Friedrich Merz is a remarkably unpopular chancellor of Germany. According to recent polling, less than a quarter of Germans have a positive opinion of him — and those numbers are dwindling fast. That shouldn’t surprise anyone, least of all Merz. He came to power less than a year ago on a manifesto promising "Political Change for Germany.” Since then, he’s avoided tackling crucial reforms. If he thinks that’s playing it safe, he’s mistaken. Germans voted for change and expect him to deliver.

Voters have known Merz a long time. He’d never held a Cabinet position before becoming chancellor, but he was a vocal conservative politician with a reputation for hotheadedness. He represented a counteroffer to a cautious center-left political mainstream. His public role was that of ex-Chancellor Angela Merkel’s archrival within the conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU), criticizing her on issues such as asylum and energy policy. When people wanted change after 16 years of Merkel and three years of her "continuity” successor, Olaf Scholz, Merz seemed the man of the hour.

Immediately after becoming chancellor last year, he looked set fair. Surveys in June 2025 indicated that most Germans were satisfied with his work and he was the fourth most popular politician in the rankings, outdone only by three members of his own Cabinet. Since then, Merz’s fall in the electorate’s estimation has been steep and fast. In one recent poll, he was as unpopular as Scholz, who’d held the negative record since such polling began in the 1990s. The far-right Alternative fur Deutschland (AfD), which was 8 percentage points behind Merz’s conservatives in last year’s election, is now neck-and-neck.

© The Japan Times