Gerhard Schröder, 2002 News

German politician, was reelected chancellor by a razor-thin margin in September, defeating conservative businessman Edmund Stoiber. Schröder, who early on trailed Stoiber in the polls, was buoyed in the weeks leading up to the election by his deft handling of Germany's catastrophic floods and his staunch opposition to any preemptive attack on Iraq by the United States. Schröder's Social Democrats and the Greens, headed by Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer, hung on to a majority of parliament, but only by nine seats.