From Economic Stabiliser Towards Contested Semi-Hegemon: German Leadership in the EU Under Pressure

Since 2009 Germany reluctantly abandoned its traditional reflexive multilateralism and adopted a semi-hegemonial leadership role in the context of the escalating eurozone sovereign debt crisis. Particularly Germany's partners in Central-Eastern Europe were adamant to ensure that the Merkel government would abandon its initial reluctance to lead efforts to resolve the eurozone crisis through new mechanisms of enhanced policy coordination. Germany’s semi-hegemonial position hence was initially built on its role of economic stabiliser in the eurozone under crisis conditions. Despite having achieved relative success in achieving this aim, German leadership became increasingly contested in Southern Europe as chancellor Angela Merkel and her finance minister Wolfgang Schäuble enforced a strict austerity agenda for the eurozone. At the same time concerns amongst the countries outside the eurozone about Germany’s selective and often secretive transgovernmental diplomacy and the implementation of new mechanisms of binding economic and fiscal policy coordination were growing. This was reflected by the demands of the British government under prime minister David Cameron to ensure that the euro outsiders would neither be marginalised in future EU decision-making, nor forced to join a potentially emerging political union in the eurozone. These concerns were the prime cause for Cameron’s demands for the renegotiation of the British EU membership conditions and the subsequent June 2016 public referendum. Parallel to this the widespread support for German leadership amongst the Central-Eastern European member states quickly started to vanish when the EU was hit by an escalating migration crisis in the summer of 2015. Berlin’s formerly closest European allies have since stood in firm opposition to the German approach towards the management of the migration challenge. This is reflected by the joint approach of the countries in the Visegrád group, which has broadened its appeal to new potential partners such as Austria. The paper offers an analysis of the factors behind the growing contestation of German leadership in the EU and examines options for Berlin to rebuild support and to invigorate the EU’s political agenda under difficult domestic and external conditions. The paper will particularly focus on the prospects for Germany’s future role in the EU in partnership with France in the context of diminished domestic political stability in the aftermath of the September 2017 national elections.