At the same time, the new generation’s stance is different from the identity politics of many young American political activists; if anything, these young Germans agree with Mark Lilla’s argument that liberalism has slipped “into a moral panic about racial, gender and sexual identity” that prevents it “from becoming a unifying force capable of governing.” Instead, they long for a “unifying” policy approach that focuses on the economic grievances of the masses — or their alleged need for cultural homogeneity.

After decades of postmodern politics, they long for grand narratives, on both sides. Call it solidarity in partisanship — a longing for clear lines that cut across policy issues, rather than a wet blanket of consensus that covers over sociopolitical fractures.

But is it what voters want, too?

It is conventional wisdom that the consensus politics of Ms. Merkel, Mr. Schulz and their generational peers strengthened the political fringes, especially the far right. That’s not entirely true, though: Polls show that Germans, even if they’re tired of Ms. Merkel, still value consensus.

“Germans are generally oriented toward compromise, not polarization,” said Andrea Wolf, a board member of Forschungsgruppe Wahlen, a major German pollster.

Though Ms. Merkel’s poll numbers dipped during the refugee crisis, they have rebounded. “I doubt that the policy approach of the younger generation of policymakers is what voters really want,” Ms. Wolf said. “It’s possibly rather just what they want.”

Real politics always consists of bullet points. You want to lift up the lower middle classes? You have to pass tax relief, restructure social security contributions, bolster the education budget — which is what the next grand coalition will vow to do, if the negotiations are successful.

The challenge for German politicians, moving forward, will be to come up with a narrative big enough to create a sense of direction, of being based on values more fundamental than raising the gross domestic product a few percentage points, but avoiding the sort of utopian visions that German voters rightly distrust.

If they succeed, they could set free a new era of political energy. If they fail, we could see a dark turn toward the sort of fractured, incoherent politics haunting the rest of the world, full of holes that the far right can move through. There’s a trap, however. In raging against the slow and boring politics of compromise, the members of the new generation are joining the very populist chant they are setting out to defeat.