4 The EconomistApril 14th 2018
SPECIAL REPORT
GERMANY2 when SPDmembers voted to support a new grand coalition with
the CDU/CSU.
Herfried and Marina Münkler, a pair of academics and
writers, capture the mood of today’s Germany in their book “The
New Germans”. Ostensibly a profile of the hundreds of thou-
sands of newcomers, their account makes a wider argument:
even ordinary Germans without migrant roots are changing.
“The order of the static” in Germany, the Münklers argue, is giv-
ing way to more fluid relations and “an end to stark national bor-
ders”, exposing the country to economic, social and technologi-
cal changes abroad. A hitherto hidebound place is turning into
something more informal, more open and more varied.
The biggest single reason is the huge influx of refugees and
asylum-seekers, which peaked in the summer of 2015. Mrs Mer-
kel famously vowed to keep Germany’s borders open to hun-
dreds of thousands of newcomers, though later she tightened up
the rules. In 2015 and 2016 a total of 1.2m people arrived, a signif-
icant addition to the population of 81m. But the old vision of
what it means to be German was already being challenged by
earlier arrivals. In last year’s election, for example, the share of
MPs with a migrant background rose to 8%, up from 3% in 2009
(though it would have to go up to 23% to be truly representative of
the population).Cool Germania
The Unbehagenalso reflects deeper trends. “Germany is in
the process of a great transformation into a more plural society,”
says Marcel Fratzscher, director of the German Institute for Eco-
nomic Research in Berlin. Church attendance is declining. People
are divorcing more and marrying less (apart from gay couples,
who were finally given the right to wed last year). A patriarchal
country is slowly becoming more gender-balanced. Mrs Merkel’s
governments have greatly increased the availability of child care,introduced quotas for women on company boards and boosted
wage transparency. In the past 15 years the share of working-age
women with jobs has increased from 58% to 70%.
These changes have been widely welcomed. “Germany
has become much more relaxed under Angela Merkel,” says Pe-
ter Altmaier, the new economicsminister and the chancellor’s
closest cabinet ally. Bernd Ulrich, a liberal commentator, reckons
that “German angst” has given way to “German coolness”. The
unofficial anthem of this cool newGermany is a music video in
English called “Be Deutsch” (see picture, previouspage) by Jan
Böhmermann, a German comedian, which has been viewed
over 7m times. “Guten Tag, the true Germans are here/ We are xe-
nophobics’ biggest fear/ You call for strong leaders, fences and
walls/ But being like us takes bigger balls,” goes the song, as
muesli-munching, European-flag-waving Germans stand up to
anti-refugee protesters. “We are no longer murderous vandals/
We’ll come for you in socks and sandals.”
But not everyone approves. A cultural divide is opening up
between urban regions and more conservative suburban and ru-
ral areas. “Cities like Munich, Cologne and Berlin now have more
in common with each other than with their own hinterlands,”
says Michael Bröning, author of a new book on nationhood. And
rising crime rates and cultural battles like the one in Essen are
making society feel more raw. On New Year’s Eve 2015 in Cologne
some 1,000 women were sexually assaulted by a crowd made up
largely of immigrants. A yearlater an Islamist terrorist from Tuni-
sia drove a hijacked truck into a Christmas market in Berlin, kill-
ing 12. The titles of recent books and films—“Nervous Republic”,
“Fear for Germany”, “The End of Germany”—capture the public
mood at its gloomiest.
Economically, the new Germans are sitting comfortably.
The country has a record trade surplus and record low unem-
ployment and enjoyed a budget surplus of €37bn ($47bn), or1.1%
ofGDP, last year. Yet even here Unbe-
hagenis creeping in. Globalisation and
technology are hollowing out the Ger-
man labour market and creating new di-
vides between haves and have-nots. And
Germany’s mightyengineering industry,
the very driver of its prosperity, is being
disrupted by new technologies and com-
petitors that upend old business models.
At the same time the world’s expec-
tations of German defence and foreign
policies are running ahead of what its citi-
zens are willing to endorse. When Donald
Trump was elected America’s president
in 2016, Germany, though reticent on the
world stage and pacifist in its instincts,
was hailed as the “new leader of the free
world”, thanks partly to its role in the refu-
gee crisis and partly to its credentials in a
Europe where France looked weak. But it
was not what the Germans wanted. The
election of Emmanuel Macron as presi-
dent has provided them with a more
equal partner in Europe, though his ideas
for an integrated euro zone make them
deeply uncomfortable.
As the old Germans give way to the
new sort, the questions mount. Guntram
Wolff, the German director of a Brussels-
based think-tank, Bruegel, speaks for
many when he asks: “Who are we, what
kind of a country are we?” 7Unemployment rate, %Current-account balance
% of GDPGDP
% change on a year earlierSources: AFP;Die Welt; national statistics; Eurostat; European Commission *ForecastRhi
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ubeDENMARKBELG.LUX.BERLINMECKLENBURG-
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SAXONY-
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DFRANCEHAMBURGFormer boundary
between East and
West GermanyStuttgartFrankfurtDortmund
Essen
Düsseldorf
CologneSimmernMunichHamburgBalticSeaBerlinGERMANYLeipzigCottbus100 kmShare of
population
with migration
background
2016, %Alternative for Germany vote share, % Less than 10 10-20 20-302007 09 11 13 15 180246810567892007 09 11 13 15 18*2008 10 12 14 16 1784048+