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| Germany and Greece need a mediator | Germany and Greece need a mediator |
| (about 1 hour later) | |
| Political Berlin feels emotional right now. A high-level German politician put it this way to me recently: “It’s like a whole hysteria going on here. The Berlin political world is emotional all the time. It has to stop, but I don’t know how. The anger is on the left, it’s on the right.” The historian Jacob Soll touched on this outpouring of emotion as it relates to Greece in a column in the New York Times last week, and his conclusion is that Germans must regain their cool if they want to lead Europe. | |
| He is right, but he is skipping a step. Germans cannot regain their cool until they reduce the outrage they feel towards Greece, which they perceive as the guilty partner in their eurozone marriage. To do this, both nations must engage an impartial, outside mediator to help them mitigate the outrage they feel towards each other. In a structured, therapy-like setting, relevant policymakers from both sides would then finally be able to sit together and create a shared vision to wrest Greece from its economic depression. | He is right, but he is skipping a step. Germans cannot regain their cool until they reduce the outrage they feel towards Greece, which they perceive as the guilty partner in their eurozone marriage. To do this, both nations must engage an impartial, outside mediator to help them mitigate the outrage they feel towards each other. In a structured, therapy-like setting, relevant policymakers from both sides would then finally be able to sit together and create a shared vision to wrest Greece from its economic depression. |
| Related: Why is Germany so tough on Greece? Look back 25 years | Dirk Laabs | Related: Why is Germany so tough on Greece? Look back 25 years | Dirk Laabs |
| Outrage-mitigation mediation works in situations where activists and corporations find themselves at loggerheads. Ideally, corporations and their critics commit to sitting together in a room and sharing their dilemmas – to actually explaining their positions in the safe space created by the mediators. | Outrage-mitigation mediation works in situations where activists and corporations find themselves at loggerheads. Ideally, corporations and their critics commit to sitting together in a room and sharing their dilemmas – to actually explaining their positions in the safe space created by the mediators. |
| The chief executive of a corporation that has flouted environmental laws might say something like: “You activists just don’t get it. This pollution is not that bad. It creates X amount of jobs and it allows us to earn Y amount of profit. We can then pay Z taxes and thereby fulfil our role in society.” | The chief executive of a corporation that has flouted environmental laws might say something like: “You activists just don’t get it. This pollution is not that bad. It creates X amount of jobs and it allows us to earn Y amount of profit. We can then pay Z taxes and thereby fulfil our role in society.” |
| The activists might reply: “We won’t accept that logic, because – aside from the fact that you’re ruining the environment, perhaps with the tacit acceptance of regulators whom you’ve bought off – your pollution is just shifting the cost of your business to society, which has to deal with all of these sick and/or dead people. But, OK, we get that your business has an economic purpose, so if you stop polluting and move to another model, we will mobilise our base and our leadership to support you.” | The activists might reply: “We won’t accept that logic, because – aside from the fact that you’re ruining the environment, perhaps with the tacit acceptance of regulators whom you’ve bought off – your pollution is just shifting the cost of your business to society, which has to deal with all of these sick and/or dead people. But, OK, we get that your business has an economic purpose, so if you stop polluting and move to another model, we will mobilise our base and our leadership to support you.” |
| Germany can look to its own transformation away from nuclear power to renewables as an example here. This process, accelerated after Fukushima, saw anti-nuclear activists, politicians and the power industry jointly define the vision for the future state of Germany’s energy supply. Since everyone has bought into the vision, activists and industry stand eagerly behind the transformation. In fact, buy-in for this green movement has become so widespread that it has become part of Germany’s national identity. | Germany can look to its own transformation away from nuclear power to renewables as an example here. This process, accelerated after Fukushima, saw anti-nuclear activists, politicians and the power industry jointly define the vision for the future state of Germany’s energy supply. Since everyone has bought into the vision, activists and industry stand eagerly behind the transformation. In fact, buy-in for this green movement has become so widespread that it has become part of Germany’s national identity. |
| Seen in this light, last week’s deal imposing a 77% VAT increase – from 13% to 23% – and other punitive measures on Greece are bound to fail: not only because they would seem to contradict a century of economic theory, but also because neither Germany nor Greece has bought into them. Everyone hates this deal. | Seen in this light, last week’s deal imposing a 77% VAT increase – from 13% to 23% – and other punitive measures on Greece are bound to fail: not only because they would seem to contradict a century of economic theory, but also because neither Germany nor Greece has bought into them. Everyone hates this deal. |
| Germany feels it is being asked for a gift at the end of a gun, sinking money into a country that will never actually pay it back and that it does not perceive as critical for its national and economic security. Greece is outraged that more austerity will further lower its standard of living, and it is tired of being called lazy and inept by Europe’s de facto hegemonic power. | Germany feels it is being asked for a gift at the end of a gun, sinking money into a country that will never actually pay it back and that it does not perceive as critical for its national and economic security. Greece is outraged that more austerity will further lower its standard of living, and it is tired of being called lazy and inept by Europe’s de facto hegemonic power. |
| An impartial mediating team could help treat the emotion and lower the outrage | An impartial mediating team could help treat the emotion and lower the outrage |
| The finance ministers Wolfgang Schäuble and Euclid Tsakalotos must lead their staffs in committing to outrage mitigation under mediation. This is imperative because functionaries from both governments are, sadly, pushing their negative emotion out into their nations’ media. And Greek and German media are in turn whipping up the kind of populist sentiment that is manifesting itself as anti-Greece protests in front of the Bundestag or Angela Merkel Hitler posters in Athens. The toxicity of the debate has reached fever pitch on both sides. | The finance ministers Wolfgang Schäuble and Euclid Tsakalotos must lead their staffs in committing to outrage mitigation under mediation. This is imperative because functionaries from both governments are, sadly, pushing their negative emotion out into their nations’ media. And Greek and German media are in turn whipping up the kind of populist sentiment that is manifesting itself as anti-Greece protests in front of the Bundestag or Angela Merkel Hitler posters in Athens. The toxicity of the debate has reached fever pitch on both sides. |
| An impartial mediating team – comprising “middle power” diplomats supported by a consultancy specialising in outrage mitigation – could help treat the emotion and lower the outrage. Once this is done, policymakers in Athens and Berlin will be in a position to draft a shared vision for what a successful future state looks like and how it can be achieved. | An impartial mediating team – comprising “middle power” diplomats supported by a consultancy specialising in outrage mitigation – could help treat the emotion and lower the outrage. Once this is done, policymakers in Athens and Berlin will be in a position to draft a shared vision for what a successful future state looks like and how it can be achieved. |
| Until this happens, we will see the perpetuation of a crisis in which Germans become angrier, Greeks poorer and other Europeans doubtful of the resilience of the European Union project. | Until this happens, we will see the perpetuation of a crisis in which Germans become angrier, Greeks poorer and other Europeans doubtful of the resilience of the European Union project. |
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