GERMANY: The chancellor is doing well on the international stage but less well at home, writes Derek Scally
Chancellor Angela Merkel began her first term in office rubbing shoulders with world leaders and ended it getting her shoulders rubbed by President George W. Bush.
The speed and skill with which Chancellor Merkel has mastered international relations and repositioned Berlin on the diplomatic map has attracted kudos abroad, but it cannot distract from the sinking feeling at home that Germany's first woman leader is heading a lame-duck government.
"I have no doubt that this government wants to tackle the right things, but it has yet to find a way of concentrating on the nitty- gritty," said Germany's president, Horst Köhler, telling the political leaders in plain language to "get out of their sandpit" and start co- operating on reforms.
Angela Merkel was the darling of the day when she moved into the chancellery last year. Fast forward eight months and she is now dubbed the "failed reformer", and her grand coalition of Christian Democrats (CDU) and Social Democrats (SPD) is viewed as a merger of mediocrity producing lowest-common-denominator compromises as insipid as the euro banknotes.
"Dr Merkel still hasn't managed to become a leading figure of popular opinion like her predecessors, Schröder and Kohl," said political scientist Prof Gerhard Himmelmann. "What is lacking is strong leadership that can communicate politics, can make complicated content more easily understood."
The grand coalition's first attempts at reforms have been a disappointment. A reform of the healthcare system fell far short of expectations, with premiums rising instead of falling, and a new super- authority was created instead of the stated goal to reduce bureaucracy.
A long-awaited reform of the power-sharing rules between Berlin and the federal states to speed up lawmaking was given an equally wet welcome, as was a three-point VAT hike and a new retirement age of 67.
Old habits die hard among political enemies. After a friendly first few weeks, the CDU and SPD have returned to their trenches to lob mortars at each other again.
A cracker came last week when an SPD parliamentary leader, Peter Struck, said that he missed the decision- making ability of Gerhard Schröder.
It took Mr Schröder years to get going on the international scene, but Dr Merkel hit the ground running, making a large contribution - politically and financially - to sealing a deal on the new EU budget.
She has revived the consensus-driven foreign policy of the Kohl era without abandoning the confidence gained during the Schröder era.
Her stature in the EU will only increase when she leads Germany's presidency of the EU next year at a time when Paris and London face a changing of the guard.
"Things are falling into place for Germany if it remains active and keeps playing a moderating role," says Dr Ulrike Gérot, analyst at the German Marshall Fund in Berlin. "There are many triangular constellations - France and US, the US and Russia - where Germany fills a dynamic position and where things can happen."
Things have been happening between Berlin and Washington thanks to Dr Merkel's personal campaign to sweeten soured relations. The pay-off came at a barbecue in Dr Merkel's constituency of Stralsund last week when she held a grilled boar steady for President Bush to carve. Berlin analysts see in Mr Bush's kisses, compliments and back-rubs for Dr Merkel a simple realisation in Washington that the US needs another dependable European partner besides Britain in a time of increasing foreign headaches.
"But the Americans are projecting their presidential system on to Germany," said political analyst Werner Weidenfeld.
"A president can easily declare and implement a new direction in foreign policy. That wouldn't be possible for Merkel, and Bush overestimates her ability to personally determine the political direction."
The new friendship could be tested sooner rather than later in the Israel-Lebanon conflict. Some 75 per cent of Germans oppose Israel's military offensive against Lebanon, but Dr Merkel has so far been far more reticent than other European leaders.
"The former government was willing to risk a conflict with the US over the Middle East," said Dr Martin Beck, an analyst at the Hamburg- based German Institute for Middle East Studies, in an interview.
"Merkel has decided to improve transatlantic relations instead, and that comes at the expense of a genuine European role in the Middle East."