German Business Wants Foreign Investors Out

Members of Germany’s upper crust are upset.

Parliament researchers for Germany’s ruling Social Democratic Party prepared a list of foreign companies they claim have “plundered German assets, laid off workers, or been just plain greedy” (New York Times, May 3). Researchers essentially came up with a list of foreign investors to blame for some of Germany’s economic woes. While fears of losing German jobs overseas are growing, so too is the need for scapegoats.

These researchers threw several American and British firms onto their list, even including those who rescued German companies from going belly-up and created new jobs for Germans. The sdp’s chairman, Franz Muntefering, said these foreign investors “fall upon companies like locusts, devour them and move on.”

The ironic part of the matter is that German investors do the same in other countries, including America and Britain. German corporations have aggressively reached out internationally, gobbling up strategic industries including power, gas, water, telecommunications and media enterprises in Europe and elsewhere.

In other words, the Social Democratic Party has a flagrant double standard. Labeling foreign investors in German companies as “parasites” for engaging in what society generally considers normal business practices only highlights the aggressiveness of its own approach, while at the same time exhibiting Germany’s rising xenophobic tendencies.

We don’t want to make too much of this, but it is at least worth mentioning the history of such thinking within Germany: Seventy years ago, when the Germans experienced major economic and unemployment problems, they were also quick to blame foreign investors, namely the Jews.