https://znetwork.org/category/place/europe/germany/ Independent Left News, Analysis, Vision and Strategy Tue, 10 Mar 2026 16:06:34 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://znetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/cropped-Z_logo_512-32x32.png https://znetwork.org/category/place/europe/germany/ 32 32 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/in-the-home-state-of-porsche-mercedes-greens-afd-won/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/in-the-home-state-of-porsche-mercedes-greens-afd-won/#respond Tue, 10 Mar 2026 16:01:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1295626 In the recent state election (8 March 2026), Germany’s environmentalist “the Greens” and the exact opposite – the neo-fascist AfD – won big time. By an extremely narrow margin, the Greens are once again the strongest force in the 11.5-million-people-strong south-western state of Baden-Württemberg – the home of, for example, the electronics maker Robert Bosch [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/in-the-home-state-of-porsche-mercedes-greens-afd-won/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/musk-wins-against-workers-at-tesla-in-germany/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/musk-wins-against-workers-at-tesla-in-germany/#respond Mon, 09 Mar 2026 15:25:25 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1295591 The really bad news is that the elections to the works council at Tesla in the 9,000-people-strong East German town of Grünheide are over. The bitter result is that Elon Musk won and workers lost. Candidates of Germany’s metalworkers’ union IG Metall (IGM) fell back to second place in the vote at Grünheide. While management [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/musk-wins-against-workers-at-tesla-in-germany/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-tesla-works-councils-in-germany/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-tesla-works-councils-in-germany/#respond Thu, 05 Mar 2026 01:06:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1295426 Once — and particularly from an anarcho-syndicalist perspective — works councils were seen as revolutionary institutions for democracy and against capitalism and war. Today, the German model of social-democratic works councils as co-managers prevails. It allows companies to function smoothly, leaves capitalism untouched — or better, supports it — and gives workers the right to [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-tesla-works-councils-in-germany/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/sleazy-afd-germanys-far-right-loots-the-state/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/sleazy-afd-germanys-far-right-loots-the-state/#comments Sat, 28 Feb 2026 16:01:18 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1295280 For weeks, allegations of sleaze, nepotism, and corruption inside the Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) have dominated local media in Germany. Nepotism within the AfD has occurred at both state and federal level. The neo-fascist AfD is not known for being a political party free of infighting. Unsurprisingly, what triggered the emergence of widespread nepotism was [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/sleazy-afd-germanys-far-right-loots-the-state/feed/ 1 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/go-film-the-police/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/go-film-the-police/#comments Fri, 27 Feb 2026 16:57:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1295223 One of the reasons for photographing and filming at protests is to document police brutality when it predictably comes. At the end of summer I found myself on the floor surrounded by 15 German police officers. I was presented with an ultimatum, either I would give my phone to the police willingly or they would [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/go-film-the-police/feed/ 1 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/francesca-albanese-is-a-powerful-voice-for-justice-which-is-why-the-israel-lobby-is-trying-to-silence-her/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/francesca-albanese-is-a-powerful-voice-for-justice-which-is-why-the-israel-lobby-is-trying-to-silence-her/#respond Wed, 25 Feb 2026 17:10:07 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1295160 Mark Twain and Winston Churchill are both purported to have once said that a lie can travel half-way around the world before truth has had a chance to put its pants on.  On February 7, Francesca Albanese, the current UN Special Rapporteur for human rights in Palestine, gave a short presentation by video conference to [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/francesca-albanese-is-a-powerful-voice-for-justice-which-is-why-the-israel-lobby-is-trying-to-silence-her/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/do-workers-in-germany-vote-neo-nazi/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/do-workers-in-germany-vote-neo-nazi/#respond Fri, 20 Feb 2026 17:31:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294968 In Germany’s recent election – held in February 2025 – the AfD managed to become the second-strongest political force, winning 21%. Four years earlier, the neo-fascist party’s share had been 10.4%. In East Germany, it even reached 32%. The AfD thus succeeded in doubling its share of the vote. Worse, this is not because fewer [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/do-workers-in-germany-vote-neo-nazi/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-outcome-of-germanys-public-sector-strike/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-outcome-of-germanys-public-sector-strike/#respond Tue, 17 Feb 2026 17:16:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294835 By mid-February 2026, and after nationwide strikes, Germany’s public service trade union, Ver.di, announced the end of the strikes. Germany’s public sector workers will receive more money. After three rounds of collective bargaining negotiations between Ver.di and public sector employers – covering bus, tram and train drivers, among others – a pact was concluded. Ver.di’s [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-outcome-of-germanys-public-sector-strike/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/working-time-in-germanys-service-sector-a-union-view/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/working-time-in-germanys-service-sector-a-union-view/#respond Fri, 13 Feb 2026 19:18:25 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294686 Perhaps ever since the dawn of capitalism, when the first workers were – literally – whipped into factory work and converted from life on a farm with a natural day and night rhythm and adjusted to the factory clock on the wall of a Satanic Mill, workers have known that working hours have a huge [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/working-time-in-germanys-service-sector-a-union-view/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/workers-and-working-time-in-germany-in-2006/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/workers-and-working-time-in-germany-in-2006/#respond Tue, 10 Feb 2026 17:01:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294559 Recently, the staunchly anti-communist supporter of neoliberalism, ex-BlackRock hedge fund manager and now Germany’s chancellor, Friedrich Merz, told Germans to work more – that is what Germany needs. But rather than being aligned with most Germans, conservative Merz seems to be off the mark. Meanwhile, the hard-working businessman Merz — who last took the rubbish [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/workers-and-working-time-in-germany-in-2006/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/public-service-worker-strike-in-germany/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/public-service-worker-strike-in-germany/#respond Sat, 07 Feb 2026 16:45:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294430 On a cold, freezing, windy, and snowy morning in late January 2026, Germany’s nationwide collective bargaining for public transport workers started under the union motto “Mobility for all and good working conditions for public transport workers.” It set the tone for collective bargaining in all of Germany’s 16 federal states. But even before the mass [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/public-service-worker-strike-in-germany/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/far-right-yellow-unions-in-germany-in-2026/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/far-right-yellow-unions-in-germany-in-2026/#respond Wed, 04 Feb 2026 18:54:04 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294355 As one of the most time-honored truths goes: wherever there is capitalism, there is labor, and wherever there is labor, there is organized labor. Yet not all organized labor is on our side. There are yellow unions – even in Germany. A yellow union is a fake or “pretend-to-be” worker organization. It is dominated, unduly [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/far-right-yellow-unions-in-germany-in-2026/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/death-amazon-in-germany/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/death-amazon-in-germany/#respond Tue, 03 Feb 2026 17:00:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294309 Barely half a year after the Amazon boss’ lavish wedding in Venice in “The Great Gatsby” style, surrounded by 250 guests, just one hour’s flying time away — in Bezos’ private jet, the Gulfstream G700, of course — a lonely Amazon worker died, abandoned in a rather non-tasteful Amazon toilet at Jeff Bezos’ East German [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/death-amazon-in-germany/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/german-state-sponsors-neo-nazism/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/german-state-sponsors-neo-nazism/#respond Thu, 29 Jan 2026 16:48:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294119 Conceivably, nobody has ever expressed the view of right-wing and Neo-Nazi parties towards the democratic state better than Hitler’s minister of propaganda, Joseph Goebbels, when acknowledging: “It will always remain one of the best jokes of democracy that it gave its deadly enemies the means by which it was destroyed.” While the neo-fascist AfD has [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/german-state-sponsors-neo-nazism/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-neo-nazi-threat-to-unitary-unionism-in-germany/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-neo-nazi-threat-to-unitary-unionism-in-germany/#respond Tue, 13 Jan 2026 17:00:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1293428 With the rapid advance of Germany’s extreme right and adjacent neo-Nazis, a serious challenge for Germany’s trade unions – organized within Germany’s peak body, the DGB – has emerged. The outlook for German trade unions will be even more grim in the upcoming works council elections to be held in spring 2026. German trade unionists [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-neo-nazi-threat-to-unitary-unionism-in-germany/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/labor-market-trends-in-germany-in-2026/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/labor-market-trends-in-germany-in-2026/#respond Fri, 02 Jan 2026 17:01:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1293006 What is commonly known as the labor market remains an inevitable feature of an economic system that converts everything into a commodity. Not surprisingly, the economist who understood this system better than many others started his three-volume seminal opus with “commodities” – the defining element of capitalism. In capitalism, two features are attached to every [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/labor-market-trends-in-germany-in-2026/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/european-russophobia-and-europes-rejection-of-peace-a-two-century-failure/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/european-russophobia-and-europes-rejection-of-peace-a-two-century-failure/#respond Wed, 24 Dec 2025 18:38:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1292724 Europe has repeatedly rejected peace with Russia at moments when a negotiated settlement was available, and those rejections have proven profoundly self-defeating. From the nineteenth century to the present, Russia’s security concerns have been treated not as legitimate interests to be negotiated within a broader European order, but as moral transgressions to be resisted, contained, [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/european-russophobia-and-europes-rejection-of-peace-a-two-century-failure/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/what-germans-think-about-ai/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/what-germans-think-about-ai/#respond Sun, 21 Dec 2025 12:17:54 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1292582 In a recent AI study (November 2025), slightly more than 1,000 Germans were asked about artificial intelligence (AI), online security, deepfakes and democracy. Overall, there is a strong increase in the uptake of AI in Germany. Roughly two out of three Germans use AI (65%) in one way or another. Given that ChatGPT started to [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/what-germans-think-about-ai/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-fabulous-hallucinations-of-the-european-leaders/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-fabulous-hallucinations-of-the-european-leaders/#respond Wed, 17 Dec 2025 18:46:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1292468 Sitting in a lively room in the University of Amsterdam, I ask a question about the respect accorded by students to their former Prime Minister and now head of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), Mark Rutte. The room is animated and funny. No-one seems to accord Rutte with the respect that he might deserve. [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-fabulous-hallucinations-of-the-european-leaders/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/workers-in-germany-strike-at-avnet-usa/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/workers-in-germany-strike-at-avnet-usa/#respond Tue, 16 Dec 2025 17:01:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1292419 It is October 2025, and one room in southern Germany was in a rage. The discontent of workers over the loss of industry-wide collective bargaining had escalated at a local technology company. Workers at Avnet and Tria had been excluded from Germany’s traditional collective bargaining regime covering the entirety of the metal industry. Avnet’s management [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/workers-in-germany-strike-at-avnet-usa/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/six-jobs-for-union-organizing-in-german-europe/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/six-jobs-for-union-organizing-in-german-europe/#respond Thu, 11 Dec 2025 16:48:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1292246 German trade unions, like any form of unionism, can be viewed from three political perspectives. From a unitarist viewpoint, trade unions are irrelevant – merely disturbing management’s self-appointed “right to manage.” Their demands are irrational, as workers and bosses supposedly share the same interests. Set against such hallucinations is the pluralist perspective, which sees trade [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/six-jobs-for-union-organizing-in-german-europe/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/germanys-far-right-reinvents-its-youth/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/germanys-far-right-reinvents-its-youth/#respond Mon, 08 Dec 2025 21:03:50 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1292141 Somewhere between a renaming and a re-founding – deceptively labelled “Generation Germany” (GG) – Germany’s far-right, or neo-Nazi, AfD has given itself a new youth organization. The cunning, innocent, and thoroughly deceptive name – “Generation Deutschland” – clearly could not be “HJ 2.0” or the more modern version of the HDJ – Heimattreue Deutsche Jugend. [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/germanys-far-right-reinvents-its-youth/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/deliberate-contradiction-how-the-west-plays-dumb-and-kills-people-in-gaza/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/deliberate-contradiction-how-the-west-plays-dumb-and-kills-people-in-gaza/#respond Fri, 05 Dec 2025 18:53:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1292019 First, let’s dissect this puzzle. On February 29, 2024, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin sent shockwaves when he informed lawmakers in the House Armed Services Committee that over 25,000 Palestinian women and children had been killed by Israel in Gaza up to that date. Austin, the military chief of the Biden Administration, delivered a fact [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/deliberate-contradiction-how-the-west-plays-dumb-and-kills-people-in-gaza/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/german-unions-and-the-working-poor/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/german-unions-and-the-working-poor/#respond Tue, 02 Dec 2025 17:31:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1291855 Ever since Shipler’s Pulitzer Prize-winning The Working Poor: Invisible in America (2004), the term working poor has entered the realm beyond industrial sociology. Put rather simply, the working poor are workers whose income has fallen below the poverty line. They work but remain under the poverty threshold. They work but are poor – these are [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/german-unions-and-the-working-poor/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/palestine-is-a-fundamental-moral-and-political-compass/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/palestine-is-a-fundamental-moral-and-political-compass/#respond Mon, 01 Dec 2025 16:15:40 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1291815 On Tuesday, November 18, I was meant to address a meeting at Berlin’s Karl Liebknecht Haus, headquarters of left-wing party Die Linke. There I was supposed to speak about the flotillas in solidarity with Gaza, in which I have myself participated. Yet the event was canceled a few hours before it was due to begin. [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/palestine-is-a-fundamental-moral-and-political-compass/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/childhood-poverty-in-germany-in-2025/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/childhood-poverty-in-germany-in-2025/#respond Thu, 27 Nov 2025 16:47:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1291690 Despite the false promises of neoliberal capitalism and its tireless ideological cheerleaders, capitalism has always coexisted with – and at times produced – staggering levels of child poverty. Not even the sacred dogma of “personal responsibility” can hide that fact. Germany, so often presented as a wealthy nation, exhibits shockingly high levels of child poverty. [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/childhood-poverty-in-germany-in-2025/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/german-works-council-in-2026-6-strategies-against-the-far-right/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/german-works-council-in-2026-6-strategies-against-the-far-right/#respond Mon, 17 Nov 2025 18:24:26 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1291364 Staunchly following the dictum of Hitler’s propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels – “it will always remain one of the best jokes of democracy, that it gave its deadly enemies the means by which it was destroyed” – today’s Neo-Nazis, camouflaged as the AfD, work tirelessly to undermine Germany’s democracy. Yet Germany’s Neo-Nazis – officially and euphemistically [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/german-works-council-in-2026-6-strategies-against-the-far-right/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/work-in-2050-three-german-scenarios/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/work-in-2050-three-german-scenarios/#respond Wed, 12 Nov 2025 18:05:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1291141 Ever since feudal peasants were converted into factory workers, academics have tried to figure out not just what “work” under the often rather inhumane conditions of capitalism means, but also what the future of work might look like. There has been plenty of speculation about that future.  From steam to electricity to computers, and now [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/work-in-2050-three-german-scenarios/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/labor-strikes-in-germany-then-today/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/labor-strikes-in-germany-then-today/#respond Mon, 10 Nov 2025 19:32:33 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1291073 The more recent history of strikes in Germany dates back to 1945 with the victory over Nazism. Yet many strikes quickly came – and still come – into the media limelight. Since many, if not most, media organizations are profit-making businesses, they rarely focus on workers, trade unions, and their demands, but rather on the [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/labor-strikes-in-germany-then-today/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/contesting-germanys-afd/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/contesting-germanys-afd/#respond Wed, 05 Nov 2025 19:22:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1290878 With the neo-fascist AfD overtaking – or at least matching – Germany’s traditional conservatives, Merz’s CDU, in recent public polling, a renewed debate has emerged on how to challenge the authoritarian, far-right, or even neo-Nazi AfD. Meanwhile, the neo-fascist AfD has – almost – become Germany’s strongest political force: 26% over the CDU’s 25%. Polling [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/contesting-germanys-afd/feed/ 0