After a brief flirtation with revolutionary communism at university, by 1980 Mr Kretschmann had found his voice on the moderate “Realo” wing of the newly formed German Green Party. For years he nourished a small but growing audience for his message, articulated in the state legislature, that sustainability and other green topics ought to be combined with innovation and wealth creation.
It is a potent combination. Mr Kretschmann has at times led national popularity polls, despite having no ambitions beyond his home state . Two-thirds ofvoters in the state say they would vote for him directly given the chance. His popularity has inspired a mild personality cult.
Too close, for some. Mr Kretschmann’s commitment to yanking his state’s sometimes-dozy carmakers into the 21st century is genuine. Fearing that Baden-Württemberg could face a fate like Detroit’s, he has chivvied carmakers to confront challenges, such as the switch to electric cars, via a seven-year “strategic dialogue” started in 2017. But results are thin.
Over the years Mr Kretschmann has clashed with his party on everything from phasing out combustion engines to deporting failed asylum-seekers. For left-leaning Greens in other states, the party’s success in Baden-Württemberg can seem a mixed blessing: why seek office only to ape the conservatives? Mr Kretschmann replies that power is useless if you leave half of society behind. And as the only Green in charge of a state, he carries outsized weight in Germany’s federal system.
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