The global financial slump has become an unexpected midwife for the rebirth of Germany as a ?normal? state that puts self-interest above other considerations in the conduct of foreign policy. Known for decades as a collegial team player that sublimates its narrow national calculations for the greater good of the European Union, Germany has recently come under a hail of criticism on the continent and across the Atlantic for uncharacteristic selfishness.
Leading the dossier of charges against German narcissism is the controversy kicked up by its finance minister Peer Steinbrueck, whom the BBC has christened ?the new bad guy in Europe?. In an interview with Newsweek magazine, Steinbrueck lambasted British tax cut policies to revive stagnant demand as ?crass Keynesianism? and wondered aloud at the hypocrisy of liberal capitalist countries incurring gigantic state expenditure to ride out recession. For Euro watchers, such harsh language was unbelievable, coming from a German cabinet member instead of the instinctively anti-Anglo Saxon French.
German pique for Britain stems partly from the latter?s disregard of Berlin?s advice at the 2007 G-8 summit to undertake stricter regulation of financial markets. The universal refrain being heard in world capitals is that the current economic mess is ?not of our making.? Germany, too, which is now officially in recession, resents the failure of the US and the UK to undertake timely repairs before the reality sunk in. A champion exporter, the German economy is suffering from contraction of importing economies rather than Anglo-American-style housing market-related financial turmoil. Berlin feels short-changed by the short-sightedness of London and Washington that robbed Germany of its prime markets.
Chancellor Angela Merkel has also earned the ire of the EU and environmentalists for obstructing ambitious new carbon emission capping targets on grounds that they would constrict the formidable German auto manufacturing industry. High-powered and high er polluting manufacturers like Mercedes and Porsche lobbied Merkel?s government and won its backing for protection from exacting standards that would be ?unfair? on them vis-?-vis competitors like France?s Peugeot and Italy?s Fiat. The end product was a Climate Change Pact that provided escape routes of longer ?phase in? cushions for German automakers.
Here, Germany is illustrating the adage that crisis engenders dour self-preservation instincts. The auto industry is Germany?s largest employer. With federal elections scheduled in the country for September 2009, Merkel and her ruling coalition cannot ignore domestic repercussions of being viewed as more European or cosmopolitan than German. The mood in Germany is that charity for wider welfare of the rest of Europe and humanity can be reserved for better times. Germany is also presently at loggerheads with the US over policies towards Iran and Russia. As Europe?s largest exporter to Iran, Germany is conscious of the blowback of tougher UN economic sanctions on Tehran. German businesses have been organising and appealing to their government to avoid concurrence with Washington on imposing more sanctions on Iran.
On Russia, because of Germany?s dependence on oil and natural gas, it has shown an opportunistic streak that sets it apart from the rest of western Europe and puts it at odds with Washington?s NATO expansion designs.
When the Cold War ended in 1991, realist scholars of international relations predicted that Germany would soon return to its traditional expansionist and domineering ways. The belief was that Germany would once again flex muscles, stride across the continent, and dictate terms to its weaker neighbours. While this oracle has not been realised militarily, the return of Germany to a more ?normal? foreign economic policy is cause for worry among Europeans.
?The author is a researcher on international affairs at the Maxwell School of Citizenship & Public Affairs in Syracuse, New York