OhOn a cool autumn afternoon last month, the Berliner Platz in the Eastern German city of Cottbus was bustling with the appearance of Sahra Wagenknecht. One activist was busy handing out leaflets promoting the latest chivalric force to disrupt European politics, while Wagenknecht said he was there because he “understands people like us.” Anti-war banners were seen around the square. An elderly woman proudly displays a plaque that says grandmother for Frieden (Grandma for Peace).
Formed only last January, the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW), which bears his name, is gathering voters from across the political spectrum, although mainly from the left. An unscientific poll suggested that most of the Cottbus audience had previously voted for the Social Democrats or the left-wing party to which Wagenknecht belonged, or for neither. His speech listed a list of workers' concerns: the cost-of-living crisis, declining health care, lack of access to good jobs and affordable housing, and meager pensions. As the main political and cultural elite, Wagenkecht said these “ordinary realities” are a nod to many victims of pathetic absence.
What do you not like? Well, it turns out a lot. Popular, charismatic and combative, Wagenknecht remained a rising star of German politics in an election in which the BSW finished a solid third in three eastern German states. His origins are left-wing, but to say that his rise has not been well received by mainstream progressives is to understate the level of hostility.
Wagenknecht was once a young communist in the former East Germany. Next to her is Björn Högke, the current neo-fascist luminary of the far-right party Alternative for Germany (AfD), as a leading commentator recently told Die Zeit: “Wagenknecht and Högke are the political sweethearts of the moment. What belongs to the former GDR is emerging: the successors of Hitler's National Socialism and Stalin's National Communism.
Hostility is not difficult to explain. Founded by Wagenknecht earlier this year as a hybrid “left-conservative” movement, the BSW's stated mission is to provide an alternative to working-class voters driven by the racist authoritarianism of the AfD. But in the eyes of its critics, the BSW's approach is to echo the AfD's talking points on the war in Ukraine, immigration and the climate crisis.
In Town Squares, Wagenknecht, a former high-profile writer and talk show expert, has dismissed progressive causes with a provocative twist. He refused from the beginning to support Western military support for Ukraine, citing public concerns about a broader war. Prioritize the restoration of cheap Russian energy for German industry.
On migration, the BSW's policies are closer to those of ethnic nationalism and the racist visions of mass deportation of French Prime Minister Michel Barnier's AfD. But Wagenknecht's language about the need for stricter borders and faster deportations of rejected asylum seekers. He played annoyingly to the gallery. And in an interview he said: “There should not be neighborhoods where indigenous people are a minority.”
The rejection of net zero emissions targets has been characterized as an undue burden on the less fortunate and political attacks on the “virtue signaling” liberal middle classes. In his 2021 bestseller, the self-deprecating Wagenknecht denounces “lifestyle leftists” who live in cities and flaunt their ethical superiority by driving electric cars, unattainable to most, and wasting time on identity politics.
Such provocations have unleashed a wave of denial. But Wagenknecht is pretty easy to spot beyond the norm. His political success in Austria, more recently, has earned a more considered and self-critical response from progressives, with far-right courts becoming more effective in winning over working-class voters across Europe.
Contrary to the claims of his exaggerated critics, Wagenknecht did not seek to resurrect the autocratic spirit of the GDR. But importantly it represents a political regression to the world before the fall of the Berlin Wall. After the collapse of communism and the deregulation of financial markets, the global economy transformed at an extraordinary pace and there was little reaction in Europe from disaffected social democratic parties. What Wagenknecht calls “BlackRock capitalism” – financially driven and relentlessly seeking short-term returns – has become a destabilizing and disruptive force.
A new movement – people, information and, above all, capital in search of profit – has stripped areas, companies and workers of the security they once enjoyed. Governments tied themselves to fiscal rules designed to curb market confidence. Inequality increased and social cohesion decreased.
BSW “conservatism” is associated with a program of defensive restructuring by the losers of this revolution. In a recent extensive interview with New Left Criticism, Wagenknecht describes his party as “the legitimate heirs of both postwar conservatism and… the 'internal capitalism' of social democratic progressivism.” Much of their approach was a rehash of the “old” leftist program buried in the ideological collapse of 1989: an activist position, substantial redistribution through taxation, massive public investment in services and infrastructure, strong unions, higher wages. and better pensions. For the less fortunate.
These social democratic priorities have faded from view since the 1990s. Remarkably, Wagenknecht's communist background combined them with a commitment to supporting middle producers – increasingly the German “middle class” – against the predations of multinational corporations. . Wagenknecht argues that the “internal capitalism” of the postwar period gave disenfranchised working-class voters a sense of power and status. His abandonment has felt like a betrayal.
It is not necessary to recognize the full extent of Wagenknecht's iconoclastic views to accept the force of this economic diagnosis. In Cottbus, the crowd was filled with the same disillusioned population that had abandoned mainstream politics across Europe. The left will fail to win back these hearts and minds without real evidence that it understands their frustration and is willing to address it.
During his successful 2021 election campaign, German SPD Chancellor Olaf Scholz received him. Referring to The Tyranny of Merit, by the American political philosopher Michael Sandel, Scholz noted the “discontent and insecurity” felt by the non-professional classes “not only in the United States or the United Kingdom, but also in the Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark , Finland and Norway. , Austria or Germany.”
The solution, he argued, lies in the restoration of the “dignity” that comes from a fair redistribution of rewards and social value. But the Scholesian-style balance was doomed to failure by the decision to form a centrist coalition that included the neoliberal and pro-austerity Free Democratic Party (FDP). The consequences of that choice were summed up last year when ministers attempted to demand the rapid installation of climate-friendly heat pumps. The refusal to provide adequate subsidies to help low-income families has contributed to the increase in AfD membership across Germany.
BSW attempts to fill the political vacuum created by such leadership failures. As the world faces era-defining geopolitical and environmental challenges, progressives should learn from Wagenknecht's provocative rise rather than raining a hail of anathema on his head.
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Julian Koeman is a contributing editor at The Guardian
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