Friedrich Merz is Germany’s new chancellor — head of government in Europe’s largest economy, but likely also setting the direction for the EU as a whole. Leader of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), Merz’s campaign for the federal election this February 23 was marked by sharp conservative rhetoric and promises of market‑driven reforms. Yet, falling well short of a majority, he immediately turned toward the familiar terrain of negotiating a “grand coalition” with the center‑left Social Democratic Party (SPD).

Merz thus sought the very alliance that he has always denounced. But who is he, and what can be expected from a chancellor who campaigned as a hard-liner but now faces the same compromises that defined Angela Merkel’s rein? To answer this, it helps to look back three years.

Back then, in a quiet dining room of a Berlin hotel, a group of leading German conservatives gathered for what was publicly described as a farewell dinner for Volker Bouffier, then prime minister of the state of Hesse. Sitting at the table were familiar faces from the CDU. As journalist Sara Sievert recounts in her biography of Merz, Der Unvermeidbare (“The Inevitable”), the real purpose of the evening was more strategic than sentimental. With Merkel’s long chancellorship nearing its end — and her chosen successors, Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer and Armin Laschet, failing to secure public confidence — the CDU elite were searching for a new direction.