You mention that Die Linke are a new political party that
have come out of nowhere in Germany. This is inaccurate.
They are the old Communist party from the former GDR that
formed after a shady amalgamation of the Russian zone’s
SPD and the KPD in 1946 to form the German Socialist Unity
party (SED), which was the party of the ruling regime
until reunification in 1989. After reunification they
renamed themselves SED-PDS, and in 1990 PDS (Party of
German Socialists), basically a kind of Democratic Left
or “reformed” communists to differentiate from the
traditional German socialist party SPD, who are basically
Social-Democrat. The Likspartei formed this year when they
amalgamated with the WASG (Literally “The voter’s
alternative for work and equality) who are disgruntled ex
SPD members that are a kind of “Old Labour”. WASG formed
in the western “old Germany” in 2004.

PDS has always had around 20 per cent of the vote in
Eastern “new” Germany, but never gained much ground in the
old states of the Federal Republic. However, this
amalgamation may be seen as a tactical move to gain more
ground in the old Laender from traditional left wing
voters disillusioned by the SPD’s “blairist” policies.
However, I expect they may steal more ground from the
Greens than from the SPD, as many disillusioned SPD voters
that are more centrist may shift to the Christian
Democrats (CDU/CSU) or the Liberals (FDP). I suspect the
next German Government will be more of a rainbow coalition
with the usual policies rather than any new populistic
majority. At least in the Federal Elections. However, they
may do well in State, Municipal and European elections.

Neo-nazis have been active in Germnay in the past 15 years
at least. Auslander Aus was a favourite slogan chant.

America is expanding its free trade agreements with Central
America, I don’t think that the decisions that the US
government makes are based upon the idea of providing jobs
for the American people. Most of the decisions that that
government has made were more benefitial to the
corporations, and thus the shareholders. The wonders of the
MBA mentality ;)

I think most Germans, including potential voters of die
Linke, are aware that the real threat to their jobs comes
from cheaper labour to the east, be that eastern Europe or
Asia. The fear to the west isn’t really anti Americanism
but rather what you might call anti “anglo-saxon
capitalism”. There has been a lot of publicity here about
US or UK hedge funds buying out companies, firing a large
percentage of the workforce to improve the balance sheet
and then selling the company within a very short time frame
for a handsome profit.

For west Germans, this goes against the German version of
capitalism, which promoted corporate social responsibility.
German capitalism also was often managed a bit like a
cartel, and as long as the jobs were secure, this didn’t
bother anyone too much. For East Germans, well this whole
capitalism thing is pretty new, and the experiences up
until now havn’t been particularly good. Since 1991, huge
numbers of traditional manufacturing jobs in the East have
disappeared since the factories were suddenly forced to pay
West German wages, but the productivity was still on a par
with Poland. In many east German towns, there are
demolition programs to knock down appartment blocks that no
one wants to live in any more. And since the populations of
these towns are decreasing, no new appartments are being
built in their place.

As an aside, I think the main reasons for the lack of a
housing boom are the banks and the rental laws.
Traditionally banks have demanded that the borrower put up
at least 20% of the price of a property in order to get a
mortgage. This is prohibitivly expensive for most. Secondly
the rental laws are such that many tenants feel secure in
rental properties. Couple this to the fact that the Germans
are quite risk adverse (I know it’s a generalisation, but
IMHO it holds true) and you’ve got a predominantly renting
population. Home ownership here is at about 43%. This is
changing slowly as the deposit required is decreasing, and
as US investment firms are buying up whole appartment
blocks. One of the few legal ways of raising the rent
beyond inflation is to renovate an appartment block, thus
raising the value of the appartments. If the old tennant
can not afford to pay the raised rent and moves out, then
new tennants can be charged whatever the landlord likes.

Returning to die Linke. They are largely comprised of PDS
members – the decendants of the East German communist party
SED. They merged with a group called WASG (voters alliance
for social justice), who protested against labour and dole
reforms last summer. Their main figure is Oscar Lafontaine.
He was Chancellor Schroeder’s right hand man when the
socialist/green coalition ousted Helmut Kohl and first took
power in 1998. He mysteriously resigned from the cabinet
within a couple of months. It was believed that the cabinet
wasn’t left wing enough for him. He’s spent the last couple
of years appearing on German political TV shows,
criticising the government and big business for their lack
of social justice, and receiving handsome appearance fees
for his work.

The polls currently give die Linke 9%. They’ve been
dropping support regularly since their inception. This is
partially due to the pounding they get from much of the
media. Almost everyone knows that their policies can’t be
financed, but many will vote for them anyway as a form of
protest against all the established parties. Prior to this,
the ex communists always managed to do reasonably well in
the east, but nationally they never got above the required
5% to take their seats in the German parliament. The merger
with the WASG, and the high profile Lafontaine, has changed
this.

Now that the Linke will surely pass the 5% threshold and
take their seats in the parliament, the opposition
Christian Democrats are getting worried. They were sure
that they were going to win the election and form the next
government with the help of the Liberal Party. Die Linke
are threatening this majority. It is becoming more probable
that the only possiblity after the election will be
a “grand coalition” of the center right Christian Democrats
with Chancelor Schroeder’s center left Socialists. In this
case, Die Linke may be the largest opposition party in the
parliament.

There have been a few slightly dubious anti-foreigner
statements from die Linke. However their policies and
propaganda are largely 70′s style socialism. The real fear
is that their populist agenda and position as leader of the
opposition will increase the feeling of discontent within
Germany. Utlimatly this will benefit the neo nazi parties,
as they will surely capitalise on the general mood, and
spread their version of populist politics. This will be a
lot more dangerous that the current strain of populism from
die Linke.