As Germany’s social Democrats promote migrants

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The SPD was for decades the most popular party among migrants. Finally, the consent declined, but strong. The SPD is looking for reasons – and a new strategy.

Patricia Baumann’s first contact with the SPD was a Non-contact. As the woman from Sierra Leone, decided last year to go into politics, she was at an Info event to all parties in Berlin. Actually, she thought the SPD would be something for you. “Justice, freedom, solidarity, the ideology seemed to fit.” Of the social Democrats was not addressed but instead the right – wing populist AfD recruited to the dark-skinned woman.

“Wow, what am I supposed to do now?” Patricia Baumann recalls her reaction. In fact, they listened to the AfD in the short, but decided for the SPD. Since then, she works in the local branch of Berlin-Lankwitz active, but has not experienced time and again that people like you are in the SPD, welcome to: “The have a different color or look foreign and the other members want to have little to do with them.”

The SPD ran the immigrants of

Were asked 9.298 people

“Which party do you like currently, Best?”

For the SPD, such stories are a disaster, because they show how deep the Problem is. The social Democrats lost their decades-long Nimbus as migrants-party. A study of the Council of experts on Migration and Integration, shows that only a quarter of Germans with foreign roots to find the SPD. Two years ago, the SPD was still the most popular German party in the case of immigrants.

Raed Saleh finds these Numbers alarming. Saleh Chairman of the social Democrats in the Berlin house of representatives and one of the few leading SPD politician with an immigrant background. With his parents he came to the beginning of the 80s from the West Bank to Germany. Was politicised him, he says, in front of the television: “My father has always said in broken English that the SPD is for us, the CDU is against us. This is the reason why I am now in the SPD.”

The work party was called “guest workers”party

Since the beginning of the 50s years of work were workers from Italy, Spain and especially Turkey to Germany, was of the workers and the workers ‘ party, the SPD, the party of the foreigners. “The SPD has always said: Welcome, your one of them. The CDU has said: Sometime back in the home countries. And that’s why people with Turkish roots have elected to in 2002 to 80% in the SPD,” says Raed Saleh.

Turkish guest workers admire in 1962, the new car of a colleague. The theme of ascension is a ursozialdemokratische narrative.

Whether on the Assembly lines of Mercedes or in the coal mines of the Ruhr region, the predominantly unskilled “guest workers” were for the economic recovery after the Second world war is partly responsible. Their interests are represented trade unions and the SPD. Together with their German colleagues, immigrants and the SPD fought for higher wages and social advancement.

As in the ‘ 80s, migrants are victims of racism, were Democrats under the leadership of Willy Brandt in front of the foreign fellow citizens under the slogan “get off my buddy!” The SPD made the case for the municipal right to vote of the migrants and, later, the SPD provided the Chancellor, Gerhard Schröder, with the Reform of the citizenship law, that the children of the guest workers were able to get a German passport. And today?

At once the SPD to power the mate

It was for the SPD last downhill, has for Saleh a reason – the party has lost its foreigner-friendly attitude. “We have to bite the bullet. Much of the is not happen because we were not clear enough in the attitude: stop to here and no further.” Saleh says specifically, the case of Thilo Sarrazin. The controversial author of the book would have from the point of view of Saleh will be in 2009, the SPD excluded.

“I don’t want us to become Strangers in their own Land.” Thilo Sarrazin (SPD)

Thlio Sarrazin was actually Senator of Finance for the SPD in Berlin. Then he began to speak on the migration and identity questions. His book “Germany abolishes itself” from the year 2010 is considered the first step in a new xenophobic discourse in Germany, has also made possible the rise of the AfD. Until today, Sarrazin’s party, a member of the social Democrats and for Saleh an Anti-SPD-Argument is: “Would you like to be insulted?”

The SPD politician Aydan Özoguz know what it’s like to be insulted. The Turkish-born Özoguz was in the Chancellery Minister of state for Migration, as the AfD wanted to dispose of 2017 “in Anatolia”. In the new government Özoguz got a new office, and also from the SPD Board of management disappeared. Critics say the SPD have dropped, had given in to the AfD. A fatal character.

The cases Sarrazin and Özoguz may have damaged the SPD. The party has failed to actively advertise to voters of non-German origin, believes the party Left Ralf Stegner. “We have, perhaps, in Parts of the left and thought of going alone, but it’s not.” Stegner believes that the SPD should, in future, to deport “the power, the advantage is in the diversity”, instead of about well-trained people: “This must stop,” says Stegner.

The answer to the crash is: more diversity

“The SPD must become more diverse”, the resolution also requests the Secretary-General of the social Democrats, Lars Kling. The 40-year-old organized the “renewal” of the party, which has been achieved by 2017 with 20.5% for their worst election result ever in a Federal election. The German Turks, only 35% have chosen a study by the University of Duisburg-Essen, according to the SPD.

Klingbeil wants to find not only old voters, but also new candidates, so that it is clear that “people with a migration background are welcome”. Klingbeil has looked at the congressional elections in the USA and seen how diverse the Democrats were, and with what success. Then, he wants to bring the SPD and addiction “faces that represent the Whole.”

“Where You come from does not count, but where You want to,” Katarina Barley (SPD)

Such a face can win the SPD for the European elections. Top candidate will be Katarina Barley. In the current Cabinet of Angela Merkel she is the only Minister that has a so-called migration background. Barleys father is British, what the daughter of a rarity in the government and to the symbolic bearer of hope for the SPD. “The migration story of my father influences me,” says Barley in the Video of the “AG diversity and Migration” of the SPD.

The working group has been set up to deal with the social Democrats and foreign voters. Irena Rudolph-Kokot is on the Board of the AG and has just declared when the SPD-debate camp, such as Russian-speaking voters through Social media. But she also believes that above all works, “when people are placed with the corresponding roots, to run, and in the parliaments sit.”

Wanted: elected officials with a migration background

Rudolph-Kokot has an example of Europe – if not from their own party, but of the liberal FDP. As the liberals in 2011, made the Vietnamese-born Philipp Rösler, the Chairman of the party and Minister of the economy, “at once the whole of the Vietnamese Community in Germany, the FDP.” In the US, the Democrats, therefore, African-Americans and Hispanics in elections to more. But with the SPD?

“The SPD must also take into account the migrants who have been living here for a long time. Recently, there have been only talking about refugees,” advises Patricia Baumann of your party.

Meanwhile, about 19 million people with an immigrant background living in Germany – and the trend is rising. A group that has identified beneficiaries in the last Federal election about 10.2 percent of the choice. All potential SPD voters, the “Dream of a social, just and solidary Germany”, believes the Berlin SPD politician Saleh. He feels among them, “a longing for your old Auntie SPD, which gives you guidance.”

Perhaps the social Democrats can make Patricia Baumann’s theory of hope. She is from Sierra Leone believes that it was due to Angela Merkel’s policy on refugees, migrants are defected in droves from the SPD to the CDU. Immigrants had felt Merkel “connected to,” says Baumann, “and thought that the CDU is for foreigners and not the SPD, but this is a misunderstanding.” The social Democrats want to correct the misunderstanding in the next few months – with Katarina Barley. The first SPD top candidate with an immigrant background is to be the face of a fresh start.