It was old Angela Merkel: the woman who has dominated European politics for the better part of two decades, handed her office to the next German chancellor, thanked her staff, then walked in the door and walked out—she was the last.
After 16 years as Germany’s leader and Europe’s unofficial leader, Merkel stepped down on Wednesday when she first met President George W.
“Congratulations, dear chancellor, dear Olaf Scholz,” Merkel told her successor at a small gathering at the chancellery. “I know from experience that this is a pivotal moment to be elected to this office.”
“It is an exciting, fulfilling duty, a challenging duty as well,” Merkel said, “but if you gladly accept it it is probably one of the most beautiful duties this country has to be responsible for.” Is.”
Long the world’s most powerful female leader, Merkel was a central political figure in Germany and Europe through four US presidents and five British and eight Italian prime ministers. Her continued rise in authority attracted fans and detractors alike, but she remained the continent’s sole source of stability through repeated crises.
Criticized for failing to prepare a successor, Merkel, a Christian Democrat, may have done so in the end. Only – to the dismay of his own party – it was a member of his traditional opposition, Scholz, a Social Democrat and his last finance minister, who was sworn in on Wednesday after promising continuity after a campaign.
Nevertheless, Merkel’s departure marks the end of an influential era of German politics that she herself called “eventful and often very challenging” – and the beginning of a new and uncertain chapter for Germany and Europe.
“It was a great period during which you were chancellor of this country and you did great things,” Scholz said after formally handing him over to the chancellor and his staff. “There were some big crises we had to deal with, some of them we went through together.”
“It tied us together, not just these events,” Scholz said. “We’ve always had a very convincing cooperation. That’s good, I believe, because it shows that we are a strong, capable democracy, with a lot of consensus between democracy, cooperation.
Many who worked closely with the late German chancellor point to a sense of dedication and willingness to compromise as the basis of his power.
“She was – and she is – someone who was always on the lookout for results, with a deep sense of responsibility,” said Dalia Graboschite, who first met Merkel in Brussels in 2005 and went on to collaborate . During his decade-long tenure as President of Lithuania. “And she was willing to make compromises to get that result.”
The full impact that Merkel made on her country and on the continent, the daughter of a former communist pastor, will only be revealed in the years to come. But for now the basis of his legacy is widely believed to be his decision to welcome more than 1 million asylum seekers to Germany in 2015 and 2016.
The decision sharply divided his country – particularly along the old East-West fault line – and fueled the rise of a far-right nationalist movement that was stronger than any since the Nazis.
But it also softened Germany’s image abroad and established its country as a liberal beacon as populism threatened the very foundations of democratic systems in the West.
“Angela Merkel changed Germany’s image in the world – in a way she saved Germany’s honour,” said Naika Fouten, an immigration expert and professor at Humboldt University in Berlin. “It went against all expectations that this obvious humanitarian gesture would come from Germany. That symbolic turning point, that Germany, the country with the ugly face, proved to be the rock and took people in, is associated with Angela Merkel.
The second period that defined his time in power was Europe’s debt crisis, and his tough prescriptions for long painful budget cuts to get out of it – something southern Europeans still call him for more than a decade. Haven’t forgiven for a long time.
“In some parts of Europe Merkel is viewed much more negatively than in other parts of the world,” Fouton said.
The same is true in Germany: Wildly popular in the country’s far more populous west, Merkel is hated in the areas of the former communist east where she grew up. The East has become the bastion of the Alternative for Germany, a party under its watch and the first far-right party to hold a place in the German parliament since World War II.
“I know my face is polarizing,” Merkel admitted two years ago in the eastern city of Chemnitz when it became the scene of violent far-right riots. At the end of their time in office, protesters would hold weekly vigils outside the chancellor and participate in public events, in which they chanted “Merkel must go!”
At the time, her approval rating was falling rapidly and it looked like she would not be able to make it politically during her fourth term. It was the pandemic that gave Merkel, a trained scientist of famous calm disposition, another honeymoon in opinion polls.
Scholz, who was his finance minister for the last four years, has very similar temperaments and similarities. “Not much will change,” he told the chancellor’s staff on Wednesday.
“The transition from Merkel to Scholz is so cohesive that you have to ask: what’s between them?” The newspaper Sudetsche Zeitung said in a recent article. “Merkel was often accused of failing to produce a successor. But maybe that’s not true.”
To the annoyance of her own party, Merkel said she would “sleep tightly at night” knowing that Scholz was running the country. He invited Scholz to accompany him to a meeting of the Group of 20 in Rome in October to introduce him to leaders such as President Joe Biden. He has included them in every major decision since the elections held two months ago. The last two jointly chaired a COVID emergency meeting with the governors of Germany’s 16 states.
During a military farewell ceremony for Merkel last week, she wished Scholz – whom she called “Dear Olaf” – “all good and lucky hands and much success.” He immediately responded with a compliment of his own. “Angela Merkel was a successful chancellor,” she said on Twitter the same night. “She stood up for her country tirelessly and stayed true to herself over the 16 years, which changed a lot.”
Many Germans expressed pride in how smoothly Merkel handled the transition, drawing direct comparisons to former President Donald Trump and his supporters’ recognition of Biden’s election.
“We are seeing a very good democratic transition, where there is a fundamental consensus,” said Christoph Heusgen, Merkel’s former chief foreign policy adviser. “I’m a little proud of our democracy the way it has managed this transition without schadenfreude, without hatred, without malice.”
Earlier on Wednesday, Merkel watched from the audience gallery in parliament – where her own family sat four times to watch her swearing in – as lawmakers voted for Scholz into office. She received a standing ovation from Chambers, before slipping quietly through the back door.
From the moment she took the oath of office in 2005, Merkel has embodied a string of firsts – the first chancellor born after World War II, the former First Lady, the First Lady. Now she has made history by becoming the first modern chancellor to step down, not by losing an election or parliamentary vote, but by deciding that she has served long enough.
One of those who most closely documented Merkel’s political career is Herlinde Koelbl, a photographer who began taking her portrait in 1991, just after taking office as Minister for Family and Children under Chancellor Helmut Koel. did. Was.
In an early interview she gave to Koelbl, the outgoing chancellor insisted that she wanted to “find the right time to leave politics.” At 67 years old, she is more than a decade younger than Biden and, after a self-imposed period of rest and reflection, has to reconcile ideals and ideas while in office, from global public health to development in Africa. have been able to. One can expect to re-focus one’s energy on promotion. ,
But comparing Koelbl’s most recent photos to the younger Merkel, the 16-year toll on helping Europe’s biggest economy is visible. The open, curious gaze is replaced by a more distant, suspicious one.
“In the beginning, her eyes were very lively,” said Koelbl, “and now she looks at you, but the vibrancy is gone. The sparkle in her eyes has disappeared.”
On Wednesday, as she left the handover ceremony near the chancellor, Merkel appeared relaxed, even happy. Walking to the door, she turned to Scholz.
“And now to work,” she said.