Berlin “Vvollig bekloppt” means “completely idiotic” in English, “totalement idiot” in French, “tutto insensato” in Italian, “completamente locas” in Spanish and “helemaal tikt” in Dutch. Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s term for the Last Generation has been translated into many languages by the world’s major newspapers in recent days.
This went hand in hand with extensive reporting on the raids against the German climate activists. It’s safe to say that the searches ordered by the Bavarian Public Prosecutor’s Office have enormously increased the group’s international profile.
Mashed potatoes on a Monet painting, paint against the SPD headquarters and lots of taped hands on the street – the last generation has been irritating and provoking for months. However, the readers of the foreign newspaper reports now also know that the judicial authorities’ counterattack came with surprising force: the images of masked investigators storming apartments and offices could have come from a Reich citizen or mafia raid. Is this the beginning of an escalation spiral?
It is the strategy of the last generation to cross red lines in order to attract attention. This approach has a long tradition in the history of civil disobedience. The suffragettes who fought for women’s suffrage a good 100 years ago already attacked pictures.
Unlike today’s climate activists, however, they did not choose works that were protected by bulletproof glass, but made deep cuts with a cleaver in the famous painting “Venus in front of the mirror” by Diego Velazquez in the National Gallery in London.
No content related to climate change
The museum attacks of the last generation are criticized, among other things, because there is no connection to climate change in terms of content. However, the activists, like the suffragettes once did, are concerned with spectacularly breaking the rules in order to emphasize the urgency of their cause.
Nationwide protests after raid on climate activists
They are convinced that in 50 years – when climate change unfolds its full devastating effects – it will not be them who are seen as the “climate terrorists”, but all those who did not act when it was still possible. This is also where the name comes from, which goes back to a quote from former US President Barack Obama: It is the last generation that can still stop climate change.
The urgency of the matter is underscored by the fact that those involved are taking personal risks. In April, for example, a 24-year-old last-generation activist who had glued herself to the frame of a Lucas Cranach painting in the Berlin Picture Gallery was sentenced to four months in prison without parole.
That the last generation commits crimes knowingly is a fact. It can also be argued that in a certain way she uses violence by forcing people through her blockades and taking them hostage, so to speak: Think of families who are stuck on the Berlin city autobahn for six hours on their way to vacation with screaming children.
>> Read here: SPD leader warns against excessive action against climate activists
Or to entrepreneurs who are in real need of existence due to the constant new blockades. The images of freaking out drivers make it clear that for many the climate activists may be pursuing the right goals – but with the completely wrong means.
“Causes deterrent effects that backfire”
However, the thesis that this is enough to label the last generation as a criminal organization is highly controversial. One of the few for whom this is already “clearly” certain is CSU regional group leader Alexander Dobrindt. He even fears “that a climate RAF will emerge”. The left-wing extremist Red Army Faction (RAF) murdered over 30 people from the 1970s to the 1990s.
For the legal scholar Matthias Jahn, there is a connection between Dobrindt’s choice of words and the raids of the past week: “The spiral of escalation is turning, the word from the “Climate RAF” has been followed by deeds,” says the criminal law professor and judge at the Frankfurt/Main Higher Regional Court German press agency. “This sets in motion a dynamic that threatens to produce martyrs because the state reacts with disproportionate harshness.”
Jahn also suspects a connection to the Bavarian state election campaign: There is no evidence that the Munich public prosecutor’s office could have confirmed an initial suspicion for improper reasons.
“But the factual influence of such investigations on the upcoming Bavarian election campaign can hardly be denied.” Citizens should obviously be given the feeling that something is being done about the annoying troublemakers.
>> Read here: Follow all current developments in the energy crisis in the news blog
The extremism researcher Matthias Quent sees the danger that the tough approach “causes deterrence that backfires”. Climate protectionists might not feel supported by the state, but instead feel abandoned: “This can lead to individuals becoming radicalized.”
Danger of radicalization in another area
In this context, the women’s rights activist Alice Schwarzer recalls the often overly harsh reaction of the authorities to the protest actions of the student movement. Fritz Teufel and other commune members were prosecuted in 1967 for a failed “pudding assassination attempt” on US Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey in Berlin. “This devil, for example, was so cornered that he finally went into hiding,” writes the 80-year-old Schwarzer in an “Emma” post. “What remained of this protest was ultimately the Red Army Faction (RAF), which self-righteously murdered.”
It is the strategy of the last generation to cross red lines in order to attract attention.
(Photo: IMAGO/A. Friedrichs)
So far, however, there have been no signs of such a development in the climate movement. “On the contrary: I find it remarkable how calm they remain, even when they are attacked,” emphasizes extremism researcher Quent.
Scientists like the Berlin social philosopher Robin Celikates see the real danger of radicalization somewhere else: “Even if protest violates individual laws and may be annoying: criminalizing protest is much more threatening, and therefore the greater danger for the democratic constitutional state also lies in this disproportionate radicalization of the Reactions to the Last Generation.”
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The lawyer Jahn appeals to both sides – the climate activists and the judicial authorities – to “go back to proportionality”. There is definitely an approach to stronger dialogue with the last generation: The movement recently cooperated with several museums by reading texts on the climate crisis there on International Museum Day. Activist Irma Trommer explained: “The hope is that people will get to know us and see: Hey, this has nothing to do with terrorism.”
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