Tribune leader, 20 April 1990
The victory of the right in the East German general election
shows that East Germans want rapid unification and, crucially, a currency agreement which allows them to
exchange their East German Marks for the same number of Deutschmarks. Many East
Germans voted right for the simple pragmatic reason that the sister parties of
those currently governing in Bonn will be better able to negotiate the
transition in East Germany's status than the sister parties of those in
opposition.
It would be wrong for the left to carp: this is the very stuff
of democratic politics. How transient can be 20-point leads in opinion polls!
Moreover, the election result does not necessarily demonstrate that East
Germany is irrevocably conservative: it could all be very different next time
round, particularly if, as seems very likely, the right fails to deliver on its
more extravagant promises. The timetables for currency union and political
unification put forward by Lothar de Maiziere's coalition are unrealistic, and
the shock of exposing the East German economy to market forces could well
damage the right's credibility.
Nevertheless, the result is a serious setback to the left,
not just in East Germany but throughout Europe. At one level, it is a blow to
expectations that a social-democratic "third way" would prove popular
in post-communist societies. More important in terms of Realpolitik because of
the pivotal role of West Germany in Europe, it has major implications for West
German politics. The Federal Chancellor, Helmut Kohl, is now riding a wave of
popularity. That makes it unlikely that his Foreign Minister, Hans Dietrich
Genscher, a liberal, will abandon coalition with the right. And that makes it very
difficult for the West German Social Democrats to win power after the West
German election later this year – even though their candidate for the
chancellorship, Oskar Lafontaine, is the best they have had since Willy Brandt.
If the SPD does not enter government, the balance of power in western Europe will remain firmly to
the Atlanticist right. The pace of demilitarisation will be slower, and moves
towards a new European system of common security to replace NATO and the Warsaw
Pact more tentative (or even non-existent). The likelihood of the European
Community's social charter being given real teeth will diminish, and so will the chances of western Europe
acting in concert to ensure the Germany is not the only part of eastern Europe
to the fate of becoming merely a source of cheap labour. European strategies
to encourage sustainable world development will be less of
a priority. And so on.
This should give the British Labour Party pause for thought.
Since 1987, it has increasingly meshed its foreign and defence policies (and to
some extent its economic policies) with
those of the West German SPD. Although this marks a welcome change from the
Little Englander assumptions of old, it
has also led to a tendency blithely to assume that all Labour's problems will
be solved by a shift to the left in West Germany in 1990. The events of the past
week suggest that it might not be a bad idea to start considering what to do if
that shift doesn't happen.
