VW scandal won't hurt Germany

Germany has been riding high in global public perception long before the country's decision to take in tens of thousands of Syrian refugees earned it international applause recently. It features as the world's most positively viewed country for two years running in the BBC's annual Country Ratings Poll. It also knocked off the US from its pole position in the most recent Anholt-GfK Nation Brands which ranks 50 nations according to global perceptions of each country.

While VW's image may suffer after the company admitted to rigging its vehicles to pass US air pollution tests, Germany's image won't, said Simon Anholt, founder and publisher of the Anholt-GfK Roper Nation Brands Index.

German image part of global culture

"I think that the idea that Germany is a friend to the environment firstly, and secondly, the idea that Germans make the rules and don't break the rules, are two of the top 50 articles of faith of humanity," he said. "It is part of the global culture."

"Germany is perceived as a leader in environmental policies and that also includes its car sector," said Michael Mehling, executive director of the Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "I fear that it will influence the perception of German industry, which does have a very high standing around the world and in the United States."

"Germany is such a success story," echoed Nancy Snow, a US branding expert based in Tokyo who worries that Volkswagen's emissions disaster will reflect negatively on the country ,which, she said, is often held up as a role model in Japan.

No change in perception

But there is little danger that the current scandal and any potential image damage for VW will automatically spread beyond the Wolfsburg-based car manufacturer, said Anholt. People in the US and elsewhere, he added, are able to differentiate between the actions and the image of one company and its home country. That is why instead of merging Volkswagen with its country of origin, people will tend to contrast them and consider VW's deeds antithetical to Germany's image as a green country full of law-abiding citizens.

A single scandal – even a large one like VW's emissions cheating fiasco in the US – simply is not enough to damage Germany's positive global image. In fact it may even strengthen it.

Bolster Germany's image

"I think it will rather reinforce the image of Germany rather than destroy it," said Anholt. "The image of Germany like the image of any other highly admired nation is a gigantic cultural edifice."

In recent years Toyota, Japan's biggest automaker and VW's main global rival, suffered a similar public image disaster when it was forced to issue several recalls involving millions of cars in the US due to safety problems.

"It didn't have any impact on the image of Japan at all," said Anholt. "I have been measuring the image of countries for 12 years with a very very large annual poll and when things like this happen they do not affect the image of the country."

It took Germany decades to slowly earn its excellent global reputation, noted Anholt. Shattering such a solidly earned image quickly is practically impossible, he added - unless it is discovered that every single German car manufacturer has been cheating on emissions and no other nationality has.