BERLIN — Even Angela Merkel, the usually unruffled veteran of European crises after almost 11 years as chancellor of Germany, had to admit it last week: “The world finds itself in a critical condition,” she said, and there is no point “in painting anything rosier than it is.”
The outlook for Ms. Merkel is not especially rosy, either.
After years of broad and deep support at home, bolstering her as she grew to become the Continent’s most powerful leader, she is heading toward national elections next year more politically vulnerable than at any time since her early days in office, with implications that extend far beyond Germany’s borders.
When she arrives in Slovakia on Friday for a summit meeting of leaders from 27 European Union nations — all save Britain, which voted in June to leave the bloc — her ability to navigate her troubles at home will hang over the gathering.
Since Britain’s decision, other European governments have done little to respond to the surge in populism and nationalism across the Continent or to reassure their citizens that the European Union can be a force for good in their lives.
With Ms. Merkel’s attention split between strengthening her domestic position and addressing Europe’s woes, the task of developing a united and effective response could become that much harder.
Her continued defense of her decision to admit more than a million migrants to Germany last year has left her increasingly isolated from other leaders coping with anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim sentiment in their electorates, especially after terrorist attacks.
With growth across the eurozone still “tilted to the down side,” as the European Central Bank chief, Mario Draghi, said on Thursday, Ms. Merkel’s new vulnerability may undercut Germany’s ability to impose its austerity-based economic policy on the bloc and fuel calls for more government spending from countries still struggling with high unemployment and slow growth.
And an inward turn by Germany as it debates its response to the migration crisis and holds elections in a year’s time could create a further leadership void in Europe at a critical moment.
Already, President François Hollande of France is all but a lame duck, deeply unpopular and a long shot for re-election next year, and Prime Minister Matteo Renzi of Italy remains politically fragile, struggling to push through constitutional changes and to assert himself on the European stage.
And the rift between the more pluralistic nations of Western Europe and governments in Central and Eastern Europe, some of which are increasingly authoritarian, has heightened the challenge of keeping the Continent knit tightly together.
In the middle of all this, as ever, is Ms. Merkel, whose political peril in Germany remains hard to judge — especially, her supporters emphasize, while the country’s economy remains relatively strong.
But she is under increased attack, from within her own center-right bloc and from a resurgent far-right, over her immigration policy. And while German officials remain aghast at Britain’s lack of a plan for disengaging from the European Union, she has not offered a well-articulated vision for how to hold the bloc together.
Hostile commentators and critics in her own bloc could hardly contain their glee at her new vulnerability after the far-right, anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany party pushed Ms. Merkel’s conservatives intothird place in an election in the impoverished and sparsely populated northeastern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern on Sept. 4.
It was the first time Ms. Merkel’s bloc of Christian Democrats and their Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union, had been overtaken on the right in any such election in modern Germany. That the result came a year to the day after she threw open the country’s borders to admit migrants trapped in Hungary, and that it occurred in her political home state, which shelters very few refugees, accentuated the loss.
“Angela Merkel is wobbling,” said Wolfram Weimer of the news channel N-TV. “Her aura of winner is destroyed, and her image as farseeing, clever strategist of power along with it.”
Talk of the twilight of Ms. Merkel’s time in office may be exaggerated, said Tina Hildebrandt of the influential weekly Die Zeit, “but that so much is open is spectacular enough.”
“Merkel’s loss of reputation is immense,” Ms. Hildebrandt added. “Her situation almost reminds us of the beginning of her career,” when the distinctly un-chic Ms. Merkel, a physicist from the Communist East, was much criticized for her style — and much underestimated in her ability and will to get to the top.
The chancellor showed that grit on Wednesday with a spirited speech to Parliament, defending her policy at home and the controversial pact she negotiated with Turkey to stop Middle Eastern migrants from crossing to Greece and into Europe.
Since that agreement was signed, she said, almost no migrants have drowned in the Aegean Sea, compared with hundreds in the two months before.
“In that situation, you can’t just loon on,” said Ms. Merkel, the daughter of a Lutheran pastor. “You must work with another country and find a way forward.”
Ms. Merkel has taken responsibility for the election loss on Sept. 4 and doubled down on her refusal to emulate neighboring Austria by limiting the number of asylum seekers who can come each year. (Austria, her partner last year in admitting the migrants, may elect a far-right politician as president this year.)
But as politicians scramble ahead of German national elections next fall, that limit on immigration is becoming a litmus test for her conservative Bavarian sister party, and even for the center-left Social Democrats, with whom Ms. Merkel governs nationally in a coalition.
Ms. Merkel has met almost every European leader ahead of the summit meeting in Bratislava, where the 27 nations are expected to agree on stronger security measures and try again to stimulate economic growth and jobs for the young.
Daniela Schwarzer, a senior director of the German Marshall Fund in Berlin, said she saw the chancellor as still very much in charge.
“I would not say that she has lost control, or the capacity to lead Germany,” Ms. Schwarzer said. “But she will have to take into account that there are vocal people in populist parties and critical voices in her own camp.”
The far-right Alternative for Germany party now has seats in nine of the country’s 16 state legislatures and seems likely to win more when the city-state of Berlin votes on Sunday.
The chancellor might turn with relief to the next item on her calendar: a Sept. 19 summit meeting at the United Nations, hosted with President Obama, on the global crisis of up to 60 million migrants, many of them in Africa.
Ms. Merkel wants vastly more aid and action to prevent sub-Saharans from surging through Niger and Mali to Libya and then to Europe.
Mr. Obama may be more sympathetic to her challenges than many of Ms. Merkel’s compatriots.
“Perhaps because she once lived behind a wall herself,” Mr. Obama said on a visit to Germany in April, “Angela understands the aspirations of those who’ve been denied their freedom and who seek a better life.”
He added, “I know the politics around this issue can be difficult in all of our countries.”
