analysis
The Greens in the federal government would do well to take the severe loss of votes in Bremen seriously and not dismiss them as a state political defeat. In Berlin there is currently a noticeable gap between ambition and realpolitik.
After the Bremen elections, it should have become clear to one and the last green strategist in the federal headquarters in Berlin: Now the fun is over. Although it is the smallest federal state, it is by no means just holding up the mirror to state chairwoman Maike Schaefer, who has already resigned because of this. All the alarm bells should be ringing now for the Greens if they want to remain a strong, serious partner in the traffic light coalition – and even have hopes of a second candidacy for chancellor in the 2025 federal election year.
Because not only the obvious weaknesses in state and federal politics should be looked at again, a finding in the analysis of the Bremen electorate is particularly alarming: In their core competence “climate and environmental policy”, which has so far been undisputed nationwide, the Greens are currently losing 24 percentage points 2019 a. Four out of five voters say that the heating plans of the Green Federal Economics Minister Robert Habeck overwhelm the citizens. More than half of the green voters say so: 55 percent.
Explain more and better
But the party leadership is first trying to limit the damage: co-chairman Omid Nouripour admitted publicly on the day after the election that there was no tailwind from the Greens in the federal government for Bremen – but 78 percent of the electorate had state political reasons for their voting decision specified. At the same time, the Greens achieved top results in the local elections in Schleswig-Holstein, for example with 27.1 percent in Kiel. That’s why he doesn’t see why there should be consequences for federal politics. At most, the Greens politician allows himself to be elicited the confession that the party needs to improve its communication.
Communication is just one of the construction sites for the Greens. Your top politicians now publicly admit that they did not hit the right note with the changes in climate protection policy: They should have explained more and better, said Green Environment Minister Steffi Lemke of the “Bild am Sonntag”.
missing professionalism in the Berlin company
This has certainly been noticeable for the Greens for some time: at the latest since the first unfinished and uncoordinated draft bill from the Habeck Ministry on the heat transition had been made public, in which the SPD still lacked social balance. More professionalism in the Berlin operation would have helped to foresee this and to have a communication strategy ready right away.
Despite all the corrections, it has not yet been possible to dispel myths surrounding the planned Building Energy Act (GEG). Although the cabinet of the traffic light coalition has signed, only the SPD and the Greens are really behind it. The FDP distanced itself from the first step and is constantly adding to it. It’s no wonder that Habeck’s law is currently making a primarily negative contribution to the green account.
They don’t seem to learn from mistakes
With a view to the two outstanding state elections this year in Bavaria and Hesse, the political scientist Ursula Münch judges: “The federal government is currently making it relatively easy for the Union to attack it – on the one hand by mistakes in content, on the other hand by the FDP .” The latter publicly differentiates itself more sharply from its own politics than it reveals in terms of content – for example with the term “heating ban”.
In addition, the Greens also have “the appearance of favoritism through the ‘best man affair’ in the Ministry of Economic Affairs and the felt in the entire field of renewable energies through foundations, think tanks to the ministry,” said Münch.
The “best man affair” surrounding Habeck State Secretary Patrick Graichen points to another problem facing the Greens: they know how important credibility is for their ambitious policies, but they don’t seem to be learning from old mistakes. At least since Annalena Baerbock’s inaccuracies in her CV during her chancellor candidacy phase, the party has felt how strong the headwind is, the more powerful the Green Party becomes.
On the defensive
Now she is back in a government for the first time since 2005 and is responsible for major upheavals in climate protection policy that lead to conflicts of interest – even if they result from Germany’s signature on the Paris climate protection agreement. This results in their high demands not only on their politics, but also on transparency and sensitivity in political action, to avoid any appearance of bias. State Secretary Graichen obviously lacked this expertise.
But even the associated ministry was not able to prevent such procedural errors from happening in the first place, for example through bias tests. If Habeck now sticks to Graichen, that may be humanly understandable – it will not help his politics and credibility. It puts the Greens on a defensive that they really can’t afford in the political challenges they want to tackle. The result of the Bremen election should at least be seen as a warning shot.