Germany in times of crisis: passive revolution, struggle over hegemony and new nationalism

Abstract

Germany appears as the case in point of a country that is getting through the current crisis rather well. Central to this “success” is the passive revolution that the country has undergone in the 2000s during which a state‐led restructuring of the regime of accumulation has resulted in the creation of a new stratum of working poor and an overall lowering of wages. Following a discussion of this passive revolution and the resulting mass impoverishment, this article explores the struggle over cultural hegemony, which has surfaced in various controversies since the beginning of the current economic crisis in 2007. I argue that there is a passive consensus concerning “poverty” – which is unpopular, but regarded as inevitable – that is outweighed by an active consent concerning “Germany” – an immensely popular notion. In Germany, a new nationalism that blends classism and racism in the service of the economic competitiveness of the nation is argued to be at the core of cultural hegemony in these times of crisis.

‘Piketty is a genius, but … ’: an analysis of journalistic delegitimation of Thomas Piketty’s economic policy proposals

“…Yet, the powerful narrative of current wealth concentrations as being beneficial to 'all of us' or 'the whole society' is reinforced, in fact obscuring the actual political economy of wealth and power. More specifically, such narratives hide recent developments such as the rising economic inequality (Corneo, Zmerli, & Pollak, 2014) and the deep changes in labour market institutions (Eichhorst, 2015) with the increase in low pay and non-standard work by reinforcing the German nationalist and classist cultural hegemony (Belina, 2013). Finally, such narratives might also be, in our view, a central reason for the widespread misperceptions of inequality which needs to be scrutinised by future research (Gimpelson & Treisman, 2018).…”

The revenge of the village? The geography of right-wing populist electoral success, anti-politics, and austerity in Germany

“…While this de facto meant that the German government was exporting its own austerity politics, it was criticized in fierce and, to a large extent, racist debates as a betrayal of German interests (cf. Belina, 2013). The AfD was founded in 2013 in this political context as a nationalist ordo-liberal party opposed to the Euro currency (Friedrich, 2017).…”

Making sense of remunicipalisation: theoretical reflections on and political possibilities from Germany’sRekommumalisierungprocess

“…Studies on the water sector have shown how, even without privatisation, public service provision was reordered by a widespread commercialisation, with still-public utilities working towards aims of economic efficiency and profit-generation (Wissen and Naumann 2006). Figuratively, neoliberalism in Germany had to engage in a 'march through the institutions' of the complex and multi-layered structures of the federal state (Gramsci 1971), meaning it would need to trickle down through a nested institutional scaffolding, providing the ground for hegemonic battles on multiple scales, producing its own variegated form of neoliberalism in Germany (Belina 2013).…”