Helmut Kohl’s Quest for Normality

Helmut Kohl’s legacy as the architect of German unification in 1990 has long entered the proverbial history books as a masterpiece of contemporary realpolitik, of tactical skill and some degree of opportunism. His career is often portrayed as the result of an uncompromising quest for political power and control of personal relationships, both political and private. One of the common assumptions is that Kohl never pursued any identifiable ideological goals (not least because he always portrayed himself as the personified antidote to ideological arguments) and, instead, relied on instinct and the subordination of ideas to the consolidation of his personal rule. During his time in office, few would have thought it worthwhile to search for, or even discuss, his ‘political philosophy’; too dull and uninspiring, he came across for the intellectuals of his generation as a provincial ‘black giant’ of evidently limited talents and vocabulary when trying to formulate any interesting ideas. Shortly after Kohl replaced Helmut Schmidt as chancellor by way of a parliamentary revirement of coalition governments in 1982, the latter not only took on the editorship of the leading German weekly Die Zeit, which in those days still played an important role at the centre of current political and intellectual debates, but also initiated a private debating society on political, scientific and philosophical issues, and even appeared on stage as a dilettante pianist performing works of Bach and Mozart alongside eminent classical musicians. The implicit comment on his successor’s intellectual capacities was impossible to ignore

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