At a moment of unnerving American nativism, Russia’s international subversion of democracy, Chinese expansionism, and European uncertainty driven by a divided Britain’s unhappiness, anything that represents a continuum of live-and-let-live liberal democracy is to be welcomed.

The horrors of Nazism and a consistently robust economy have inoculated the country from extremism, but undercurrents of discontent should not be ignored, says Michael Bröning

At a moment when one political office after another falls to, or seems under threat from, a resurgent and harder right, the announcement that the German chancellor Angela Merkel is to seek a fourth term must be welcome.