In der SPD wird traditionell geduzt. In the SPD, members traditionally say du to each other. In 2015 the Social Democrat Otto Schily told the Zeit Magazin that even for him, after many years in the party, the party du still took getting used to. A party anecdote tells of a comrade who asked Herbert Wehner whether he should say du to him. Wehner answered: Das können Sie halten wie du willst! You can handle that as you like. His answer uses both Sie and du in one sentence.
politics
Too Often He Broke My Trust
On 6 November 2024, Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced that he would ask the Federal President to dismiss his finance minister, Christian Lindner. “Zu oft hat er mein Vertrauen gebrochen,” Scholz said. Too often he broke my trust. “Es gibt keine Vertrauensbasis für die weitere Zusammenarbeit.” There is no basis of trust for further cooperation.
Promises Kept, Trust Not Regained
The coalition agreement of 2013 between the CDU/CSU and the SPD contained 188 concrete measures and goals. In February 2018 the Bertelsmann Foundation published a study that analyzed them in detail. The government had carried out 80 percent of them, fully or in part. Yet only 13 percent of eligible voters believed that all, almost all or a large part of the promises had been kept. The largest group, 38 percent, believed that only a small part, or hardly any, had been kept.
The record was better than its reputation. The study called the difference a very painful credibility gap.
Secondary Virtues
In July 1982, during the dispute over the stationing of new NATO missiles, the Social Democrat Oskar Lafontaine answered his own party’s chancellor, Helmut Schmidt. He told the magazine Stern that Schmidt kept speaking of “Pflichtgefühl, Berechenbarkeit, Machbarkeit, Standhaftigkeit,” a sense of duty, predictability, feasibility and steadfastness. Then he went on: “Das sind Sekundärtugenden. Ganz präzis gesagt: Damit kann man auch ein KZ betreiben.” These are secondary virtues. To put it precisely, you can also run a concentration camp with them. German uses the word Sekundärtugend for traits such as diligence, punctuality and reliability. They are useful in daily life. Pursued for their own sake, they have no moral value.
Reliability earns trust in Germany, but Germans also ask what it is used for.
The Chatter of Yesterday
Was kümmert mich mein Geschwätz von gestern? What do I care about my chatter of yesterday? Germans often attribute this sentence to Konrad Adenauer. It cannot be found in his writings or speeches. It first appears in print in 1969. What Adenauer did say, in December 1949, was milder. He was criticized at a meeting of his party’s parliamentary group for changing his position. He answered: “Aber meine Herren, es kann mich doch niemand daran hindern, jeden Tag klüger zu werden.” But gentlemen, nobody can stop me from getting wiser every day.
The Member of Parliament Without a Degree
Petra Hinz had been a Social Democratic member of the Bundestag since 2005. In July 2016 it became known that she had neither the Abitur nor a law degree, and so had passed no state law exams. She announced her resignation on 20 July 2016 and left the Bundestag at the end of August. The prosecutors in Essen found no initial suspicion of a crime and opened no investigation.
Prosecutors saw no crime in the false claims. They still ended her career in parliament within weeks.
Doctorate Lost, Office Won
On 19 May 2021, Franziska Giffey resigned as federal minister for family affairs because of the plagiarism affair over her doctoral thesis. On 10 June 2021, the Free University of Berlin announced that it would withdraw her doctorate. On 21 December 2021, she was elected Governing Mayor of Berlin, with 84 of 139 votes.
The lost title cost her a federal ministry. It did not end her career.
The Corrected CV
In June 2021, the Greens’ candidate for chancellor, Annalena Baerbock, had to correct her CV on her website. The heading Mitgliedschaften, memberships, became Beiräte, (Förder-)Mitgliedschaften, regelmäßige Unterstützung, advisory boards, supporting memberships and regular support. “Ich habe da offensichtlich einen Fehler gemacht und das tut mir sehr, sehr leid,” she said. I obviously made a mistake there, and I am very, very sorry. The taz noted that her party’s poll numbers were falling again. It named two likely causes, the late reporting of special payments from her party and the inaccurate details in her CV.
Hard on the Matter
The president of the Bundestag can call a speaker back to the subject. This is the Sachruf. A speaker called back to the subject three times in one speech can lose the floor. The president can also call a member to order by name when the member violates the order or the dignity of the house. This is the Ordnungsruf. Three calls to order within three sitting weeks bring a fine of 2,000 euros, and 4,000 euros in a repeat case. In November 2025 the Bundestag rejected objections by AfD members to calls to order they had received. Vice President Andrea Lindholz explained the line. Members may “hart in der Sache diskutieren,” argue hard on the substance. They may not give up decency and a dignified manner toward one another.
Vanity, the Enemy of the Matter
In his 1919 lecture Politik als Beruf, Politics as a Vocation, Max Weber named three qualities a politician needs. “Leidenschaft – Verantwortungsgefühl – Augenmaß.” Passion, a sense of responsibility and a sense of proportion. Then he named the danger. It is ordinary vanity, “die Todfeindin aller sachlichen Hingabe und aller Distanz,” the deadly enemy of all devotion to the matter and of all distance. Vanity tempts the politician to become an actor and to ask only about the impression he makes. In politics, Weber wrote, there are in the end only two kinds of deadly sin. One is Unsachlichkeit, losing sight of the matter. The other, often though not always the same, is irresponsibility.