Bundestag senior president Wolfgang Schäuble (CDU) maneuvered the republic through difficult, but mostly golden times. The Green Emilia Fester, as the youngest member of parliament, is nevertheless looking towards a bleak future. How can that be? Part 2 of the conversation about the concerns of the young, the mistakes of the old and the meaning of politics.
Ms. Fester, you are now sacrificing your youth to save the world. You put it that way yourself. What about your mandate gives you this feeling?
Fester: It is a great privilege, a gift that I can participate in this democracy with this mandate and give young people a voice. But it is certainly also an enormous task that does not leave much room for a life as a teenager.
And do you miss that?
Fester: Yes. Once in a while. Gaining privilege always comes with sacrifice. I suddenly have to be an adult and allowed to be an MP.
Mr. Schäuble, do you also say that you sacrificed your life for politics?
Schäuble: No. Politics has always filled me, it was rarely boring. I have lived a rich life with many ups and downs.
Ms. Fester, we’re sorry, but here’s another rather steep thesis from you: The older generation sits around in the Bundestag and shows little interest in work. What experience led you to this view?
Fester: It is my observation, even if I would like to exclude Mr. Schäuble. But the enthusiasm is very different.
Should parliament membership then be limited to two or three legislatures?
Fester: No, people who get involved should be allowed to work in the Bundestag. You don’t have to limit that. I myself come with a huge will to change, which will not dry up anytime soon.
Schäuble: Firstly, we all change in the course of our lives, and what Ms. Fester perceives as a lack of drive can also be an expression of experience. Second: I am convinced that political commitment is not the better, the more you want to change. Maybe it’s better to say: We want to create. This can also include: I would like to receive many things. For me, reducing political commitment to as much change as possible is an abridgement of realities.
Fester: Now we are at the point where conservatism differs from progressiveness! Of course, change is not good per se. But in progressive teaching, change is always constructive for living together. I would never say that if we don’t do anything, it will automatically get better.
Schäuble: Retaining doesn’t mean doing nothing.
Fester: I know. But “change” is an important word for me. Because it says that man is able to get out of a bad situation.
Schäuble: I don’t accept the dichotomy between conservatism and progressiveness. An example: Ludwig Erhard, father of the economic miracle, advocated moderation and not overdoing it after the first few years of the strong upswing. In line with today’s zeitgeist for responsible use of resources. He was a liberal, Protestant-leaning politician. And then we come to religion. She teaches us to strive for change in order to preserve our world. I am convinced that without religion we find it harder to keep moderation. If we only believe in ourselves, we are very close to hubris.
Ms. Fester, can religion contribute to moderation?
Fester: I’m an atheist. I never had a church, my parents decided against giving me one. When I was in high school I tried to understand more about religion, I’m probably an agnostic by now. But I am sure of one thing: We have things in our own hands. There is no need for religion or God. The climate crisis as we find it now could have been prevented by our own insight and reason.
Schäuble: Religion is a valuable asset, which is not anchored in our constitution for nothing and whose exercise is protected by it. And it gives our earthly being and our free and democratic order a higher meaning. It helps to keep measure, to preserve creation.
But for that, people would have to be willing to forego wealth, right?
Fester: That wasn’t said at all! If we distributed the emissions a little more fairly overall, that doesn’t mean that everyone has to live in less prosperity.
Schäuble: When I went to school, it was said that the earth could feed three or four billion people. Not more. Without advances in chemistry and biology, we would never be able to feed eight billion people. Well, far too many are still starving. And I fear that the war in Ukraine could cost more lives in Africa than in Ukraine because of the shortage of food.
Should politics act more, set the direction more than just reacting to undesirable developments?
Schäuble: When politicians think they know what’s right and set the direction too much themselves, politics can easily become ideology. You have to have an idea of where you want to go, you have to lead and argue about the matter – but we only determine it to a very limited extent. The future is open, people don’t know it. Therefore one should be so humble as not to think that we know exactly where we are going.
Fester: I think there is a big difference between us: Leading a society doesn’t mean that you have to wait for the catastrophe to act. But that even a scientific finding may trigger a reaction in politics.
Schäuble: In hindsight, what is right and what is wrong always seems so clear. I was head of the Chancellor’s office with Helmut Kohl when the reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant exploded. I know exactly how great the impact has been on the peaceful uses of nuclear energy. With consequences for the climate.
Fester: I’ve always wanted to ask this: Why didn’t people simply opt for renewable energies after the nuclear phase-out, but instead for coal power?
Schäuble: It is true that no new reactors were built after Chernobyl, but the nuclear phase-out only happened much later. Coal has long stood for sensible economic development and thus for jobs and ultimately for the creation of a level of social justice that you could only have dreamed of before. You say today: a single catastrophe. The opposite is true if you don’t reduce it to the climate aspect.
Fester: But that could have been done just as well with renewable energies!
Schäuble: No! You yourself just spoke about worldwide developments. We have to see that we are always in global competition with everything. I always got into arguments with my local farmers when they complained that, for example, strawberries from other countries were being offered far too cheaply. Then I asked: And if you go shopping on Saturday – what do you buy then? The most expensive t-shirt? Here, too, we must take note of the global connections between raw materials, production, supply chains and end users.
Fester: I take note of where my clothes were made.
Schäuble: Yes? Where?
Fester: Well, this one (touches her shoes) is German-made.
Schäuble: And where does the raw material come from? The supply chain?
Fester: It’s actually not real leather, I can definitely understand it. More and more people are trying to dress, feed and behave as fairly as possible. That gives me hope because it makes the markets adapt. In my view, what we should never do is make this criticism of consumerism really loud! That you ask me: Where does your clothes come from?
Schäuble: I didn’t mean to attack you personally, that would be unfair, but…
Fester: Exactly! It would be unfair to me, but especially to those people who cannot afford the expensive stuff.
So should politics steer consumer behavior or the market more strongly?
Fester: We have to create structures in which it is no longer possible to make the wrong decision in the supermarket.
Schäuble: So you would like to tell me how I should eat? Preferably vegan?!
Fester: No, I don’t want to dictate anything. I want to make sure that the alternatives you find in the supermarket are just as tasty and tastier and healthier than meat!
Schäuble: What if I would like to continue eating meat?
Fester: Then you can, but more consciously. And you have to be willing to pay an adequate price.
Ms. Fester, money plays a big role in your generation. In surveys, young people state that pay is the most important motivation for a job – ahead of fun and self-realization. Does that surprise you?
Fester: No. My generation is growing up in a world so troubled that they want at least material security. She’s not greedy, she’s afraid.
Schäuble: This justification is nonsensical, Ms. Fester! Everyone wants as much money as possible. It’s been like that forever. And because they don’t want to admit it, they say: I’m afraid of the future.
So people are greedy after all – no matter which generation?
Schäuble: Yes! Such is man! Since the expulsion from paradise. That’s how it started. Why did Cain kill Abel. Do you know?
Fester: No (laughs), I have no idea why the Cain…
Schäuble: But that is important! Because Abel’s flame has risen a little fairer than Cain’s. Out of envy! Moses 1
Fester: I have a different image of man. Everyone is socialized by the environment in which they grow up. He learns from his parents, in kindergarten, at school. That’s the way it is: We live in a neoliberal system – and wealth, possessions, money for one’s own purposes are part of it.
The previous studies were also created in this system. But having fun at work was always the most important thing.
Schäuble: But that is progress. Life isn’t just about having fun! Life is so much more – and a large portion of seriousness is part of it. And yes, Ms. Fester, sure, you don’t need Cain or Abel. But you too will be looking for answers to the question: what makes people special? I’m telling you: you won’t finish this quest until the end of your days.
Fester: That’s still a while away for me, but I can well imagine that you’re right on this point.
