Dialog International

Renewed Efforts to Ban Neo-Nazi NPD

The German Social Democrats (SPD) are again pushing for a new ban of the extremist party NPD.  This was last attempted in 2003, but the ban was thrown out by Germany's supreme court.  Since then, the NPD won some seats in Saxony's state assembly, and gained support in many rural communities in eastern Germany.

I have always been opposed to an outright ban of the NPD. For one thing, I agree with the columnist Harald Martenstein that it is far better to confront extremism openly and publicly rather than trying to sweep it under the carpet. For another, banning political activity could open the door to restricting any expression of political opposition. Germany has a terrible historical legacy in this respect.  But I am less sure in my position after reading this interview in the Berlin daily Der Tagesspiegel with Jan Zobel.  Zobel is former spokesman for the NPD who dropped out of the party in 1997 and since then has been sounding the alarm about the party's activities.

In the interview Zobel comes out strongly in favor of a party ban.  A ban would destroy the party's structure, disrupt its recruiting efforts and isolate its leadership. Zobel stresses the violent and even terrorist orientation of some of the NPD's membership:

Die NPD arbeitet ganz offensichtlich auch mit Gewalttätern zusammen - mit Personen, die wegen Körperverletzung angeklagt waren oder etwas mit Terrorismus zu tun hatten, also etwa eine kriminelle Karriere als Bombenbauer und –bastler gemacht haben. Sie sind mittlerweile in der NPD absolut integriert und arbeiten zum Teil als Mitarbeiter von Landtagsfraktionen. Dafür gibt's unzählige Beispiele. Die NPD schämt sich dessen auch nicht mehr, sie geht ganz offensiv damit um. Wenn jetzt in der Verbotsdebatte leisere Töne angeschlagen werden, ist das natürlich Humbug. Die sind radikal wie eh und je. (The NPD is publicly working together with violent criminals - with individuals who have been charged with assault or who were involved in terrorist activities such as bomb-making. They have been completely integrated into the party and even working with the party members in the state assemblies. The NPD is not even trying to hide this anymore, they are on the offensive.  It doesn't make sense that  people want to tone down the debate over banning the party.  They are more radical than ever.)

The biggest danger of a ban is that the party would be forced underground, where there will be even less scrutiny of their activities and possibly adopt even more violent tactics.

 

Huge Chance for Germany's Greens

Black-Green are the colors of the moment.  Black - the traditional party color of the Christian Democrats (CDU) and Green, the proud color of Die Grünen, Germany's Green party.  The weakness of the two big established parties in Germany (Volksparteien CDU,SPD) and the rise of the LEFT party have led to new political considerations which a decade ago would have been pure fantasy.  The CDU's traditional political ally - the LIberals (FDP) - has lost its way with an unpopular neo-liberal course; the ruling Red/Black (SPD/CDU) Grand Coalition in Berlin is viewed as dysfunctional. So the results in the state elections in Hamburg last weekend have provided a new chance for the Greens.  Chancellor Angela Merkel has already blessed a new alliance: 

"Angela Merkel, Germany’s Christian Democratic chancellor, on Monday gave her approval to the creation of the first coalition of the CDU and Greens in a move that could transform the country’s party-political landscape."

The Greens risk becoming marginalized by the surging LEFT party; the party's identity would be subsumed in a "me-too" alliance with the SPD, or in a "Red-Red-Green" coalition.  Cooperation with Germany's largest party - the conservative CDU - could further mainstream the core environmental concerns of the party and promote the greening of Germany industry. 

Still, a Black-Green coalition in the state of Hamburg is not without risks.  The blogger DoDo on European Tribune writes:

However, Black-Green is dangerous for the Greens: coalitions with the SPD already resulted in tough-to-stomach compromises, the CDU can only demand more, and could scare away the Green left. Especially in Hamburg: even if the local CDU is more progressive, so is GAL, the local Greens, with its alternative-left elements and still strong basis democracy (the party leadership has no monopoly on decisions).

Disenchanted left-oriented Green members may bolt to the LEFT party. But Black-Green cooperation is not without precedence in Germany.  The city of Frankfurt has been governed for some time by a CDU/Green coaltion.  And even in Hamburg itself the district of Altona put in a CDU/Green council four years ago. How has Black-Green worked there?  Quite well, according to Die Zeit: 

"Dass es mit der CDU aber auch anders funktionieren kann, haben die Grünen in Altona erlebt. Dort haben Schwarze und Grüne in den vergangenen vier Jahren gemeinsam regiert. Plötzlich war es mit der CDU möglich, medizinische Versorgung für Illegale aufzubauen, eine Wohngruppe für psychisch kranke Migranten einzurichten und ein Verkehrskonzept, bei dem alle Straßenteilnehmer vom Fußgänger bis zum Porsche-Fahrer gleichberechtigt behandelt werden, zumindest anzudenken. Auch die Grünen konnten sich vom Koalitionspartner einiges abschauen. „Etwa wie man mit Investoren umgeht“, sagt Altonas Grünen-Chefin Gesche Boehlich: „Wenn ein Investor etwas bauen will, meldet er sich nicht bei uns. Bei den Grünen rufen nur die Leute an, die sich beschweren, dass deswegen ein Baum gefällt werden soll“, sagt die Bezirkspolitikerin. Erst in der Koalition mit der CDU sei ihre Partei frühzeitig an solchen Projekten beteiligt gewesen und hätte Einfluss nehmen können."

Black-Green may be seen by many cynical observers as pure opportunism by the once radical party.  But it is a chance for the Greens to have a major impact.  And if it does happen in Hamburg it can change the political landscape far beyond the Hanseatic city.

Another Gain by Germany's LEFT party

 Watching the results for Hamburg's election today, it appears that the LEFT party has gained some seats in the state assembly, duplicating the party's successes in Hesse, Bremen, and Lower Saxony.  The CDU will most likely continue to govern Hamburg in a new coalition with the Green Party, due to the poor showing again by the Liberals (FDP).

The results show that the LEFT party was able to weather the firestorm caused by the "bring back the Stasi" comments by Christel Wenger.  Still, the LEFT party struggles - especially in the west - with the GDR heritage it is still associated with.  I asked Olaf Petersen, a friend of this blog and a district organizer for the LEFT party in Nordfriesland, to comment on the Wenger/DKP flap.  I had interviewed Petersen last summer about his party activism. Petersen confirms that there are indeed LEFT party members who are nostalgic for the good old days of the Wall and Stasi repression:

Es gibt sie tatsächlich bei uns, DDR-Nostalgiker, die Schießbefehl, StaSi, Mauer und staatliche Repression verharmlosen und bagatellisieren. Einer meinte mal in meiner Gegenwart, man solle sich doch über die politischen Todesurteile in der DDR nicht aufregen - in Deutschland kämen heute jährlich tausende von Menschen bei Verkehrsunfällen um's Leben und darüber regt sich ja auch keiner auf. Meine Frage, ob ich ihm denn mal den Unterschied zwischen einem Todesurteil und einem Verkehrsunfall erklären soll, blieb unbeantwortet.
Wir Linken sollten uns von diesen Leuten distanzieren - von der anderen Seite des politischen Spektrums (CDU/CSU) erwarten wir doch auch, dass sie sich nicht von Verfassungsfeinden unterwandern lassen. (Yes, there really are such people (in the LEFT party): those who are nostalgic for the GDR, who make light of th the shoot-to-kill order, Stasi, the Wall, or who minimize the state repression. Some one actually said in my presence that we shouldn't get so upset about the political executions in the GDR, since every year thousands of Germans die in traffic-related accidents and no one gets too excited about that.  I asked him if I needed to explain the difference between a traffic accident and a political execution, but I didn't get a response.  We in the LEFT party need to distance ourselves from these people; but we also insist that the parties on the other side of the political spectrum  - the CDU/CSU - not allow permit enemies of the constitution to infiltrate them.)

Also worth reading is this post by Der Spiegelfechter, who points out that the GDR is a really a taboo topic in Germany today.  It cannot be mentioned in any context other than total condemnation.  No doubt, this inability to deal with the past (Vergangenheitsbewältigung ) in a differentiated manner is fueling the GDR nostalgia.  

"Bring Back the Stasi"

Just as the LEFT (die LINKE)  party was beginning to see some  success in the state elections in western Germany, they have been dealt a serious blow by one of their own representatives:

"Christel Wegner, a member of the German Communist Party (DKP) and a parliamentary representative of the Left party in Lower Saxony, came under fire from all sides after advocating the return of former East Germany's dreaded secret police.

"I think that if a new society was created, we would need such an organization [like the Stasi] again, because we would have to protect ourselves against reactionary forces trying to weaken the state from within," she said on Thursday in an interview with Germany's ARD television broadcaster.

She also said that the Berlin Wall, which divided the city from 1961 to 1989, needed to be built in order to protect the East German economy from West Germans who wanted to cross the border to buy cheap goods."

Officials of the LEFT party - including Gregor Gysi - have condemned Wegner for her remarks and demanded that she step down from her seat in the state assembly.  But then Gysi made some wild accusations against the Verfassungsschutz (Federal Office for the Protection of the Consitution):

"Ich bin wirklich kein Verfolgungstheoretiker. Aber ich kann mir nicht vorstellen, dass eine DKP-Politikerin einfach so dumm ist, kurz vor der Hamburg-Wahl ein solches Fernseh-Interview zu geben, wohl wissend, dass sie uns damit schaden wird. Das heißt, sie wollte uns schaden. Und das sieht doch sehr komisch und eher nach Verfassungsschutz aus", sagte Gysi.

Does Germany Need an Obama?

My blogger friends over at Anglofritz in Berlin are depressed because German politics are so dull.  There are no German Barack Obamas to pull Germans out of their somnolence:

"German politics today appear dull and lacklustre when compared to the American revival of democratic participation in recent weeks.

There are five parties who strategize about how to block each other. Their profiles are waning while Merkel stands guard as the gatekeeper of mediation. What Germany direly needs are politicians with big ideas that reach beyond greater exports and talk about what people feel and want. Someone who stands up for their beliefs, is steadfast, honest and authentic."

Let's face it, Angela Merkel is not the most charismatic leader.  And the opposition?  Kurt Beck comes across as your average Stammtisch blowhard. Only Oscar Lafontaine and Gregor Gysi of the dreaded LINKE (LEFT party) exude a modicum of charisma.

On the other hand, most Americans would gladly trade the excitement of the presidential race for the dullness of Germany's Sozialstaat: good, affordable health care, solid infrastructure - including a functioning mass transit system, decent schools, and a higher per-capita affluence.  Oh, and a non-interventionist foreign policy. It may, however, require true inspirational leadership to keep this Sozialstaat from unraveling.

Whither Germany's LEFT Party?

Der Spiegelfechter attends a rally for Die LINKE (the Left party) and is appalled by what he finds:

"Ein sympathischer aber ebenso chaotischer Haufen aus Salon-Sozialisten, Gewerkschaftlern, Altkommunisten und enttäuschten Sozialdemokraten erwartet den Besucher, der in seiner ungeordneten, basisdemokratisch inspirierten Naivität zwar eine echte Alternative zum übrigen Parteiensystem darstellt, sich aber erst noch finden muss, bevor es an die Realpolitik geht."

He points out that the chaos reminds him of the early days of the Green Party, which, soon enough, learned the lessons of Realpolitik all too well.

In any event, the LEFT party is now being taken very seriously, even in the western states, and especially by the established Social Democrats (SPD).  The big brother on the left at first ignored the upstart LEFT party.  Then, as they saw disgruntled social democrats leave in droves to join the LEFT, they demonized them.  The SPD leadership still categorically refuses to cooperate with the LEFT party, but they now have adopted some the rhetoric from their rival.  In particular, the SPD has regained some momentum with a call for a minimum wage - one of the LEFT party's original demands.  Now the LEFT party is scoring points with its criticism of Germany's deeply unpopular mission in Afghanistan.

The question remains: can the LEFT party succeed as a pure opposition party that pulls the SPD to the left? Or can it govern on a national level, as it does in Berlin and some of the eastern states? 

It is interesting to see how the Western media has taken note of the LEFT party following its electoral successes in Hesse and Lower Saxony two weeks ago.  Columnist Stefan Theil is flabbergasted by the voodoo economics of the LEFT party in an op/ed piece which appears today the Dallas News:

Meanwhile, two in three Germans say they support at least some of the voodoo-economic, roll-back-the-reforms platform of a noisy new anti-globalization political party called Die Linke (The Left),        founded by former East German communists and Western left-wing populists.

Theil attributes the rise of the LEFT party to the education system in Germany, which teaches the Philosophy of Failure:

Many of these popular attitudes can be traced to state-mandated curricula in schools. It is there that economic lessons are taught that diverge substantially from the market-based principles on which the Western model is based. The phenomenon may hardly be unique to Europe, but in few places is it more obvious than in France and Germany. A biased view of economics feeds into many of the world's most vexing problems, from the growth of populism to the global rise of anti-American, anti-capitalist attitudes.

The Washington Times - the mouthpiece of the neoconservative establishment in Washington DC (and property of cult-leader Sun Myong Moon) -  likewise sounded the alarm about the LEFT party:

The trend is worrying German business. "The conservatives must stop allowing Oskar Lafontaine to dictate their agenda," said Patrick Adenauer, president of the Association of Independent Business Managers...One of the Left Party's leaders in Lower Saxony, Manfred Sohn, has called for a tax on private swimming pools and wrote in an article for a left-wing newspaper two years ago: "For 40 years East Germany was the more peaceful and socially just part of Germany."

The LEFT party is succeeding not because the schools are not teaching the glories of capitalism, but rather because blue collar workers have experienced the outcome of the "reforms" pushed through by the Social Democrats in the previous administration. Life is getting more difficult for their families, while a small managerial class is getting wealthier. The American mindset that it's your own fault if you aren't rich hasn't caught on in Germany, and may even be losing ground in the US. 

Germany's Five-Party Reality

Yesterday's elections in Hesse and Lower Saxony changed the political landscape in Germany.  Attracting the most attention was Roland Koch's spectacular fall from grace thanks to his right-wing populist attacks on foreign youth in Germany.  Andrea Ypsilanti's breezy advocacy of social justice won the day in Hesse. But perhaps the biggest surprise was the success of the Left party (Die Linke) in both Hesse, where it enters the state assembly for the first time with 5.1% of the vote and Lower Saxony, where it had even stronger results.  So the Left is no longer just a legacy party of the eastern states - it is a legitimate national power. The Social Democrats, under the leadership of Kurt Beck, have vowed to ignore the Left and try to form a "traffic-light coalition" (Ampelkoalition) of SPD, Greens and Liberals, but that may be impossible.  Five-party representation in the state assemblies is now a fact, and the major parties marginalize the Left at their own peril. The Neue Zürcher Zeitung sees this as a very negative development:

"The elections have not only brought about an unpleasant stalemate between the two largest established parties, but also the entrance of the political left, which calls itself the ‘Left Party.’ It got a foothold in Lower Saxony, too, where the CDU and FDP kept their hold on the government. This has now highlighted the disastrous five-party pattern in West Germany, which is tantamount to the destabilization of the parliamentary system. All established parties treat the Left Party as a bunch of street urchins. But how can a government be formed without them? One practical solution would be a Grand Coalition between the CDU and SPD, clearly a stop-gap method, as the black-red partnership on the federal level has demonstrated numerous times of late.

Last week the FT had very good article about the rise of the Left party:

The Left party, forged from the debris of the east German ruling party after reunification and known then as the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS), gained a western breakthrough after trade unionists and others rebelled against Agenda 2010, a package of social security and labour market reforms instituted four years ago by Gerhard Schröder, chancellor in the SPD-led government of the time.

As voters turned their backs on Mr Schröder, bringing a string of spectacular electoral defeats and a collapse in SPD membership, the idea of a nationwide, unashamedly leftwing party gained traction. Discontented westerners in the Electoral Alternative for Labour and Social Justice (WASG), which embodied the resistance to Mr Schröder’s attempt at reconstructing the SPD along market-friendly lines, began talks with the east German PDS. Last June they merged into the Left party under the joint stewardship of easterner Lothar Bisky and westerner Oskar Lafontaine, a former SPD chairman and finance minister.

“We are already a nationwide party,” says Mr Bisky. “But we haven’t yet got the seal that our entry in the parliament of a big western state would bring.”

The results from the election yesterday made one thing clear: the German electorate is now clearly left-of-center. When will the government reflect this new reality?

Youth Violence and Demagoguery

I have been following the elections in Hesse with a great deal of interest, since this time there are some clear parallels to the US presidential election.  In the US, illegal immigration (primarily of Mexicans) is a huge topic, which dominates right-wing hate radio as well as prime-time CNN reports. In Hesse, minister president Roland Koch (CDU) is trying to gain reelection by criticizing youth violence by immigrants. Koch's incendiary language has polarized Germany and damaged the CDU.

"We have too many criminal foreigner juveniles in Germany," Koch said. "In the name of multi-cultural tolerance, we've been blinded to accept behavior that can lead to dangerous aggression. We've got to put an end to the grand delusion." (Koch said)"it must be clear that the slaughtering (of animals) in the kitchen...runs counter to our principles." He also said: "People who live in Germany must behave properly and refrain from using their fists. That's how one behaves in a civilized country."

The racist overtones of Koch's rhetoric sound quite similar to the xenophobic speech of Republican congressman Tom Tancredo (who dropped out of the race for US president) and the Islamophobia of Rudy Giuliani.

The Hamburg journalist Jens Jessen, who ealier urged us to "forget America", stepped into the fray earlier this week in his video blog, when he accused his fellow Germans of being Spießer (an untranslatable word roughly equivalent to petty-bourgeois philistines), who are partly responsible for the youth violence since they display intolerance against immigrant children.  It is eye-opening to read the online comments Jessen received in Die Zeit.  Jessen himself responded to outpouring of hate. Bild-Zeitung exploited the situation by fanning the anti-Jessen sentiment and selling more newspapers.  Germany is completely polarized over the issue, just as America is polarized over what to do about illegal immigration.

But there are some hopeful signs on both sides of the Atlantic. It appears that Roland Koch is falling in the polls in Hesse and the SPD candidtate Andrea Ypsilanti has an excellent chance.  In the US, Rudy Guiliani has yet to get more than 5% of the votes in any primary.

Muslims in Germany

I may never have the time to read the entire 500-page report Muslime in Deutschland (pdf) which was commissioned by the German ministery of the interior and prepared by the Institute of Criminology at the University of Hamburg, but it is interesting to read the reception in the German media. Apparently both Islamophobes and Muslims alike can find data in the report to support their position.

The tone of the reception has been strongly influenced by interior minister Wolgang Schäuble's foreward to the report: "Liebe Leserinnen und Leser, der weltweit operierende islamistische Terrorismus ist heute eine der größten Gefahren für unsere Sicherheit." (Dear Reader, the worldwide-operating Islamic terrorism is one of the greatest threats to our security today) Schäuble has been sounding the alarm of homegrown terrorism in Germany for years, using this as a pretext for systematically dismantling civil liberties (Stasi 2.0).  The report showed that 6% of the approx. 3 million Muslims living in Germany would consider violence as an acceptable solution. The right-wing noise machine immediately kicked in: "180.000 Muslims in Germany are willing to commit violence in the name of Islam" was the headline in the right wing Pajamas Media. Politicians immediately began to exploit the report's finding, with Bavaria's interior minister Joachim Herrmann demanding that all Muslims in Germany sign a Pledge renouncing violence (Gewaltverzichtserklärung ).

Those that actually read the report came away with a different conclusion.  The vast majority of Muslims reject violence; the number of violence prone Muslims is no greater than the right-wing extemists who routinely carry out attacks on foreigners in Saxony. Indeed, Eberhard Seidel, writing in the Tageszeitung, sees uncomfortable similarities between Muslims and non-Muslims in Germany:

"(the report's) results show that considerable similarities exist between the attitude of a minority of Muslims and the authoritarianism, intolerance, xenophobia and extreme right wing mentality among young Germans. The sole difference: in the one case the ideology of inequality is based on religion, in the other on nationalism. This data and the questions raised could open a new chapter in the social sciences."

The report does expose a huge problem for Germany with respect to the integration of its Muslim population. Even third generation Muslims in Germany feel socially excluded, even though they were born in Germany, attend German schools and speak German as their first language. They are German, but they feel like foreigners in their own country and consequently turn to Islam.  Especially students, the report shows, see themselves as collective victims of global anti-Islamic sentiment, increasing the risk of radicalization. Hopefully this report will initiate a new national discussion in Germany on the persistent barriers to integration of its minorities.

For German readers, Telepolis has a good and objective analysis of the report.

Will Germany Ban Scientology?

I have to confess that I'm baffled by the German government's obsession with the Scientology cult. Scientology has been in the crosshairs of German law enforcement officials for years, but know they are debating an outright ban:

"Germany paved the way yesterday for a ban on the Church of Scientology, with federal and regional ministers declaring that the US-based organisation contravened the constitution and posed a danger to democratic order. In a sharp escalation of a decade-long row, German officials asked the domestic intelligence agency to gather evidence that could be used in support of a legal move to secure a ban. "Scientology works on the basis of massive repression, like a totalitarian organisation which wants to break the will of the people, which is precisely why we have to fight it," Ralf Stegner, interior minister of Schleswig-Holstein, said after yesterday's meeting.

The German authorities are mistaken in their belief that Scientology is a "totalitarian commercial sect that seeks to crush individuality." The cult is actually a clever ponzi scheme for intellectually-challenged  Hollywood celebrities. If other non-celebrities want to give their money to Scientology rather than to Disney or Wal-Mart (two actual totalitarian commercial sects) who cares?  By banning Scientology - just as by banning the neo-Nazi NPD - the German government is only lending the organization a level of recognition and legitimacy it doesn't deserve. Besides, there are more serious things in Germany to worry about:

Mittweida, Germany - Police dispersed an unauthorized rally Saturday by 150 to 200 neo-Nazis in Mittweida, an eastern German town where authorities this year outlawed a neo-Nazi organization. Police said the rightists waved flags and chanted in the centre of town before being chased away by the police.

A local broadcaster, MDR, said the clash delayed the start of a gathering of people wearing the ancient folk costumes and playing the folk music of the Ore Mountains of Saxony.