It’s a truth universally acknowledged that in times of crisis, it was the German-French tandem – as the two largest member states of the EU – that has been key for EU stabilization, the “engine of European integration”. That it was those two countries that could provide the necessary guidance to keep the EU together and safeguard its polity, or even more, to further develop it and make it more crisis-proof.
Even in moments when their national interests, “different exposure and capacities” should have pulled them in different directions (think the Eurozone crisis, or later, the COVID recovery plan), Berlin and Paris found a way to cooperation in moments of acute crisis. An uncomfortable couple forced to live under the same roof.
The EU faced hard times when they couldn’t.
The events of the recent months prove that the German-French tandem started to pull in different directions, again. Hindered by their respective domestic issues, Berlin and Paris have a hard time finding a common ground, let it be about financing the EU or the level of protection the EU’s market needs from China.
While it was expected that their cooperation would stall during the governmental formation phase in Germany (following the retirement of long time chancellor Angela Merkel) and the onset of the French election campaign, experts hoped that it can restart without delay as those were over.
A series of unfortunate events prevented it from happening.
It was already obvious a year ago, when German-French differences on many issues significantly slowed EU decision making, and no public “team-building exercise” or joint declaration could mask it. Fast forward a year, and
Germany’s traffic light coalition gradually lost the support of its voters, to an extent that during the European Parliamentary elections in June, Chancellor Scholz’s Social Democrats suffered their worst result in a national vote in more than a century. The Greens (Die Grüne) suffered a similarly major loss, as they “had lost trust amongst the electorate”, as Green Federal Minister of Agriculture, Cem Özdemir said.
On the other hand, the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) secured 15.9 percent of the vote. Recent state-level elections in Brandenburg, Saxony and Thuringia confirmed the trend.
President Emmanuel Macron’s own party didn’t fare much better in the French European Parliamentary elections or in the ensuing national snap elections, prompted by Macron’s decision to dissolve the National Assembly, for that matter. Consequently, a new centre-right government was formed with the leadership of Michel Barnier. As a minority coalition of two blocks, it is a government that must rely on the far-right National Rally to stay in power.
The growing strength of the National Rally was monitored with anxiety from Berlin, as it has been known as “deeply Germanophobic”. A thing that can potentially complicate negotiations in the future.
In both countries, experts point at the governments’ failures to take note of their voters’ problems as a reason behind the radical shifts in the electorates: casting their ballots for the “far-right”, voters express their dissatisfaction with the current governments, without actually identifying with their political beliefs. In Germany, for example, young people were the traditional voters for Die Grüne. Now they flock to vote for the AfD.
The German economy is stuck in stagnation, while France’s government is battling high levels of public debt and budgetary constraints. Economic difficulties have also played a role in the change of voting patterns.
Beset with intensifying domestic troubles, Berlin and Paris are hardly in a position to play their traditional roles.
The engine moving the EU forward has stalled, and with no hopes of a surprise return to domestic stability in those two countries, it is likely to stay so for years to come.
Freshly elected for her second term at the helm of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen seems eager to fill the power vacuum. She was already called “Queen Ursula”, after all, for her lack of collegiality and power grabs.
The incoming new Commission was set up with this in mind. Von der Leyen will keep control over the money, thanks to appointing Poland’s Piotr Serafin to lead the budget portfolio and report directly to her.
France’s original nominee, Thierry Breton abruptly resigned a day before the planned announcement of the new commissioners, in an effort to gain a “more influential portfolio for France”.
The new nominee, Stéphane Séjourné might lead the “prosperity and industrial strategy” portfolio, though he has not much experience in the field, except for having been an adviser to (then) Minister of the Economy and Finance Emmanuel Macron from 2012 to 2014, then following him to the Elysée Palace. He has been considered a close ally of President Macron ever since.
With a German leading the Commission and a close ally of the French president being in charge of a portfolio of great importance for the “competitiveness” promised by von der Leyen, it could happen that French and German interests would be represented accordingly, even if the national governments are unable to do so, being bogged down in domestic fights.
France’s actual power to influence EU decisions might be limited, though, as proved by the recent debate over the EU-Mercosur trade deal.
Alas, von der Leyen is known more for cooperating with lobby groups, and subsequently keeping it secret, let it be meetings with big pharmaceuticals or equine industry lobbyists. According to the Commission, she had no obligation to disclose such meetings.
Based on data published by Transparency International, von der Leyen has quite an imbalanced meeting history with lobbyists. During the first part of her first mandate, she reported about 101 meetings – 84 of those were with companies and just 17 with NGOs.
Based on this, and the other scandals linked to her first tenure, like the issue of the disappeared messages with Pfizer chief Albert Bourla, von der Leyen is more likely to represent the interests of multinational companies than those of Germany, or the EU as a whole, for that matter.
