analysis
It should expressly not be about the AfD. If the CDU is looking for a course today and tomorrow and is also looking for a bit of self-discovery, it should be about content. But the party is rumbling.
In the CDU party headquarters in Berlin, work has been going on for days: spotlights are being hung, a stage set up, tables and chairs set up. The Konrad-Adenauer-Haus is to serve as a party hall. The CDU meets for the so-called federal committee, a kind of small party conference. Everything is less lavish than usual: fewer delegates, a smaller hall, a shorter time frame.
This saves the CDU money, but it also saves time. Because the party is still looking for its substantive guidelines. A large party congress with controversial debates would probably overwhelm the Christian Democrats at the moment. After the high polls for the AfD, the party seems to have fallen into a kind of shock. Why is the CDU, as the largest opposition party, not the alternative for the dissatisfied? The question drives the party, stirs up the base and management level.
More variant than counter-model
The CDU is perceived more as a variant of the current traffic light government, not as an actual counter-model. You hear that again and again in the party. The so-called Merkel years would still lag behind. Who buys the Union to do better when it was responsible for itself for 16 years?
Johannes Winkel, chairman of the Junge Union, demands that one must distance oneself more from some of the decisions made at that time. Incorrect decisions were made during migration, but also during the energy transition. If you don’t admit that, you have little credibility. The fact that, according to surveys, 80 percent of people are dissatisfied with the traffic light, but the Union still receives less than 30 percent approval, is an alarming signal.
How to deal with the Merkel years?
Party leader Friedrich Merz, on the other hand, is apparently still struggling with how to deal with Angela Merkel’s term in office. When the former chancellor was awarded Germany’s highest order of merit two months ago, he couldn’t bring himself to congratulate her. However, one does not hear any public criticism of her reign either. He should be aware that he would offend some in the party and parliamentary group who were themselves in office at the time.
Merz always has to manage the balancing act between the more liberals in the party and the electorate and those who want the CDU to be more conservative. He doesn’t always succeed. He sounds populist when he speaks of “social tourism” and “small pashas”. But he distances himself just as clearly from the AfD, calling it xenophobic and anti-Semitic.
How much populism should it be?
Merz is very determined that there will be no cooperation with the AfD. Even if the individuals in the Eastern CDU see things differently. For Yvonne Magwas, member of the Bundestag from Saxony and Vice-President of the Bundestag, distancing yourself from the AfD also means using different language. Populism only helps the populists. She appeals to address more factual issues: care, medical care, hospital reform.
But there are currently two schools of thought in the CDU. On the other hand, there are those who prefer brute force rhetoric and talk of “energy stasis” and “green paternalism.”
Merz also recently polarized with controversial statements. In his weekly newsletter, he claimed that with every gendered newscast, a few hundred more votes would go to the AfD.
“Keep Linguistic Clean”
This causes unrest, not only behind the scenes. Schleswig-Holstein’s Prime Minister Daniel Günther even publicly criticized Merz for this. In the “Süddeutsche Zeitung” he called for the party to “remain linguistically clean and not engage in debates about gender and other trivial matters”. There are even voices in the party who expect four more years in the opposition if Merz runs for chancellor.
How far away from the Greens should it be?
The following story also comes up again and again when it comes to the question of why the CDU is not doing better in the polls: one does not sufficiently differentiate oneself from the Greens. Especially in the eastern associations, in Brandenburg, Saxony and Thuringia, where state elections are due next year, there is a deep desire to be even more critical of the Greens – to the point of demanding a coalition with the Greens, similar to CSU leader Markus Söder almost ruled out.
But Merz will not do that. It would deny him a power option. So the feeling remains that the CDU is sitting like a rabbit in front of a snake.
difficult government formation in the East
Next year it could actually be dangerous for the party. In Thuringia, the AfD could become the strongest force. There is a risk of the Free State becoming ungovernable. Even if this initially seems to be a problem for the state association, the CDU in the federal government must also act on it.
It is then also a question of: if the firewall is to continue to the right, how does it look to the left? How does the CDU feel about the Left Party, which is currently leading the government in Thuringia with Bodo Ramelow? Does the ban on cooperation remain? But how can a government be formed against the AfD?
It’s all a dream of the future, is the soothing message from the Konrad-Adenauer-Haus. The AfD should not play a major role in the federal committee today. There are two leading motions on the abstract topic of “freedom” and more specifically on a “children’s future package”.
The next day, the CDU wants to discuss its new basic program at a convention, which has been in the works for months. This should then be adopted next year in May at the next big party congress. By then, the CDU should know in which direction it is headed.