meeting of European leaders was called on Monday. Scholz’s decision to be the first leader to leave the meeting, coupled with his rejection of the discussion surrounding sending a peacekeeping force to Ukraine, highlight the pressure the Chancellor is under. At a time of deep economic turmoil in Germany as the country enters its third year of recession, the AfD have argued for neutrality rather than support in relation to the Ukraine-Russian conflict, a position heavily criticised by the other main parties.
All eyes on Sunday
The election on Sunday will be one of the most important in Germany since the Second World War. The advance of the AfD; the economic vulnerability of a country that would be deeply affected by potential U.S. tariffs; the escalation of the situation in Ukraine; and the interference by the American Vice-President all paint a troubling picture.
The indications that America is moving toward both a more isolationist and protectionist foreign and economic policy respectively further highlight the importance of not just a strong and stable Germany, but a Europe and Britain united against economic vandalism and Russian aggression. The time for a deeper relationship with Germany and the EU as a whole has never been more prescient for the UK. No matter the result of the German election, the UK must deepen its alliance with Europe.