A green Realo makes realpolitik – Minister of Agriculture Cem Özdemir releases areas intended for species protection for grain cultivation. It’s the same as with arms deliveries and energy policy. A green success pattern will appear.
Applause from the farmers’ lobby, criticism from the environmental lobby – that’s the new world of Agriculture Minister Cem Özdemir. That may sound wrong for the Greens, but Özdemir is only following the Greens’ real political mobility. A pattern is slowly emerging, and the next change of course is imminent.
Because of the war in Ukraine, which has led to a global shortage of grain, the Federal Minister of Agriculture has allowed farmers to use agricultural land longer, which according to the European Union should actually be set aside in the coming year. Özdemir emphasizes – rightly – that it is not about a “deterioration” of the rules, but the un-green message of his actions is nonetheless: species protection must wait for now.
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The additional areas earmarked for species protection – a total of four percent – will not be available until a year later. Cereals can now be grown on these fields for another year. The CDU-governed countries applaud – Özdemir needs their approval for this regulation. A “decision at the last minute”, praises the farmers’ president Joachim Rukwied, at the same time slightly reprimanding.
The German Environmental Aid calls what the CDU, FDP and the farmers like “insanity”: releasing species protection areas for arable farming, “while 3.4 million tons of grain and oil plants are wasted unchecked for agrofuels in the tank”. What the environmental aid, often criticized as a mere “warning association”, does not mention:
That farmers produce more for “the plate than for the tank” is the aim of the next regulation, which the two Green Ministers for Agriculture and Environment, Özdemir and Steffi Lemke are already tinkering with – to the chagrin of the liberal Transport Minister Volker Wissing.
The FDP man argues that he needs fuel from plants, biofuel, in order to be able to achieve the climate protection goals in road traffic. Ironically, this means that two primary green goals get in the way: species protection and climate protection.
However, it is not to be expected that the traditionally conservative farmer’s lobby and the green farmer’s minister will become close friends. Because Özdemir will not stop his warning to eat less meat just because the meat-producing farmers think it’s stupid. And Özdemir is unlikely to meet the demand of the farmers’ lobby to use “all areas” for food supply where it makes “agricultural sense”.
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The conflict that the agriculture minister enters into with the green base and the strong green lobby is manageable. It is only a limited conflict that does not affect the fundamental green goals. And this is precisely the reason for the current success of the Greens:
They make partial realpolitik concessions that are born out of necessity, for which they are only moderately criticized in their own camp, but are strongly celebrated in the other camp. But in reality they don’t drop a single one of their green targets. Her mobility is quite limited. This makes the responsible-ethical Realo line manageable for green fundi-minded ethicists.
Communication plays an important role in this dual strategy. Because she is supple, empathetic, suggests that there is no alternative in terms of coping with reality. Her biggest secret is moderate self-criticism – playing with a bad conscience. In this way, political compromise is ennobled – stylized as a personal sacrifice.
It is the communication model that drives Robert Habeck to mastery, Annalena Baerbock when delivering weapons to a war zone, and Özdemir when – for a limited time – priority is given to grain cultivation over species protection.
Özdemir speaks of a “compromise that also hurts in one place or another”. Economics Minister Robert Habeck used the same method to justify his – so far unsuccessful – gas kipping with the Qatari sheikhs. It is a psychological trick that works according to the motto: become invulnerable with partial self-harm.
With this logic of practical necessity, liquid gas from fracking can then be justified, which means a double violation of green principles. This is made palatable to the party people and the Green Lobby with the aim that it is only a matter of “bridging technologies”, meaning: After that, sun, wind, water and biomass as energy suppliers will become really serious, just like the Greens have always promised.
In this logic, German arms deliveries lead to peace – currently in Ukraine. And grain cultivation now for proper protection of species later. This approach, which has made the Greens more popular than ever before, also gives rise to the borders, let’s call them “green lines”.
Species protection is only limited in time, fracking gas from the USA is only used until the renewables can take over and weapons are only delivered for so long and only to where they defend “our values”. This principle can also be used to support the “extended operation” of nuclear power plants, which has now been publicly advocated by top Greens, because that is: just another word for the final phase-out of nuclear power.
That is why the “green lines” must not be crossed, which means: under no circumstances should new fuel rods be ordered for the reactors, because then the nuclear phase-out would mean a nuclear re-entry. Under no circumstances should the ban on fracking in Germany, which has been in effect since 2017, be lifted, because then the imported US fracking gas would become a permanent solution for this frowned upon technology.
Fracking, this: Chlorine chicken of German energy policy. Five years ago, the green-primed panic over disinfected chickens was enough to torpedo an important trade agreement with the United States. In truth, behind this was primordial green gene fear.
Conclusion: The Habeck-Baerbock-Özdemir method shows that the course corrections do not turn the Greens into conservatives or liberals. They only show their suitability for reality and government. That is the goal: staying green without being perceived as just green. This is how you expand your playing field. Vulgo: The power to be able to push through green politics in the end.
