Sigmar Gabriel exits stage left

BERLIN — They called him “Siggi Pop.” When Sigmar Gabriel lost his bid for reelection as prime minister of Lower Saxony in 2003, his Social Democratic Party gave him a consolation prize. Henceforth he was to shine as the SPD’s Commissioner for Pop Culture. A punk rocker like Iggy Pop Gabriel was not, but the nickname stuck.

And yet, despite his life in the basement office, his career continued — until Tuesday, when he gave away the whole store. After months of toing and froing, he renounced all ambitions, declining to run against Chancellor Angela Merkel in the fall and declaring he would also step down as chairman of his party. No German politician has climbed faster and fallen harder than this boy from Hannover.

Instead of spelling early retirement, Gabriel’s stint as the Pope of Pop served as the launch pad for a stellar rise: environment minister in Merkel’s first cabinet (2005), then chairman of the party of Willy Brandt, Helmut Schmidt and Gerhard Schröder, then economics minister and vice-chancellor. With the country headed into general elections in September, most Germans expected Gabriel, 57, to throw in his hat for the country’s top job.

He was, in the end, Siggi Pop — quick-footed and entertaining, but without the gravitas that Germans like in their leaders.

So why did he ditch what was his for the taking? The best and cruelest answer is that he didn’t have a chance in the world to unseat Merkel, who has served as Germany’s eternal chancellor since 2005 and who is all-but guaranteed to govern until 2021. In the latest poll of voter intentions, the SPD — a party that once raked in nearly 46 percent of the vote — hit rock-bottom: 21 percent.

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The fate of the SPD is mirrored in the decline of once-proud social democratic parties in Europe: Britain, France, Italy. The problem is structural and historical. There is an almost perfect correlation between the shrinkage of the industrial sector and the drop in voter allegiance to the democratic left. The SPD’s current 21 percent nearly mirrors the 20-percent share of GDP contributed by the industrial sector. In Britain and France, the situation is even worse. The industrial share is down to 11 percent, which explains the dismal performance of Labour in Britain and the Socialists in France.

These parties came to power because they were the voice of the rising working class. Today, there are simply not enough workers to carry the left to victory. No socialist party has managed to harness a winning coalition among the new rising classes in the service and knowledge sectors. And they have no idea how to deal with the populist revolt.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Gabriel arrive for a weekly meeting of the German cabinet | John MacDougall/AFP via Getty Images

In the German case, a personality factor added to the structural challenge. Enter Martin Schulz, the long-standing Social Democratic president of the European Parliament. When voters were asked for their preferences, they came down in favor of the “carpetbagger” from Brussels.

For months, the two had been running neck and neck. Suddenly, last fall, Schulz, who had decamped for Belgium ages ago, pulled ahead. Some 40 percent of German voters declared they would want him as chancellor candidate; only 30 percent preferred Gabriel. Among the SPD faithful, the gap was even larger.

So put these two trends together — the long-term decline of the SPD and the sudden rise of Martin Schulz — and Gabriel’s auf Wiedersehen isn’t at all surprising. After a grueling campaign, he was destined to end up as the loser. So why be the sacrificial lamb for a party that has never loved him?

Gabriel had two critical handicaps. He lacked charisma and decisiveness. He was, in the end, Siggi Pop — quick-footed and entertaining, but without the gravitas that Germans like in their leaders. Too nimble, he kept veering from left to right and back. His comrades and the electorate never quite knew where he would take a stand — or how long he would stay there.

He was the walking dilemma of the center left. Appeal to the party’s traditional, shrinking clientele or reach out to the new risers? Mollify the swelling demand for internal security in the age of terrorism or defend personal liberty and privacy rights? As economics minister, should he applaud free trade or bow to protectionism? Cheer or condemn the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership? Gabriel could never make up his mind.

Gabriel faced an inhuman task: How to lasso in the 7 million SPD voters who have bolted from the party since 2005?

To put it in crude numbers, Gabriel faced an inhuman task: How to lasso in the 7 million SPD voters who have bolted from the party since 2005? French President François Hollande couldn’t pull it off on his home turf, and Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of the British Labour Party, will go down in flames in the next general election.

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So why should Martin Schulz, the new boy on the block, whom Gabriel will anoint, do better? Because the Brussels expat is an outsider, a bit like that extra-planetary invader U.S. President Donald Trump.

Wherever you look in the West, the outsider is the new insider. Their attraction is that of a blank canvas. You can project onto it what your fancy desires, whereas the old pros have been weighed and found wanting. Will Schulz look as good in September as he does now? He will have to steer the same cross-currents that made Gabriel’s boat capsize.

Meanwhile, Merkel’s star is rising. She is polling at 37 percent. German voters, wedded to incremental changes of the status quo, may in the end discover that Martin “Blank Canvas” Schulz is an outsider just by way of previous residence. He is as establishment as can get, a professional survivor who will try to be all things to all people.

Martin Schulz, left, and Sigmar Gabriel in 2014 | Thomas Peter/Reuters

If so, the reasoning could very well go: Why not give Merkel another chance? We know her, and with the exception of her open-door policy on refugees from the Middle East, she has done well. Indeed, Germany is the best-run country compared to France, Italy or Spain. Growing again, its economy boasts full employment. Germany’s future is unlikely to include a Trump or Marine Le Pen, folks who don’t just want to sit at the head of the table but overturn it.

Josef Joffe is editor of the German weekly Die Zeit. He teaches international politics at Stanford University, where he is also a Fellow of the Freeman-Spogli Institute for International Studies and the Hoover Institution. His latest book is “The Myth of America’s Decline.”