Declining Leaders and An Ascendant Political Right in Germany and Canada

By Kieran Grundfast, Elections

German and Canadian voters will go to the polls this year in national elections. At the latest, Canadian voters will vote in October, while a German snap election will be held on February 23. Both elections will take place in the context of ongoing political and economic turmoil in both countries and backlash directed at incumbent political parties observed in elections globally in 2024. However, Germany and Canada are unique in that their elections have been preceded by intense political crises sparked by intra-party and coalition infighting. Both parties had unique governing arrangements before these crises, which merit closer examination. In the case of Canada, Justin Trudeau’s decade-long stint as Prime Minister is coming to an anticlimactic close—he is now rejected by even his own party, which he helped bring into power at the beginning of his tenure and has led ever since. In Germany, Chancellor Olaf Scholz, the first chancellor from the Social Democratic Party (SPD) since 2005, failed to keep his historic three-party coalition government together, falling to third place in national polling behind the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and Alternative for Germany (AfD). The result of the elections in both countries, following public polling, is likely to produce a remarkable shift to the political right, following global trends.

    Germany’s three-party coalition included the SPD, the Free Democratic Party (FDP), and the German Green Party, forming after the 2021 elections in which the previously governing CDU lost first-party status to the SPD. Not wanting to rerun a “Grand Coalition” between the two parties that had governed the country since 2013, the CDU announced that it would remain the parliamentary opposition (Kinkartz 2024). Scholz and the SPD, lacking an outright majority in the German Bundestag, opted to form a coalition with the Greens, a party to their left that shares certain ideological proclivities and policy goals, and the FDP, a centrist liberal party that is mainly pro-business and prefers a smaller state government (Kinkartz 2024). 

     In 2021, the new coalition was introduced with much optimism and ambition, promising to host a government that straddled ideological divisions, would help modernize the German economy, lead it out of the COVID-induced economic malaise, and initiate a green shift in energy use and production (Associated Press 2024a). However, these assurances did not last long as policy disputes within the coalition—driven primarily by the ideological divisions between the coalition’s junior members, the FDP, and Greens—bled into the open, sometimes over already-agreed-upon policy plans. For example, the coalition had an intense period of public disagreement over the government’s 2025 budget. Internal debate was thought to have been settled in July of last year until, several weeks after the deadline, the FDP raised concerns over potential tax increases and budget shortfalls that would have violated German public deficit laws (Associated Press 2024b). Other points of contention have included the Ukraine crisis, where Scholz and the SPD have taken a cautious approach to supporting the Ukrainian government with weapons transfers while the FDP and Greens vigorously support further aid (Reuters 2025). Scholz’s coalition ultimately collapsed in November of last year when the Chancellor fired Finance Minister and FDP leader Christian Linder; the decision came after Linder publicly released a policy document and list of demands that denounced the government’s economic agenda and criticized it for failing to jumpstart Germany’s economy, which shrank in both 2023 and 2024 (Associated Press 2024c; Associated Press 2024d). Scholz made a brief attempt at running a minority government comprising the SPD and Greens until eventually acquiescing to opposition demands and holding a vote of no confidence in January. The vote passed, paving the way for snap elections on February 23. 

     As a result of the intense coalitional infighting, Scholz’s government is highly unpopular among Germans, with the SPD trailing the CDU in public polling since 2022. Beginning in 2023, the AfD overtook the SPD in polling, relegating them to third place (Politico 2025). Besides internal tensions, the downturn in the SPD’s polling has been driven by increasing concerns over immigration policy and national involvement in the Ukraine crisis, in addition to general dissatisfaction among German voters with mainstream political parties. The AfD has been consistently locked out of governing arrangements with other political parties due to policy positions widely regarded as far-right (especially on immigration issues) and controversial statements by its leaders, likely adding to the anti-establishment appeal it has gained among disillusioned voters. The result of all the discord is an increasingly fractured electoral landscape in which no party is likely to get more than 30% of the vote. This portends further political deadlock, an intense struggle between German political parties, and a grinding government formation process, no matter the upcoming election results. It also implies a shift toward the political right, with the center-right CDU expected to come in first place and the right-wing nationalist AfD likely to take a record 20% of the vote and second place. This forecast follows the global trend of electoral backlash against incumbent governments and mirrors a more significant shift toward the national populist right in Europe and the wider Western world.

     Justin Trudeau has led Canada as Prime Minister (PM) since a decisive election victory in 2015 returned the Liberal Party to government. In the two elections in 2019 and 2021, Trudeau ushered his party to first-place finishes, but with lessening support. In 2019, the Liberals lost their majority in Parliament and formed a single-party minority government. In 2021, despite gaining a handful of seats, Trudeau established a confidence-and-supply agreement, an arrangement where one party supports the governing party without officially being a part of the government, with the social democratic New Democratic Party (NDP). Successfully preserving his incumbent position as PM and leader of the Liberal Party, he was relatively popular with Canadian voters until discontent began to rise in 2022. Much like Scholz, Trudeau and his party have become deeply unpopular due to economic issues stemming from COVID, immigration policies, and internal scandals within his Cabinet (Gillies 2024a). Canadians have reacted strongly to a cost-of-living crisis, which has seen the country’s food and housing prices soar. Carbon tax legislation by Trudeau’s government only added to voters’ discontent over economic issues and convinced many that Trudeau and his Liberal party were out of touch with their concerns (Al Mallees 2024). Voter discontent has been exacerbated by a recent surge in immigration, leading Trudeau to announce new restrictions last year—a deviation from the Liberal Party’s long-held position on the issue (Yousif and Murphy 2024). In September of 2024, due to his rising unpopularity, the NDP dissolved its legislative support agreement with the Liberals (Zimonjic 2024). Facing dismal personal approval numbers and a widening gap in election polling with the Conservative Party, Trudeau faced calls to resign from some Liberal members of Parliament in October of last year, yet resisted, determined to lead his party into the 2025 elections and continue his term (Gillies 2024b; Previl and Piper 2024). 

     Though it seemed he might retain his position as PM and Liberal Party leader, at least until the 2025 elections, Trudeau faced a crisis when, in late December, his Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland resigned from the Cabinet. Freeland stepped down due to disagreements with Trudeau over fiscal policy, potential trade disputes with the U.S., and, ultimately, a request from the PM that she take on a new, less influential role in the Cabinet (Gillies 2024c). Following this setback, two other Cabinet ministers resigned, sending the Liberal Party—already reeling from two losses in parliamentary by-elections in districts it had held for years just months prior—into further turmoil (The Economist 2024). Facing overwhelming internal pressure, Trudeau resigned on January 3, and the Liberal Party began the process of selecting a new leader (Gillies 2024d). The opposition parties in Parliament are likely to force a vote for early elections, which will probably be held sometime in the spring. 

     Trudeau’s resignation is yet another extension of the global backlash against incumbent governments and leaders in a time of widespread cost-of-living difficulties and voter dissatisfaction over immigration. It signals the end of political dominance for the Liberal Party, given their still-wide deficit in election polling against the Conservatives (CBC 2025). Much like Germany, the coming election promises a significant shift to the political right, though without the same degree of electoral fragmentation. The Canadian Conservative Party, led by Pierre Poilievre, seems poised to obtain at least a plurality in the Canadian Parliament and govern for the first time in a decade.

     Scholz and Trudeau are both entries in a now long list of political leaders who have fallen victim to a global anti-incumbent backlash. The political and policy issues that produced their downfalls are remarkably similar, with both facing intense economic and cost-of-living issues and voter discontent with their handling of immigration, environmental, and foreign policy. The coming elections in both countries will likely produce strong, and in the case of Germany, historic shifts towards the political right. What sets these two leaders apart is the intense internal battles within their parties and coalitions that helped to produce the conditions for their downfalls, mirroring personal popularity’s role in President Biden’s exit from the presidential election last year. What remains to be seen is whether the political instability and anti-incumbent trend that characterized the inter-party politics of many nations last year will extend into the coming year. If this were the case, the volatility of national and global politics would surely increase, extending into political parties’ internal processes.

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