Annalena Baerbock is said to be tough, talented, and very ambitious. But since she was named as Germany's Green Party's candidate for chancellor, she has been struggling to fend off a barrage of attacks.
Annalena Baerbock has been sharpening her political profile
When Annalena Baerbock was named the Green Party's first-ever chancellor candidate in April she was credited for her party's remarkable rise in opinion polls in late April 2021.
But then she suffered a barrage of personal attacks, putting her on the defensive, as criticism targeted her personal credibility: Baerbock, who has never held a government office, was accused of minor inaccuracies in her official resume, of a delay in paying taxes on a sizable Christmas bonus, on plagiarizing parts of her new book, and then she used a racial slur in a quote in an interview. Each time Baerbock was quick to apologize. But her approval rates have declined.
By late August the Green Party had fallen in the polls to under 20% — which is still a remarkable increase on the 8.9% of support they won in the previous general election in 2017.
But the party's campaign has not managed to regain the positive momentum of earlier in the year and has been the prime target of targeted disinformation during election campaigning ahead of the September 26 vote.
Climate change as the core issue
Annalena Baerbock stepped into the limelight when she was elected party co-chair in 2018. The still little-known regional politician — a resident of the eastern state of Brandenburg — has since projected herself as an expert on how to tackle climate change.
In live TV debates with her two competitors for the chancellorship — Armin Laschet of the center-right Christian Democratic Union CDU/CSU and Olaf Scholz of the center-left Social Democrat SPD — Baerbock scored point with younger voters.
She attacked the current CDU-SPD coalition government over its dismal record on climate protection. "We are missing our climate targets, with dramatic consequences, and you have both made clear that you didn't orientate yourselves around the solutions, but just pushed the blame on each other about who was hindering what," she said.
Baerbock has been arguing in favor of phasing out coal-powered energy far earlier than the current target date of 2038. She also backs a speed limit of 130 kilometers per hour (80 miles per hour) on the "autobahn," as German highways are known, and limiting short-haul flights. She also supports a raise in the minimum wage to 12 euros ($14) per hour, and she opposes a hike in German defense spending.
Baerbock has also spoken out on thorny foreign policy issues, advocating a tough stance on Russia and China over human rights issues. She has also spoken on the threats posed by far-right populism and xenophobia.
The Greens are traditionally struggling to gain ground in eastern Germany. Baerbock and her family of four have long been based in the eastern city of Potsdam, where she is running against her Social Democrat competitor for the chancellory, Olaf Scholz.
Early on, Baerbock was driven by ambition. Born in 1980 in the small town of Pattensen in Lower Saxony, she was a natural athlete, placing third at Germany's national trampolining championship. She was only 16 when she went to spend a year in the United States. Later, she studied law in Hannover before going on to the London School of Economics, where she studied international law. As a result, Baerbock gives interviews in fluent English — something that even in this day and age still can't be taken for granted among German politicians.
In an interview with DW in early 2021, Annalena Baerbock welcomed President Joe Biden's decision to bring the US back into the Paris Climate Agreement.
"We Europeans, including the German government, need to take advantage of the current situation to realize the proposals that the US administration has put forward concerning climate-neutral cooperation. We need to get moving and point the way towards a European and transatlantic Green Deal."
GERMAN ELECTION 2021: GOVERNING COALITION OPTIONS
Deciphering the color code
The center-right Christian Democrat CDU and its Bavarian sister party CSU are symbolized by the color black. The center-left Social Democrat SPD is red, as is the communist Left Party. The pro-free market Free Democrats' (FDP) color is yellow. And the Greens are self-explanatory. German media refer to the color combinations and national flags using them as shorthand for political combinations. 123456
Possible coalitions
Both Baerbock and her co-party chair Robert Habeck have few inhibitions about talking to members of other parties, to seek possible common ground.
Initially, there was speculation about a possible conservative-Green coalition in Berlin after the 2021 election, but with the SPD rising in the polls, Baerbock has stressed that a center-left coalition would be her preference.
Any alliance would most likely require the participation of a third party to reach a majority, with the libertarian pro-free market Free Democrats (FDP) the most likely candidate.
But with the conservatives experiencing a fall in the polls, they have taken to conjuring the specter of a far-left coalition with the communist Left Party that would upend German politics.
Germany needs a new beginning, 40-year-old Baerbock stressed in the debate with her two competitors, who are both in their early sixties. "That can only happen with Greens in a leading role," she said, stressing that all democratic parties would have to talk to each other. In doing so, she included the Left Party. She warned strongly against equating the Left with the far-right populist Alternative for Germany (AfD).
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