© ImagoFriedrich Merz • Jens Spahn • Annegret-Kramp Karrenbauer
Three top candidates have emerged to succeed Angela Merkel as leader of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) on December 8, and thus plausibly as chancellor in 2021 or even earlier. The rest of Europe and even the world has a stake in this contest. How would each of the potential heirs change Germany's geopolitical direction?
These are the candidates: Annegret-Kramp Karrenbauer, 56, is the party's secretary general. Friedrich Merz, 63, was sidelined by Merkel in the early 2000s but has since been successful in business. And Jens Spahn, 38, is currently Merkel's health minister. A fourth potential candidate decided not to run this time, but could enter the race for chancellor later: Armin Laschet, 57, the premier of North Rhine-Westphalia.
None of the four would represent a fundamental break with German tradition. All four will honor the two main pillars of Christian-Democratic and German foreign policy: a dual commitment to the trans-Atlantic relationship and to the European Union.
AKK the Francophile
But there are differences. Start with Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, nicknamed AKK, who currently appears to have the best odds. She was premier of the small German state of Saarland (with a population less than one million). Merkel made her secretary general of CDU only in 2018. Dubbed "mini-Merkel," the centrist AKK is widely seen as Merkel's favorite.
Unsurprisingly, she therefore presents herself as the embodiment of continuity in foreign policy: Atlanticist, pro-European and skeptical towards Russia. Her own, personal emphasis is on Franco-German relations. She lives in the small city of Püttingen near the French border, speaks French and in 2011 was tapped by Merkel as Germany's "representative for Franco-German cultural cooperation." AKK was also one of the first German politicians who supported Macron's recent call for a "European army." AKK thus represents the Francophile wing of CDU, while her ties to the US are somewhat weaker - in July, she visited the US for first time since 2002.
Merz the Atlanticist
Friedrich Merz stands for the Atlanticist wing. He is the head of Atlantik Brücke, a US-German network of business and political elites. Merz is well connected in American and German business circles, not least through his work as a lawyer. In one of his roles, he has been chairman of the German arm of the world's biggest fund manager, US-based BlackRock.
In the US, Merz, who is remembered in Germany for his economic liberalism (in the European and pro-market sense of "liberal"), would probably be a moderate Republican. But like many other Germans, he is disturbed by the disruptive policies of Donald Trump. That's one of the reasons Merz has recently emphasized his European credentials. He started his political career as a member of the European parliament (1989-1994). And he has called for an EU tax, deeper reforms in the euro zone, and more European cooperation in foreign and security policy.
But the broader framework for Merz is the "liberal order." With regard to China, Merz has recently warned about Beijing's "global bid for power." The West must counter China's authoritarian model with "our model" of liberal societies and open markets, he said.
Spahn the gadfly
The third major candidate, Jens Spahn, is an Atlanticist of an unusual color. Spahn, who has the worst odds of the three, has positioned himself as the leading Merkel critic with regard to immigration. This topic is also the springboard for the connection he has built to the Trump administration, through his friendship with the US ambassador in Berlin, Richard Grenell. Spahn regularly emphasizes "joint interests" between Germany and the US, ranging from China to nuclear non-proliferation and NATO. Spahn also advocates higher defense spending, one of Trump's main demands from Germany.
In European policy, Spahn emphasizes national interests. He is opposed to a "transfer union" in the euro zone and considers the EU a "grouping of sovereign nation-states" rather than a federation in the making.
Laschet the Russophile
The fourth potential successor as chancellor is Laschet. Like AKK, if not more so, he is more of a "Europeanist" than an "Atlanticist." He grew up in Aachen, near the Belgian border, in a bourgeois Catholic culture where being pro-EU is in the air. From 1999 to 2005 he was also a member of the European Parliament. "For us in Aachen, Paris and Brussel are closer than Berlin. That's why I have always been a passionate European," Laschet says.
But Laschet differs most from the other three in his position on Russia. He has repeatedly warned against a supposed "demonization" of Russia and an "anti-Putin populism in Germany." On prime-time TV he has said that it is "good that Putin plays a role in Syria."
How might they approach foreign policy? Let us speculate. On Europe, the most avid supporter of more integration is Laschet, followed by Kramp-Karrenbauer. Neither would cross the German line of entering a "transfer union," but both would be more open to some risk-sharing in the euro zone. By contrast, Merz would take a more stereotypically "German" tack and emphasize rules and reforms. Spahn would probably be even more skeptical towards deeper economic integration.
On trans-Atlantic relations, Merz stands for traditional and pro-American Atlanticism, with trade and NATO as its pillars. Despite the shock of Trump, Merz believes in "the West" as a political space to which Germany properly belongs. Spahn, by contrast, appears to emulate Trump to some extent, testing the waters for a more nationalist kind of conservativism: tough on immigration and blunt on national self-interest.
On Russia, only Laschet would be inclined to change Merkel's course. In this, he appears to be closer to former chancellor Gerhard Schröder (a Social Democrat), who is friends with Putin and on the board of a Russian-German gas pipeline in the Baltic. Among the four, Laschet also seems least attached to the trans-Atlantic relationship.
What actual German policy will look like under any of these four depends on the crises to come, of course. What is clear, however, is that the personality of the chancellor matters. Somebody other than Merkel might, for example, have supported the military intervention in Libya (which Germany sat out), or pushed for a stronger trans-Atlantic strategy in Syria. A different chancellor might have refused to support the US in Afghanistan or France in Mali; pushed Greece out of the euro zone or pushed less hard for sanctions against Russia after its attack on Eastern Ukraine. And, of course, a different chancellor might not have let in so many refugees in 2015.
This is why the outcome of the CDU's party congress on December 8, and the eventual succession to the office of chancellor, has consequences far beyond Germany.
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