Friedrich Merz, Germany’s chancellor-in-waiting?
TIME AND again the ambitions of Friedrich Merz to attain Germany’s top political job have been thwarted by events, by rivals—or by himself. Yet at last the chancellery looks within the grasp of the 68-year-old leader of Germany’s centre-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU). On September 17th Mr Merz secured the backing of Markus Söder, the ambitious leader of the Bavarian Christian Social Union (CSU), for that job. The sister conservative parties agree on a joint chancellor-candidate at federal elections, an unusual process that has not always run smoothly. For Mr Merz’s supporters, Mr Söder’s quiet surrender one whole year before Germans go to the polls speaks to the evolution of their man’s political skills.
Mr Merz’s long journey has been full of potholes and apparent dead ends. Born in Germany’s west into a family of conservative Catholic lawyers, he followed a conventional path of legal studies and lawyering before winning election to the European Parliament in 1989. He soon moved to the Bundestag, Germany’s lower house, working his way up to the chairmanship of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group in 2000. Alas for Mr Merz, he had made the first of several important enemies along the way. In 2002 Angela Merkel, the CDU’s little-known new leader, ousted him from that job in an intra-party power struggle. Not for the last time, Mr Merz had underestimated a rival.
A few years later a chastened Mr Merz quit politics for a lucrative career in corporate law, with sidelines on the boards of financial groups including the German arm of BlackRock, a giant asset manager. Yet he discreetly retained old contacts while forging new ones, via senior roles in organisations including the Atlantic Bridge, a body that promotes transatlantic relations. His limited public appearances usually involved taking potshots at Mrs Merkel—who meanwhile was winning election after election.
So it was a shock in October 2018 when Mr Merz emerged from the wilderness to stand for the leadership of the CDU, from which a fading Mrs Merkel had resigned (she remained chancellor until 2021). Mr Merz, a forceful orator on good days, wowed those among the party faithful who thought Mrs Merkel had corroded the party’s conservative soul. Yet like the flawed Shakespearean protagonist to whom he is sometimes compared, Mr Merz blew it when it mattered. After failing to rally support among delegates he lost a close vote to Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, Mrs Merkel’s preferred heir.
His defeat seemed to vindicate those who thought Mr Merz’s arrogance was his undoing. But Mrs Kramp-Karrenbauer imploded in 2020, vacating the CDU leadership again. Mr Merz lost his second bid, to Armin Laschet, the centrist premier of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW). Yet after the hapless Mr Laschet led the CDU/CSU to a catastrophic defeat in Germany’s 2021 election, it was third time lucky for Mr Merz. In January 2022, he finally landed the job.
Mr Merz has trod a fine line since. He has tried to convince CDU moderates that their views have a place in the party, while showing German voters that he is steering the party back to its conservative roots. It hasn’t always worked. Last year Mr Merz troubled party allies by claiming that refugees were hogging dentists’ appointments. Some think his tirades against immigration veer too close to territory staked out by the hard-right Alternative for Germany (Mr Merz once boasted he could win over half the AfD’s voters).
Still, the work paid off. In May Mr Merz was easily re-elected CDU leader. The party seems broadly unified: potential rivals have pledged allegiance, while the mercurial Mr Söder appears to have been brought to heel. So desperately unpopular is the left-leaning coalition led by Olaf Scholz, the chancellor Mr Merz hopes to unseat at next year’s election, that the conservative candidate is a clear front-runner.
Politically, Mr Merz adopts the persona of a flinty teller of difficult truths. Lately that has meant hammering the government for being lax on irregular immigration. Yet he says that his focus next year will be Germany’s faltering economy. Here his instincts are those of a pro-business small-stater: he once said tax returns should be small enough to fit on a beer mat. He will seek to reverse what he calls Germany’s “creeping deindustrialisation”, including defending its troubled carmakers by fighting against EU proposals to phase out the combustion engine.
On foreign policy he sits squarely in conservative Germany’s pro-NATO mainstream. He has attacked Mr Scholz for refusing to send Taurus cruise missiles to Ukraine. He proudly proclaims his pro-Europeanism, including in a guest article for The Economist. But those expecting a turn from some of the CDU’s more dogmatic instincts may be disappointed: Mr Merz’s main response to Mario Draghi’s recent sweeping report into European competitiveness was to reject proposals for more common EU debt.
Exuding a confidence that sits at odds with opinion polls, Mr Scholz and his team think Mr Merz can effectively be portrayed as an inexperienced, out-of-touch hothead who will take a hatchet to Germans’ rights and pensions. (Expect references to his wealth and the private jet he enjoys flying.) And in the heat of an election campaign they reckon they can goad him into an ill-considered remark or two.
Certainly, Mr Merz has his work cut out. Although the CDU/CSU is polling better than the three parties in Mr Scholz’s government combined, Germans do not find the prospect of him in the chancellery any more enticing than the incumbent. Only half of his own party’s voters think he is the right man for the job. He polls dreadfully among women and younger voters. And fresh intra-party spats await over potential coalitions: many in the CDU/CSU have taken a violent dislike to the Greens, Mr Scholz’s junior partner, but Mr Merz may need them to govern. While few expected he would get this far, Mr Merz’s sternest tests await. ■