analysis
Saskia Esken has been at the head of the SPD for almost four years. The fact that Olaf Scholz is now chancellor also has a lot to do with her. Was the former backbencher underestimated?
There she is again, the real Saskia Esken: the Bundestag network politician and computer scientist. On the stage of Europe’s largest digital conference, the re:publica, she recently had a controversial discussion with the head of YouTube Germany, Andreas Briese, about the democratic public sphere on the Internet. With him she is of course on first name terms.
The 61-year-old is in her element here, for a long time she was a third-tier member of the Bundestag, known only as a digital specialist. When it comes to a digital platform, she really gets into raptures: “Twitter was my digital home,” she says, putting her hand on her heart: “Honestly, I loved her.” She has left there since Twitter, for reasons of profit, has given free rein to forces that are damaging to democracy.
In this hour of digital shop talk, which also deals with AI and the political regulation of the Internet, the viewers could almost forget that a co-chairman of the large, sometimes sluggish people’s party SPD is sitting here. A party that has just celebrated its 160th anniversary in the Willy Brandt House with Esken – and which is the chancellor’s party again for the first time since 2005.
Silent rise from the third row
Esken, which belongs to the party left, has a lot to do with the latter: that Olaf Scholz is now chancellor. If anyone inside or outside the party had dared to predict in 2018 which moves Esken has helped influence for the SPD in recent years, the only reaction would probably have been a disbelieving shake of the head.
Because it was not exactly to be expected that this former backbencher, of all people, together with a relatively unknown state politician, Norbert Walter-Borjans, would beat Olaf Scholz in the runoff election for party chairmanship at the end of 2019. Much less that she – despite her loud GroKo criticism and much more left-wing positions than the Vice Chancellor who was responsible for the government at the time – suggested this Scholz to her SPD as a promising candidate for chancellor.
It became the story of an electoral success, albeit a narrow one. He carries her handwriting with him. Since the first dual leadership, both have had a close conversational wire, she says in an interview tagesschau.dethe competition from back then no longer plays a role.
Scholz owes her a lot
So Scholz owes a lot to Esken, even if not to her alone. In retrospect, one could say that it was part of a calming down process for the party, which was at odds with itself after many years with Schröder and GroKo, and which was reflected in many changes at the top of the party. The spontaneous resignation of Realpolitiker Andrea Nahles from the leadership of the party and parliamentary group was like a wake-up call for the Social Democrats, says one from inside the SPD. After a poor result in the European elections, Nahles lacked support, and after 13 months at the top she drew her conclusions from it. After that, most of the Social Democrats realized that things couldn’t go on like this.
The fact that Esken, together with Walter-Borjans, was able to win the party via a member vote was also due to the support of the party left, Kevin Kühnert and the Jusos he led at the time – Esken consistently represented their displeasure with the GroKo’s constant policy of compromise. Later, Esken didn’t want to know so much about it – and developed a quasi-friendly relationship with the CDU Chancellor Angela Merkel.
end of indiscretions
When the new leadership duo – this construct also a novelty in the party’s history – then managed to keep the decision to nominate Scholz as a candidate for chancellor secret for about six weeks in the summer of 2020 – it gained complete respect in their own party. Because this was more known for indiscretions.
In the meantime, she has been leading the party fairly quietly for the fourth year, since the end of 2021 with the former SPD General Secretary Lars Klingbeil, after Walter-Borjans did not stand for re-election. This duo also works – and also in the direction of the parliamentary group and the chancellery. Klingbeil, today one of the pragmatic, economically liberal “Seeheimers” of the SPD, received the better election result, while Esken again only won three quarters of the SPD delegates. She doesn’t seem to care. Rather, the secret of their success seems to be to pacify the party by covering all wings with it and General Secretary Kühnert.
Of course there are political differences of opinion, but they are clarified internally, according to party circles. Externally, however, they act in a coordinated manner and do not reveal any different positions – unlike, for example, the top Green duo Ricarda Lang and Omid Nouripour recently on the EU compromise on refugee policy.
Esken has also gained respect across the wing in the faction: she has made a lot of progress, it says and is not meant as poisoned praise. It sometimes takes a while to get from the back seat to the exposed top – you have to be able to speak on all current political issues, whether in the parliamentary group meeting, in the coalition committee or on the talk shows. However, Klingbeil is considered the somewhat smoother communicator there.
She is undeterred
But after a few verbal awkwardnesses in the first two years, Esken has now also attracted public attention through loyal communication with sober and different party personalities such as Scholz, Nancy Faeser or Franziska Giffey. Esken, Kühnert and Klingbeil try to address the traffic light with further demands – for example on the subject of tax increases for higher earners to the FDP-led Ministry of Finance or in the debate about the four-day week.
For example, that a tax reform aimed at higher earners is still an issue, even if it hardly seems so in the party constellation of the traffic light with the FDP: They continue to rely on the “power of the argument,” says Esken. “And I don’t get tired either, even if I cause eye rolls in liberal circles.”
As a network politician, Esken was already known in her group for a certain persistence and perseverance. Some may have underestimated them.