As the general elections in Germany draw nearer, Angela Merkel’s time as Chancellor, and thus an era of German EU policy-making, is coming to an end. A new German government will step onto the EU policy stage. This year’s “Actually European!?” study examines the expectations that citizens have of the next German government’s EU policy. Moreover, the long-term study, now in its third year, surveys what Germans perceive to be the country’s role within the EU.

Just under 100 days before the start of the German Presidency of the Council of the European Union, the Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung and Das Progressive Zentrum presented a study on the German populace’s expectations of the German Presidency of the Council of the European Union and how they perceive themselves as Europeans. Michael Roth, the German Foreign Office’s State Minister for Europe as well as Green Party Member of Parliament Franziska Brantner stood up for European solidarity in times of crisis. However, they each had a different assessment of the current state of affairs.