Germany's first female chancellor: Who is Angela Merkel?

Although known as Angela Merkel, her real name was Angela Dorothea Kasner. She was born on July 17, 1954, in Hamburg, West Germany. She trained as a physicist. She entered politics after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. She rose to the presidency of the Christian Democratic Union party. After the 2005 national elections, she became Germany's first female chancellor and one of the leading figures of the European Union.

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German stateswoman and chancellor Angela Merkel was born Angela Dorothea Kasner on July 17, 1954, in Hamburg, Germany. She was the youngest of a sister named Irene and a brother named Marcus. The daughter of a Lutheran pastor and teacher who moved her family east to pursue her theology studies, Merkel grew up in the countryside north of Berlin, then East Germany (German Democratic Republic).

Living in East Germany made him part of the socialist Free German Youth movement. She became a district board representative through the organization at a young age and demonstrated her leadership skills as the secretary of Agitprop, the youth movement's agitation, and a propaganda campaign. But she made it clear by not participating in the secular Jugendweihe, a very popular adulthood rite of passage in East Germany.

The family, led by the priest father, held "sympathetic" views towards East Germany's communist regime because they were given freedoms not given to Christian priests. Just like getting from West Germany to East Germany easily and having two cars.

He studied physics at the University of Leipzig, earned a Ph.D. in 1978, and later worked as a chemist at the Central Institute of Physical Chemistry, Academy of Sciences from 1978 to 1990. Angela Kasner married physicist Ulrich Merkel in 1977, but the marriage ended in divorce in 1982. Now that she was well-known in politics, she kept her ex-husband's surname and in 1998 married Joachim Sauer, a Berlin-based chemistry professor, to whom she has been married ever since.

After the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, Merkel joined the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) political party. She was soon appointed to Helmut Kohl's cabinet as minister of women and youth and later served as minister of environment and nuclear safety. Following Kohl's defeat in the 1998 general election, she was elected general secretary of the CDU. Merkel became party leader in 2000 but lost the CDU's candidacy for chancellor in 2002 to Edmund Stoiber.

In the 2005 elections, she narrowly defeated Chancellor Gerhard Schröder by just three seats. The CDU then signed a coalition agreement with the Social Democrats (SPD), and Merkel was declared Germany's first female chancellor. Angela Merkel was the first East German citizen to lead a reunified Germany and the first woman to rule Germany since it became the modern nation-state in 1871. She was re-elected in 2009 and started her second term.

Angela Merkel made headlines in October 2013, accusing the US National Security Agency of tapping her cell phone. She denounced the United States for this breach of privacy at a summit attended by European leaders. "Spying among friends is never acceptable," she said. Shortly after that, she was sworn in for a third term in December 2013.

Angela Merkel was re-elected as chancellor for the fourth time in September 2017. Although the CDU party holds the majority in the Bundestag, the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party received 13 percent of the vote. It was the third largest group in parliament after the CDU and SPD. It was the first time since 1961 that a far-right party had entered the Bundestag.

"We expected a better result, that's clear," Merkel said after the election. "The good thing is that we will definitely lead the next government," Merkel said that she would listen to the problems and concerns of AfD supporters and underlined that she would do this with a healthy policy. Merkel topped Forbes's list of the world's most powerful women for the seventh time in a row in 2017 and 12 times overall, despite the September election showing her authority waning.

But other problems arose in mid-November as attempts to form a new governing coalition collapsed. After weeks of negotiations, the Free Democratic Party (FDP) abruptly withdrew from meeting with the CDU and the Greens due to differences of opinion on immigration and other policies. This rejection was another blow for Merkel, but she said her party "will continue to take responsibility for this country even in such a difficult situation".

In March 2018, the Social Democratic Party (SPD) decided to renew its coalition with the CDU, allowing Merkel to finally start a fourth term. Although the talks between the parties slowed down over time, the stalemate eased with the resignation of SPD leader Martin Schulz in February.

That summer, Merkel again went through a critical period, facing the ultimatum from Horst Seehofer, her own interior minister and leader of the Bavarian Christian Social Union. Seehofer threatened Merkel to resign because she did not agree to reject migrants seeking asylum in the European Union. However, they agreed in early July and it was decided to establish transit centers on the Austrian border. Asylum seekers were thus directed to responsible countries. "How we deal with the migrant problem will decide whether Europe will continue to exist in the future," Merkel said.

In October 2018, Merkel announced that she planned to step down as head of the CDU at the end of the year and would not seek re-election as chancellor in 2021. Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer later took over the leadership of the CDU and it was thought that Merkel would fill her place. However, Kramp-Karrenbauer's surprise resignation in February 2020 created uncertainty over who would take over as chancellor.

December 2021

Known as Germany's 'eternal chancellor', Angela Merkel left her job as chancellor for 16 years voluntarily. Olaf Scholz, the leader of the Social Democratic Party, who won the country's elections in September, became the new chancellor.