Petra Pinzler
Petra Pinzler is a journalist with the German weekly Die Zeit based in the Berlin office. She writes on the EU, foreign policy as well as economic affairs and development. From 2002-2007 she was the paper’s European Correspondent based in Brussels.
Updated: 31 October 2011
It dictates the agenda of EU summits, defines the rules, makes an entire continent wait, and always ends up imposing its will. With the euro crisis Germany finds itself alone at the head of the Union. But is it up to this new role? 
To save the eurozone, do as the Germans. Much repeated by Angela Merkel, this message is getting through to her partners. But for the crisis-ridden EU, such is the price to pay, argues Die Zeit. 
German procedure for the elaboration of European policy is already extremely complex, and a recent decision by the country's constitutional court requiring increased participation by the German parliament will certainly not make it any simpler. But how is Germany to manage without a Ministry of European Affairs? wonders Die Zeit.