The societal foundations of German nation-centred economic policies: trade surplus, energy transition, and Eurozone debt

Abstract

Germany traditionally supports multilateral economic rules and European integration, but also pursues nation-centred policies in key economic policy areas. In the last decade, German governments prioritised national goals over multilateral governance, for instance, by opposing the regulation of export surpluses to reduce global imbalances, by deciding to phase-out nuclear energy without embedding this course in a multilateral European agreement, and by imposing austerity rules in the Eurozone crisis instead of enabling an integrative balancing of member states’ positions. Why did German governments engage in nation-centred economic policies that privilege national concerns over multilateral rules and European compromise in the 2010s? I argue that these policies correlate with domestic alignments between material interests of lobby groups and ideational expectations of voters as well as with governmental and media framings. The paper employs the societal approach to governmental preference formation in analysing the domestic politics of nation-centred policies regarding global imbalances and trade surplus, unilateral energy transition, and the imposition of austerity and debt brake in the Eurozone crisis.