GERMANY'S SOCIAL Democrats (SPD) go back to the future today, re-electing as party leader Franz Müntefering, the right-hand man of Gerhard Schröder.
The return of the 68-year-old Mr Münterfering, one of the SPD's most capable and entertaining figures, kicks off the run-in to next autumn's general election. Party members will be hoping he can give Germany's oldest political party the jump-start it badly needs: in three lacklustre years as second fiddle to chancellor Angela Merkel, the party has lingered around the 25 per cent mark in polls, nearly 10 points down on its 2005 election result.
But Mr Müntefering's expertise will come at a price. If elected, as expected at a special party conference in Berlin today, he will end the SPD's recent leftward drift. He was after all the one who, four years ago, sold to a sceptical party the economic reforms even Dr Merkel now credits with Germany's recent economic turnaround.
He stood down as leader in 2005, fed up with fighting the SPD's left-wing who saw the reforms as a betrayal of core SPD values. From his post as labour minister, Mr Müntefering watched in dismay as his successor, Kurt Beck, placated the party's left-wing by offering to roll back some of the more controversial reforms.
Last year, Mr Müntefering quit the cabinet to care for his terminally ill wife; two months after burying her in July, he let it be known in the party that he was open to offers. The offer came last month when, after a swift putsch by Schröderists, the luckless Mr Beck threw in the towel.
Journalists are sharpening their pencils for today's return of the eminently quotable Müntefering to a job he once described as "the best in the world - next to pope".
He will work in tandem with the SPD's chancellor candidate in 2009, foreign minister Frank-Walter Steinemer. While Mr Steinmeier will stay in cabinet with Dr Merkel until the government ends, Mr Müntefering will lob in barbs from the wings. Considering his talent for barbs, he may well be the man who brings down the government. Before that, however, he has to fix the SPD. Step one is to convince SPD rank-and-file to stick with reforms agreed four years ago. The level of support for his re-election will indicate the grassroots appetite for such a line.
Step two is to win back the trust - or at least agree a ceasefire with - the strong SPD left-wing. It's not an impossible task: he impressed them greatly in 2005 when he attacked private equity investors as "locusts".
Step three for the new-old SPD leader is to restore equilibrium to a party caught between Dr Merkel's centrist Christian Democrats (CDU) and the Left Party, new home for anti-reform former SPD members. The SPD's deep ideological insecurity can be seen in its highest echelons. Earlier this year, its environment minister, Sigmar Gabriel, began writing Politics for the Middle Ground. The book has just appeared under the title Thinking Left Anew.