Where is Germany going?

Like any other member country, Germany too has a particular role in the European Union, a role that reflects her importance and the idea she has of herself. Germany’s particularity consists in her central position, her territorial extension, the size of her population and especially her economic power, which is based not only on the size of the country but especially on its federal organization, which comprises both competition between the individual parts of the country and the commandment of subsidiarity and its reverse: solidarity. Moreover, the Federal Republic has traditionally made great efforts to achieve economic efficiency, and at the same time to guarantee social cohesion. These are some of the more important conditions that have led to the success of the “German model”.But this success, though considered a necessary and hence desirable prerequisite for the salutary development of Europe, is perceived by some foreign observers as a threat, since it contributes to the economic imbalances of the European Union, especially when some partners have no success with their own models due to reckless interventions. So the initiatives and actions of German policy are always followed with concern, particularly in periods of crisis, when it is a question of taking painful decisions. An occasion to express concerns was recently given by the sentence of Germany’s federal Constitutional Court on the Lisbon Treaty in June 2009; it established that the continuation of the classic German policy at the European level, aimed at the progressive creation of a federal European state, was subject to conditions that are difficult to fulfil. And in the spring of 2010 astonishment was aroused by Germany’s hesitant attitude to the crisis of Europe that was caused by the dramatic indebtedness of Greece and of other member states and that has ever since kept the EU with bated breath. And what significance should be attached to the German Federal Republic’s abstention in the Security Council of the United Nations on the occasion of the vote on the use of military means to protect the population of Libya from the attacks of the dictator Gheddafi? An individual action! Does this perhaps mean that the Germans will cease to show solidarity with their partners in NATO and in the EU and take sides with Russia and China instead? What arouses disquiet is not so much the material result of this decision (non-participation in the military intervention in Libya), as the fact that the Germans did not bother to consult their partners in the EU (and in NATO) beforehand to explain their own intentions and motivations. Yet, Germany is not the only member state of the EU to distinguish herself by some isolated position. Indeed, in comparison with other European protagonists, it is a form of conduct rather atypical for Germany, which can be explained only by some nervousness in domestic policy, in a year of important elections in many Länder. The reserved and hesitant attitude of Germany on the occasion of EU action to provide a rescue package for Greece was more difficult to understand and has therefore led some analysts to doubt in German solidarity, though the problem was caused instead by the violation of agreed rules and by the lack of solidarity on the part of Greece herself with her own partners in the EU. The German government helped to solve the situation in a fair and equable way, in spite of the opposition of public opinion in its own country. Criticisms directed at Germany due to the hesitation of the German government show a lack of understanding for the prevalent position in social, cultural, economic and political elites in Germany, which in large part continue to be deeply convinced of the need for European unification. The Germans insist however on the fact that unification must happen in conformity with the agreed rules and mutual equity. For a community in which some countries must support the costs of the recklessness of others cannot be long-lasting. So, where is Germany going? It cannot be ignored that Germany – just like all the other member states, for that matter – has for some time been following the tendency to ignore the procedures for forming a consensus and determining the decisions taken on a Community basis. Instead, preference is given to the bilateral method between individual states, in which what prevails is the inspiration of heads of state and of government rather than the contribution of the European institutions. This has also favoured a mental “renationalization” which will lead to isolation, in contrast to the experiences of European integration in the 1960s. In consideration of her particular importance and her role in the European Union, and also her history in the twentieth century and the lessons to be drawn from it; in consideration, lastly, of her own interests, characterized by a wide network with other European economies, it can be predicted that Germany will remain faithful to the project of unification and that in due course she will take renewed initiatives in support of an ever greater union of the peoples and states of Europe.