DT e-Paper 24 February 2017

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14 FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 2017 DT Opinion What is Merkel’s next step? The Trump doctrine presents new challenges for Angela Merkel • Paul Wallace British Prime Minister Theresa May was the first foreign leader to meet Donald Trump at the White House, but the one who counts in Europe is German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Her response to Trump’s apparent readiness to overturn seven decades of American support for NATO and the EU will be crucial in determining the future of Germany and the EU. The provocations of what may come to be called the “Trump doctrine” are causing angst in Berlin. At their joint press conference on January 27, May claimed to have secured the president’s 100% backing for NATO, the Western alliance underpinned by American military might since 1949. But Trump’s description of NATO as “obsolete” just days before he took office continues to reverberate, as does the message from US defense secretary James Mattis, who on February 15 said that America could “moderate its commitment” to the alliance, if other members continued to spend too little on their military. The position is especially worrying since Trump is tolerating Putin despite Russia’s annexation of Crimea and support of separatists in eastern Ukraine. Trump gives short shrift to the EU, depicting it shortly before his inauguration as “a vehicle for Germany,” which, according to his chief trade adviser, is exploiting the US through an undervalued euro. By contrast, Trump effuses over Brexit, saying at the press conference with May that “a free and independent Britain is a blessing to the world.” Trump’s praise of Brexit and prediction that other countries will leave the EU breaks with American support for European integration stretching back to the Marshall Plan. Taken at face value, the Trump doctrine undermines the key strategy of post-war Germany, which, from Konrad Adenauer to Angela Merkel, has sought to regain international respect and influence by binding the country to a common European destiny. Integration has been primarily economic and monetary through institutions such as the European Commission and the European Central Bank rather than through a shared European military, which remains covered by NATO. Germany has thrived both politically and economically The chancellor is in a predicament Merkel is likely to react cautiously to the Trump doctrine in order to see if the president’s actions are less provocative than his words by pursuing this approach, not least through achieving German unification in 1990. If Germany can no longer rely on American support, Merkel will have to reshape that post-war strategy. Her most radical response would be to push for the creation of a European military force, while also getting the EU’s troubled core, the 19-country euro area, to work better. The creation of such a military force with its own permanent headquarters is potentially easier because the UK, which has always opposed such a move, has written itself out of the script. Yet it would be hazardous for Merkel. The decision to pursue economic integration at the Treaty of Rome, whose 60th anniversary will be celebrated at the end of March, followed the collapse of an attempt in the early 1950s to create a “European Defense Community.” Such a project risks conjuring up old spectres of German armed might, scaring Germans as much as other Europeans. Sorting out the euro area will be just as tricky for the chancellor. At the heart of the problem is a flawed design that has proven too strict for uncompetitive and debt-ridden countries in southern Europe, in particular Italy -- the monetary union’s third-biggest economy. The euro is weak not because of Germany but because the ECB is keeping monetary policy ultra-loose in order to resuscitate the sick in the singlecurrency ward. Since the costs of a breakup of the monetary union would be huge, the way to make the euro zone work better is through a common fiscal policy based on a shared budget, which would in turn require much deeper political integration. But there is little appetite for this, in Germany or other crucial countries such as the Netherlands, for fear that northern tax-payers will end up paying the bill for struggling southern economies. Selling the case at home for deeper economic ties will be particularly tricky for Merkel as she prepares for an election in September. The chancellor, who is seeking her fourth term in office, faces an unexpectedly strong challenge from Martin Schulz, the candidate of the Social Democratic Party and former president of the European Parliament. Merkel has less room for maneuver than before due to the rise of alternative for Germany, a right-wing party that has capitalised on public frustration with the chancellor’s migration policy that let in so many asylum-seekers in 2015. And Germans are feeling less than enthusiastic about the ECB, the centrepiece of European integration. A nation of savers does not take kindly to earning negligible interest on their deposit accounts when REUTERS inflation, their historic nemesis, is back, surging from 0.7% in November to 1.9% in January. Merkel is likely to react cautiously to the Trump doctrine in order to see if the president’s actions are less provocative than his words. If his dissatisfaction with NATO is primarily that Europe does not pull its weight, then that call for burden-sharing can be met through higher defense spending by Germany and the rest of the EU. The sour mood of voters in Europe rules out any immediate push forward on deeper fiscal and political integration. Yet, the chancellor’s predicament in responding to the challenge posed by Trump reflects an unwelcome reality. The German question once posed the difficulty of containing German power within Europe. Now as much as anything, it means the difficulty of getting Germany to underwrite Europe. • Paul Wallace is a London-based writer. A former European economics editor of The Economist, he is author of The Euro Experiment, published by Cambridge University Press. This article previously appeared on Reuters.
Trouble in Tamil Nadu How will the AIADMK survive without its unifying figure? Opinion 15 DT FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 2017 • Arild Engelsen Ruud There is unrest in the AIADMK after Jayalalithaa’s demise. How will the party survive without the icon of Amma as its unifying figure? Last Saturday, there was a vote in the state assembly and the result was a vote of confidence for E Palaniswami. Known as EPS, he was appointed as chief minister just a few days earlier. He won with 122 votes against 11. The 11 belonged to the rival faction led by O Panneersalvam -- OPS -- who had revolted against the party leadership. EPS is party leader Sasikala’s man and it is clear that it was Sasikala who won the vote. She herself is currently in jail after following a conviction in a corruption case, but a sentence even in a corruption case is not necessarily detrimental to a political career in India. state elections may not be until 2020, but she is very far from the elevated position that Jayalalithaa held. Jayalalithaa and her predecessor MGR built and maintained an extensive network of loyal followers from among the enthusiasts of Tamil film. The film clubs constituted the core of their solid organisation. And in addition, both MGR and Jayalithaa were populists who generously handed out sops -- saris and cheap television sets, mid-day school meals, and bicycles. Equally significant was the considerable economic growth that the state has seen over many decades, in part due to the fact that even the dynastic and populist AIADMK had an accomplished administrative hand. It was OPS who inherited this hand, not Sasikala. He is referred to as the people’s chief minister and has a reputation for being incorrupt. She herself is currently in jail after following a conviction in a corruption case, but a sentence even in a corruption case is not necessarily detrimental to a political career in India Can she ever fill her mentor’s shoes? REUTERS Some of the limelight of the AIADMK power struggle was stolen by expressions of ire by the opposition DMK. They protested against the vote and the DMK vice chairman got his shirt torn up in a fight. But the noise was a result of the opposition’s powerlessness. They demonstrated vigour rather than having to choose from the ruling party’s two lead candidates. Future anxieties The power struggle in the AIADMK is about the future. There are those within the party who, over the years, have built a close relationship with Sasikala and naturally want that she retains power. But even if she has demonstrated reasonable control of the party’s representatives in the state assembly, there is a fear in the party that she will not be able to ensure the same support in a future election. Polls indicate extremely low confidence in her among voters. The party’s representatives in the Lok Sabha, over whom she has more limited control, are also opposed to her. The next Within the few weeks he was chief minister, he proved himself an able administrator. Among other things he lifted the ban on jallikattu, the popular ox taming race, and he oversaw the efficient distribution of relief efforts in the aftermath of the cyclone Vardah. Sasikala has far to go before she achieves Jayalalithaa’s seemingly invulnerable, larger-than-life status where she was the subject of unwavering devotion from her followers. Sasikala has yet to prove that she has charisma, and she even has to contend with a reputation for being Jayalalithaa’s evil adviser. The question is whether she will have the necessary political space to construct herself as the party’s beloved and undisputed leader, or whether she will remain a transitional figure with only a half-hearted party apparatus between herself and the voters. • Arild Engelsen Ruud is Professor of South Asia Studies, Department of Culture Studies and Oriental languages, University of Oslo, Norway.
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DT e-Paper 24 February 2017

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