Habeck has woken up the Germans who are tired of talking
With a camera and a few social media accounts, Federal Economics Minister Robert Habeck has delighted the whole world. His speech is translated, quoted, printed, distributed, commented on and cheered. There are hardly any complainers. And it raises the question: Why is the Minister of Economic Affairs the only high-ranking politician in Germany who has the thoughtfulness and stamina to translate the horror of the last four weeks into a powerful interpretation? Why is Habeck the only one to confront the extermination of the Jews with a powerful speech? Today, 80 years after the Holocaust?
Until recently, the German government was a stuttering disaster when it came to Israel. "The traffic lights can't take any more" I typed into my collection of notes last week, under which I noted a few communicative failures: Education Minister Lisa Paus (Greens) suffered a blackout on camera and no longer knew whether Israel's right to exist should become a naturalization requirement (yes). Several FDP ministers spread the word with completely twisted Instagram tiles that would be too grotesque even as a negative example for a communication seminar. The Federal Chancellor delivered his usual completely loveless government statement. And it is unclear what Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier is up to these days; the last time I saw him was in Africa.
In the same week it became known: Hamas has dismembered the German-Israeli tattoo artist Shani Louk. It is said that a significant part of the skull has been found. Despite the atrocity, Germany remains silent on a UN resolution that does not even mention Hamas. Just don't step on anyone's toes! Meanwhile, the CDU stamps its new party logo on a Shani-Louk photo and demonstrates that it really no longer feels anything in the entire party body.
Nothing special in terms of content
Now we're all alone with Shani Louk's skull piece, I thought. The body organ responsible for horror is drained, pumped dry. After four weeks in a maelstrom of violence, there is no historical interpretation, no path, no consolation. Someone is needed to find meaning in the chaos, to make hope plausible. And during this time, someone had pondered and written and then stood in front of his teleprompter.
Habeck had no lectern, no occasion, no auditorium, no setting, and the wrong office - but he had something that the chancellor lacks: an interest in the public and a desire to be understood. What his opponents mock is his strength: the children's book author knows how to make himself understood.
In terms of content, the speech was nothing special. Other Greens had already lashed out at the left, others had already described the horror, practically everyone had gone over Germany's responsibility and Habeck didn't even mention the UN resolution.
The recipe for charisma
However, Habeck's speech was more professional in every respect than anything that had been heard in the traffic lights up to that point: his sentences are very short, which makes them easy to understand, and he used dramatic repetitions (anaphors): "Today, here in Germany, almost 80 years after the Holocaust." He repeats this three times.
Habeck describes exactly the horror, the vague disappointment, that which creeps up in many Germans: "We thought the Holocaust was behind us! Is it happening again now?
His voice begins lower than it ends, which indicates vocal training. He makes clear pauses where they belong. He avoids empty phrases and jargon, his gestures are calm, he follows a structure. He uses what consultants call "storytelling": He doesn't just make abstract confessions, he reports his experiences, such as a conversation in Turkey. Habeck does this often. Because it works.
In other words, he cooks according to the recipe for charisma.
Germans are tired of talking
The great speeches of history are not the result of talent, but of enormous effort, borne by the desire to be understood. Even Winston Churchill was not born an orator: he rehearsed, pondered and polished like a man possessed, wrote his speeches around his speech errors, marked his pauses in manuscripts and rehearsed, rehearsed, rehearsed some more.
This is alien to the Germans, they are tired of talking: they don't like the idea that people influence not through office and authority, but through words and thoughts. When they do see a successful speech, they frantically search for explanations. Why? If someone cuts the Cologne Cathedral into a block of ice with a chainsaw, you don't say "well, it's cold".
Germans have long had a completely dysfunctional relationship with rhetoric, and not just since the Third Reich. Good words belong in poetry, but not in politics, please. What counts in politics is what the rational German supposedly likes best: content, order, depth. "According to its constitution, Germany cannot have any masterpieces in political eloquence", the poet Christian F. Daniel Schubart is said to have said, public life takes place "in writing rooms and on parade grounds".
Wordless against Höcke and Wagenknecht
But this authority-driven speech fatigue has consequences for democracy: those who vilify speech, such as the Chancellor, leave room for others: AfD politician Björn Höcke, who is working hard to become the oratorical successor to Joseph Goebbels, is a good contemporary example. His pompous formulations thunder through the republic and will implant the idea in the minds of many: A thousand years of Germany, that would be something. Even if many Germans believe it, those who despise good speech are not automatically immune to its effects.
At the other end of the political spectrum, Sahra Wagenknecht has built a party around herself as a rhetorical sounding board. She has named it after herself because the ex-leftist knows full well that she attracts, everyone else does not. This is of course due to her elegant appearance, but it is also due to her rhetoric.
Do we really want to debate the outcome of a debate between Wagenknecht and Olaf Scholz? Does anyone think Friedrich Merz would survive even one round? Do we want to clear the field of Wagenknecht and Höcke and rely on content, content, content?
The end of the voiceless administrators
Habeck's speech is hopefully a wake-up call against anti-Semitism and for an important antidote: good speech. German politics, the German people's parties SPD and CDU must gradually understand who gathers political power in the mediatized world. The art of oratory means: to establish equality of arms with seducers without following them into the mud.
Scholz could therefore be the last chancellor of his kind: a voiceless administrator. He is followed by a generation for whom Instagram is the most important lectern. The proportion of the population that can be addressed through direct social media channels is growing continuously.
However, only a few have responded to this development so far. Most well-known politicians post filmed parliamentary speeches. Few speak directly to the camera; FDP leader Christian Lindner is one of the few exceptions.
For populists like Wagenknecht and Höcke, on the other hand, this is a matter of course.
- Following the speech by Robert Habeck, many are questioning why he is the only high-ranking German politician to directly confront the extermination of Jews with such vigor, even 80 years after the Holocaust.
- Olaf Scholz, the Federal Chancellor, delivered his usual cold and distant government statement regarding Israel, while Christian Lindner of the FDP has been one of the few exceptions to communicate effectively through direct social media channels.
- Despite the horrific incident of Hamas dismembering the German-Israeli tattoo artist Shani Louk, the German government remains silent on a UN resolution, raising concerns of anti-Semitism and the lack of support for Israel.
- Björn Höcke, an AfD politician, is working diligently to become the oratorical successor to Joseph Goebbels, while Sahra Wagenknecht has built her political platform around her rhetorical skills, showcasing the importance of good speech in the mediatized world.
Source: www.ntv.de
