What would CDU leader Friedrich Merz do differently from Merkel if he became chancellor?

It is difficult to imagine more economical praise than that of Angela Merkel for CDU party leader Friedrich Merz. In a recent interview in weekly magazine Der Spiegel Merkel said when asked whether Merz is suitable for the chancellorship: “Whoever has come this far must have certain qualities. You don’t become a candidate for chancellor without a reason.”

Friedrich Merz (1955) became candidate chancellor of the Christian Democrats in January 2022, when he was finally elected chairman of the CDU after two previous unsuccessful attempts in 2018 and 2021. Now Merz and his CDU/CSU faction are comfortably ahead in the polls for the Bundestag elections in February, and the chancellorship seems within reach.

The almost seventy-year-old Merz has been pursuing his political career since he was a teenager, and had probably imagined emerging a little earlier in his life. Angela Merkel put a stop to this by taking over the chairmanship of Merz’s faction in the Bundestag in 2002 and governing for sixteen years from 2005 onwards according to a course that was too progressive for Merz. In her memoirs writes Merkel: “From the beginning it was a problem that we both wanted to be in charge.” First it was Merkel, and now, almost a quarter of a century later, it is Friedrich Merz’s turn. Merz seems to want to get rid of the legacy of his former antagonist as much as possible: he is not only a new party leader, he stands for a radically different CDU than the one under Merkel.

“Merz is a classic German conservative from the Helmut Kohl school,” says Veit Medick, chief of the political editorial staff of the weekly. Stern. “He stands for what was also highly valued in the old Federal Republic: security, economic stability and classic family values. To that extent he is someone of the old school. But he is also adaptable and would not roll back social reforms such as gay marriage.”

According to the election manifesto, Merz wants to reverse other decisions from recent years. The CDU under Friedrich Merz stands for a strict migration policy: according to the election manifesto, Afghanistan and Syria are safe and refugees from those two countries can be sent back. The CDU also wants to maintain the current border controls and stop refugees at the border.

Climate is not a priority, because that will not win elections at the moment

The decision of the Schröder and then Merkel governments to stop nuclear energy may be revised. The new social assistance system introduced by the Scholz government is being reversed – the CDU wants policies for the “hard-working” and “industrious” population, which means, among other things, that people who are not disabled would receive only minimal benefits. In terms of security, the CDU stands for a zero-tolerance policy, more cameras and facial recognition, and the rollback of cannabis legalization under Scholz. Climate is not a spearhead in the program and emissions must be reduced through CO₂-price and market forces. “Climate is not a priority now for the CDU,” says political journalist Medick. “But that can also be a tactic, because you cannot win elections with climate politics at the moment.”

Jens Spahn (CDU), State Secretary and later Minister under Angela Merkel, and now a confidant of Merz, said in recent months repeatedly and with satisfaction: “Germany has not been so left-wing for a long time.” In 2021, the Greens seemed likely to become the largest party, eventually becoming the SPD, which formed a progressive coalition with the Greens and the liberal FDP. Now Merz’s CDU is leading in the polls (31 percent), followed by the radical right AfD (19 percent), and SPD and Greens come second. Is the conservative Merz the right man at the right time for Germany?

Friedrich Merz joined the CDU youth organization as a teenager and had “excellent contacts” in the West German party, according to Ruprecht Polenz, who served in the Bundestag for the CDU from 1994 to 2013 and knows both Merz and Merkel well. From 1989 to 1994, Merz sat in the European Parliament, then, from 1994 to 2009, in the Bundestag. For Merz, with his good network and extensive experience, it will not have been easy to see a relative outsider like Angela Merkel, an East German woman whose political career only started in 1989, surpass him. “Their style is of course very different,” says Polenz. “Merkel often rolled her eyes at the vain men around her who pushed themselves to the fore. She herself was not vain at all. And not necessarily Merz either, but he is almost two meters tall and moves a bit differently on stage than Merkel, who had to search a lot in the beginning.” According to Polenz, Merkel and Merz still don’t get along, but they have found a modus operandi.

In 2009, Merz left politics, out of dissatisfaction with Merkel and his own career prospects within the party. He worked as a consultant, had a number of supervisory directorships, and was chairman of the German branch of asset manager BlackRock. He developed himself into a successful businessman, and he ostentatiously flies through Germany on his private jet.

In 2018, when Merkel gave up the CDU party chairmanship, he saw his opportunity and returned with the idea of ​​relieving her. At that time, as in 2021, he was defeated by a candidate ideologically close to Merkel. He was not finally elected until 2022.

For many former Merkel voters, and also for many CDU members, Merz is an overly irritable and unconnected successor to Merkel. After the turn of the year from 2022 to 2023, when cars were set on fire and emergency services were attacked in various Berlin neighborhoods where many Germans with a migration background live, Merz spoke of “little pashas”. He later said that Germans cannot get dental appointments because migrants are having “new teeth” fitted.

In recent months, with the elections in February in sight, Merz has become a lot more cautious in his statements. His main competitor Olaf Scholz and his SPD must mainly hope that Merz makes a mistake in the remaining weeks, for example with a few more such verbal slips, so that Scholz can still overtake Merz. Or the SPD must hope that the tactic of portraying Merz as a cold neoliberal who does not care about the ‘common man’ applies – winning on Scholz’s own merits is virtually impossible, given the great unpopularity of his government.

In the election manifesto, the CDU also shrinks from major reforms that Merz initially advocated: for example, he does not want to increase the retirement age, despite the fact that the current pension system is not sustainable for much longer. Medick: “Merz is now trying not to alienate Merkel voters too much – but also not the conservative part of the CDU that elected him. He looks for a middle ground. That may sound tactical, but he may also lose the image of a reformer who really wants to do things differently.”

Angela Merkel receives flowers and sparkling wine when she is elected chairman of the CDU in April 2000 with 96% of the votes. Friedrich Merz stands next to her.

The German cabinet fell on December 16, 2024, after the coalition had already lost its majority in parliament. Opposition leader Friedrich Merz called Scholz “an embarrassment” for Germany.

For Merz, the most important election issue is the ailing German economy. To get this going again, the CDU advocates tax cuts, which would particularly benefit high incomes and companies. The CDU also wants to hold on to the ‘Schuldenbremse‘, the law that limits government debts, even as economists and many CDU members consider the lack of investments in infrastructure and schools disastrous for the German economy. Critics also point out that it remains unclear how the tax cuts should be financed.

Is it conceivable that a politician, who was formed in the 1990s under Helmut Kohl, who came up with a very predictable election manifesto and who needed decades to come to power, becomes Chancellor of Germany in such tumultuous times? Political journalist Medick thinks so: “In a way, Merz fits in with these times. He has an important role in the party system, precisely because he is still a classic conservative. You don’t have to agree with everything he says, but he is not a right-wing populist. He positions the party slightly right of center, also to make it more difficult for populists. As far as I’m concerned, Merz is the CDU’s last experiment as to whether you can still win an election with such a person, and whether the classic conservative people’s party in Germany still has a future. It is a gamble, and if it does not yield a profit, the CDU is done for. ”

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