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Precarious
This article "Kampf um Begriffe" (A Battle over Political Terms) appeared in the Sunday edition of the Frankfurter Allgemeine (FAZ) newspaper on February 9th, during my last visit to Germany. It refers to the efforts of Right- and Left-wing political parties in Germany to tar each other with the "Nazi" or "Commie" brush. The Nazis during World War II slaughtered millions of people; likewise the Communists in the Soviet Union. Only a fool In Germany would advertise himself openly as one or the other. That such terms linger for so long in the media culture of Germany interests me, since the Germans use them mostly for their defamatory value.
Also, speaking as an American, none of it surprises me much. Democrat Party activists use terms like "racist", "fascist", and "imperialist" against the Republicans, who use terms like "Flaming Liberal", "Socialist", and "Marxist" against the Democrats. Political activists realize that using such terms polarizes the American population and hurts the nation's solidarity and readiness, even while it galvanizes the party-faithful to contribute and participate. So activists can cry all the way to the bank, decry the loss of unity and faith, and blame the other side for it.
The text of "Kampf um Begriffe" consists of an interview between an FAZ-journalist and the historian Volker Weiß, who writes about the rise of the new right-wing populist party, the Alternative für Deutschland, or AfD. He published a book titled Deutschlands neue Rechte. In the very first exchange of the interview, Volker Weiß uses the term "Precariat Party", a clever portmanteau word caused by joining "precarious" and "proletariat". "Prekariat" describes the most vulnerable class of people in our society. The changes in the character and wealth of the German economy will affect them the most. At the same time, no one wants to identify as a member of the "Prekariat", since the term denotes political constituencies who turn to more radical means to regain their previous status.
The very first exchange between the FAZ interviewer and Volker Weiß hits on the rising tensions between the political parties and those precarious constituencies:
FAZ: Herr Weiß, in a meeting between Elon Musk and Alice Weidel (Chairwoman of the AfD Party), Weidel referred to Nazi leader Adolf Hitler as "politisch links", or as politically left-wing. Does that surprise you?
Weiß: Not in the least. Frau Weidel has stumbled before, such as her description of the Nazi Party as a "Precariat Party".
I have to admit, I had never heard the term "Precariat" before I read this article—me with my college degree! Once I had studied the term, I wondered why Weiß would deny that the Nazis represented a Precariat party. As more adult German males lost their jobs from the effects of the Great Depression and had little hope in the future, the Nazis grew in power, because they restored that hope. That they gained power as con-men, by deceit and intimidation, does not change the fact that they represented the last great hope for Germans who had lost their status in life from the Depression and the predatory animosity of the French government. Hitler made no secret of wanting to dish out payback on the French for it.
Also, no one should miss that "Kampf um Begriffe" really deals with the conflict and disunity in German society, and by extension the American one. It does not, however, bother with an analysis of policy-initiatives, how the political parties align themselves, or even what they stand for. The battle of political terms lacks philosophical dimensions. The combatants mostly perceive that the opposing side represents a threat to the livelihood of the home-side; so that you can say that they both belong to the Precariat Party, since neither has a sense of solutions to their precariousness, except to harm the other.