Merkel running for 4th term

[Hnv1]

Is there anyone among the SPD ranks who looks like chancellor material or is the centre-left disease of weak politicos haunting the SPD as well?

[politicus]

Is there anyone among the SPD ranks who looks like chancellor material or is the centre-left disease of weak politicos haunting the SPD as well?

Hannelore Kraft

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannelore_Kraft

[Middle-aged Europe]

To my knowledge, nobody from either the Greens or the Left has ever suggested something close to a merger of the two parties. Culturally and ideologically, they're just too different.

The Greens basically consist of a centrist and a left wing, while the Left is made up of a left and a far-left wing. The most pragmatic/realist members of the Left may be somewhat similar to the most leftist members of the Greens, but that's about it. A merged Green/Left party would basically cover the entire political spectrum currently occupied by the SPD, plus a huge chunk to the left of it.
 
The East German Greens trace their roots back to the dissident movement against the SED's rule, so in that part of the country, both parties are former political enemies. And in West Germany, some Green state chapters are relatively conservative. Baden-Württemberg in particular comes to mind. The Baden-Württembergian Greens would probably prefer to merge with the CDU if forced to choose.

[Famous Mortimer]

Nah, Greens and The Left are basically the same ideologically. All the differences are cultural.

[politicus]

Nah, Greens and The Left are basically the same ideologically. All the differences are cultural.

'

Well, that is contrary to the opinion of basically anyone knowledgeable about German politics.

[Hnv1]

Is there anyone among the SPD ranks who looks like chancellor material or is the centre-left disease of weak politicos haunting the SPD as well?

Hannelore Kraft

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannelore_Kraft

is she considered more to the left or a centrist hero? I guess running a centrist hero against the current CDU wouldn't change much.

[politicus]

Pragmatic - with some leftist instincts and working class background, but she has the common touch, and I think that is more important.

[Middle-aged Europe]

Nah, Greens and The Left are basically the same ideologically. All the differences are cultural.

Winfried Kretschmann would like to have a word with you.

[Middle-aged Europe]

Nah, Greens and The Left are basically the same ideologically. All the differences are cultural.

'

Well, that is contrary to the opinion of basically anyone knowledgeable about German politics.

Another major difference between Greens and Left would be foreign policy, I guess.

Left: Anti-American, anti-NATO, anti-military intervention, somewhat anti-EU ("critical of it in its current form"), pro-Russian.

Greens: Somewhat complicated feelings towards the United States, which means generally pro-American as long as Obama or a Clinton is in charge, except for what the NSA is doing. Pro-NATO/pro-Euromaidan/anti-Putin and more or less in favour of Western military interventions provided it happens for purely humanitarian reasons and not "for oil" (which basically applies to everything except Iraq 2003). Strongly pro-EU.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Is there any remaining anti-militaristic sentiment in today's Greens, or have the Fischer years ended such feelings for good?

How is Kretschman as a Minister-President, anyway?

[Middle-aged Europe]

Is there any remaining anti-militaristic sentiment in today's Greens, or have the Fischer years ended such feelings for good?

Short answer:

How is Kretschman as a Minister-President, anyway?

The best Christian-democratic minister-president the state ever had.

[Famous Mortimer]

Nah, Greens and The Left are basically the same ideologically. All the differences are cultural.

'

Well, that is contrary to the opinion of basically anyone knowledgeable about German politics.

I think this is a case where they can't see the forest for the trees. They are focused so much on detail they can't see the bigger picture that they are indeed basically the same. Maybe not the same, let me put it this way, the differences between the Greens and the Left are less than the differences between the left and right wings within other single political parties.

[MaxQue]

Nah, Greens and The Left are basically the same ideologically. All the differences are cultural.

'

Well, that is contrary to the opinion of basically anyone knowledgeable about German politics.

I think this is a case where they can't see the forest for the trees. They are focused so much on detail they can't see the bigger picture that they are indeed basically the same. Maybe not the same, let me put it this way, the differences between the Greens and the Left are less than the differences between the left and right wings within other single political parties.

I fail to see how someone which annual birthday wishes to Fidel Castro and is nostalgic for DDR (a few old school PDS members) and someone like the minister-president of Bade-Wurtenberg (a green sounding like an old style christian-democrat) are similar.

[Simfan34]

You already have Die Linke.

Lafontaine & Co never managed to turn Die Linke into a Left SocDem party. It has too much bagage and its very existence blocks the advance of a credible leftist alternative.

I was speaking of Jeremy Corbyn more specifically.

It remains to be seen if left-wing social democrats can appeal to a broader audience generally, anyway. Throw in the Greens and they're already at 20%. Outside of Greece, where has a party to the left of mainstream social democratic party done better than that? Even Podemos is polling in that range.

Most usually, such parties struggle to get over 10%. Their room for improval is questionable.

Maybe this is more idiosyncratic than you are looking for, but the Icelandic Pirates?

Needless to say, the amount of Greens who would be happy with a coalition with the CDU would seem to indicate a Linke-Green merger is a long way off. Unless the party underwent a Swiss style schism.

Yeah, a bit too sui generis. I'm also tempted to write Iceland off as "too small to count".

[politicus]

You already have Die Linke.

Lafontaine & Co never managed to turn Die Linke into a Left SocDem party. It has too much bagage and its very existence blocks the advance of a credible leftist alternative.

I was speaking of Jeremy Corbyn more specifically.

It remains to be seen if left-wing social democrats can appeal to a broader audience generally, anyway. Throw in the Greens and they're already at 20%. Outside of Greece, where has a party to the left of mainstream social democratic party done better than that? Even Podemos is polling in that range.

Most usually, such parties struggle to get over 10%. Their room for improval is questionable.

Maybe this is more idiosyncratic than you are looking for, but the Icelandic Pirates?

Needless to say, the amount of Greens who would be happy with a coalition with the CDU would seem to indicate a Linke-Green merger is a long way off. Unless the party underwent a Swiss style schism.

Yeah, a bit too sui generis. I'm also tempted to write Iceland off as "too small to count".

If we are talking about the general issue of whether such a party could have success in Europe the size of the country is a rather irrelevant criteria. Provided it has an independent economy, which Iceland has ( ex. San Marino would not count because it is de facto Integrated into a bigger country).

(ftr: I do not consider the Pirates to be left wing SDs - or any other kind of SDs for that matter)

[Cranberry]

Nah, Greens and The Left are basically the same ideologically. All the differences are cultural.

'

Well, that is contrary to the opinion of basically anyone knowledgeable about German politics.

I think this is a case where they can't see the forest for the trees. They are focused so much on detail they can't see the bigger picture that they are indeed basically the same. Maybe not the same, let me put it this way, the differences between the Greens and the Left are less than the differences between the left and right wings within other single political parties.

As nearly every post from page 2 on has said, no they are not. People make an error if they automatically put Green parties on the further left side of the spectrum, especially the Greens in the German-speaking area. I can't possibly try to make better arguments for the case than Old Europe has already made, and since you apparently stubbornly refuse to listen to him, I doubt you would listen to mine; but let me give you just one last thing - that guy is German. We are talking about Germany. I'm pretty sure he knows what he is talking about.

[Hnv1]

Nah, Greens and The Left are basically the same ideologically. All the differences are cultural.

'

Well, that is contrary to the opinion of basically anyone knowledgeable about German politics.

I think this is a case where they can't see the forest for the trees. They are focused so much on detail they can't see the bigger picture that they are indeed basically the same. Maybe not the same, let me put it this way, the differences between the Greens and the Left are less than the differences between the left and right wings within other single political parties.

I fail to see how someone which annual birthday wishes to Fidel Castro and is nostalgic for DDR (a few old school PDS members) and someone like the minister-president of Bade-Wurtenberg (a green sounding like an old style christian-democrat) are similar.

Well in any merger the right section of "righter" party and left of the other one will be pretty far off. Now i don't enough to say about Die Linke and Green in general but in my short time living in Bremen their supporters were very similar and didn't seem to differ on many subjects (also lot of left wing people I met were undecided between the two) I don't know if it's a local thing in Bremen but they didn't seem that far of each other back then

[palandio]

That's only natural. The people you are describing can be reached by both parties and are similar to US Green party voters for example. The thing is that the urban alternative milieu is a stronghold for both parties, but both parties extend far beyond that milieu, differently from the situation in the US.

The Greens get vote shares in upper middle class suburban regions that the US Greens would never get. Many of these voters care about things like "fiscal responsibility", security, of course also ecology and sustainability, but are culturally far away from the CDU/CSU.
The Left Party (compared to 2009) has lost some of its appeal to the group of white working-class males which is so popular here on the forum, but still gets voted by people that would never consider voting for the Green Party.

[Middle-aged Europe]

Well, if go to anecdotal evidence.... I'm a member of the Green Party. One of my friends is active in Left Party's youth wing.

We disagree on a lot of things politically - mainly because I think he's spouting a lot of naive, outdated Marxist rethoric - and I can't really myself in the same political party with him.

[Viewfromthenorth]

In this thread: Non-Germans enthusiastically lecturing Germans about how their political system works, or at least ought to work.

[politicus]

In this thread: Non-Germans enthusiastically lecturing Germans about how their political system works, or at least ought to work.

Why the plural?

[Cranberry]

In this thread: Non-Germans enthusiastically lecturing Germans about how their political system works, or at least ought to work.

Why the plural?

Also, this has been more of a discussion of party ideology than of the workings of the German political system.

[palandio]

In this thread: Non-Germans enthusiastically lecturing Germans about how their political system works, or at least ought to work.

Despite being a German myself and despite thinking that Greens and Left are ideologically different, I find that question worth a discussion. Because there is an overlap between the parties ideologically (at least between parts of them) and from an outside perspective both might look like "to the left of mainstream SDs on all relevant issues". But the Left normally deemphasizes "social issues" (American meaning) and the Greens partially fill the gap of a Dutch/Danish style social-liberal party (admittedly some Greens like Ströbele, Giegold, Zion and probably also Trittin are clearly more on the left).