A model in crisis: Germans head to polls amid economic downturn

The economy is a top concern for voters in Germany as they go to the polls on Sunday to elect a new government. The country has seen two consecutive years of economic contraction and this stagnation could very well continue for a third year. Its post-Covid recovery was completely stunted by Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and the energy crisis that followed, laying bare Berlin’s deep dependence on Moscow’s oil and gas. Now the return of Donald Trump as US president is further muddying the prospects for growth. To better understand how Germany got here and how it can dig itself out of this hole, Charles Pellegrin talks to Shahin Vallée, senior research fellow at the German Council on Foreign Relations.