The Agenda 2010 is a series of reforms planned and executed by the German government which they say will modernise the German social system and labour market. The declared aim of Agenda 2010 is to improve economic growth and thus reduce unemployment. The Federal Republic of Germany (in German: Bundesrepublik Deutschland) is a federal representative democracy. ...

On March 14, 2003 Chancellor Gerhard Schröder gave a speech before the German Bundestag outlining the proposed plans for reform. He pointed out three main areas which the agenda would focus on: the economy, the system of social security, and Germany's position on the world market. March 14 is the 73rd day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (74th in Leap years) with 292 days remaining in the year. ... 2003 is a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... This article discusses the Social Democratic German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder. ... The Bundestag (Federal Diet) is the parliament of Germany. ...

The steps to be taken include tax cuts targeted at the well-to-do (those in the higher marginal tax brackets) as well as big cuts in the cost absorption for medical treatment and drastic cuts in pension benefits and in unemployment benefits alike. In that, the programme closely resembles similar measures taken earlier in the USA and the UK. Those measures are also being proposed in accordance with the market liberal approach of the EU's Lisbon Strategy. The name Agenda 2010 itself is a reference to the Lisbon Strategy's 2010 deadline. The Lisbon Strategy, also known as the Lisbon Agenda or Lisbon Process, is an action and development plan for the European Union. ... The Lisbon Strategy, also known as the Lisbon Agenda or Lisbon Process, is an action and development plan for the European Union. ...

The series of changes in the labour market known as Hartz I - IV started in 2003, with the last step, Hartz IV, having come into effect on January 1st, 2005. The changes have altered the face of unemployment benefits and job centres in Germany, and the very nature of the German system of social security. The Hartz concept is the name given to the recommendations resulting from a commission on reforms to the German labour market in 2002. ... The Hartz concept is the name given to the recommendations resulting from a commission on reforms to the German labour market in 2002. ...

Reaction to the changes

Politicians, industrial leaders, trade unions, media and population alike justifiably consider the Agenda 2010, especially the Hartz IV law, as the most massive cut into the German system of social security since World War II. The Hartz concept is the name given to the recommendations resulting from a commission on reforms to the German labour market in 2002. ... Mushroom cloud from the nuclear explosion over Nagasaki rising 18 km (over 11 miles) into the air, August 9, 1945. ...

While industrial leaders and both the conservative and market-liberal parliamentary parties such as the CDU and the FDP greeted Agenda 2010 as it implemented their long-time demands, there was some upheaval in Schröder's own social democratic party. After Schröder threatened to resign (with no obvious successor as Chancellor) if the changes were blocked since they were so vital to his government, he received an inner-party 80% vote of approval as well as a 90% approval from his coalition partner, the Greens. (Schröder had won the 2002 federal election with, among other things, the promise not to cut into the social security system.) In a reaction to the policies declared and the measures taken, about 100,000 members of Schröder's SPD left the party but the more prominent left-wing politicians stayed on. Although the changes eventually got through, after devastating opinion polls Gerhard Schröder resigned as party chairman - not as Chancellor - in February 2004 to give way to the more popular Franz Müntefering. The Christian Democratic Union (CDU - Christlich-Demokratische Union) is a political party in Germany, founded after World War II by Konrad Adenauer, among others. ... Categories: Politics stubs | Liberal related stubs | German political parties | Liberal parties ... Party symbol of Bündnis 90/Die Grünen Bündnis 90/Die Grünen (literally: Alliance 90/The Greens), the German Green Party, is a political party in Germany whose regional predecessors were founded in the late 1970s as part of the new social movements. ... The Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD – Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands) is the second oldest political party of Germany still in existence and also one of the oldest and largest in the world, celebrating its 140th anniversary in 2003. ... 2004 is a leap year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Franz Müntefering (born January 16, 1940) is a German politician and chairman of the Social Democratic Party (SPD), one of the two largest national parties in modern times. ...

This development left the PDS (with only 2 out of the 603 members of the federal parliament) as the only outspoken opponent to the Agenda 2010 policies but their course is somewhat inconsistent. In the regional Länder of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and Berlin, where there are SPD-PDS-coalistions, PDS ministers are actively implementing the Agenda laws. For the PDS of India, see Party of Democratic Socialism (India). ... Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania (German: Mecklenburg-Vorpommern) is a Bundesland (federal state) in northern Germany. ...  Berlin? (pronounced: , German ) is the capital of Germany and its largest city, with 3,426,000 inhabitants (as of January 2005); down from 4. ...

The German Trade Union Federation (DGB), the most influential group outside parliament and historically interwoven with the SPD, massively stepped up their discourse against Agenda 2010, especially prior to the Hartz IV law in July 2004, but the rumble subsided quickly after a summit meeting with Schröder in August 2004. The trade unions suffered from a lot of attrition in that process as their members defected in droves either because the unions' attitude was perceived as too lenient or as too strongly opposed. There were no strikes against Agenda 2010 as the German constitution (Grundgesetz) prohibits politically motivated strikes, but some demonstrations at least were organised and supported by the unions. The biggest demonstrations, held in Cologne, Berlin and Stuttgart on April 3rd, 2004 brought together some 500,000 people. The German Confederation of Trade Unions (Deutscher Gewerkschaftsbund, DGB) is an umbrella organisation (sometimes known as a national trade union center) for eight German trade unions, in total representing more than 7 million people (Dec 31, 2004). ... The Hartz concept is the name given to the recommendations resulting from a commission on reforms to the German labour market in 2002. ... The Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany (German: Grundgesetz für die Bundesrepublik Deutschland) is the constitution of modern Germany. ... Cologne skyline at night. ...  Berlin? (pronounced: , German ) is the capital of Germany and its largest city, with 3,426,000 inhabitants (as of January 2005); down from 4. ... Stuttgart is a city located in southern Germany, it is the capital of the state of Baden-Württemberg, and has a population of approximately 600,000 as of June 2004. ... April 3 is the 93rd day of the year (94th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar, with 272 days remaining. ... 2004 is a leap year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

The German mass media (TV and radio stations, newspapers and magazines alike) in the majority welcomed the changes as "overdue"; there were very few critical comments. Since the media and journalists themselves suffer a lot from unemployment and low wages, and since many newspapers only just avoided bankruptcy after the new economy and media crash following the stock crash in 2000, it is possible that their independence has been undercut by threats from their industrial advertising partners. There has generally been a consistent trend toward more neoliberal positions in German media in the past few years, starting in the 1990s. 2000 is a leap year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

In December 2003, the Bundesrat, dominated by the opposition CDU party, blocked some of the reforms on political grounds until several compromises were reached, many of which put a particularly painful twist - for those affected, for example the unemployed or the ill - on the measures taken. The Bundesrat, German for Federal Council, is a political institution in several countries: Bundesrat of Austria (legislative) Bundesrat of Germany (legislative) Bundesrat of Switzerland: the Swiss Federal Council (executive) This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists other pages that might otherwise share the same title. ... This article needs cleanup. ...

Dissatisfaction with Agenda 2010, and in particular with Hartz IV, lead to thousands of people protesting in the streets of Berlin, Leipzig and other big cities particularly in eastern, but also western Germany over the summer of 2004 (see Monday demonstrations). The Hartz concept is the name given to the recommendations resulting from a commission on reforms to the German labour market in 2002. ...  Berlin? (pronounced: , German ) is the capital of Germany and its largest city, with 3,426,000 inhabitants (as of January 2005); down from 4. ... Map of Germany showing Leipzig Leipzig [ˈlaiptsɪç] (Polish; Sorbian/Lusatian: Lipsk) is the largest city in the federal state (Bundesland) of Saxony in Germany. ... Monday Demonstrations 1989 Monday demonstration in Leipzig The Monday demonstrations started in 1989 in the Eastern German city of Leipzig after prayers for peace in the Nikolai Church with parson Christian Führer. ...

Dissent with the Agenda 2010 has also promoted the foundation of a new political party, the Labor and Social Justice Party (WASG) by long-term SPD members and union activists. The WASG is squarely against the measures taken in the Agenda 2010 process and ran in the 2005 North Rhine-Westphalia state election, where it gained 2.2% of the votes, against what it considers "the neoliberal consensus" displayed by the governing centre-left political parties and the more conservative opposition alike. The Labor and Social Justice Party (German: Arbeit & soziale Gerechtigkeit – Die Wahlalternative or WASG) is a new German political party. ... 2005 is a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar and is the current year. ... North Rhine-Westphalia (German: Nordrhein-Westfalen) is the largest in population (though only fourth in area) among Germanys 16 federal states. ... The term neoliberalism is used to describe a political-economic philosophy that had major implications for government policies beginning in the 1970s – and increasingly prominent since 1980 – that de-emphasizes or rejects positive government intervention in the economy, focusing instead on achieving progress and even social justice by encouraging free...

Consequences

So far, the Agenda 2010 has lived up to Schröder's expectations: while average real wages were cut in 2004 in the second straight year and continue to fall, industrial profits of listed companies have been soaring to new record levels. Unfortunately, those companies are not only failing to hire new workers from the ranks of the unemployed, but they are also continuing to shed workers in order to boost profits further, and invest them in low-wage countries. While overall economic growth remained feeble at 1.6% in 2004, Germany's unemployment figure reached a new record high of over 5.2 million in February 2005. Economic growth is dramatically hampered by an ever-weakening domestic demand. Some political scientists liken Schröder's politics with the deflationary politics pursued by Chancellor Brüning in the early 1930s which led to record unemployment in the Weimar republic, and ultimately the rise of Hitler. In economics, deflation is a decrease in the general price level, or a rise in the purchasing power of money with respect to a large class of goods or services. ... The period of German history from 1919 to 1933 is known as the Weimar Republic (Pronounced Vye-Mar, and in German it is known as the Weimarer Republik). It is named after the city of Weimar, where a national assembly convened to produce a new constitution after the German monarchy... Adolf Hitler Adolf Hitler (April 20, 1889 – April 30, 1945, standard German pronunciation in the IPA) was the Führer (leader) of the National Socialist German Workers Party (Nazi Party) and of Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945. ...

It had been planned to cut the ancillary labour costs financing the social security system in order to stimulate hiring; these could not be cut, and instead, the workers now additionally have to pay some parts of their social security contibutions out of their own pockets. The number of people who cannot afford proper health insurance, until now almost negligible, is sure to rise.

Economic inequality in Germany has risen to unprecedented levels in the past years, with 13.5% of Germans or 11 million (2004 figure) officially living below the poverty line. (1 in 10 children and 1 in 5 young people are said to live in poverty.) Due to the Agenda 2010, especially the Hartz IV law, the number of poor Germans and the number of homeless people is expected to rise further, and it is feared that inequality will grow strongly. Renate Schmidt from the German government re-defined in February 2005 that "poverty is not only depending on money".

In the Länder elections in 2004, electoral turnout fell to unprecendeted lows (sometimes just above 50%), and some elections produced unpleasant results like the 9.2% (and parliamentary seats) won by the neo-fascist NPD in the election in Saxony, which are widely seen as a protest vote to the consequences of the Agenda 2010 politics. In the 2004 elections to the EU parliament, the SPD reached an all-time postwar national election low of only 21% of the votes. Generally, mistrust against politics, and politicians, has been growing strongly in Germany. Germany is a federation of 16 states called Länder (singular Land, which may be translated as country) or unofficially Bundesländer (singular Bundesland, German federal state). ... The National Democratic Party (German: Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands, NPD) is a far right political party in Germany that was founded in the early 1960s as a successor to the German Empire Party: (German: Deutsche Reichspartei, DRP). ... With an area of 18,413 km² and a population of 4. ...

The SPD lost by a wide margin in the 2005 regional election in its "heartland" of North-Rhine Westphalia; the regional government was replaced by a CDU-FDP coalition. The SPD losses were widely attributed to the voters' discontent with the Agenda 2010 reforms as workers and unemployed people defected from the SPD in droves. As a consequence, Chancellor Schröder admitted defeat and called for an early general election in the autumn of 2005 (one year ahead of schedule).

See also

• Politics of Germany
• Demographics of Germany
• Labour and Social Justice Party

The Federal Republic of Germany (in German: Bundesrepublik Deutschland) is a federal representative democracy. ... The population of Germany, currently numbering over 80 million, is primarily of German nationality. ... The Labor and Social Justice Party (German: Arbeit & soziale Gerechtigkeit – Die Wahlalternative or WASG) is a new German political party. ...

External links

• Descriptions of Agenda 2010 from the German Embassy in Britain, in English
• German government site on Agenda 2010, in German and English