Leaders Revealed by Covid-19: Ursula von der Leyen, or the Reaffirmation of a European Ambition

Elegant, reserved, small in stature, more hardworking than brilliant, multi-lingual, but lacking exceptional charisma, Ursula von der Leyen does not resemble the classic image of a political "iron lady," like Margaret Thatcher, or even that of a more maternal figure, like Angela Merkel.

In her already lengthy career, the strengths of the President of the European Commission have also often been perceived as weaknesses: as the daughter of a titan of German politics, educated in both Brussels and the United Kingdom, a medical doctor by training, promoted within the CDU by Merkel herself, von der Leyen has led a privileged life. The apparent ease with which she has entered key positions partly explains the failure - relatively, of course - of her political career in Germany. Once considered the most likely successor to the Chancellor, she fell from grace because of her failure in the role of Minister of Defence, a portfolio that is certainly very risky for any politician in the Federal Republic.

She was dropped into Brussels somewhat by chance, and against the wishes of her own party, because of President Macron’s refusal to ratify the nomination of Manfred Weber of the EPP (European People’s Party) – the "Spitzenkandidat" – as a future President of the European Commission. Another center-right German, like Weber, was needed, but one who would better suit France’s political orientation; the Franco-German compromise settled on von der Leyen, who in her duties as Defense Minister demonstrated an openness with respect to the views of Paris. Her arrival in Brussels in the midst of this situation was challenging; she only narrowly won the nomination of the European Parliament after having worked so hard on forming the College of Commissioners. Her ability to stamp her authority on the Brussels bubble was immediately called into question.

Yet Ursula von der Leyen has certainly been able to put herself at the forefront of the "European recovery" that is necessitated by the coronavirus crisis. Up against this hurdle, she seemed well aware of the EU’s mistakes and determined to set out a new path for Europe with the recovery plan. Will her personality become more assertive? The issue is important at a time when the Commission – after the admittedly much better years – has regained a strategic role in the European project. Hence the importance of this detailed political portrait of the President of the Commission, so tested by the Covid-19 crisis, written by Alexandre Robinet-Borgomano, the Head of our Europe Program.

Michel Duclos, Special geopolitics advisor, Editor in Chief of this series

 
"For some time, we’ve been looking into the abyss...." Interviewed by the German Press Agency DPA on March 28, 2020, the European Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen, acknowledged how the coronavirus pandemic had put the European Union in a critical situation. As Europe became the pandemic’s epicenter, the closure of national borders and the uncoordinated strategies of European states to contain the spread of the virus meant that European institutions were relegated to the status of helpless onlookers.

For a period of time, and for the first time in its recent history, the European Union seemed on the verge of sinking into irrelevance. This was in stark contrast to the slogan adopted by the Commission a few months earlier, advocating for "a more ambitious Union." It also revealed the fragility of European integration and the inability of European decision-makers to act decisively in emergency situations.

Aware of her weaknesses and the mistakes she made in handling the crisis, while also alert to that specific moment in Europe, von der Leyen was able to transform the crisis into giving the European project a new dimension by developing a groundbreaking recovery plan and asserting new European powers. As she stated in her interview with the German Press Agency: "The crisis represents a great opportunity for Europe to reinvent itself."

A German and a woman

In a survey published in France at the beginning of March, 67% of the French population said they did not know – even when provided with her name – Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission President, although Forbes magazine had named her the fourth most powerful woman in the world in 2019. The first woman – and the first German since Walter Hallstein in 1958 – to serve as the President of the European Commission, von der Leyen is the perfect embodiment of the invisible power of Europe.

Before coming onto the European scene, she was a leading political figure in Germany. The only minister to serve continuously in Angela Merkel’s cabinet since she became Chancellor, Ursula von der Leyen was long considered the leading contender to succeed her in the Chancellery. As such, journalists Ulrike Demmer and Daniel Goffart entitled their biography of von der Leyen "The Reserve Chancellor," a book that reveals the atypical career of a woman who came into politics late and was able to modernize her party, the Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU). 

The daughter of Ernst Albrecht, a former Minister-President of Lower Saxony, she was sent to London to live in hiding in the late 1970s by her father, who feared she would become a target of the Red Army Faction (RAF), a far-left militant organization responsible for several terrorist attacks during the "Years of Lead." Returning to Hannover, she studied medicine and went to live with her husband in California for four years, staying home to raise their seven children, before entering politics, at the local level, in the late 1990s.