Why after a year the traffic light coalition SPD and FDP lose and the Greens win

A year of the traffic light coalition is a year full of unusually unanimous criticism, even malice here and there: that the coalition members are not pursuing a policy from a single source. That the three parties are rather at odds. And that they are anything but a “progressive coalition” as promised.

And yet there is a small miracle that deviates from this balance sheet: no party had to deviate so far from its programmatic principles as the Greens. The real existing energy, foreign, defense, tax, environmental and agricultural policies are pretty much the opposite of what they stood for in the last general election. Despite this, the party is far more popular than its fellow coalition partners: the SPD and FDP lose in all polls (and many state elections), while the Greens win.

In addition, unlike in other parties, the Green community does not mind that the two leaders Robert Habeck and Annalena Baerbock more or less openly compete, while in the ministerial ranks of the SPD and FDP there are total failures like Christine Lambrecht, Volker Wissing and Bettina Stark-Watzinger do not cause any friction.

So why the green run?

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On the one hand, the Greens have spread their public impact over many heads. Three strong ministers, two party leaders and two faction leaders all play in the political Bundesliga. If a head slips up, like Habeck did with the gas levy, the party remains stable in the polls. Very different from the SPD and FDP, which are more or less one- to two-man events.

The top Greens in the cabinet – Habeck, Baerbock and also Minister of Agriculture Cem Özdemir – have a better command than the rest of the government, but above all the big, coherently staged appearance, the really big political story.

Minister of Effects

Whether gas price brake, Qatar kipper, visit to India or farmers’ summit – every statement, every appointment is part of a big story, according to which the Greens fight for the common goal of a climate-neutral, fair and good world despite all adversities in everyday life. The achievement of which is only postponed through concrete day-to-day politics, but not abolished.

Habeck, Baerbock and Özdemir are Ministers for Effects – not for Results. This is of course better than the vast majority of SPD and FDP rulers, for whom neither the effect nor the result is right. But still problematic.

The hastily bought gas? Can be expensive. Loud criticism of China? Can quietly cost prosperity. The pastel-colored agricultural policy? Can get stuck in the thick of everyday life.

>> Read also: One year traffic light coalition – That is the balance sheet of the most important ministers

In addition, the fight for a better energy future, the tireless commitment to a fairer world, the arguing for better agriculture sounds more edifying than the minimum wage, the debt brake or whatever other hyphenated topics the SPD and FDP fight with.

The Greens’ soaring shows that, despite all the calls for crisis, a large part of German society does not experience the Ukraine war primarily as material, but above all as ideal insecurity.

This shows that, despite all the calls for crisis, a large part of German society does not primarily experience the Ukraine war as material, but above all as ideal insecurity. Many people want a story that warms. Economically rational arguments are of secondary importance.

If you live in Hamburg, Tübingen or Munich with a household income in the high five or six figures, an extra 1,000 euros a year for energy is not as important as the collapse of the world view caused by the Russian war. And in such situations, people want security through a big story, not bourgeois small-small.

After a year of traffic lights, the country is politically in the same constellation as it was before Markus Söder and Armin Laschet once crumbled the Union: It is divided into a large Union and a large Green Party supporters.

Unless reality dissolves the beautiful narrative. Because the question is whether the effect policy will last for more than three years. Or whether a policy that promises to save the climate but burns coal into electricity, that demands a moral foreign policy but delivers realpolitik, that propagates change in agriculture but does not deliver it, is not eventually overtaken by the very concrete results of its policy.

More: The fairy tale of progress – A summary of the first year of the traffic light coalition

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