The Bundestag can set up an Enquete-Kommission, a commission of inquiry, to prepare decisions on large and important subjects. Members of all parliamentary groups sit on it together with outside experts. Setting one up needs the support of at least a quarter of the members of the Bundestag. The commission Lehren aus Afghanistan, lessons from Afghanistan, examined Germany’s twenty-year deployment there, from 2001 to 2021. It presented an interim report in February 2024. In January 2025 it adopted its final report, with 72 recommendations for Germany’s future role in international crisis management.
The Benefit Must Be Calculated So Others Can Follow
On 9 February 2010, the Federal Constitutional Court ruled that the basic welfare rates known as Hartz IV were incompatible with the constitution. Much of its reasoning concerned how the amounts had been reached. The legislature must set the benefit “nachvollziehbar auf der Grundlage verlässlicher Zahlen und schlüssiger Berechnungsverfahren.” That means in a way others can follow, on the basis of reliable figures and consistent methods of calculation. The rate for children had been set as a fixed reduction from the adult rate. According to the court, it rested on “einer freihändigen Setzung ohne empirische und methodische Fundierung,” a figure set freehand, without an empirical or methodical basis. Estimates made “ins Blaue hinein,” at random, are not a realistic calculation. The legislature had until 31 December 2010 to pass new rules.
Students Who Studied the Opponent
For about seventeen years, students of the German Sport University Cologne helped prepare the German national football team for its opponents. The Spielanalyse-Team Köln, the game analysis team, began as a pilot project. It supported the coaching staff with systematic computer and video analyses of each opponent. About 1,000 students were trained in the program. The cooperation ended at the turn of the year 2022–23.
The Imperative of Responsibility
In Das Prinzip Verantwortung (The Imperative of Responsibility, 1979), the philosopher Hans Jonas proposed a new rule for an age of powerful technology: Handle so, dass die Wirkungen deiner Handlung verträglich sind mit der Permanenz echten menschlichen Lebens auf Erden. (Act so that the effects of your action are compatible with the permanence of genuine human life on earth.) Where the risks are uncertain, he asked for a Heuristik der Furcht, a heuristic of fear. That means to die schlechtere Prognose der besseren vorzuziehen, to give the worse forecast priority over the better one.
The Vocabulary of Rushing
Mit heißer Nadel gestrickt — knitted with a hot needle. It is said of a law or a program that was made in a hurry. A newspaper wrote in 2007: Offenbar ist das Programm zum raschen Stellenabbau mit heißer Nadel genäht worden. (Evidently the program for fast job cuts was sewn with a hot needle.)
Hauruckverfahren — the heave-ho method. DWDS defines it as hasty, reckless action. A CDU politician said in 2006: Ein Ding, das für Jahrzehnte gelten soll, muss nicht im Hauruckverfahren entschieden werden. (A thing that is meant to last for decades does not have to be decided by the heave-ho method.)
Blinder Aktionismus — blind actionism. Duden defines Aktionismus as an exaggerated urge to be active, and notes that the word is often critical.
Generalstabsmäßig — like a general staff. Duden defines it as with military care and precision. Duden gives it no critical label. Its example is a bank robbery planned like a general staff operation.
Erst wägen, dann wagen — first weigh, then venture. It is the motto on a cast-iron wall relief of Helmuth von Moltke in uniform, made in Ilsenburg in 1891.
Gut geplant ist halb gewonnen — well planned is half won.
After Euro 2000
At the European Championship of 2000, the German national team went out in the group stage. The German Football Association responded with a plan for the long term. It expanded its talent program to 390 training centers for players aged eleven to seventeen. From 2001, youth academies were introduced in the Bundesliga, and from 2002 they were mandatory in the second division as well. Today every club in both leagues must run one to obtain its license. The academies were long seen as the origin of the golden generation that won the World Cup in 2014.
Plan First, Then Build
In April 2013, the federal ministry for transport and building set up a commission of 36 senior experts on the construction of major projects. Its final report of June 2015 named three examples of projects that had gone far over cost and schedule: the new Berlin airport, the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg and the Stuttgart 21 railway station. One of its ten recommendations, under the heading Erst planen, dann bauen, was this: Der Bauherr sollte mit dem Bau erst nach Erstellung eines zusammenfassenden Dokuments beginnen, das die lückenlose Ausführungsplanung für das gesamte Projekt sowie detaillierte Angaben zu Kosten, Risiken und zum Zeitplan enthält. (The client should start building only after a summary document has been drawn up. It must contain the complete construction planning for the whole project and detailed information on costs, risks and schedule.) In December 2015, the federal cabinet adopted a ten-point action plan. Point two was Erst planen, dann bauen, plan first, then build.
The Elbphilharmonie
Hamburg’s concert hall on the Elbe was first planned to be finished in 2010. The city’s share of the cost was first calculated at 77 million euros. In the end, construction cost about 866 million euros, and the first concerts took place on 11 January 2017. A committee of inquiry of the Hamburg parliament examined what had gone wrong. It found that when the work was put out to tender in 2006 and the contract was signed in 2007, the planning noch nicht weit genug fortgeschritten gewesen, had not yet advanced far enough.
The Easter Rest That Never Happened
In March 2021, during the pandemic, Chancellor Angela Merkel and the state premiers agreed overnight on an Osterruhe, extra days of rest over Easter. On 24 March 2021, Merkel withdrew it. She explained that the idea hatte ihre guten Gründe, war aber in der Kürze der Zeit nicht gut genug umsetzbar, had good reasons, but could not be carried out well enough in the short time available. The open questions concerned pay for the lost working days and the situation of shops and businesses. They could not be answered in time. She added: Dennoch war die Idee der sogenannten Osterruhe ein Fehler. (Nevertheless, the idea of the so-called Easter rest was a mistake.)
Thinking From the End
In the Chancellery under Angela Merkel, her method had a name: Die Dinge vom Ende her denken, thinking things through from the end. Her biographer Ursula Weidenfeld described the steps. Merkel commissioned reports, called ethics councils, watched public opinion and kept her own intentions to herself. Weidenfeld summed it up as Warten, Schweigen und dann erst Handeln, waiting, silence, and only then action. Merkel herself tells a story from school. In a sports lesson, she stood on the three-meter diving board and jumped only when the school bell had already ended the lesson.