Deutschland

[Johannes Schneider]

Dennis wrote:
> Schroeder is
>not, as you might think, a cheap opportunist like Clinton, but rather an
>expensive one
I dont think it depends so much on the personalities of Clinton or
Schroeder, but on how much resistance the working class is going to deliver
against neo-liberal politics.
>But there's much to cheer about in this election. The Greens racked up
>a solid 6.7% in national elections, and the PDS got around 5.1% or so,
>which means a solid contingent of diehard radicals will be able to shut
>der Gerd down cold if he even tries to pursue Kohl-like policies (and the
>SPD would, if they could get away with it, which they can't).
I wouldnt trust the Greens at all. On social issues (taxes, pensions, social
insurance) they are to the right of the SPD, because union influence is much
stronger on the SPD. The electorate of the Greens is the well-to-do liberal
middle class, even the 'lefts' within the Greens like Trittin have to take
this into account. As for the PDS: they are neither part of the government,
nor needed for a majority. So, they are in an even weaker position than
Rifondazione Communista in Italy. Remember how Prodi, brought them into line
last year just by threatening fresh elections.
>Two of the
>more subtle but nevertheless extremely important effects the election will
>have: (1) the new coalition will revise the citizenship laws, probably the
>most archaic in Europe, so that the 8 million or so immigrants in Germany
>have a real chance of becoming citizens; these people are mostly
>workingclass and hyperexploited, and will vote solidly for the Left,
I ask you to be cautious on this one. The SPD has played the rascist card
during the election campaign as well. So the SPD is very vulnerable on
conservative pressure from this side. I agree with you that there will be
some reformed citizenship law, but I doubt it will be any substantial change
for immigrants who came to Germany. Any changes will rather apply to second
( or third generation ) children that have been living in Germany. So only a
few will really profit, it will rather split the immigrated working class
even further. Whether immigrants will solidly vote for the left is not sure
at all: the conservatives use dubious polls to block any changes at all, but
one has to keep in mind that after forty years of immigration to Germany
there has been an immigrated middle-class as well. These people are proably
the ones to get citizenship first.
>and (2) more money will be funneled into EU projects of all kinds, and
>especially into Eastern Europe. Long boom, here we come.
This one I doubt as well. Schroeder is very critical about paying 'german'
money to the EU. Now that Kohl has gone the conservatives will ( together
with playing the rascist card ) try exploit anti-EU sentiment as well.
>One other point: you shouldn't get the idea that Germany is going down the
>Clintonite road to ruin. In fact, the real story in Deutschland is the
>emergence, after a century of war, barbarism and petrifaction, of one of
>Europe's liveliest political cultures. In 1996 there were huge street
>protests against Kohl's austerity package (it was a mere $20 billion in
>cuts, and was later reduced somewhat, but people were PISSED OFF), in 1997
>there were massive student strikes and more protests, and now, here in
>1998, the first transfer of power by an election (as opposed to the
>coalition reshuffling of 1969) in the Bundesrepublik went off without a
>hitch. What's happening in Europe today is that the trainwreck of
>neoliberalism has created such social mayhem that people are beginning to
>wake up and actively fight back, on countless cultural and political
>levels. It's those new grassroots social movements, plus the Greens and
>PDS, which are constructing the 21st century left as we speak.
Dennis, I wished the picture you are painting was true. But the fact is that
Schroeder has moved the SPD considerably to the right. The same goes for the
Greens under Fischer. In the West the PDS got less than 2% percent and in
the East the PDS was voted not because of their left-socialdemocratic
platform, but despite it.
Last years student movement does not exsist any longer. Its right there was
some working class resistance. But this one was purely defensive and totally
under control by the union beaurocracy.
If you only look at the figures you could compare the SPD victory to 1972.
But at that time there was really wide-spread enthusiasm. Today people only
wanted to get rid of Kohl, knowing Schroeder would not change much. The only
people who were enthusiastisc were those juppies of the SPD election
campaign hoping to replace the ageing Kohl followers in a new Schroeder
administration.
Johannes