Germany Needs a New Center-Right Party

“The decline of the Union parties and the FDP is self-inflicted. Like the SPD, they have lost touch with the working population. A fresh start requires a party that is not worn out.

 

The traditional center-right political camp lies in ruins. Between 1953 and 1990, the Union and the FDP together consistently secured more than 50 percent of the vote in federal elections. From 1994 to 2017, their combined share still ranged between 40 and 50 percent. Since then, however, it has been a steep decline: according to current polls, the old center-right camp now averages around 25 percent—with a downward trend. The moderate Left is unable to capitalize on this debacle. On the contrary, the SPD—with the exception of places like Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania—is also in a steep downward spiral.

 

The parties that shaped the Federal Republic for decades now face an existential crisis. They resemble once-prestigious brands that have long since lost their reputation. Instead, a growing number of voters who identify as center-right are casting their ballots for a pro-Russian party that oscillates between right-wing populist and right-wing extremist.

 

The Union, the FDP, and the SPD share a common fate: a severe loss of relevance, particularly among the active workforce—both employees and the self-employed—a significant portion of whom are defecting to the ‘Blues.’ The proportion of pensioners among Union and SPD voters is rising; consequently, their policies are increasingly perceived as out of touch with economic realities. Yet, in an aging population, those who lose the working population ultimately lose the country.

 

This sorry state of affairs can be observed in other nations as well: voters accuse the political establishment of failing in core state responsibilities such as internal security and education and, in the interest of their remaining clientele—who largely lack a background in business—to pursue special interests alongside an economic and fiscal policy that intervenes without any coherent concept or principles. The hope prevalent among party veterans that the established parties might somehow make a comeback underestimates the dynamics of change in our times and overestimates the willingness of these venerable parties to adapt.

 

Germany needs a new center-right party that champions an agenda committed to the social market economy—based on fundamental state pillars such as democracy and alignment with the West—and is thus able to offer voters a narrative for the future. This party would need to stand for a state that is strong, capable, and efficient in performing its core tasks, while simultaneously advocating—in the interest of individual liberties—for a long-overdue state withdrawal from over-regulation and paternalism. It would view technological progress as an opportunity to modernize the German economy and abandon the old conviction that the state need only incur sufficient debt to advance the common good.

A narrative for the future is possible

 

To simultaneously achieve the consolidation of public finances and create room for tax and levy cuts, a new party cannot treat reductions in government spending as taboo. It will not win popularity everywhere, but it can provide a counterpoint to populist fantasies and offer a perspective to working people who have long felt undervalued by the political establishment.

 

The Union—which, out of a sense of responsibility for the state, shows itself to be all too accommodating in a coalition with a weak partner—no longer credibly embodies such an offering. It long ago sacrificed its economic competence—once one of its greatest strengths—on the altar of governing for the sake of governing, a process that began during the Merkel era. Its economic wing still exists on paper, but no longer at the ballot box.

 

Friedrich Merz quotes Ludwig Erhard, but who in his party joins him out of conviction? For the moribund FDP, the only question on election nights for quite some time has been whether it will still register as an independent minor party—staying below the five-percent threshold—or sink ignominiously into the "Others" category alongside other fringe parties. That is not what a future looks like.

 

Rebuilding the political center through a new party—with new personnel and a fresh image—will take time. Nor is there any guarantee of success, especially if it were to become a catch-all for failed figures from the established parties.

 

But the attempt must be made. In the interest of this country, things cannot go on as they have recently.

 

Gerald Braunberger

 

Publisher”