I’m repeating myself. But I can’t help myself. More precisely I can’t help it if what’s happening in the world demands I return over and then over again to one of my running themes.*
The theme: the unprecedently high rate of dissatisfaction by followers with their leaders. This manifests itself of course only in democracies. Autocracies – especially those at the repressive end of the spectrum – do not allow displays of disapproval. Meantime democracies are being weakened by leaders, especially though not exclusively political leaders, who fail to meet their followers’ expectations and by followers whose expectations are unreasonably high. The result? Disgust and dismay – and dysfunction.
In recent days the chattering class in the United States and Europe has been preoccupied with the results of Sunday’s state election in Germany. The ruling center-right Christian Democrats were purportedly “deeply shocked” by the results, which were not just their ignominious defeat. It was their dismal showing at the hands of the AfD, a right-wing party that is so extreme that until the last few years it had been effectively taboo.
The real story here though is less about the label and more about the leader. As I wrote in my post of May 9, 2025 (see link below), incumbent German Chancellor Friedrich Merz was hobbled from day one. There was scant chance he would morph into a successful and popular leader. Put differently, there was every danger that Germany, like Great Britain, would experience leader churn to a degree that was historically unprecedented and politically unhealthy.
England’s Andy Burnham is the country’s 7th prime minister in 10 years. Now let’s look at leadership in Germany. At its track record for the last half century.
- Helmut Schmidt was chancellor from 1974 to 1982 – 8 years.
- Helmut Kohl was chancellor from 1982 to 1998 – 16 years.
- Gerhard Schroeder was chancellor from 1998 to 2005 – 7 years.
- Angla Merkel was chancellor from 2005 to 2021 – 16 years.
- Olaf Scholz was chancellor from 2021 to 2025 – 3 years.
- Friedrich Merz became chancellor in May 2025.
Though Merz has been in office for little more than a year his poll numbers are already at record lows. And his party colleagues are doubting that he can recover from his dismal start or deliver on his promises. Wanna bet that he lasts even so long as his immediate predecessor did – that he makes it even to three years?
Such an inordinately high level of leader turnover is not healthy for democracy in Germany or anywhere else. More to the point of this post is it says more about followers in Western democracies than it does about their leaders.
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*For more on this see my previous posts on the subject.