Contemporary Germany and the Nazi Legacy: Remembrance, Politics and the Dialectic of Normality (New Perspectives in German Studies)

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Contemporary Germany and the Nazi Legacy Remembrance, Politics and the Dialectic of Normality

Caroline Pearce

New Perspectives in German Studies General Editors: Michael Butler is Emeritus Professor of Modern German Literature at the University of Birmingham and Professor William E. Paterson OBE is Professor of European and German Politics at the University of Birmingham and Chairman of the German British Forum. Over the last twenty years the concept of German studies has undergone major transformation. The traditional mixture of language and literary studies, related very closely to the discipline as practised in German universities, has expanded to embrace history, politics, economics and cultural studies. The conventional boundaries between all these disciplines have become increasingly blurred, a process which has been accelerated markedly since German unification in 1989/90. New Perspectives in German Studies, developed in conjunction with the Institute for German Studies and the Department of German Studies at the University of Birmingham, has been designed to respond precisely to this trend of the interdisciplinary approach to the study of German and to cater for the growing interest in German in the context of European integration. The books in this series will focus on the modern period, from 1750 to the present day. Titles include: Matthew M.C. Allen THE VARIETIES OF CAPITALISM PARADIGM Explaining Germany’s Comparative Advantage? Peter Bleses and Martin Seeleib-Kaiser THE DUAL TRANSFORMATION OF THE GERMAN WELFARE STATE Michael Butler and Robert Evans (editors) THE CHALLENGE OF GERMAN CULTURE Essays Presented to Wilfried van der Will Michael Butler, Malcolm Pender and Joy Charnley (editors) THE MAKING OF MODERN SWITZERLAND 1848–1998 Paul Cooke and Andrew Plowman (editors) GERMAN WRITERS AND THE POLITICS OF CULTURE Dealing with the Stasi Beverly Crawford POWER AND GERMAN FOREIGN POLICY Embedded Hegemony in Europe Wolf-Dieter Eberwein and Karl Kaiser (editors) GERMANY’S NEW FOREIGN POLICY Decision-Making in an Interdependent World Karl Christian Führer and Corey Ross (editors) MASS MEDIA, CULTURE AND SOCIETY IN TWENTIETH-CENTURY GERMANY Axel Goodbody NATURE, TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURAL CHANGE IN TWENTIETH-CENTURY GERMAN LITERATURE The Challenge of Ecocriticism Jonathan Grix THE ROLE OF THE MASSES IN THE COLLAPSE OF THE GDR

Gunther Hellmann (editor) GERMANY’S EU POLICY IN ASYLUM AND DEFENCE De-Europeanization by Default? Dan Hough, Michael Koß and Jonathan Olsen THE LEFT PARTY IN CONTEMPORARY GERMAN POLITICS Margarete Kohlenbach WALTER BENJAMIN Self-Reference and Religiosity Charles Lees PARTY POLITICS IN GERMANY A Comparative Politics Approach Hanns W. Maull GERMANY’S UNCERTAIN POWER Foreign Policy of the Berlin Republic Alister Miskimmon GERMANY AND THE COMMON FOREIGN AND SECURITY POLICY OF THE EUROPEAN UNION Between Europeanization and National Adaptation Caroline Pearce CONTEMPORARY GERMANY AND THE NAZI LEGACY Remembrance, Politics and the Dialectic of Normality Christian Schweiger BRITAIN, GERMANY AND THE FUTURE OF THE EUROPEAN UNION James Sloam THE EUROPEAN POLICY OF THE GERMAN SOCIAL DEMOCRATS Interpreting a Changing World Ronald Speirs and John Breuilly (editors) GERMANY’S TWO UNIFICATIONS Anticipations, Experiences, Responses Henning Tewes GERMANY’S CIVILIAN POWER AND THE NEW EUROPE Enlarging Nato and the European Union Maiken Umbach GERMAN FEDERALISM Past, Present, Future Roger Woods GERMANY’S NEW RIGHT AS CULTURE AND POLITICS New Perspectives in German Studies Series Standing Order ISBN 0–333–92430–4 hardcover Series Standing Order ISBN 0–333–92434–7 paperback (outside North America only) You can receive future titles in this series as they are published by placing a standing order. Please contact your bookseller or, in case of difficulty, write to us at the address below with your name and address, the title of the series and one of the ISBNs quoted above. Customer Services Department, Macmillan Distribution Ltd, Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS, England

Contemporary Germany and the Nazi Legacy Remembrance, Politics and the Dialectic of Normality Caroline Pearce Department of Germanic Studies University of Sheffield, UK

© Caroline Pearce 2008 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London W1T 4LP. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. The author has asserted her right to be identiﬁed as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. First published 2008 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS and 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010 Companies and representatives throughout the world PALGRAVE MACMILLAN is the global academic imprint of the Palgrave Macmillan division of St. Martin’s Press, LLC and of Palgrave Macmillan Ltd. Macmillan® is a registered trademark in the United States, United Kingdom and other countries. Palgrave is a registered trademark in the European Union and other countries. ISBN 13: 978–0–230–51804–9 hardback ISBN 10: 0–230–51804–4 hardback This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental regulations of the country of origin. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. A catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. 10 17

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Printed and bound in Great Britain by Antony Rowe Ltd, Chippenham and Eastbourne

To my parents, my brother and Simon

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Contents

Acknowledgements

x

List of Abbreviations

xi

Office Holders and Commemorations in the Federal Republic of Germany Introduction Layout and structure

xiii 1 3

Chapter 1 German, European and Global Recollection of the Nazi Past Collective, individual and national memory narratives Collective memory and communities of memory Memory as conscience: individual memory reconstruction Germany as community of memory: national narratives The layering of recollection and interpretation National memory management in West Germany 1945–98 From communicative to cultural memory Recasting national memory narratives in post-war Europe Global memory narratives on the Holocaust The Americanisation of a German memory The Stockholm International Forum on the Holocaust The Holocaust as intellectual exercise Holocaust Memorial Day in Britain Anne Frank’s diary An end to the negative national memory narrative in Germany? Chapter 2 Schröder, Walser and the Dialectic of Normality The Berlin Republic: New government, new generation, neue Unbefangenheit? Living with the past The dialectic of normality The debate on Martin Walser’s Peace Prize speech Layers of interpretation: the spoken, written and researched speech The impact of the speech Walser versus Bubis versus Dohnanyi: a clash of communities of memory Irreconcilable differences vii

6 6 8 10 10 12 14 25 28 31 35 37 39 40 42 43 44 44 49 50 54 61 63 65 68

viii Contents

‘German lessons’ ‘Intellectual arson’? New critical discourse on the National Socialist legacy A shift to the right? Allegations of anti-semitism The overlap of past and present A critique of the Meinungssoldaten Normalisation or the dialectic of normality?

70 72 73 74 76 77 78

Chapter 3 Approaches to the Dialectic of Normality Leitverantwortung and Leidkultur Kosovo and the international dimensions of Leitverantwortung Leitverantwortung as a matter of image Leitverantwortung as imposed responsibility: compensation for former forced labourers Leitverantwortung and the campaign against the far right 9 November 2000: a public expression of Leitverantwortung Leitverantwortung in practice – pedagogical and political education initiatives ‘Active memory’ initiatives Initiatives against the far right: Gesichtzeigen Leidkultur and the ‘hysterical Republic’ The Leitkultur and Nationalstolz debates The Leitkultur debate Leitkultur as ‘moral cudgel’ The Nationalstolz debate Media reactions The political dimensions of Nationalstolz The ‘Patriotism Debate’ in the Bundestag

80 80 83 89

99 101 102 103 105 106 108 111 112 114 116

Chapter 4 The Holocaust Memorial in Berlin Cultural remembrance in post-war Germany Geschichtskultur A memorial concept for unified Germany: The Enquete-Kommission Berlin as topography of memory Setting the dialectic in stone: the Holocaust memorial in Berlin The history of the Holocaust memorial Marketing the memorial Beyond aesthetics: the memorial and Geschichtskultur Victimhood, guilt or pride? The memorial and Leidkultur The memorial as ‘experience’ Life beyond the Holocaust: the Jewish Museum A Jewish museum or a Holocaust museum?

119 119 123 125 127 129 132 140 141 146 148 151 154

91 94 97

Contents ix

The Jewish Museum and Leitverantwortung History from the perpetrator perspective: the Topography of Terror The planned redevelopment of the SS-Truppenlager in Oranienburg

155 157 161

Chapter 5 The ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’ An epilogue to the Nationalstolz debate The Finkelstein debate – a new layer of interpretation? The ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’ The Möllemann debate (Secondary) anti-semitism Breaking taboos Reversing the victim-perpetrator distinction Failed Vergangenheitsbewältigung? Political consequences Tod eines Kritikers: the second Martin Walser debate Parallels with the Möllemann debate A clash of Meinungssoldaten The debate on German victimhood A new German Sonderweg?

163 163 166 171 172 173 174 176 178 179 181 184 185 187 192

Chapter 6 Sixty Years On: Commemoration and a New Government The 60th anniversary of the end of World War Two The 2004 D-Day commemorations 27 January 2005: an international commemoration Counter-commemoration: the far right and German victimhood 8 May 2005: a public commemoration From Schröder to Merkel Foreign policy after Fischer A return to the 1950s? The Centre against Expulsions The East German past – a West German concern? The problems of memorialising the ‘double past’ New patriotism, old neuroses: Summer 2006

196 196 197 199 203 205 207 207 208 209 214 217 219

Conclusion

228

Notes

234

References

241

Index

254

Acknowledgements I would above all like to thank Wilfried van der Will for his support, advice and encouragement and his enthusiasm for my research. In addition, I am most grateful to Michael Butler for his invaluable comments and suggestions and his prompt responses to my queries concerning the manuscript. My sincere thanks also go to the Institute for German Studies at the University of Birmingham and the Department of Germanic Studies at the University of Sheffield. I would like to thank the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung and the Stiftung Luftbrückendank for enabling me to pursue a period of sustained research in Berlin. I am also grateful to the staff at the Grossbritannienzentrum in Berlin. During the course of my research for this book I have been fortunate to meet with representatives from memorial sites and organisations including the House of the Wannsee Conference, Sachsenhausen and Gesichtzeigen. I would like to thank them for their interest in my work and for providing me with new insights and materials. My thanks also go to the Otto-SuhrInstitut, the Zeitungsarchiv and the Topography of Terror in Berlin, as well as the German Historical Institute in London for enabling me to access relevant publications. I am also most grateful for the assistance I have received from Alison Howson and Gemma D’arcy Hughes at Palgrave and Shirley Tan, my copy editor. Finally, I wish to thank my parents and my brother for all their encouragement, and Simon for his patience, understanding and advice. April 2007

x

List of Abbreviations The following list gives the newspaper, magazine and television sources cited in the text. The abbreviations used are in parentheses. Arbeitsgemeinschaft der öffentlich-rechtlichen Rundfunkanstalten der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (ARD) Berliner Morgenpost (BM) Berliner Zeitung (BZ) Bild Bild am Sonntag (BAMS) Centre for European Reform (CER) Bulletin (CER) Das Parlament (DP) Der Spiegel (Spiegel) Der Spiegel Online (Spiegel Online) Der Tagesspiegel (Tagesspiegel) Deutsche Welle Die Sonntagszeitung (Sonntagszeitung) Die tageszeitung (taz) Die Welt (Welt) Die Zeit (Zeit) Die Zeit Online (Zeit Online) Donau Kurier (DK) Dresdner Neue Nachrichten (DNN) Financial Times Deutschland (FTD) Focus Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) Frankfurter Rundschau (FR) Handelsblatt Jerusalem Post Jungle Welt Konkret London Evening Standard (LES) Mannheimer Morgen (MM) Metro Netzzeitung Neue Zürcher Zeitung (NZZ) New York Review Spiegel Special Stern Süddeutsche Zeitung (SZ) xi

xii List of Abbreviations

Südwestrundfunk (SWR) The Daily Telegraph (Telegraph) The Economist (Economist) The Guardian (Guardian) The Independent (Independent) The Observer (Observer) The Scotsman (Scotsman) The Sunday Telegraph (Sunday Telegraph) The Sunday Times (Sunday Times) The Times (Times) Times Literary Supplement (TLS) Times 2 Welt am Sonntag (WAMS) Zitty Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen (ZDF)

Office Holders and Commemorations in the Federal Republic of Germany Chancellors of the Federal Republic 1949–63 1963–66 1966–69 1969–74 1974–82 1982–98 1998–2005 2005–

Konrad Adenauer (CDU) Ludwig Erhard (CDU) Kurt Georg Kiesinger (CDU) Willy Brandt (SPD) Helmut Schmidt (SPD) Helmut Kohl (CDU) Gerhard Schröder (SPD) Angela Merkel (CDU)

Presidents of the Federal Republic 1949–59 1959–69 1969–74 1974–79 1979–84 1984–94 1994–99 1999–2004 2004–

Theodor Heuss (FDP) Heinrich Lübke (CDU) Gustav Heinemann (FDP) Walter Scheel (FDP) Karl Carstens (CDU) Richard von Weizsäcker (CDU) Roman Herzog (CDU) Johannes Rau (SPD) Horst Köhler (CDU)

Commemorations Below is a list of the annual German commemorations related to the Nazi past that are mentioned in this book. 27 January: Tag des Gedenkens für die Opfer des Nationalsozialismus (Holocaust Memorial Day) Anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration and extermination camp by the Soviets on 27 January 1945. The commemoration was introduced in Germany in 1996 by President Roman Herzog and is now observed in a number of countries including Britain, Sweden and Italy. In 2005, the UN designated 27 January as International Holocaust Memorial Day. xiii

xiv Office Holders and Commemorations in the Federal Republic of Germany

8 May: Tag der Befreiung (Day of Liberation) Anniversary of German capitulation on 8 May 1945 and the end of the Second World War in Europe. 3 October: Tag der deutschen Einheit (Day of German Unity) Marks the official unification of Germany on 3 October 1990 following the ratification of the ‘Two-plus-Four Treaty’ by the Federal Republic (West Germany), the German Democratic Republic (East Germany), France, the United Kingdom, the United States and the Soviet Union. 9 November: Anniversary of Kristallnacht (the Night of Broken Glass) on 9 November 1938, when the Nazis instigated a wave of pogroms against Germany’s Jews. Thousands of synagogues and Jewish businesses and homes were destroyed within a few hours. 9 November: Anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall on 9 November 1989. 9 November marks some other significant events in German history. On 9 November 1918 Kaiser Wilhelm II abdicated, leading to the foundation of the Weimar Republic. 9 November 1923 saw the ‘beer hall putsch’ in Munich, a failed attempt by Adolf Hitler and his followers to overthrow the Weimar Republic. 19 November: Volkstrauertag (People’s Day of Mourning) Day of remembrance for the victims of National Socialism and the victims of both World Wars.

Introduction

No one can say what human rights violations will be like in the 21st century, but it is likely that they will bear no resemblance to Auschwitz and that we will not notice them if we remain transfixed by Auschwitz alone (Jan Ross, 1998). The terrorist attacks on New York’s World Trade Centre on 11 September 2001 revealed a new form of human rights violation. Germany’s reaction to these events was significant in not drawing comparisons with the crimes of the National Socialist past. Such comparisons appeared inappropriate as the terrorist attacks had revealed a different sort of enemy with a different target. Germany’s response to the ‘war on terror’ is one example of how recollection of Nazi atrocities is inevitably losing its force in political decision-making in Germany as the country faces European and global responsibilities in the present and as distance increases from the National Socialist past. However, this does not mean that popular interest in this past is fading in Germany, or indeed in other countries. On the contrary, media attention together with ritual commemoration, educational initiatives and political debate keep the period very much alive. This book assesses why and how the Nazi past has continued to impact on contemporary Germany since the emergence of the ‘Berlin Republic’ in 1998. The term Berlin Republic is used to describe the Berlin-based government of post-unification Germany. Although the government officially moved from Bonn to Berlin in 1999, the term relates to the period starting with the change of government in 1998. The right-wing coalition between the CDU (Christian Democratic Union) and FDP (Free Democratic Party) led by Chancellor Helmut Kohl (CDU) was defeated in the national elections in September 1998 and replaced by a left-wing coalition between the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and the Green Party with Gerhard Schröder (SPD) as Chancellor. Unification in 1990 inevitably changed the German discourse on the Nazi past with the need to shape a common narrative following decades when East and West Germany had pursued conflicting 1

2 Contemporary Germany and the Nazi Legacy

narratives on this past. The arrival of a new generation of politicians in Berlin in 1998, however, can also be regarded as a turning point, raising controversial questions as to the future course of national remembrance of the Nazi past. The generational change was particularly significant: this was not only the first post-war government with no direct experience of the Second World War (one exception being Interior Minister Otto Schily, born in 1932), but its members also represented the left-wing generation of 1968 which had sought an active confrontation with the Nazi past. The SPDGreen government was in power between 1998 and 2005. It is valuable to look back at this period to establish to what extent it marked a change in political and public attitudes to the Nazi legacy and to consider whether these attitudes have been carried over into the CDU-led government elected in September 2005. Many of the developments cited, for example the breaching of post-war taboos, are indeed to be seen as part of an ongoing process rather than limited to Schröder’s SPD-Green government. The emergence of the Berlin Republic coincided with a less restricted discourse on the Nazi past, which led to criticism that the SPD-Green government was attempting to draw a conclusive line under it. However, I will argue that a more balanced discourse has been achieved, one that openly acknowledges past atrocities but also takes pride in post-war achievements, especially unification. My central thesis in this book is that responses to the Nazi past in contemporary Germany are characterised by a dialectic of normality. Whilst the Nazi past may have ceased to restrict German domestic and foreign policy making, references to past abnormality continue to have an impact on the country’s ‘normality’ in the present. The Nazi past, including the Holocaust in particular, remains difficult to ‘process’ as it is so alien to the democratic, tolerant and anti-extremist profile of the country today and it continues to both repel and fascinate as a period of history that defies rational explanation. There ensues a conflict between the perceived need for remembrance and the desire for ‘normality’. Attitudes to the Nazi past in the Berlin Republic are essentially responses to the dialectic of normality. I have adopted the term Leitverantwortung to point to a productive response that encourages remembrance and attempts to incorporate the ‘lessons’ of the past into political education and international policy as well as public initiatives. However, the dialectic of normality can also manifest itself in a more negative sense through overemphasis, inappropriate instrumentalisation or in some cases even trivialisation of the Nazi past. I use Henryk Broder’s term Leidkultur to describe this tendency. The dialectic of normality additionally points to a seemingly self-imposed discourse which keeps awareness of past atrocities alive in order to uphold the democratic values established in the Federal Republic and to act as a brake against unwelcome tendencies such as right-wing extremism. The implied fear of what would replace the narrative if reference were no longer made to past crimes could be one reason to explain why the call to

Introduction 3

‘remember’ retains such prominence despite increased temporal distance from the Third Reich. The practice and politics of remembrance form a key element of this book. Recollection of the Nazi past is manifested in layers of both ritual and active recollection and interpretation, ‘ritual’ referring to commemoration and ‘active’ to initiatives or debates. These layers of interpretation are also evident at an international level, with Auschwitz viewed as the ultimate embodiment of evil. However, despite the internationalisation of the Nazi past, the German narrative on this past is dominated by national constants, for example the question of guilt or responsibility. The layering of interpretation can lead to conflict concerning the priorities and parameters of remembrance. The debates analysed in this book frequently reveal a difference between what is stated at one level and how it is interpreted at another, depending on the interests at stake. They are also shown to be influenced, and at times manipulated, by the perspectives of a range of ‘communities of memory’, for example at political or generational level. The book also discusses the tendency to openly address certain ‘taboos’ imposed in the post-war period, notably German criticism of Jews and the question of German victimhood during the Second World War. Such taboos are, however, not as clear-cut as they may appear and frequently draw inappropriate comparisons between events in the present and attitudes towards the Nazi past, for example with regard to the conflict in the Middle East. Nonetheless, they represent an almost inevitable broadening of the narrative on the Nazi legacy with the passage of time: indeed, contemporary issues often dominate commemoration of the Nazi past. As another tendency, the boundaries between conventional left- and rightwing interpretations of the Nazi legacy have become more fluid. Both Gerhard Schröder and his CDU successor, Angela Merkel, have for example, laid claim to a positive sense of national identity in Germany. On the one hand, this allows for a more inclusive debate based on individual perspectives, but on the other it increases the potential for a manipulation of the past for political gain.

Layout and structure The book examines the main public debates and controversies on the legacy of National Socialism that took place in Germany between 1998 and 2006. The main focus is on the two terms of Schröder’s SPD-Green government, but the final chapter assesses attitudes to the Nazi past under the Grand Coalition that came to power in 2005 under the CDU Chancellor Angela Merkel. The approach is essentially chronological but also highlights various thematic aspects. These aspects broadly comprise the conflict between public and private remembrance of the Third Reich as well as generational differences (Chapter 2); how the Nazi legacy can be superimposed


on a debate about present-day issues and instrumentalised for political purposes (Chapter 3); the problems of recalling the Holocaust in cultural form (Chapter 4); the German interpretation of an American narrative and the final ‘taboo’ of German-Jewish relations (Chapter 5); and the question whether the end of the Schröder government also marked a shift away from the focus on Auschwitz as a cornerstone of political culture (Chapter 6). To briefly sum up the content, Chapter 1 presents a typology of different forms of recollection of the National Socialist past in Germany, outlining the concepts of individual, collective and national memory and communities of memory. Having established these theoretical parameters, it provides an overview of the German discourse on the Nazi legacy from 1945 to 1998 in order to set the context for the remaining chapters. In addition, it considers global and European narratives on the National Socialist past and indicates a shift away from the positive post-war narratives established outside Germany. Chapter 2 contrasts the less burdened attitude towards the Nazi past associated with Schröder’s SPD-Green government with the controversy sparked by Martin Walser’s Peace Prize speech in 1998 in order to illustrate the ‘dialectic of normality’. Chapter 3 examines differing approaches to the dialectic of normality through examples of Leitverantwortung and Leidkultur. This chapter demonstrates how Auschwitz as a universal symbol1 can be both used to promote democracy, racial tolerance and human rights and instrumentalised for less altruistic purposes. Chapter 4 considers the debate on the construction of the Holocaust memorial in Berlin together with other memorialisation projects to show the dialectic of normality in terms of cultural remembrance, as well as the conflict between differing perspectives on the Nazi legacy. Chapter 5 notes an increased openness in the discourse on the Nazi past, with former ‘taboos’ frequently addressed and the concerns raised of secondary anti-semitism or a ‘shift to the right’, concerns which are, however, both perpetuated and countered by references to the negative aspects of the Nazi legacy. Chapter 6 discusses the global, European and national dimensions of the 60th anniversary commemorations of the end of World War Two as well as how the change to a CDU-led government in 2005 might alter the national narrative on the Nazi past. This chapter examines the debate on a ‘new patriotism’ during the 2006 World Cup as well as the growing prominence of discussions on German victimhood and the dangers of conflating the history of National Socialism and of the GDR (German Democratic Republic). I have chosen to focus on national, rather than regional or local debates and initiatives as the emergence of the Berlin Republic corresponded with discussions of the national self-image of Germany with relation to the Nazi past as well as the national narrative that Germany projects to the outside world. These national debates provide a key to the contemporary intellec-

Introduction 5

tual and political climate in Germany, but I have also sought to emphasise the degree of public engagement with the legacy of the Nazi past. It is also important to mention that the starting point for the debates under consideration is a West German narrative on confronting the Nazi past that altered with the impact of unification: reasons of scope have not allowed me to assess the important issue of how perceptions of the Nazi past have altered in the former East Germany. Given the media prominence of the debates discussed, the book makes extensive reference to newspaper sources. So as not to disturb the flow of the text, these references are given in parentheses (a list of the abbreviations used is provided at the beginning of the book). This book is targeted at both general readers and students of modern German politics, culture and history. In discussing German attitudes to the Nazi past, it also seeks to demonstrate how responses to this past continue to influence Germany’s perspective on events in Europe and the wider world over six decades since the end of the Second World War. The extensive bibliography of primary and secondary sources provides pointers to further reading.

1 German, European and Global Recollection of the Nazi Past

Collective, individual and national memory narratives Over six decades since the end of the Second World War, public discourse in Germany continues to refer to memory of the National Socialist past and the importance of remembrance. Memory is evoked as part of the language of ritual, for example at commemorations for the victims of Nazism. Historical research seeks to preserve and contextualise memory of the period. Popular interest in the Nazi period explains its presence in the media. Finally, references to memory have a didactic purpose in emphasising the view that atrocities such as the Holocaust should never occur again. It is important to note that with the increased temporal distance from the Third Reich the terms ‘memory’ and ‘remembrance’ most commonly mean ‘interpretation’. After all, one cannot remember something that one has not experienced. As the number of those with direct memory of the Second World War dwindles, what is at stake is rather the transmission of knowledge through cultural, political or educational reconstructions of the period. The associated discourse in Germany is not about the direct recollection of the Nazi period but rather how the legacy of this period has been dealt with by different groups and how it has influenced the political culture of the Federal Republic. The evolving discourse on the Nazi legacy in Germany maintains certain constants: the question of guilt, the problem of configuring identity, and the quest to find a rational explanation for the Zivilisationsbruch (breakdown in civilisation) represented by the Holocaust. Whilst details of what happened during the period may have become clear, it remains difficult to understand how individuals could have perpetrated the genocide. The search for understanding – motivated by the fear that the past might repeat itself, that civil society might slip back into a state of depravity – is one reason why this discourse has not faded with time. The Holocaust not only poses a challenge to memory but also defies it to disappear, resulting in a 6

German, European and Global Recollection of the Nazi Past 7

dialectic between the human need to forget and the perceived societal need to remember. Added to this is the difficulty of identifying with this period of national history. It is crucial to recognise the distinction between remembrance of the Holocaust and remembrance of the Third Reich or the Second World War as a whole. However, the difficulty in comprehending the magnitude and horror of the Holocaust leads to a tendency to consider it as the sum of the Second World War – and indeed German history. Post-war Germany has been criticised for dealing either too much or too little with the atrocities of the National Socialist period. Any attempt to draw a conclusive line under this period is justifiably cause for concern, but has thus far proved unsuccessful. At the same time, the parameters of memory have become much broader. Ritualised memory, for example in the form of public commemorations, remains crucial to show respect to the victims of Nazism, avoid any distortion of their history and maintain some collective connection with the past. Yet this is accompanied by a more active form of recollection that focuses on the ‘lessons’ of the past that can be applied to the present and involves a greater public engagement with the Nazi legacy. Memory of the National Socialist period, or any other for that matter, has of course never been a mirror image but rather a reconstruction viewed and modified through the prism of present circumstances. As Paul Antze and Michael Lambek put it: ‘what we remember are memories – screens already impressed by the fantasies or distortions of a series of successive rememberings’ (Antze and Lambek 1996: xvii). Memory is selective and thus frequently distorted. Such distortions are intrinsically human, as is the tendency to repress certain particularly traumatic or unwelcome events. Memory reconstruction is, moreover, a creative process. It will be considered here as a narrative in that it is always manipulated or selected to present a certain interpretation of events, with some parts embellished or wilfully obliterated depending on the narrator and audience (see Antze and Lambek 1996). Memory narratives always have a purpose in the present; they are ‘determined by the intentions and pre-dispositions of the remembering individuals’ (Fentress and Wickham 1992: 36). They are also constantly evolving. As the way we remember reveals both the way we are and the way we wish to be perceived, narratives of memory at the same time serve as ‘guides […] to social identity’ (Fentress and Wickham 1992: 88) and have determining effects on actions and approaches in the present. Memory narratives are then a product of contemporary culture rather than vice versa (J. Assmann 1999a: 14). Raphael Samuel and Paul Thompson aptly define the narrative reconstruction of memory: All recollections are told from a standpoint in the present. In telling they need to make sense of the past. That demands a selecting, ordering and


simplifying, a construction of coherent narrative (Samuel and Thompson 1990: 8). This definition illustrates that, despite some overlap, memory narratives are not the same as historiography; they do not represent a fixed account, just as memory is not a fixed phenomenon. The frequently used term ‘collective memory’ can also be misleading. Memory of the National Socialist period in Germany has never been collective in the sense of universally encompassing all members of society. There is rather a whole kaleidoscope of recollections of this period, which can be broadly divided into collective, individual and national narratives.

Collective memory and communities of memory Collective memory theories have come into vogue in recent years, with the work of the French sociologist Maurice Halbwachs from the 1920s frequently used as a starting point.1 Halbwachs’s theories can be used to illustrate different forms of memory of the Nazi past in Germany. For Halbwachs, memory is always collective and socially constructed and the individual relies on the collective to acquire, localise and recall memories: We call on witnesses to reinforce or invalidate what we know of an event, but also to complete the details of an event which we are informed about to a certain extent but of which many features remain unclear (Halbwachs 1968: 1). According to this theory, the collective is required to authenticate individual memory, hence even if experiencing something alone we see it not just through our own eyes but indirectly through the eyes of the collective in that we will recall what we have heard, seen or read about it elsewhere. Individual memory is then like a patchwork of recollections, encompassing our own experience, what others have told us and what we have been told is significant. In Halbwachs’s view, there are as many collective memories as there are different groups in society. Each individual belongs to a plurality of ‘communities of memory’, including for example the family, school, social class, religion or nation. Communities of memory reconstruct their own unique understanding of the past by establishing a shared and agreed version of it, emphasising or underplaying certain aspects. In order to reconstruct a certain event, the individual places himself within the context of one of the communities of memory. With regard to those who experienced the Third Reich period, a prisoner of war would then be at home in a different narrative from a Nazi bureaucrat, a victim of a bombing raid or a concentration camp survivor; narratives would also differ according to sex, age,


profession and so on. This diversity of experience contradicts the extreme thesis that all Germans were ‘willing executioners’ or knew the extent of the atrocities committed.2 As Alfred Grosser points out, the Germans probably knew a lot more about these atrocities than the majority cared to admit at the end of the war, but a lot less than the Allies claimed that they did (Grosser 1993: 101). In post-war Germany, new narratives have emerged with the impact of political and generational change, German division and unification. The public or political discourse on the Nazi past has been influenced by the impact of different communities of memory. The range of distinct recollections held by these communities of memory can lead to conflicting interpretations of this past. Halbwachs maintains that one can only reconstruct or share a collective memory as long as one remains part of the relevant community of memory and this community continues to communicate its recollections: In order for our memory to make use of the memory of others it is not enough for others to recount their experiences of an event to us. It is also essential that our memory continues to concur with theirs and that there are enough points of contact between these memories for the recollection to be reconstructed on a common basis. […] This reconstruction has to be built on common facts or notions which are found in our own mind as well as in that of others (Halbwachs 1968: 12–13). Collective memory narratives can, however, be passed on to those that have not necessarily witnessed an event but are implicated in it via participation in a certain community of memory. In this respect – and significant for recollection of the National Socialist past – it is important to note that communities of memory not only determine what should be remembered but also what should be forgotten. Memory narratives based on shared experience can form a bond between the members of a community of memory as well as helping to forge a collective identity. The extent to which subsequent generations take on these narratives depends on the extent to which they are communicated and recalled by the respective community of memory. The elements that are ‘forgotten’ can tell us as much about a society’s attitude to the past as the elements that are remembered. Widespread non-communication between and within generations meant that the construction of collective memory narratives on the National Socialist period was hindered or distorted in the initial decades after the Second World War, particularly by perpetrator communities of memory wishing to silence their role in the war, but also, to a certain extent, by the survivors of Nazi persecution who were initially unable to vocalise the horror of their experiences. This has had an impact on the perception of the National Socialist period in subsequent generations.


Memory as conscience: individual memory reconstruction Halbwachs’s theory of collective memory points to the influence of different groups on the way that a past is remembered, a version which can change with time. However, the theory precludes the concept of individual memory. For Halbwachs, memory can only be purely individual if a person has never had any contact with the outside world because as social beings ‘we are never alone’ (Halbwachs 1968: 2). This theory is problematic in that it ignores the individual interpretation inevitably applied to a collectively formed narrative, especially if this refers to something one has not experienced directly. Moreover, in the case of the National Socialist past, Halbwachs’s theory cannot adequately accommodate the moral and metaphysical questions of conscience or guilt which, as Karl Jaspers pointed out in Die Schuldfrage (1946), are a matter for the individual, not the collective.3 Not all memories are – or indeed can be – communicated at collective level. Whilst collective memory narratives are required for factual recollection, the collective cannot enter the individual psyche. As Martin Walser puts it: ‘One can move around in a common past as if it were a museum. However, one’s own past is impassable. We can only access the parts that it relinquishes’ (Walser 1998a: 9). The Holocaust was not a dominant feature of German collective and individual memory narratives directly after the Second World War, whether due to a lack of information or a focus on individual (national) suffering. However, as it started to enter official discourse (see the section on ‘National memory management’) it necessarily required individuals to reflect on their own role and potential guilt during the war. For those who had lived through the period, the problem was how to reconcile individual experience within a community of memory, for example positive recollections of membership of the Hitler Youth, with the negative national narrative ensuing from the increasing revelation of Nazi atrocities. The onus on the individual to make sense of the national narrative has continued even with the dwindling of direct memory. Two points should be raised here. First, the polarisation of the narrative by subsequent generations makes it difficult to voice publicly authentic individual memories about the National Socialist past if these do not mention the Holocaust, as this runs the risk of being wrongly associated with a revisionist view of history. Second, reconstructions of the National Socialist period are becoming increasingly individualised and subjective. With the wealth of information available one can, as it were, appropriate a certain narrative – usually from a victim perspective. The danger is that historical reality may become distorted.

Germany as community of memory: national narratives The bridging point between collective and individual memories are national memory narratives, which can be defined as a public or official version of


the past anchoring what Jan Assmann refers to as the ‘connective structure’ of a society (J. Assmann 1999b: 16). A nation can be defined as a community of memory, and national memory narratives go some way to providing a sense of national identity or national image, whether or not individuals have actual experience of the events recalled. A sense of shared national memory, however artificial, is essential for the cohesion of a nation: In order to constitute themselves, nations need to discover (or construct) a past, a collective memory. When their identity is taken for granted the past becomes less of an issue. […] When identity is not in question, neither is memory (Antze and Lambek 1996: xxi). National memory is shaped into what Henry Steele Commager has termed a ‘usable past’ (cited in Fentress and Wickham 1992: 129) through the creation of a plurality of ‘myths’ based on the reconstruction of the aspects of national history considered most significant for a nation. National myths also assume a narrative form, condensing a historical event down to a single, clear occurrence that all members of the nation can understand. In recalling events that have shaped a society, a national myth can help (re)shape a sense of collective identity. If skilfully constructed, it can have an emotional charge for the population and live on even if no one knows what it really means any more: James Fentress and Chris Wickham refer to the ‘Dunkirk spirit’ in England or the storming of the Bastille in France (Fentress and Wickham 1992: 128–9). Just as collective and individual memory narratives are shaped by their ‘narrators’ to achieve a certain effect, so narratives of national memory are purposely formed to portray the nation in a certain way. Hence: […] the history which became part of the fund of knowledge or the ideology of nation, state or movement is not exactly what has been preserved in popular memory, but that which has been selected, written, pictured, popularised and institutionalised by those whose function it is to do so (Hobsbawm and Ranger 1984: 13). The statement importantly signals the possible distinction between popular and national narratives on a past. In the Federal Republic, national memory narratives on the Nazi past have continued to evolve in line with political and social developments and the agendas of different groups (communities of memory) responsible for forming them, largely politicians, intellectuals and the media. For younger generations, national memory is the principal historical narrative informing their interpretation of this past. The notion of a ‘usable past’ is of course problematic in the case of Germany where the Nazi period fundamentally challenges the traditional


configuration of national memory and myths. To be successful and accepted a national myth must be positive. Following capitulation, Germany could not, however, re-establish a positive national myth based on resistance, military valour or victimhood, nor could it hark back to a glorious past. It was outwardly cut off from its history pre-1933, meaning that national memory started (and German history apparently ended) with Auschwitz. In the post-war period, the German narrative has then been founded on an essentially negative national myth; the atrocities of the National Socialist regime forming the dominant – or at least constantly visible – layer. The two German states – and subsequently unified Germany – have adopted strategies of dissimulation or confrontation to establish alternative narratives based on a reaction to Nazism rather than the historical period itself. As we will see, after decades of perpetuating myths of valour or innocence countries outside Germany are also starting to challenge the notion of purely positive national myths, which may in turn lead to a more nuanced approach to the National Socialist period.

The layering of recollection and interpretation As chronological distance increases from the National Socialist period so do the number of debates on how best to ‘remember’ it. Memory has become a multi-disciplinary phenomenon, addressed not only in medical and psychological but also in political, academic and cultural terms. The current framework for recollection of the National Socialist past in Germany can be defined in terms of layers of recollection and interpretation. Just one newspaper page may, for example, contain articles about payments to former forced labourers, a Holocaust memorial, new historical research into National Socialism and a political debate on national pride. The paradox is that it is easy to read a number of co-existing narratives on one page of the newspaper as if they belonged to different histories. The layers of recollection and interpretation can be described as horizontal in covering groups of narrative themes and interests such as those of victims, perpetrators, East and West Germany, political parties, regions and so on. They are also vertical in covering individual, collective, national and global narratives on these themes in terms of their past, present and future significance. New layers of recollection are established with generational change but also, for example, with changes of government or other significant events. It is also important to note the layer represented by the multi-ethnic society in Germany, where interpretations of the National Socialist past are not necessarily based on ethnic association.4 The multiplicity of layers means that remembrance of the National Socialist past is not just ‘managed’ or debated at one single level. There may be overlap, blurring or competition between different layers of memory. Each layer can also have several sub-sections, for instance, the national


narrative can be split into active and passive layers; the former relating to ongoing debates and the latter to ritual commemoration. The national narrative also comprises a number of political layers and a broad number of themes, from the rise of National Socialism to the experiences of the Wehrmacht, and to Jewish persecution. On a broader scale, the German national narrative forms one layer of a global narrative on the Holocaust. The emergence of this global narrative in turn adds further complex layers of interpretation to the national narrative. Taken as a whole, this multifarious discourse on the National Socialist period is dominated by its ‘top layers’. It is useful here to refer to Grosser’s analogy of ‘waves’ of images or information about the Third Reich, which all provoke recollection. For example, he writes that the broadcast of the American television series Holocaust in 1978–79 displaced the previous ‘shock’ of the revelations of Anne Frank’s diary twenty or so years before (Grosser 1993: 134–5). The Holocaust can be said to have formed the ‘top layer’ of both the German and global narratives since the 1980s. Recognising the plurality of memories and competing narratives is one of the keys to understanding the problematic nature of the national discourse on memory in the Federal Republic. The remainder of this chapter will consider political, European and global layers of interpretation of the Nazi past. The political layer is particularly significant in Germany as recollection of this past has indirectly or directly influenced the development of the Federal Republic. A common term to denote the interlinking of memory and politics is Geschichtspolitik (the politics of history), defined by Edgar Wolfrum as: […] an area of research that examines debates on history as a political occurrence within democracies and focuses above all on the motives of political players. […] Pluralist societies constantly engage in Geschichtspolitik for political elites […] establish and define the range of fundamental perceptions, norms, values and symbols constitutive for a political group (Wolfrum 1998: 4–5). For a time, Geschichtspolitik ran on party political lines with, crudely speaking, the CDU advocating silence on or relativisation of memory and the SPD active and critical debate. It is however perhaps more accurate to attribute the evolution in Geschichtspolitik to changes in the Federal Republic itself. At first used in a legal and practical framework, Geschichtspolitik was later applied to actively question the past through debates and writing. Such political distinctions have largely faded since unification, especially with the aforementioned individualisation of memory. Moreover, whilst negation or silencing of the National Socialist past was prevalent in the first decades of the Federal Republic, active acknowledgement is now the norm. What has remained is the tendency for instrumentalisation, which


often comes into conflict with the unspoken requirement for a politically correct narrative.

National memory management in West Germany 1945–98 The history of the Federal Republic has been explicitly bound up with the attempt to reconfigure the parameters of national memory after the Holocaust to establish some sense of cohesive, positive identity whilst at the same time accommodating the multiple experiences of the Third Reich. It is important here to distinguish between political and historical memory narratives. A political narrative based on achievements in the present succeeded in establishing some sense of positive identity in post-war West Germany, whilst East Germany focused on a narrative of anti-fascism. Yet the dominant historical memory narrative has been that of the Third Reich, with events pre- and post-1933 inevitably filtered through the prism of Auschwitz. The negative history of National Socialism makes it difficult to form a positive national identity based on the entirety of German history. Rather than a linear narrative from Stunde Null (Zero Hour)5 to successful democracy, a series of national memory narratives have been formed in layers according to historiographical and ideological developments. These layers can be viewed in terms of multiple reconstructions. Significantly, they can also be considered in the context of multiple denationalisations, whereby the past is addressed but in such a way that it is distanced from the national historical narrative, which thereby assumes universal or abstract proportions. Hence, in the early post-war decades the Führer and a small group of perpetrators were placed into a distanced narrative as symbols of evil, whilst the country re-defined itself according to a series of non-national criteria (e.g. European integration, democracy or the economy). In turn, and especially in recent decades, the narrative has become somewhat ‘de-Germanised’ and abstract at international level, assuming the form of universal lessons. This is not necessarily a criticism; in a sense defining oneself in contradiction to this negative past is the only way of addressing it without being mentally or morally overwhelmed. It would be wrong to assume that a veil of amnesia fell over Germany immediately after capitulation. In the period 1945–49, Allied occupation and large-scale material destruction meant that negative memory of the immediate past was all-pervasive. At this stage there was, however, no discursive and cognitive framework for the genocide of European Jewry and the Holocaust was not known by that name. The narrative concerned the experience of defeat and German hardship rather than the fate of the Jews. This being said, the war crimes trials at Nuremberg from 1945–46 served to inform the public about the atrocities of National Socialism, whilst the Allied denazification and re-education programmes demanded public con-


frontation with the Third Reich. Along with this ‘imposed’ confrontation, there were some efforts on the part of German intellectuals to address the recent past. As early as 1946, publications such as Karl Jaspers’s Die Schuldfrage and Friedrich Meinecke’s Die deutsche Katastrophe called on Germans to reflect on the Nazi past and shape a new future. The newspaper Der Ruf aimed to educate the German public about democracy, although the Allies revoked its printing licence in 1947 on account of its critical stance towards German occupation. The Gruppe 47, a circle of critical intellectuals, provided a forum for discussion of German politics and society and the role of literature after the war. These developments were all ‘indispensable pre-conditions for public memory of Nazi crimes against humanity’ (Herf 1997: 208). The change to a more ‘official’ narrative came with the founding of the Federal Republic and the GDR in 1949. Both states established foundation myths based on rejection – but also repression – of the National Socialist past. Whilst the GDR pursued a narrative of anti-fascism and heroic resistance to Nazism, West Germany focused on democracy, stability and integration into Europe and the West (on national memory narratives in the two German states, see Groehler and Herbert 1992; Herf 1998; and Fulbrook 1999). This took precedence over critical reflection on the past. Konrad Adenauer, the first Chancellor of the Federal Republic, was of the view that, to quote Jeffrey Herf, ‘democracy was possible, provided that it was inaugurated by a period of silence about the crimes of the Nazi past’ (Herf 1997: 225). This silence was considered necessary not only to win votes but also to maintain a stable society and avoid any nationalist revival.6 To a certain extent, the Adenauer period undid the initial confrontation with the Nazi past in the period 1945–49. The denazification process in the Allied occupation zones had lost its impetus with the onset of the Cold War and was halted in 1948, undoubtedly to the benefit of many former Nazis. Under Adenauer there was a wide-scale amnesty of war criminals and many former Nazis were allowed to resume their previous positions, particularly in the teaching, legal and medical professions. The ‘131 Law’, for example, granted pensions and the possibility of re-employment to 150,000 persons who had been employed in the civil service or armed forces in 1945. Adenauer even appointed some former Nazis to his Cabinet, including Hans Globke, who was a key figure in formulating the Nuremberg Race Laws. The Nazi past was primarily a legal and judicial matter in the early years of the Federal Republic. Political discourse made concessions to Germany’s responsibility for the Second World War but in most cases did not refer specifically to atrocities against the Jews and, moreover, tended to include the ordinary German soldier as a victim of Nazism. As Bill Niven points out, from the mid-1950s there were also political attempts to emphasise the role of the resistance against Hitler, focusing on the assassination plot of 20 July 1944 (Niven 2002: 71). All these developments implied neither a


break with the past nor a confrontation with it. Jaspers’s later comment that the ‘moral and political’ obligation to create a completely new state had not been met was not without justification (cited in Bullivant and Rice 1995: 213). Norbert Frei uses the term Vergangenheitspolitik (politics of the past) to describe ‘the amnesty and integration of former supporters of the Third Reich and the normative split from National Socialism’ at the time (Frei 1997: 397). However, it is important to note that the term also encompasses the process towards democracy. Repression is of course not the same as obliteration. Willed amnesia at national level did not mean that the Third Reich had been forgotten at individual and collective level: there can be no Stunde Null in terms of memory. Moreover, national memory of the Third Reich was, as Christian Meier puts it, ‘engraved’ onto the identity of the Federal Republic (Meier 1997: 64). This was particularly the case with the newly founded democratic institutions and the provisions of the Basic Law (Grundgesetz), formulated by former adversaries to the Nazi regime, which were based on the aim to prevent a regime such as the Third Reich coming to power again. The paradox at the time could be defined as schizophrenic memory: accepting the provisions of democracy, but at the same time perhaps also retaining sympathetic memories of the old regime. Herf refers to polls carried out by OMGUS (US Office of the Military Government) in 1945–47, which revealed that 47–55 per cent of the population thought National Socialism a good idea, just badly carried out, whilst Peter Steinbach points out that narratives of German suffering continued within families or at the Stammtisch after 1949 (Herf 1997: 205; Steinbach 1997: 4; also see Eckstaedt 1992). Robert G. Moeller (2001) also examines the tendency to focus on German victimhood in the late 1940s and early 1950s. In this context, it is useful to draw on Dan Diner’s notion of ethnos as the basis for the collective memory of a society or nation. Diner draws the distinction between ethnic ethnos (exclusive, based on shared origins and a (fixed) identity rooted in the distant past) and political ethnos (inclusive, based on (changing) values and ideology). Whilst assuming a positive political ethnos, albeit under the tutelage of the Western Allies, the Federal Republic was not able to shed the negative ethnic ethnos associating it with National Socialist crimes (Diner 1995: 118).7 The response was to establish a range of what could be termed anti-memory narratives. This involved a range of identities, myths and instrumentalisations, which served to set the new state in a positive light whilst simultaneously creating distance from the past. The first and most obvious came with the onset of the Cold War, which ‘offered postwar Germans an opportunity to drape amnesia about Nazi crimes in the cloak of an eerily familiar sounding struggle against Communism’ (Herf 1997: 261). Hence, East Germany criticised the ‘Nazis in Bonn’, whilst in West Germany national memory was relativised into a myth of anti-Communism. The Allies were also quick to forget the recent


past as they needed West Germany as a crucial ally in the Cold War. Throughout the Cold War period both East and West Germany instrumentalised the legacy of Nazism with the aim of idealising their own society and demonising the other. This tendency both defused the negative charge of the past and moved it one step away from historical reality. Nazi atrocities towards the Jews were pushed to the background as Germans were portrayed as the victims of division and a seemingly deterministic past: The ‘Third Reich’ was excluded from historical continuity; the notion of a ‘mishap’ […] determined the reductionist public image of National Socialism. Right- and left-wing politicians assured the Germans that they had been victims, not perpetrators, of the ‘Third Reich’ and now had to suffer the ‘injustice’ of division, for which the Soviet Union alone was made responsible (Wolfrum 1998: 8). The next stage of the West German narrative involved veiling the recent past with events in the present. The problematic legacy of the Nazi past meant that West Germany was essentially a ‘denationalised’ state. For the historian Heinrich August Winkler, Auschwitz was to become the ‘negative symbol of a new, “post-national” West German identity’ that required Germans to give up thoughts of nationhood and focus instead on being good Europeans and world citizens (Spiegel, 24 August 1998). Subsequently, the Federal Republic established a plurality of political identities – European, industrial, economic, ‘Americanised’ (Burns and van der Will 1995: 310–24) and so on – all of which were based in the present and on negation of the past that had brought the new state into existence. The identification with Europe as a necessity to ensure peace and stability is one that still persists today. The only ‘permissible’ outlet for national pride was Verfassungspatriotismus (constitutional patriotism), which has a political rather than a historical basis.8 The narrative of success in the present was of course not part of national memory at the time, but would become so in subsequent decades. West Germany’s amazing economic regeneration led to the founding myth of the ‘Economic Miracle’ (Wirtschaftswunder), which again responded to the practical rather than the moral priorities of the early years of the Federal Republic. The ‘Economic Miracle’ was a founding myth in which all could take part, re-establishing national memory on tangible productivity (money) rather than incomprehensible destruction (the Holocaust). Its success however also required repression of authentic memory of the past. By the mid-1950s, German atrocities in the Second World War had largely been reduced to a myth of demonisation, whereby Hitler and a few associates were deemed responsible and the rest of the nation were portrayed as ‘politically “seduced” individuals, who had ultimately even themselves become “victims” of the war and its consequences’ (Frei 1997: 405).


Interviews carried out by Lutz Niethammer with members of the Third Reich generation suggested that pre-1945 memory had largely been abandoned for a ‘dream world’ based on ‘normalisation’ and with the onus on hard work and material rather than moral issues (Niethammer 1987: 156–7). Patchy knowledge of the period could at first justify a distorted view. However, by the 1960s the facts could no longer be denied. Legal, media and political confrontation with the Nazi past was necessitated by the Eichmann trial in Jerusalem (1961),9 the Auschwitz trials in Frankfurt (1963); the Verjährungsdebatten (debates on the statute of limitations for Nazi crimes)10 and the establishment in 1958 of the Ludwigsburgbased Central Office of the Judicial Authorities of the Federal States for the Investigation of National Socialist Crimes. Increased information on the war became available, for example with the gradual release of documents on the war on the Eastern Front, and historical research carried out by the Munich Institute for Contemporary History. Moreover, there was intellectual confrontation with the writings of those such as Heinrich Böll and Günter Grass and plays including Peter Weiss’s documentary drama Die Ermittlung (1965), based on the Auschwitz trials, and Rolf Hochhuth’s Der Stellvertreter (1963) criticising the role of the Catholic Church during the war. Reporting on the Eichmann trial, Hannah Arendt famously adopted the concept of ‘the banality of evil’. She considered Eichmann to be terrifyingly ‘normal’ rather than a genocidal monster and concluded that great evils were not necessarily carried out by fanatics but also by ordinary citizens (Arendt: 1994). Yet the public still appeared to distance itself from the crimes of the Nazis. According to a survey conducted at the time of the Eichmann trial: Barely one third of those questioned followed the trial with the feeling that these crimes had been committed by Germans. Yet 88 per cent stated that as Germans they did not feel guilty for the extermination of the Jews (Hoffmann 1992: 200). Nonetheless, the 1960s saw a marked change in the narrative on recent history as a result of increased information, but most importantly generational change and rebellion against what was viewed by the left as a restorative political regime. The Nazi past was to become a reason for critical confrontation and moral reproach. It is useful at this point to return to the theory of ‘communities of memory’. For Halbwachs, these groupings are temporal and thus constantly evolving as a result of losing or gaining members (Halbwachs 1968: 73). In the process, one could say that new ‘sub-communities of memory’ are formed, adding their own perceptions and narrative layers to the original memories of the


group. One can liken each generation to a sub-community of memory. The way that memory is transmitted from generation to generation determines its perception (and continued existence). Paul Connerton writes: […] it is not sufficient that the various members who compose that group at any given moment should be able to retain the mental representations relating to the past of the group. It is necessary also that the older members of the group should not neglect to transmit these representations to the younger members of the group (Connerton 1989: 38). If memory is not shared, generational communities of memory feel no common link and are mentally and emotionally distanced (Connerton 1989: 3). The Third Reich generation frequently omitted to transmit their memories of Nazism to their children, whether because they were unwilling or ashamed to tell the truth or had repressed the past in favour of the comforting stability of the Federal Republic. However, in the 1960s, the children of the Third Reich generation, or vaterlose Gesellschaft (society without a father), as Alexander Mitscherlich (2003) termed them, were to discover the reality of National Socialism, which often conflicted with what they had (not) been told at home. This generation went on to create its own negative founding myth for the Federal Republic. They accused their parents of repressing memory and demonised their (in)action during the war, yet at the same time they repressed or rejected their own heritage. This could have had something to do with feelings of guilt or trauma being passed on without an explanation (see Wangh 1994: 51–2). This tendency has repeated itself in subsequent generations: each generation has discovered the horrors of the Holocaust anew and established its own critical – but also distancing – ‘foundation myth’ for the period. Writing in 1965, Armin Mohler asserted: ‘A chain reaction of repression has set in, which is constantly grasped by new generations’ (Mohler 1965: 184). It is of course easier to condemn a regime that one had no direct part in. Mohler gave a further possible explanation for this phenomenon: At first glance, the historical legacy currently faced by young Germans does not seem pleasant. Almost superhuman efforts are required to deal with it. There is thus a great temptation to unceremoniously lump everything together and to make a clean sweep. In branding their parents’ generation as criminals […] they hope to free themselves of the responsibility for this legacy (Mohler 1965: 140). However, several decades later, the involvement of younger generations in both critical debates on Germany’s Nazi past and memory initiatives suggest that they do not want to make a completely clean break from this past but rather to try and understand it.


Paradoxically, it was the left-wing generation of 1968 – the generation involved in the student revolts of the late 1960s – who breathed new life into national memory of the Third Reich, despite having no direct experience of it. However, they also used the Nazi past to illustrate their own political agenda. The appointment of the former Nazi, Kurt Georg Kiesinger, as Chancellor of the Grand Coalition (1966–69) provoked a wave of criticism. Government members were branded as ‘Nazis’ and criticised for ‘restorationist’ policies such as the enactment of the Emergency Laws in 1968. The ensuing focus on Germans as perpetrators meant that the victims of Nazism were again sidelined; indeed the Left cast the memory of the Jews in a negative light in the context of the Six-Day War in 1967, when the Palestinians were seen as victims. The associated theoretical and politicised debate on ‘fascism’ was another distancing feature of the narrative that could be interpreted as a form of repression (see Koenen 2001). With the emergence of a generation which had ethnic links to the Third Reich past but no direct experience of it, the priority was no longer the legal or political impact of this past but its moral implications. Vergangenheitspolitik was to be replaced by Vergangenheitsbewältigung. Literally translated as ‘mastering the past’, the term is commonly used to describe public confrontation with the National Socialist past in post-war (West and unified) Germany and attempts to ‘come to terms with’ this past. It is, however, problematic in implying that the past can be ‘put to rest’ or ‘mastered’ once and for all: this is neither possible nor indeed desirable. It is also difficult to find a uniform – or satisfactory – definition of the term. Wolfgang Benz, for example, suggests a purely political process in referring to ‘the period of National Socialism and how Germans dealt politically with its catastrophic consequences in the post-war period’ (Benz 1992: 196), whilst Christa Hoffmann describes a process that ‘assumes first crimes, then their termination and finally democratisation’ (Hoffmann 1992: 26). The definition ‘(internal) working through the past’ (Duden: 1989) reflects a broader moral or psychological process that is lacking in the statements above, but seems so general that it could apply to any past. The most accurate definitions are perhaps those that signal an active and evolving process. Michael Wolffsohn describes Vergangenheitsbewältigung as ‘a complete turnaround in former, now rejected, values’ which involves ‘knowledge, evaluation, tears and will’ followed by ‘action’ (Wolffsohn 1997: 16), whilst Claude Leggewie points to an active process involving ‘attempts […] to reconstruct and interpret processes and events from the past which impose a moral or criminal burden on a nation either in part or as a whole, and to draw conclusions from this’ (Leggewie 1987: 122). Finally, the philosopher Theodor Adorno used the term ‘working through the past’ (Aufarbeitung der Vergangenheit) (Adorno 1963: 125–47). According to Jaspers’s criteria, moral and metaphysical reflection on guilt are a matter for the individual (Jaspers 1974). However, Vergangenheits-


bewältigung was woven into national memory as a collective need to address the recent past. One of the most famous calls for Vergangenheitsbewältigung is found in the 1967 publication Die Unfähigkeit zu trauern (The Inability to Mourn). The psychologists Alexander and Margarete Mitscherlich state the necessity of the active process of ‘remembering, repeating, working through’ (‘erinnern, wiederholen, durcharbeiten’) – originally drawn from Freudian psychology – with relation to memory of the National Socialist past. They assert that Germany as a community of memory had repressed (guilty) memory in favour of building up the ‘Economic Miracle’. In the process, the past was not actively mourned but rather remained associated with melancholia, which made it impossible to move on into the future. Moreover, the ‘Economic Miracle’ had not been able to replace the identity lost with the fall of Hitler and the destruction of National Socialism. Die Unfähigkeit zu trauern offers a psychological insight into German responses to the trauma of the collapse of the Third Reich. However, it is intrinsically human rather than uniquely German to repress trauma. Moreover, just as the Allies found it difficult to class the Germans into ‘grades’ of Nazis, so it would be unwise to attempt to place post-war Germans into the categories provided by the psychological studies in the book. Despite the problems associated with the term Vergangenheitsbewältigung, the concept has held a dominant role in the national – particularly leftliberal discourse on the legacy of the Holocaust since the 1960s. The associated turning point can be summed up as follows: In the early post-war period, moral discourse on the Holocaust posed an obstacle to democratisation. Now these memories became the prerequisite of a strengthened democracy (Levy and Sznaider 2001: 117–18). Willy Brandt was perhaps the first Chancellor to openly apply the concept of Vergangenheitsbewältigung, though of course his Ostpolitik was as much about improving diplomatic relations between East and West as it was about repentance. In 1970, he famously knelt down at the memorial at the Warsaw ghetto. Whilst the gesture provoked a mixed response in Germany, the iconic image was broadcast around the world and suggested that moral responsibility for Nazi atrocities had become a central pillar of German national memory, at the same time pushing German suffering to the background. For Niven, Brandt’s gesture ‘paved the way for a more self-critical memory’ (Niven 2002: 176). As a further step towards German-Polish reconciliation, in 1977 Helmut Schmidt was the first post-war Chancellor to visit Auschwitz. He emphasised German responsibility for the war, although as Herf points out, he did not refer to Auschwitz as a death camp where some 1.5 million Jews had been killed (Herf 1997: 346). The tendency towards active Vergangenheitsbewältigung was countered by those who wished to rebuild a patriotic identity based on a continuous


sense of history and national traditions. Wolfrum notes a shift in Geschichtspolitik from the mid-1970s marked by a more conservative approach to national memory and identity. According to this view, the critical engagement with the National Socialist past in the 1960s had led to a disturbed relationship between West Germans and their national history. Whilst the Third Reich was a substantive component of German history it was argued that this should not overshadow German history altogether (Wolfrum 1998: 12–13). However, by the 1980s, the Holocaust had become the dominant historical narrative in Germany, for various reasons. Firstly, there was a further significant wave of public confrontation with the National Socialist past, as mentioned above, with the German broadcast of the American series Holocaust in 1979, viewed by some 15 million Germans. Subsequently, the word ‘Holocaust’ and a narrative of Jewish victimhood entered both the political and the popular vocabulary of the discourse on the National Socialist period. Secondly, the heightened media focus on this period was coupled with the development of Alltagsgeschichte (everyday history), whereby local and regional initiatives researched history ‘from below’, as well as the opening of more museums and memorials to victims of the Holocaust, shifting the focus away from Germans as perpetrators to Jews as victims. Increased international awareness of the Holocaust also played a role in the prevalence of this narrative in Germany. However, Ulrich Herbert’s view still applies today that with increased exposure to the theme: ‘It was not the knowledge about the German policy of exterminating Jews that increased but the number of those who talked about it’ (Groehler and Herbert 1992: 81). Attitudes to the Nazi past under Helmut Kohl’s Chancellorship were characterised by the popularisation of history, the prominence of the Holocaust and contested attempts at ‘normalisation’. Whilst not drawing a line under the Nazi past, Kohl did use Geschichtspolitik in an attempt to normalise its negative legacy. Wolfrum notes the attempt to focus on the successes of the post-war period rather than the shadow of Auschwitz: The aim was to end the discourse on Vergangenheitsbewältigung and, after almost forty years of successful democracy, to provide the Federal Republic with the positive foundation myth of a constitutional state on the side of the West, in the process continuing to bracket out the NS past as much as possible. This was intended to eliminate the final moral remnants of the probationary period for a historical, moral guilt (Wolfrum 1998: 14). Now that memory of the Federal Republic was fresher than that of the Third Reich for many Germans, the Adenauer era could be used as the basis for a ‘Golden Age’ myth, which could also enhance Kohl’s own political goals:


The struggle for control over the historical-political discourse now focused on extending the Federal Republic’s ‘success story’ embodied by Adenauer into the Kohl era and to claim the Federal Republic for the conservatives. […] A ‘decriminalisation’ of German history as well as an end to Vergangenheitsbewältigung as a ‘continuous process of repentance’ within society were seen as the prerequisite for a new patriotism based on a more positive relationship to one’s own past (Wolfrum 1998: 14). The focus remained, however, on responsibility and reconciliation rather than a new nationalism. The aim was also to show that Germany had learnt from the past. In his famous speech of 8 May 1985, President Richard von Weizsäcker significantly referred to 8 May 1945 as a day of German liberation rather than capitulation. He stressed the need to remember Nazi atrocities and to distinguish between the plurality of memories of the Second World War, but he also emphasised the positive progress that Germany had made in the forty years since liberation: We truly have no grounds for arrogance and self-righteousness. Yet we may thankfully recall the developments of the past 40 years if we use our own historical memory to guide our actions in the present and the unresolved tasks that await us (cited in Gill and Steffani 1986: 188). Yet it was evidently too early to speak of a ‘normal’ discourse on German national memory. Kohl’s use of the unfortunate phrase die Gnade der späten Geburt (‘the grace of late birth’) for example to refer to those too young to have been implicated in the Third Reich, his own generation included, led to the accusation that he was trying to draw a line under the past. There was also controversy in 1985 when Kohl invited President Reagan to lay a wreath at Bitburg cemetery, where members of the Waffen-SS are buried. This was to be the ultimate reconciliation, designed to ‘publicly disentangle German national identity from the singularity of the Holocaust’ (Kattago 1998: 95). Instead the event provoked widespread criticism both in Germany and abroad for apparently suggesting that the public should honour Nazi soldiers. In November 1988, the Bundestag President Philip Jenninger made a stylistically ambiguous speech giving a detailed historical narrative about the Third Reich period in an attempt to explain the fascination for National Socialism during the 1930s. He was instead accused of justifying it and compelled to resign (see Herf 1997: 360–2). The conflict regarding the future path that German national memory should take came to a head in the mid-1980s with the ‘Historians’ Dispute’ (Historikerstreit), a debate which, in dealing mainly with perceptions of the Third Reich, reflected the continuing need to find an appropriate narrative. The debate was triggered by an article by Ernst Nolte in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) entitled ‘The Past that will not Pass Away’ (Nolte


1986). Nolte challenged the notion of the Holocaust as a unique event by tracing a link between the Bolshevik threat and the Nazi genocide, asserting that the Holocaust was a reaction against the ‘Asiatic’ deeds of the Soviet Union, that is, the murder of millions during the Stalin regime. He presented a revisionist view of history, but also a political agenda, in implying that the contemporary Cold War enemy in the East was also the original source of genocide in the twentieth century. The opposing view was represented by Jürgen Habermas (1986a and 1986b). Habermas was among the left-liberal thinkers who asserted that Germany’s deviant Sonderweg had led to two World Wars.11 He was suspicious of attempts to relativise recent German history in order to foster a more positive sense of national identity. Habermas viewed not only the collapse of Nazism and the division of Germany but also the foundation of democracy and integration into the West as the root of post-war identity. This identity was based on a turn against negative developments in German history and a break with values associated with the National Socialist period. The Historians’ Dispute marked the start of a series of media-fuelled debates in the Feuilletons (culture sections of the press) focusing on the ‘self-image of the Federal Republic’ (Steinbach 1997: 6) rather than just historical inquiry. Such debates are confirmation that the National Socialist past was not ignored in West Germany as has often been claimed. Although ostensibly about whether the Holocaust should be compared to other atrocities or retain its singularity, the Historians’ Dispute was not so much about factual recollection than the form in which it should enter West German national memory. It was, furthermore, a debate about the future direction of Geschichtspolitik: whether German democracy should continue to bear witness to its historical responsibility or go its own way. Hermann Rudolph sums up the dilemma: […] should the Third Reich be treated historiographically so that it no longer blocks the way to our past like some sombre and monstrous monument, but rather itself becomes ‘history’, past time, one epoch among other epochs? Or should it simultaneously remain as some admonitory memorial […] because […] this stone actually became the cornerstone of the new beginning after the Second World War? (cited in Maier 1988: 9) The question attained special prominence with unification in 1990. Despite initial optimism that ‘inner unity’ could be achieved, divided memory became all the more apparent in the framework of grave economic and social divergence and difficulties encountered in fusing what had become two very different nations with two distinct narratives on the Nazi past. Left-liberals such as Günter Grass had viewed German division as ‘punishment’ for Auschwitz and were fearful of a dangerous renationalisation of


German politics if this negative past were allowed to fade from national memory. The increase in violent neo-Nazi attacks on foreigners in the early 1990s seemed to confirm these fears. For Moische Postone (1992), the end of the Cold War saw the renewed prominence of aspects of the German past which many had thought to have disappeared. Bill Niven and Roger Woods are among those who note the presence of a conservative grouping, the ‘New Right’ (Neue Rechte), since unification. The ‘New Right,’ which essentially intellectualises certain far right views to make them palatable to a broader audience, seeks a more self-assertive role for Germany and an end to its apparent subservience to the West and to America. It also supports a revisionist view of history, for example, normalising the economic and social aspects of National Socialism and perceiving Nazism as a phenomenon of totalitarianism and a response to Soviet Communism (Niven 2002: 5; Woods: 2007). Whilst this development should not be discounted, it has not become a dominant force in mainstream German politics and has attracted opposition from both the left- and the right-wing. Unification did not put an end to the discourse on the National Socialist past, as was confirmed by the extensive commemorations to mark the 50th anniversary of the end of the war in 1995. The lively debate on both Daniel Goldhagen’s Hitler’s Willing Executioners and the Wehrmachtausstellung (exhibition on the crimes of the Wehrmacht) raised questions about the role of ‘ordinary Germans’ during the Second World War (see, for example, Niven 2002: 119–75), whilst the release of Stephen Spielberg’s Schindler’s List in 1993 provoked international reflection on the Holocaust. Niven makes the valid point that sustained interest in the Nazi past in unified Germany is not a contradiction to unification but a result of it. This interest reflects the need to find a single historical narrative after decades of shifting responsibility for Nazism towards the East or the West (Niven 2002: 2). However, it is also true to say that the legacy of the Nazi past tends to overshadow that of the GDR in the layers of discourse in united Germany. The GDR can to some extent be explained away as an imposed dictatorship, whereas it remains impossible to understand the atrocities of the Third Reich which, moreover, continue to attract greater international interest. To paraphrase Gregor Gysi, the mountains of files generated by the GDR regime pale into insignificance when compared to the piles of corpses associated with the Nazi regime (Spiegel, 8 March 1999).

From communicative to cultural memory With increased temporal distance from the Third Reich, Geschichtspolitik with relation to the National Socialist past has the task of purveying historical understanding as well as maintaining commemoration. To use Jan Assmann’s terms, there is a definitive shift from communicative to cultural


memory of the period. Communicative memory is the interchange of direct (biographical) memory of the recent past between contemporaries. It is informal, non-structured and inclusive, occurring through everyday interaction. Communicative memory has a fixed duration: as the ‘short-term memory’ of a society (Assmann and Frevert 1999: 37), it is associated with specific generations. According to Assmann, it can be maintained for a period of between 80 and 100 years (three to four generations). The mid-point (40 years) represents a threshold point where the generational profile of a society changes and communicative memory starts to shift to cultural memory (J. Assmann 1999b: 51). Cultural memory represents the ‘long term’ memory of a society. It is non-direct recollection which is formal and structured, requiring ‘props’ to keep it alive, such as monuments, speeches, books, commemorations and films. As it is based on indirect recollection of the non-recent past it is less about experience than perception and transmitting meaning. For Assmann: Cultural memory does not concern actual but rather recalled history. […] This memory is cultural because it can only be realised in an institutional, artificial way, and it is a memory because it functions with regard to societal communication as individual memory functions with regard to conscience (J. Assmann 1999b: 24). Manifestations of cultural memory are the result of efforts in society to give concrete form to those parts of communicative memory considered significant in order to produce a permanent and symbolic version of the past that can persist once personal memories have faded. Cultural memory allows members of a society to communicate in a long-term historical perspective and to secure an identity through the cross-generational transmission of a broad historical experience (Assmann and Frevert 1999: 50). According to Jan Assmann’s theory, Germany would have crossed the threshold into cultural memory in the mid-1980s. German national memory narratives on the Third Reich are now primarily interpretations based on cultural memory. Whereas all members of a nation share in communicative memory transmission, the shaping of cultural memory remains the preserve of certain – usually elite – groups such as politicians, intellectuals and, increasingly, the media. In this context, one can refer to ‘communities of interpretation’, that is groupings not necessarily bound by a shared memory but rather a shared ideology or perspective. Aleida Assmann and Ute Frevert are of the view that cultural memory cannot really be standardised or politically instrumentalised because there are a multitude of interpretations (Assmann and Frevert 1999: 50). However, it is surely this multitude of interpretations that allow for instrumentalisation by a variety of different groups


seeking to assert certain interests and individual perceptions, taking us back to the notion of the individualisation of memory. Pierre Nora would agree: The […] obligation to remember makes every man his own historian. Thus the historical imperative has reached well beyond the limited circle of professional historians. […] The demise of history-memory has multiplied the number of private memories demanding their own individual histories (Nora 1992: 10). Cultural memory could also be defined as a historicised interpretation of communicative memory. In this sense, Nora notes a problematic shift from memory, which is ‘always a phenomenon of the present, a bond tying us to the eternal present’, to history, ‘the reconstruction, always problematic and incomplete, of what is no longer’ (Nora 1992: 3). In Nora’s view, the contemporary interest in history (here cultural memory) is attributable to the fading of (communicative) memory, but he views this in negative terms: ‘History divests the lived past of its legitimacy’ (Nora 1992: 3) and has banished memory to the archives. Similarly, Reinhart Koselleck asserts that the apparent shift from memory to history of the Nazi period leads to its ossification. By consequence, the direct experience of the survivors becomes a distanced past removed from experience: ‘Soon only the files will speak, enriched by pictures, films and memoirs’ (Koselleck cited in Assmann and Frevert 1999: 28). Yet the opposite is surely true as the Third Reich past has retained its emotional pull. Even if they are difficult to identity with, the increasing layers of narrative and perception are very much ‘alive’ as cultural memory, expressed for example through memory initiatives and debates. The potential for distortion has, however, increased in a narrative that has more to do with reconstructing a certain interpretation of memory than the original memory itself: Hence, it is not just the issue of authenticity that is at stake but rather the problems of memory itself are expounded and the memory of a memory becomes the focus. To put it another way: the issue is no longer the Holocaust but rather its representation and the political and cultural consequences (Levy and Sznaider 2001: 217). The shift to cultural memory and media projections of the National Socialist past have established it as a familiar narrative in countries outside Germany. Unification, an increasingly multi-ethnic society and the subsequent emergence of globalised or universal communities of memory have released the narrative from its former boundaries and given rise to a range of national and international narratives on the period.


Recasting national memory narratives in post-war Europe In Europe, the Holocaust made many nations call their own systems of values into question. There are some parallels in the way that Germany and other European countries have dealt with this period of history, especially in terms of repression and distancing. In the early post-war period, Allied and formerly occupied countries built up positive myths of resistance and past glory in order to restore national self-esteem. In the process, past complicity with or support for the Third Reich was repressed. Similar to the situation in Germany, what emerged were national myths of idealisation or demonisation. In an interesting article about the shaping of memory in post-war Belgium, France and the Netherlands, Pieter Lagrou writes that in the newly liberated countries ‘a patriotic memory of the Resistance emerged as a collective image of society during the war’ (Lagrou 1997: 194). National resistance became the stuff of new national myths and the concentration camps were ‘re-created’ as a site of national martyrdom rather than Jewish genocide. These countries had not only been occupied but also liberated by foreign armies, which implied their own helplessness. Hence, ‘Mourning without triumphalism would have undermined post-war national recovery’ (Lagrou 1997: 196). As these countries saw the return of more repatriates than Holocaust survivors, national memory was dominated by accounts of displaced workers and prisoners of war, even though the number of Jewish deportees had been far higher than the number of political deportees or forced labourers. The tendency was to give ‘national martyrs’ precedence, something which was of course impossible in Germany: […] the hero-victims […] were commemorated because they could be integrated into a national epic and an ideological discourse. The victims of the genocide were not commemorated because they could not be integrated in this way and because their memory was inert to the chemistry of post-war commemoration (Lagrou 1997: 222). Perhaps the most successful manipulation of national memory of the Second World War occurred in France. The extent of wartime collaboration in this country has since come to light, but in the initial decades after the war the national myth that emerged told the story of resistance and largely ignored or downplayed the role of Vichy France. At the same time, accounts of deportation included both those deported as part of the compulsory labour service and those sent to concentration camps and thus lessened the singularity of the Holocaust in national memory (on the ‘Vichy syndrome’, see Rousso 1990). In Belgium, there has been practically no public debate on potential national complicity with the Nazi genocide. After the war, only resisters were granted full recognition by the state and the title ‘political prisoner’ in


the framework of the aid programme for victims of the Third Reich. In the Netherlands, national memory was reconstructed on the basis of the 1941 one-day strike in protest against Jewish deportation and the story of Anne Frank. This is despite the fact that this country was home to about as many Nazi supporters as resisters and that the percentage rate of Jewish extermination in the Netherlands was the greatest of any occupied country, second only to that in Eastern Europe. In the immediate post-war period, the focus was on the suffering of the domestic population rather than the misery of those who had been in the concentration camps. Lagrou writes that there was widespread ‘indifference towards expatriates’, citing a Dutch historian who described the reaction to the return of a Jewish survivor thus: ‘Well, quite a lot of your lot came back. Just be happy you were not here. How we suffered from hunger!’ (Lagrou 1997: 227) In the UK, victory over the Germans has become what Hugo Young terms ‘a sort of spiritual core of its national self understanding and pride’ (Guardian, 16 February 1999) and this country can be said to have adopted a ‘myth of military valour’ after the war (Schöpflin 1997: 32). It should be noted that this myth does not generally draw on Germany’s role in the atrocities of the Holocaust, although a change may emerge following the introduction of Holocaust Memorial Day in 2001. As a final example, Gerhard Botz writes that in post-war Austria: ‘They turned Beethoven into an Austrian and Hitler into a German’ (Botz 1987: 143). The founding myth of the second Austrian Republic was its status as victim and not collaborator of the Third Reich and Austrian culpability for Nazi crimes only came to the fore following the Waldheim Affair in 1986. During the presidential campaigns that year, formerly concealed details about the Nazi past of candidate Kurt Waldheim came under public scrutiny. Waldheim attracted particular controversy for asserting that he had only ‘done his duty’ in the German Wehrmacht. Nonetheless, he was elected President of Austria, which caused an international furore. The situation in Europe is changing, however, with increased moves to open up the respective ‘black boxes’ of national memory. To take Austria as an example, the Austrian Historical Commission was set up by the Austrian government in 1998 to investigate expropriations in Austria during the Nazi period and compensation after 1945.12 In 2000 the country set up the ‘Austrian Fund for Reconciliation, Peace and Cooperation’ to compensate former forced labourers. Again mirroring the situation in Germany (though starting much later), as more and more facts emerge about the 1933–45 period – and new generations encounter it – the ‘unblemished’ moral record of countries besides Germany has been challenged. Whilst Vergangenheitsbewältigung was once a purely German phenomenon, other European countries in particular have now themselves embarked on a process of collective selfexamination, deconstructing post-war national myths and at times revealing uncomfortable truths about their own relationship with the Nazi regime.


In the framework of these evolving layers of national memory, the Holocaust has started to feature increasingly at a European level, with a tendency to regard the period as a chapter in the history of this continent rather than as a purely German history. Michael Jeismann sees the Holocaust as part of a new European memory narrative: ‘Memory of the recent past is undergoing a transformation. This past is shown to be a common European one’ (Jeismann 2001: 150). In Jeismann’s view, the National Socialist past has latterly been functionalised in the framework of the European Union as a means of promoting eastward enlargement, enhanced integration and intervention in Kosovo. He goes as far as to suggest that ‘The new Geschichtspolitik could […] be a significant basis for the future work of the European Union’ (Jeismann 2001: 163). This rather bold theory does contain a grain of truth if one considers the prime reason for the original establishment of what has become the EU, i.e. to prevent another war such as that unleashed by the Nazis. This kind of narrative could also be facilitated by the end of the EastWest conflict and the search for a unifying myth based on reconciliation and a shared history. In 1996, 27 January (the date of the liberation of Auschwitz) was established as the ‘Day of Remembrance for the Victims of National Socialism’ in Germany. Significantly, this date has become the first European commemoration of the 21st century, with the introduction of Holocaust Memorial Day in countries including Sweden, Britain and Italy to add to that in Germany. This suggests that the Holocaust has become the defining event of the Second World War for European memory, thereby superseding the layers of national memory focusing on military valour, resistance or indeed neutrality. This development is, however, not just about reconstructing history, but also has moral parameters that place it within the context of what Helmut Dubiel has referred to as Legitimationskultur (the culture of legitimation): […] throughout the world there is increasing evidence that the traditional, ‘positive’ form of state legitimation is evolving into a democratic culture of public justification, which includes remembrance and mourning for the collective injustice committed in the context of one’s own history (Dubiel 1999: 290–1). National narratives based on guilt are a new phenomenon in post-war history, but no longer restricted to Germany.13 To give some examples, Jacques Chirac has belatedly apologised for the role of the Vichy government in the deportation of French Jews and the Netherlands and Belgium have now recognised the extent of their collaboration with the Nazis. This suggests a turnaround in the traditional formation of national myths outside Germany, which hitherto relied on a positive configuration of national identity and achievements.


The following points should be raised in this respect. First, the formerly triumphant or victim perspectives used to contrast other countries with Germany is subject to revision. Second, the notion of Legitimationskultur allows the legacy of the National Socialist past to have a more universal scope, but also polarises it in focusing on the Holocaust as the tragic result of collaboration or a failure to act. Third, the subsequent narrative has an abstract dimension, which creates distance from the historical reality of the past. In the process, the Holocaust stands apart from the ‘necessary’ events of war and becomes a symbol for all victims of war. Fourth, the more abstract narrative allows the past to be used for purposes in the present or future in the framework of what Daniel Levy and Natan Sznaider refer to as ‘forward-looking memories’ (Levy and Sznaider 2001: 211–12). Finally, this multiplication of layers of memory outside Germany has the scope to ‘de-Germanise’ and denationalise it. This has become particularly apparent with the emergence of narratives of memory on the Holocaust outside Europe. Whilst the German narrative on the Nazi legacy used to stand alone, since the mid-1990s in particular it has been integrated into an increasingly internationalised narrative.

Global memory narratives on the Holocaust After the Second World War, the establishment of institutions such as the United Nations, and treaties including the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (1948), the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) and the European Convention on Human Rights (1950) created an international framework with the aim of preventing an atrocity such as the Holocaust from happening again. The assumed ‘lessons’ of the Holocaust were then placed into an international context from the start. However, as in Germany, it was not until the end of the 1970s that the Holocaust began to attain prominence in international political discourse. ‘Auschwitz’ has since become a universally understood metaphor for evil and the Holocaust is, so to speak, ‘everyone’s history’. Jeismann is perhaps going a step too far in deeming the Holocaust a ‘founding myth of new world politics’ (Jeismann 2001: 146) but it is true to say that in the 21st century the Holocaust is viewed as more than a single historical event and has assumed multiple ‘identities’. It is a staple media topic. It is the subject of intellectual and academic inquiry as well as popular debate. The negotiations on payments to former forced labourers have revealed it as a political bargaining or blackmailing tool. Those such as Norman Finkelstein (2000) who criticise the apparent ‘Holocaust industry’ are canny enough to realise that it can also mean big business. The prevalence of Holocaust museums and monuments in the United States in particular – and also in countries such as Japan and South


Africa14 – indicates that a territorial or ethnic link is no longer a prerequisite for founding a memory narrative on the Holocaust. For Jeismann, the past is now used – or recreated – to define the present (Jeismann 2001: 174), which is one of the reasons why ‘memory’ has become such a popular topic. Put in these terms, German Vergangenheitsbewältigung with regard to the National Socialist past is now just one aspect of a global phenomenon. Indeed, the Holocaust would appear to have usurped Nazism as the defining factor in the Second World War and thereby sapped this ideology of some of its ‘German-ness’. This development has something to do with increased information on the period, its presentation in the media, its use as a paradigm of evil, and as part of a Legitimationskultur. Another factor, pointed out by Peter Novick, is that historical consciousness and historiography have become internationalised. As information is no longer restricted to national boundaries, there is no specifically national school of scholarship on the Holocaust or a difference in the level of shock that its evocation produces.15 The globalisation of the Holocaust is also associated with the emergence of global communities of cultural memory based on shared perceptions and values rather than ethnicity or nationality. These can be said to have emerged with the change of the nation state from a purely ethnic to a geographical or political entity. Individuals increasingly belong to a series of both national and transnational communities of memory, not necessarily bound by ethnic identity: one can be Bavarian, German, European and international at the same time. In the 2001 book Erinnerung im globalen Zeitalter: Der Holocaust, Daniel Levy and Natan Sznaider pose some related questions that link to the individualisation of memory already discussed: Is it actually possible to refer to a ‘collective’ that remembers? Does globalisation not imply the fragmentation of ‘collectives’ and that we become individuals without a home, indeed without a memory, who select their memories on an ad hoc basis, whether from the television, a history book, the cinema, the personal sphere of the family, from friends and acquaintances, as if choosing from a supermarket shelf? However, does ‘collective memory’ then just mean ‘national memory’ or can it cross these boundaries, gain a global centre, so to speak, and therefore threaten and challenge the foundations of national consciousness (and of memory)? (Levy and Sznaider 2001: 33–4) Following this line of thinking, narratives on the Holocaust are not necessarily based on historical connection, localisation or ethnicity, and thus allow it to be used as a symbol in a variety of contexts. Levy and Sznaider perceive a shift from a national to a cosmopolitan (global) culture of memory since the late 1990s, which would reflect the shift from communicative


to cultural memory. They view the recollection of the Holocaust as a focus of the new communities of memory that result (Levy and Sznaider 2001: 9). This global memory has not erased or supplanted individual, collective and national memory narratives, but rather added yet another layer of recollection. Countries are both part of a global narrative and pursue their own national narrative: in what Levy and Sznaider term ‘glocalisation’ (Glokalisierung) (Levy and Sznaider 2001: 22) the global narrative is interpreted in a national way. Interpretations of the Holocaust thus emerge from an interplay of global and local narratives and the nation state loses its monopoly on interpreting memory. As a result, the Holocaust has become common historical and cultural property and can be interpreted in different ways in different countries (Levy and Sznaider 2001: 16–17). Levy and Sznaider stress the continued distinction between particular and universal memory of the Holocaust, the former demonstrating a direct link with the past and the latter a broader interpretation. The particular is represented, for example, by the foundation of the state of Israel and the universal by the Declaration of Human Rights. However, it would seem that this distinction is only superficial; the increased individualisation of memory means that countries can create a particular narrative from a universal one, for example making the universal ‘lessons’ of the Holocaust their own. For Levy and Sznaider, the release of the Holocaust from national boundaries and the universalisation and indeed modernisation of the associated discourse can have a positive impact in encouraging international solidarity. The ensuing ‘community of fate’ (Schicksalsgemeinschaft) (Levy and Sznaider 2001: 14) does not have national boundaries but is rather based on the Holocaust as the defining event of the 20th century. Elsewhere, Sznaider refers to the Holocaust as a ‘symbol of moral globalisation’ that can be put to positive use, in particular to establish an international human rights policy: It is precisely this European catastrophe that becomes the starting point for a new solidarity. In an age of ideological uncertainty, it is memories of the Holocaust that become a yardstick for humanist and universal identification. At the beginning of the third millennium, memories of the Holocaust allow the formation of cultures of memory that extend beyond nations and in turn create a basis for a global human rights policy. […] In many Western nations, the Holocaust (and its association with ‘genocide’) has become a moral yardstick to distinguish between good and evil, a yardstick to measure humanist and universalist claims (Tagesspiegel, 3 September 2001). This approach is not confined to ethnic nationality but suggests a universal conscience. It is of course paradoxical for the Holocaust to provide a unifying memory, let alone conscience, when there are so few survivors


with direct experience of the period. For Sznaider, globalised and individualised memory do not mean the end of ritualised official memory, but perhaps the end of its usefulness: he sees ritual memory as existing in a ‘parallel space’, distanced from everyday experience and individualised approaches to memory (SZ, 17 February 2000). It is true that official commemorations may not have much meaning for younger generations. And yet, as mentioned, these are necessary alongside more ‘active’ forms of memory to place the past into context and to maintain a distinct national memory. Sznaider welcomes what he sees as the timeless narrative of the Holocaust: past catastrophes thus become relevant for the present and can help shape memory for the future, and one can move on from the guilt discourse in Germany (Tagesspiegel, 3 September 2001). Increasingly, references to memory of the Holocaust also address present concerns, for example right-wing extremism or terrorism. However, the danger is that authentic memory narratives will be replaced by mere symbolism, or instrumentalised for illegitimate purposes. Moreover, by globalising victimhood in an abstract manner the real victims may be forgotten. After all, such globalisation cannot represent authentic memory. A global narrative of the Holocaust may be a productive response to the fear of a constant threat to democracy and civil society, for example by demanding common solutions to human rights violations. However, to use Peter Novick’s argument concerning collective memory in America, it can also be instrumentalised as the ‘absolute evil’ in order to paper over a nation’s own shortcomings: […] talk of uniqueness and incomparability surrounding the Holocaust […] promotes evasion of moral and historical responsibility. The repeated assertion that whatever the United States has done to blacks, Native Americans, Vietnamese, or others pales in comparison to the Holocaust is true – and evasive. And whereas serious and sustained encounter with the history of hundreds of years of enslavement and oppression of blacks might imply costly demands on Americans to redress the wrongs of the past, contemplating the Holocaust is virtually cost-free: a few cheap tears (Novick 2001: 15). Such a tendency can, in addition, lead to a struggle for ‘ownership’ of the Holocaust. In what Michael Berenbaum has termed the nativization of memory (cited in Wollaston 2001: 509, footnote 2) a variety of at times conflicting narratives and representations of the period have emerged, reflecting multiple agendas. Whilst Elie Wiesel considers the Holocaust to represent a ‘war against memory’, Isobel Wollaston refers to ‘wars of memory’ (Wollaston 2001: 509). These are not just fought out within Germany but also within and between other countries, each trying to be a ‘model pupil’ in terms of Holocaust remembrance. The greatest competition is within countries, where the


increasing distance from the past means that there are more groups wishing to emphasise a certain narrative. To sum up, there is a defined shift from remembrance of the Third Reich period in its (German) entirety – that is a separate consideration of military aspects and the background to persecution – to remembrance of the Holocaust as a shorthand symbol for all of this, which in turn can blur the authentic context. In the process, perception changes from a series of perpetrator and victim narratives to a narrative on the genocide of European Jews, largely excluding other victims. There is a further polarisation with the evocation of Auschwitz, which becomes the location where all Jewish victims were murdered. The global narrative of the Holocaust is subject to a variety of interpretations and runs parallel to a range of national narratives focusing on certain aspects of the Nazi legacy. The danger is that the historical event may become distorted through too many layers of interpretation. Moreover, Eva Hoffman warns that if not accompanied by knowledge and thought, memory can become a vehicle for ‘sentimental subjectivism’ (New York Review, 9 March 2000). The question remains as to whether the Holocaust can or should be used as a didactic means to transmit universal values or seen in particularist terms as the experience of Jewish suffering, or whether it is possible to find a balance between these two narratives. The following section will illustrate various manifestations of the globalisation of the Holocaust: first, the Americanisation of German memory; second, the Stockholm international conference on the Holocaust as the institutionalisation of a global narrative; third, the nationalisation of a global narrative by the UK Holocaust Memorial Day; fourth, the intellectualisation of memory in the David Irving case; and finally Anne Frank as the globalisation of individual memory. All show the appropriation of, but also distancing from, the past, together with the tendencies towards polarisation and instrumentalisation already discussed above.

The Americanisation of a German memory The appropriation of the Holocaust as an ersatz memory narrative in America is a well-known phenomenon, documented by those such as Peter Novick (2001), Tim Cole (1999) or Edward Linenthal (1995) and in a particularly polemical fashion by Norman Finkelstein (2000). Though far removed geographically from the National Socialist atrocities of the Second World War, America has developed a ‘de-localised’ narrative on the Holocaust. A detailed account of changing perceptions of Americans and American Jews with regard to the Holocaust is given in Peter Novick’s The Holocaust and American Life. The differing titles of this publication themselves suggest a range of national narratives. The UK version is called The Holocaust and Collective Memory but, as if to emphasise the negative


past, the German publication is titled Nach dem Holocaust. Der Umgang mit dem Massenmord (After the Holocaust. Dealing with Mass Murder). To sum up Novick’s findings very briefly, in the immediate post-war years the Holocaust was just considered part of the horror of war in America. With the onset of the Cold War, the American narrative focused on rescuing the world from a new evil. American Jews distanced themselves from the Holocaust at first, emphasising survival rather than victimhood and wishing to get on with their lives. The change came with the broadcast of the TV series Holocaust in 1978, which had an audience of more than 100 million in the US. This made the Holocaust more ‘American’ and was also the start of a media-based narrative on the period. After a long debate, the Holocaust became ‘an event officially incorporated into American memory’ in April 1993 with the opening of the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington (Linenthal 1995: 1). Edward Linenthal describes this museum as ‘a physical container to preserve the memory of the Holocaust for all Americans’ (Linenthal 1995: 1). The fact that it is adjacent to the National Mall, an area containing many national museums and memorials, suggests that the Holocaust is a central feature of American memory. The American Holocaust narrative can be used to underline the principles of the country’s constitution. For Linenthal, it has indeed become a ‘national trust’ with ‘pluralistic ownership’ (Linenthal 1995: 5); blacks, Jews and other ‘victim groups’ use the term ‘holocaust’ to define their identity in America. Though they are often confused, it is important to differentiate between the American and American Jewish layers within this narrative. Novick considers that for Americans as a whole the Holocaust is used both to teach moral ‘lessons’ and to promote the evasion of historical and moral responsibility according to the notion that whatever the US has done in the past pales into comparison with the Holocaust.16 At the same time, he describes how the Holocaust has become the only element that can provide a common identity for American Jews at a time when the prominence of religion is waning and intermarriage increasing. Hence, Holocaust memory in the US is a by-product of American Jewish concerns of how to shore up their own shifting identity. Levy and Sznaider maintain that the current European understanding of the Holocaust is largely ‘made in America’ as a result of the delocalisation of Holocaust memory and its emergence as a global standard for human rights (Levy and Sznaider 2001: 210). One could then refer to an American narrative of a German history. This could in turn help to remove some of the stigma attached to post-war Germany. Yet whilst the German narrative may draw on the American one, it should be reiterated that the ethnic relationship to the Nazi past continues to produce a specific and problematic national discourse in Germany. In any case, it is perhaps more accurate to say that the universalisation of the Holocaust ensues from the interplay of a range of national and transnational narratives; the idea of using the


‘lessons’ of the Holocaust to promote human rights comes from Europe just as much as it does from the US. The American influence is strongest in terms of media presentation of this period of history. With the film Schindler’s List (1994) as well as the immense Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation, which has recorded testimony from over 50,000 Holocaust survivors, liberators and eye-witnesses from all over the world,17 Steven Spielberg in particular has brought his own narrative of history to mass audiences and largely shaped the ‘Holocaust film’ genre. The influence of this genre should not be underestimated: based on fact, such films are often presented in a way that makes them almost interchangeable with documentaries. Their continuing appeal was demonstrated by Roman Polanski’s 2003 hit film The Pianist, focusing on life in the Warsaw ghetto, which won awards for best producer and best actor.

The Stockholm International Forum on the Holocaust A good example of the applied universalisation of Holocaust recollection was the International Forum on the Holocaust in Stockholm in January 2000. The Forum was held at the instigation of the Swedish Prime Minister Goran Persson after revelations of his own country’s collaboration during the Second World War. Persson was also the initiator of the ‘Task Force for International Cooperation on Holocaust Education, Remembrance and Research’ set up in 1998. This body, with 24 member countries, consists of representatives of government as well as governmental and non-governmental organisations.18 At the International Forum on the Holocaust, 22 heads of state and government and leading politicians and historians from 44 countries discussed how memory of the Holocaust could be kept alive and how it could contribute to the campaign against racism, antisemitism and ethnic conflict. Solemn statements were made about the importance of remembering and never letting such atrocities happen again, whilst the past was used to shape a specific political narrative in the present. On the surface this reflected Dubiel’s notion of Legitimationskultur, but this narrative was also very much targeted to suit certain (national) objectives: ‘A culture of confessing guilt emerged. […] Vergangenheitspolitik was used to a previously unknown extent as a prerequisite for contemporary politics’ (Jeismann 2001: 140–1). This in turn overshadowed the authentic memory of the survivors participating in the conference, who received scant media attention. This shows the potential dominance of a constructed cultural memory narrative over authentic communicative memory. The Forum produced an eight-point Declaration, which provided an institutionalised international narrative on the Holocaust as well as showing the complex pedagogical and commemorative layers of narrative involved in Holocaust remembrance in the 21st century and the notion of


‘remembering for the future’ (Stockholm Declaration 2000). The italicised words below suggest some of the multiple roles and identities that the Holocaust has assumed. The Declaration firstly states that the Holocaust challenged the foundations of civilisation and that its unprecedented character will always hold universal meaning, as well as leave a scar across Europe. Second, the magnitude of the Holocaust must be seared in collective memory, as well as the sacrifices made by those who defied the Nazis or tried to help others – these are touchstones of the understanding of good and evil. Third, with humanity still scarred by genocide, ethnic cleansing, racism, anti-semitism and xenophobia, it is the responsibility of the international community to fight these evils, and political and public moral commitment should be strengthened to ensure that future generations understand the causes of the Holocaust and reflect upon the consequences. Fourth, the declaration pledges to promote education, remembrance and research related to the Holocaust, and fifth, it encourages the study of the Holocaust in all its dimensions. The sixth clause states the commitment to commemorate the victims of the Holocaust and those who resisted it, for example through a Holocaust Memorial Day. Seventh, the declaration states that research is to be promoted into as yet unclarified aspects of the Holocaust, for example by opening up archives. Finally, the declaration pledges the desire to plant the seeds of a better future in the soil of a bitter past; to remember the victims, respect the survivors and reaffirm humanity’s common aspiration for mutual understanding and justice. Germany’s role at this forum was that of an equal partner calling for Holocaust remembrance rather than a former perpetrator country. The forum was thus less about accusations of German guilt than international responsibility. This suggests that Germany too has become part of an international Holocaust narrative, which concentrates on the victims rather than the perpetrators of genocide. This was also apparent in the German contributions to the forum. Underlining the increased universalisation of the Holocaust, and also considering it in the context of other genocides, the then Culture Minister, Michael Naumann, pointed out that since German capitulation in May 1945 there has been at least 100 genocidal acts, for example in East Timor, Rwanda and Yugoslavia, most of which had come to public attention too late. He called for an international ‘early warning station’ to collect and disseminate information about potential genocides and for more information to be transmitted on the conventions set up in the wake of the Holocaust (Naumann 2000). Chancellor Gerhard Schröder did refer directly to the need for Germans to be aware of the country’s Nazi past, but also emphasised that vigilance to protect freedom and tolerance was required in civilised society as a whole. He called for cooperation between governments to promote education ‘that will preserve the memory of the Holocaust and […] combat hatred and contempt for mankind’ and to fight against neo-Nazis, racism and hate propaganda


(Schröder 2000a). As if to emphasise the ‘lessons’ of the Holocaust in the present, the focus in Stockholm was less on Hitler as an embodiment of evil than on Jörg Haider and his far right Freedom Party, which were about to form part of a coalition government in Austria. For Levy and Sznaider, the Stockholm conference was a ‘global discussion of values’ that sought to shape a community based on such values and an official memory for unified Europe based on the prevention of a new Holocaust (Levy and Sznaider 2001: 211). However, to return to Novick’s argument, the question remains whether the pledge to prevent another Holocaust can provide an adequate response to threats to humanity in the present. As a specific historical occurrence the Holocaust cannot of course happen again, so the sentiment inevitably refers to atrocities of this magnitude rather than a repetition of the exact same event. On the one hand, one can argue that merely being aware of the evil represented by the Holocaust – without knowing all the historical details – is effective enough to ensure a commitment to act against evil. Yet on the other hand, incidences of terrorism in the 21st century suggest that the ‘lessons’ of the Holocaust are slow to be learnt – if indeed one can learn from it at all – and that the Holocaust may not be the sole benchmark for evil in the world. Moreover, there is the danger that such benchmarks may lead to an underestimation of the destructive power of evil.

The Holocaust as intellectual exercise It would be wrong to assume that the increasingly global layers of the narrative on the Holocaust have led to a completely distorted picture of the period. Detailed academic research into the history of the National Socialist period and the Holocaust continues in Germany and in other countries. There are attempts to look beyond the view of the Holocaust as a unique and inexplicable event and to find reasons for it in Nazi policy. To give just two of many examples, the book National Socialist Extermination Policies (2000), edited by Ulrich Herbert, looks at the role of food and security policy in the acceleration of the Final Solution, as well as local and regional participation in atrocities. Mark Roseman’s The Villa, the Lake, the Meeting. Wannsee and the Final Solution (2002) places the notorious meeting of Nazi bureaucrats at Wannsee in January 1942 within the complex of circumstances, orders and initiatives at different levels which culminated in the Holocaust. In recent years, the international and interdisciplinary approaches to this period of history have challenged a former taboo in daring to compare the Holocaust with other incidences of human rights violations, although it must be said that this approach is still viewed with caution in Germany. The international conference ‘Remembering for the Future 2000’ held in Oxford and London had as its sub-heading: ‘the Holocaust in an Age of Genocides’, and some of the papers considered the Holocaust in the light


of atrocities in, for example, Armenia or Kosovo. This conference considered the Holocaust from a variety of legal, academic, religious and historical perspectives. However, in the process the word ‘Holocaust’ seemed to be taken out of its historical context to become an academic and abstract conundrum. Some 250 papers were submitted to the conference. One can count on one hand the number that mentioned Germany at all. A further example of how discourse on the Holocaust can become an intellectual exercise beyond the German context was the two-month David Irving case in Britain in 2000. The British historian David Irving brought a libel case against Penguin Books and Professor Deborah Lipstadt, a Jewish American academic, after Lipstadt had referred to him as one of the world’s most prominent and dangerous Holocaust deniers in her 1994 book Denying the Holocaust: the Growing Assault on Truth and Memory. Irving does not deny that tragedy befell the Jews in the Second World War, but claims that there was no systematic Nazi plan and that Hitler knew nothing about the Final Solution. He puts the death toll at around one rather than six million Jews and denies the existence of the gas chambers as purpose-built killing establishments. The prosecution had to prove that Irving had wilfully distorted the facts for the purposes of Holocaust denial. In a kind of cross-examination of Holocaust denial, judge and defendant indulged in semantic sparring that took the Holocaust out of context and put it at the level of a debating chamber. Irving ultimately lost his case and his reputation, though he continued to publicise his views. In 2005 he was arrested and jailed in Austria over speeches he had made in the country in 1989 claiming that the Auschwitz gas chambers did not exist, showing no remorse upon his release the following year. Whilst Holocaust denial is rare, Lipstadt had a point in describing it not as a ‘clear and present danger’ but rather a ‘clear and future danger’ (Jerusalem Post, 13 April 2000). The dangers of mis-education will of course increase with time. Ironically, this is both a product of and reason for the increasingly globalised narrative on the period.

Holocaust Memorial Day in Britain The Irving trial raised the profile of the Holocaust in Britain. Britain is an interesting case in that at national level memory narratives on the Second World War still tend to be marked by military remembrance, especially in terms of how the country defines itself in relation to present-day Germany. However, although the Holocaust remains marginal in official discourse in Britain, the country has started to ‘discover’ this aspect of Second World War history. The history of the Holocaust is now part of the National Curriculum at Key Stage 3. The Imperial War Museum opened a Holocaust Museum in 2000 and on 27 January 2001 the UK government launched the first annual Holocaust Memorial Day. This commemoration is an example of the complex interplay and instrumentalisation of national, European


and global memory narratives on the Holocaust. It shows how the Holocaust can be appropriated as a universal narrative but also treated as a particular memory narrative to serve national purposes. The 2002 theme of the commemoration was ‘Britain and the Holocaust’, emphasising the Holocaust as a national issue: ‘The persecution and mass murder of the Jews by the Nazis and their collaborators […] is a part of British history and has disturbing implications for us today’ (Ceserani 2002). The Holocaust Memorial Day website states that the Holocaust is ‘relevant to everyone in the UK today. The day provides a focus […] for people to think about the repercussions of the Holocaust and more recent genocides on our society’.19 Yet, as well as using a national focus to recall the history of the Holocaust, the commemoration is intended to show the government’s general commitment to oppose racism, victimisation, religious prejudice and genocide and to promote tolerance, democracy and good citizenship. The universal level of the commemoration is apparent in the themes for 2001: ‘Remembering Genocides: Lessons for the Future’, 2003: ‘Children and the Holocaust’ and 2007: ‘Dignity of Difference’. It is also evident in the ‘Statement of Purpose’, which gives objectives such as raising awareness and understanding of the Holocaust as a continuing issue of importance for all humanity; emphasising the need for vigilance against human rights violations; highlighting the value of dignity and equal rights; remembering the victims of Nazism and those who still suffer the consequences; and reflecting on recent atrocities that raise issues similar to the Holocaust.20 Tony Blair has deemed the commemoration ‘a day when the country reflects on the terrible and evil deeds in the world’ (Guardian, 27 January 2000) whilst the Home Office proposal for the commemoration stated: ‘Auschwitz is a powerful and universal image of the Holocaust’ (UK Home Office 1999). This image indeed attained an almost religious form at the televised official ceremony for the first Holocaust Memorial Day, which was highly ritualistic and emotional. The UK Holocaust Memorial Day of course also has a European level in coinciding with the commemorations of other European countries on this day. The Statement of Purpose refers to the Holocaust as ‘a crisis for European civilisation’, whilst the Home Office proposal alluded to the notion of a European memory narrative bound together by the Holocaust: Nazism and the Second World War remains of fundamental importance to both our national values and our shared aspirations with our European partners centred on the ideals of peace, justice and community for all (UK Home Office 1999). Holocaust Memorial Day has, moreover, underlined the tendency towards abstraction. At the launch, Tony Blair uttered the familiar words ‘The Holocaust, and the lessons it teaches us for our own time, must never be


forgotten’ (cited in Cook 2000). As mentioned, it is not only uncertain whether the Holocaust can ‘teach’ us anything, but also why the Holocaust is needed as a tag to promote values that should surely be self-evident in any civil society. Geoffrey Wheatcroft sees the introduction of Holocaust Memorial Day as misplaced so long after the end of the war, a sign of mere ‘gesture politics’ (Guardian, 27 January 2000). Yet the ‘lessons’ of the past are still given priority: the 2004 Holocaust Memorial Day was titled: ‘From the Holocaust to Rwanda: lessons learned, lessons still to learn.’

Anne Frank’s diary Perhaps the most familiar theme in Holocaust remembrance in the UK, as throughout the rest of the world, remains the poignant story of Anne Frank. Anne Frank’s diary has become a symbol of the individualisation of Holocaust remembrance all over the world. In this case too, a universal narrative is given distinct national forms. Anne Frank has become an ambassador for the Netherlands, for the ‘good Dutch’ against the ‘bad Germans’, even though she was German and could well have been betrayed by a Dutch person. She has also become an American product. In 1985, there was an American musical entitled Yours Anne, in 1995 a film Anne Frank Remembered, and in 1997 a Broadway musical, which altered some of Anne’s words to give the production a more optimistic note. There was criticism that these productions were stripped of specifically Jewish elements (Levy and Sznaider 2001: 216–18). Wolfgang Benz describes the diary as the most successful book about the National Socialist period, a cornerstone of the culture of remembrance with the quality of a metaphor (Zeit, 10 September 1998). The ensuing narrative is essentially non-historiographical, leading to an individualised interpretation. Siggi Weidemann quotes the director of the Anne Frank Museum: ‘The visitor should be guided by feeling rather than understanding’ (SZ, 29 September 1999). The story of Anne Frank is perhaps so successful as it enables one to stand on the side of the victims whilst not dealing with the real terror of the concentration camps. Moreover, the diary can be interpreted in multiple ways. The universal and representative story of Anne Frank can, however, serve as a catalyst for knowledge of the period. The Anne Frank Trust, set up in the UK in 1991 as a multi-faith educational charity, is one example. The Trust works with young people to ‘help build a society based on acceptance, mutual respect, compassion and responsibility.’21 It organises travelling exhibitions to inform people about the life of Anne Frank but also broader social issues. The most recent, entitled ‘Anne Frank + You’, firstly presents contemporary issues for the UK such as racism in football, anti-social behaviour and the debate on wearing religious symbols, before charting the history of Anne Frank and the Holocaust. This is a clear attempt to embed the Holocaust into a national narrative.


An end to the negative national memory narrative in Germany? To return to the notion of Legitimationskultur, Dubiel asserts that it is the skeletons in the closet of their history that give people an existential feeling of belonging to a nation marked by repressed feelings of guilt (Dubiel 1999: 293). The assertion is too strong in terms of the narratives of countries outside Germany concerning their role in the Second World War. Despite admissions of collaboration, a narrative of guilt is not dominant in these countries; they are still able to draw on a series of positive national myths. The globalisation of memory on the Holocaust on the one hand suggests a dilution of the narrative of specifically German guilt and Vergangenheitsbewältigung. However, the German narrative remains influenced by the country’s ethnic ties to the perpetrator regime of National Socialism and the continuing attempts to reconcile present identity with past involvement in atrocities. The perpetrators and architects of the Nazi genocide are still associated with Germany. Hence, in a post-war grid of national myths and stereotypes Germany continues to be regarded as the perpetrator nation. In response to the continued question of past guilt, Karl Wilds’s notion of a ‘culture of contrition’ in post-unification Germany is appropriate: the medium of contrition is used both to address the Nazi past and to reformulate the perceived need for engagement with history and national identity (Wilds 1999). The German national narrative may no longer be the dominant global narrative on the Holocaust, but at the same time the existence of the latter means that the Holocaust cannot be ‘forgotten’ at the level of national discourse. The remaining chapters will consider how these issues have manifested themselves in the discourse on the Nazi legacy in Germany since 1998.

2 Schröder, Walser and the Dialectic of Normality

The Berlin Republic: New government, new generation, neue Unbefangenheit? The debate on the Holocaust period of German history must never come to a complete end and the majority of Germans do not want it to (Gerhard Schröder, speech cited in Handelsblatt, 27 January 2000). Surely the readiness of a new generation to deal with [the Nazi past], not to forget, also makes it possible to represent one’s own interests in a less restricted way? (Gerhard Schröder, interview in Zeit, 4 February 1999) The above quotations sum up two distinguishing features of the national discourse on the Nazi legacy in Germany since 1998. First, the historical narrative is perpetuated by ritual commemoration, memory initiatives, media presentation and debate. Second, whilst the National Socialist past does inevitably enter political discourse, it no longer dominates decisionmaking, which is subject to new challenges and, in the wake of incidences such as the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001, new paradigms for evil. This chapter will consider the articulation of these two aspects in the Berlin Republic. It will then give an overview of the problems that may arise when they overlap, using the controversy surrounding Martin Walser’s 1998 Peace Prize acceptance speech as an example. For some commentators, the arrival in power of Gerhard Schröder’s SPDGreen coalition in September 1998 represented the end of the post-war period and a sea change in terms of attitudes to the National Socialist past (see, for example, Ross (1998) and Grimond (1999)). This can be illustrated with reference to several linked developments. Firstly, a change in the nature of recollection of this past with the evolution from communicative to cultural memory. This evolution was of course already underway during the Kohl era, when the majority of Cabinet members had no direct 44

Schröder, Walser and the Dialectic of Normality 45

memory of the Third Reich. However, it now comprised a second aspect characterising the Berlin Republic, that is, a further generational change. The founding historical moment for Gerhard Schröder’s generation is 1968 – or even 1989 – rather than capitulation or the establishment of the two German states. The dominant layer of memory for this generation is the experience of the development of political culture in post-war Germany. Critical discourse on the legacy, rather than the history, of the Third Reich is one of the ingredients, but not the whole of this experience. The fact that a new political generation was in power was also significant, with the change from a right-wing to a left-wing government. Whilst Kohl had followed the conventional right-wing approach of seeking to promote national identity and normalisation, the SPD-Green government contained members of the generation of 1968 who had both condemned the Second World War generation for failing to address, or repent for, the National Socialist past and sought to revolutionise the political establishment. However, whilst there was no discussion of a line being drawn under the Nazi past, the left-liberal tradition of Vergangenheitsbewältigung did not become a dominant feature under the SPD-Green government, which was itself associated with attempts at ‘normalisation’. The change in perspective could be explained by the need to focus on other priorities, not least the desire to promote post-unification Germany on the world stage. Other factors could include the passage of time and a feeling that the Nazi past had been adequately confronted following the input of this generation in the late 1960s. It was perhaps reconciling their present with the legacy of 1968 that caused this government the most difficulties. For Jan Ross (1998), the past that the SPD-Green government had to ‘overcome’ was not that of Nazi Germany but rather the contradictory experiences of the generation of 1968. This past was to return, for example, with a controversy in 2000 surrounding the alleged terrorist activities of Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer in the 1960s. Another tendency explaining a shift away from the conventional notion of Vergangenheitsbewältigung is that the former left-right distinction in this respect has become somewhat blurred; attitudes to the Nazi past are increasingly shaped according to individual interpretation rather than along party political lines. Interestingly, the loudest criticism of how the Nazi legacy is dealt with continues to come from younger generations: despite the increased distance from the Nazi past each new generation embarks on its own process of Vergangenheitsbewältigung. The German national memory narrative was also modified with the move of the capital of unified Germany from Bonn to Berlin. This move not only shifted emphasis to the problems associated with unification but also highlighted the negative past. Whilst Bonn had represented the positive political myth built up in post-war West Germany (parliamentary democracy, federalism, integration with the West, the EU and NATO, in short, a successful learning from ‘lessons’ of the past), Berlin evoked mental


associations with Prussia, failed democracy, totalitarianism, the rise of the Third Reich, capitulation, occupation and the Berlin Wall. In the June 1991 debate on whether to move the capital to Berlin, keep it in Bonn or divide government institutions between the two, pragmatic, financial and legal considerations became secondary to historical-political symbolism (Dubiel 1999: 249–56). Once the decision was made, media headlines such as ‘The Post-War Generation Comes to Power. Goodbye Yesterday’ (Spiegel, 9 March 1998) and ‘From Bonn to Berlin. A Move into History’ (Spiegel, 25 May 1998) suggested both positive and negative anticipation regarding the move of the capital. It was uncertain what kind of founding myth would ensue. The emergence of the Berlin Republic – a term that came to be associated with the new Berlin-based generation of government – was heralded by the media and politicians as a ‘new start’ but also reawakened concerns in Germany and beyond that unification might lead not just to a more relaxed attitude to the past but also to a new nationalism. The question was how much power a united Germany would seek to exert on the European and international stage, that is whether or not its actions would continue to be restricted by the legacy of a negative past. Whilst the Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer (Green Party) stressed that the foreign policy of the Berlin Republic would be essentially a continuation of that established in Bonn (interview in Zeit, 12 November 1998) Schröder – perhaps unwittingly – provoked controversy soon after becoming Chancellor with some of his statements on the future role of Germany. In a television interview, for example, he said that he wanted the Berlin Republic to be ‘less restricted (unbefangener) and more German in the good sense of the term’ (cited in Brumlik et al. 1999: 62). This neue deutsche Unbefangenheit (‘new uninhibitedness in Germany’) a term used, for example, by the journalist Reinhard Mohr (Spiegel, 30 November 1998) was commonly cited to describe the SPD-Green government’s approach to the National Socialist past. Moreover, it came to be associated with a new, aggressively confident attitude when, in his inaugural speech to parliament in November 1998 Schröder referred to the: […] self-confidence of a mature nation, which does not have to feel superior to anyone, but not inferior either; a nation which faces its history and its responsibility but although prepared to deal with these still looks forwards (Schröder 1998). The sentiments may be bold and indeed seem more at home on a rightwing agenda, but they do not propound a particularly accentuated nationalism, and it is surely legitimate to look to challenges in the future. Moreover, Schröder said this in a speech that stressed the importance of democracy and tolerance, referring to the Nazi past and the significance of 9 November, and further qualified his comment with: ‘It is the


self-confidence of a nation that knows that democracy is never gained for all eternity but rather that freedom […] has to be “conquered daily”’. The press, however, largely interpreted the speech as a call for Germany to pursue its own interests, thereby raising fears of a new German Sonderweg. With the shift from communicative to cultural memory, one of the pervasive features of the discourse on the Nazi legacy is (deliberate) misinterpretation or instrumentalisation of the views expressed. Schröder perhaps underestimated this at first, but in an interview in Die Zeit (4 February 1999) he later acknowledged that he was part of a culture of debate where any word that could be misinterpreted and used against someone would be. This is not to say that Schröder’s attitude to the German past mirrored that of his predecessor Helmut Kohl: Schröder displayed less historical pathos and more pragmatism. The approach to European integration is just one example. For Kohl, like Adenauer before him, the Europeanisation of Germany represented the attempt to anchor the country into a stable, Western system and prevent a dangerous resurgence of nationalism. By contrast, in the aforementioned interview Schröder commented: The generation before mine said: We are Europeans because that is the correct response to German history. And if Germans are not Europeans other countries will have an overwhelming fear of the Furor teutonicus. Now we must also add to this in saying: Germans are not only Europeans because they have to be, but also at least because they want to be and because there is no alternative. The statement is valid to the extent that the initial fears following unification that Germany might try to dominate the European stage have largely dissipated. Moreover, Germany’s role in the EU is no longer one of necessity in the sense of working towards German and European unification, but one of choice. Germany now asserts its own interests as an equal partner at European level. With European integration embedded in national politics Schröder indeed said that Germany’s neighbours expected it to formulate its interests in a more self-assured fashion (Zeit, 12 November 1998). The resulting attitude to Europe reflects Germany’s interests in the present more than its past history. Whilst Kohl stressed the importance of the euro for political union in Europe, during his candidature for Chancellor Schröder asserted ‘We want the euro as an option on our future rather than to overcome the past’ (Zeit, 12 November 1998). How then did Schröder define the role of the Berlin Republic? In his February 1999 interview with Die Zeit he stated: We need to link the democratic traditions of the old Republic and the courage of convictions that became apparent during the revolution-


ary change [in 1989]. Then Berlin will play a completely new role, unlike any European city. Berlin will be a bridge between East and West, with all the associated risks […] and opportunities. This indicates that whilst acknowledging the legacy of 1945 and the democratic tradition of Bonn since 1949 as part of its heritage, the SPDGreen coalition also used direct memory of the events surrounding unification in 1989–90 to inform a forward-looking standpoint. In addition, Schröder’s comments suggested the need to deal with social change in the present and to expand and emphasise the capital’s role in the future, for example in terms of the eastward enlargement of the European Union. The parameters – and priorities – of ‘normalisation’ would seem to have shifted from the philosophical-historical to the political, based on Germany’s international and European role. Significantly, in the same interview, Schröder said that normality and recollection could go hand in hand, that is the country could be ‘normal’ despite the dreadful uniqueness of German history: Even someone who considers the Germans to be a normal people and is ready, willing and able to interact with colleagues from other countries in a much less restricted way, is aware of this uniqueness. To this extent I feel that there is no contradiction between normality on the one hand and the readiness to remember on the other. For Schröder, ‘normality’ did not then mean drawing a line under the National Socialist legacy. The implication was rather that it was not necessary to refer to it constantly. Schröder stressed that the advent of the Berlin Republic should not be seen as a Stunde Null or an end to Germany’s historical burden. In the aforementioned inaugural speech in November 1998 he indicated the start of a new era with the move of the government to Berlin. Yet he also praised the achievements of Bonn and implied that the Berlin Republic was more about continuity than a break with the past, especially in terms of responsibility: This change of government is also a generational change in the life of our nation. Our country is increasingly shaped by a generation with no direct experience of the Second World War. It would be dangerous to misconstrue this as a way out of our historical responsibility. Schröder went on to challenge Kohl’s formulation in insisting that those born after the Second World War still had to shoulder the legacy of the past: ‘Each generation leaves burdens behind and no one can use the “grace of late birth” to talk themselves out of it.’ This perceived responsibility is, however, not just related to the Nazi past. In the same speech, Schröder acknowledged the biographies of some parliamentary members who had


contributed to the development of democracy in the Federal Republic, but he also referred to the experiences of his own community of memory for whom the dominant layer of memory recalls the courage of convictions and the fight against authoritarian structures in the period up to unification. The national memory narrative on recent history adopted by the Berlin Republic was perhaps best summed up in Schröder’s speech at the first Bundestag session in the newly-inaugurated Reichstag on 19 April 1999. He was quick to place the Reichstag into its correct historical context to allay fears of a resurgence or dominance of the negative legacy of Nazism in Berlin: As the Bundestag of a democratic Germany we are now meeting in a building with good democratic traditions. […] even if some object to the prefix ‘Reich’: after Hitler assumed power in 1933 the Reichstag did not convene here in this building for its constituent meeting but in the Garnison Church in Potsdam. And the ‘Enabling Act’ that in practice excluded the Reichstag was not adopted here but in the Kroll opera house opposite. […] It is true that the move to Berlin is also a return to German history, to the location of two German dictatorships, which caused great suffering in Germany and Europe. However, it would be as illogical to equate ‘Reichstag’ with ‘Reich’ as to confuse the glory of Prussia with German centralism. The federal model of German politics is proven and not threatened in the slightest. […] as Bonn ultimately represents the West of the Republic so Berlin symbolises unified Germany (Schröder 1999a). Berlin’s new role is of course only possible because of the tremendous strength of the democratic and federalist foundations long since laid in Bonn. However, in the same speech Schröder associated Berlin’s image more with the Berlin Wall, asserting that the wounds of the Cold War could still be felt. This implied that it was important to deal with the legacy of the East German past and the Cold War as well as the Nazi legacy, particularly in view of Berlin’s pivotal role as a bridge between East and West. From Schröder’s perspective, German historical responsibility then related to both the Nazi and the GDR pasts. This perspective also afforded positive elements such as democracy and freedom a legitimate place in the national memory narrative alongside the negative aspects of recent history. Schröder made this clear in his millennium speech: ‘We are at the end of a century of war and dictatorships, but also a century of the economic miracle and unification, of democracy and freedom’ (Schröder 1999b).

Living with the past The Schröder government was criticised for apparently abandoning decades of left-liberal Vergangenheitsbewältigung (see, for example, Herf 1998), but such a view ignores the formative experiences of those of its members from


the generation of 1968. Germany cannot draw a line under its National Socialist past, as this would mean obliterating parts of its history. The call for neue Unbefangenheit was rather the attempt to achieve a sense of normality based on open acknowledgement of past crimes; that is accepting and ‘living with’ rather than constantly questioning the negative aspects of the past. Jeismann aptly defines the approach as a combination of ‘distancing and monopolisation’ (Jeismann 2001: 174): referring to the past when it is useful to do so. Ross (1998) sees such distance as necessary: in his view Germany’s Nazi past and the principle of nie wieder (‘never again’) no longer suffice as the sole root for its political or moral orientation. Ross’s perspective has been borne out to a certain extent by the range of atrocities since the Second World War, including the terrorist threat of the new millennium, which cannot necessarily be countered using arguments based on the past. One can, moreover, quite legitimately ask the question as to what role the negative narrative of National Socialism really plays in the lives of Germans today. For the members of what Heinz Bude terms the ‘generation of 89’ or ‘fun generation’ (Spaßgeneration) (Zeit, 25 May 1999) in particular, which has little or no memory of German division – let alone the Second World War – and which has been brought up in a peaceful Europe, the Third Reich is surely something to be learnt about at school, depicted in films and debated by intellectuals but not agonised over daily. John Grimond (1999) perceived a new political and economic climate in Germany with the emergence of the Berlin Republic, one that included a fading sense of guilt and the end of the determination not to interfere abroad. Contemporary Germany understandably has more pressing policy concerns than the Nazi past. The sense that this past forms a cornerstone of policy-making is likely to fade further with time. According to Matthias Döpfner, the generation that grew up in the old Federal Republic and have now reached their mid-30s or 40s, are rather more sympathetic towards Germany and its political system than preceding generations, as well as more relaxed towards national symbols (Döpfner 2002: 51–2). Whilst this may be a somewhat over-optimistic assessment, it is true that the taboos associated with the Nazi past are being challenged. In terms of popular culture, the ARD film Goebbels und Geduldig broadcast in November 2002, part of which was set in a concentration camp, portrayed Hitler and Goebbels as comic characters, whilst in July 2000 the artist Achim Greser produced a book of satirical cartoons portraying the Führer as a buffoon. The trend has continued post-Schröder: Daniel Levy’s 2007 film Mein Führer presents a parody of Hitler, who is depicted as a drug addict who bathes with plastic battleships and has personal coaching from a concentration camp inmate.

The dialectic of normality In his February 1999 interview with Die Zeit, Schröder boldly defined contemporary Germany as ‘a normal nation’. And yet it is not as simple as


that. The easing of taboos does allow for a more open discourse on the past. Yet whilst one may be able to laugh at a caricature of Hitler, one cannot laugh at the Holocaust. Germany is a successful liberal democracy, a civil society that respects human rights. However, it was also the root of the ultimate crime against humanity in the twentieth century. Germany can certainly count itself among other ‘normal’ nations in the present in the sense of pursuing an accepted set of values and rules. Yet it is precisely this present normality that throws the absolute abnormality of the Third Reich past into sharp relief. As Wilfried van der Will puts it, as the concept of Germany as a civil society based on human rights has become the norm, the greater the need for explanation of the German past (van der Will 2000: 147). Hence, despite attempts to secure a less laboured approach to the National Socialist past, this legacy continues to perpetuate a conflict between the need to preserve memory of past atrocities and the desire to pursue a ‘normal’ existence in the present. To refer to Saul Friedländer, a society cannot be ‘normal’ if it denies memory of a traumatic past (Zeit, 10 December 1998). Moreover, ‘a nation that committed these crimes is not so normal after all’ (Friedländer cited in Kattago 1998: 102). In this sense, contemporary Germany is faced with what can be termed a dialectic of normality. This is borne out by the constant recurrence of debates on the Nazi legacy, which suggest the ever-present fear that civil society might slither back into a state of barbarism. Even if there is perhaps no actual angst that Nazism might repeat itself, there is in German political culture a constant vigilance to combat the beginnings of fascist manifestations in public life. This makes sense of Adorno’s reference to a ‘new categorical imperative’ requiring humanity ‘to arrange their thoughts and actions so that Auschwitz will not repeat itself, so that nothing similar happens again’ (Adorno 1997: 29). In line with the emergence of the Holocaust as a paradigm of evil, many other democratic countries acknowledge the presence of the dialectic in the sense of issuing warnings against human rights violations. In Germany, the dialectic of normality additionally involves the implied fear of what will sustain democracy in the country if references to the negative past are suppressed. The question could become more urgent as new forms of evil emerge in the world. The dialectic of normality suggests a split into two levels of discourse, one looking forward and outward and one looking inward and to the past, a split which is likely to become even more apparent with time. In Germany, this dialectic continues to manifest itself in both domestic and foreign policy. The compensation to former forced labourers agreed to by German businesses is a case in point. German businesses with former links to the Nazi regime were obliged to pay compensation or face obstacles to trade, and of course reputation, in the present. The Green Card initiative to bring foreigners into Germany to cover the skills shortage in various industrial sectors was carried out against the backdrop of increased


neo-Nazi violence and a debate on whether to ban the far right NPD (National Democratic Party), which can lead to the country being judged by the standards of its past rather than its present. The Max Planck Society, a leading institution for the promotion of scientific research, has apologised for the involvement of its predecessor institute, the Kaiser Wilhelm Society, in Nazi medical experiments on humans (Spiegel, 2 June 2001), whilst the German Research Foundation has also acknowledged the need to investigate its record under National Socialism (DFG 2000a; 2000b; 2007). There was alarm at Bonn University in August 2001 concerning a brochure containing biographies of famous alumni, including Goebbels, but not mentioning the atrocities of the Third Reich (Universität Bonn 2001). Even though the serialisation of Adolf Eichmann’s diaries was deemed irrelevant ‘to modern day Germans trying to get on with their lives’, Allan Hall deemed it ‘one more painful reminder of modern-day Germany’s inability to escape the shackles of its violent past’ (Scotsman, 12 August 1999). The new capital in effect epitomises the dialectic of normality. One of the centre’s key architectural statements is a vast Holocaust memorial, opened in 2005, which is located in the direct vicinity of the government quarter as well as the new, high-tech premises of Sony, Deutsche Bahn and Daimler-Chrysler, apparently positive manifestations of a continuing economic miracle. As a further example, the police in front of the synagogue in Oranienburger Strasse, as well as outside other Jewish institutions, may be stationed there primarily on account of current tensions in the Middle East, but they also evoke vivid associations with the Nazi past – and heighten worries about right-wing extremism in present-day Germany – thereby conveying a somewhat disturbing sense of abnormality in the midst of the fashionable bars and cafés of central Berlin. For decades, the dialectic of normality in Germany was perpetuated by outside pressure from those determined not to let the country forget. As Herf (1998) puts it: Since 1945 each effort to ‘finally’ put the past behind has elicited protests from a minority coalition of memory composed of voices of the many ‘other Germanys’, fellow Europeans, and survivors of the Holocaust, their children and grandchildren. The attitude seems, however, to have changed in recent years. As Christoph Schwennicke points out, the involvement of German soldiers in the 1999 Kosovo conflict led to echoes of their counterparts in the Second World War, and the appointment of the German General Klaus Reinhardt to lead the troops of KFOR, the UN peace-keeping unit in Kosovo, provoked ripples of disapproval and discontent (SZ, 10 August 1999). However, by 2003 the German leadership of troops in Afghanistan was no longer the stuff of headline news. Admittedly, whilst Germany is treated as an equal partner


at the elite levels of politics and business, stereotypical clichés – whether in football chants or the tabloid press – do continue to ‘mention the war’ and thereby underline the dialectic of normality. Yet this dialectic is upheld most vigorously – perhaps deliberately – within Germany itself: the discourse seems largely self-imposed. Ignatz Bubis summed up the paradox with the comment that the only thing abnormal about Germany was its constant debates on the desire for normality (Bubis 1999: 138). Post-war Germany has developed, and indeed flourished, on the basis of this dialectic, which has assumed various forms: between memory and the attempt to forget; imposed democracy and the familiarity of dictatorship; with East-West division and the co-existence of anti-fascism and anticommunism; and with the challenges of unification. The democratic institutions and Basic Law, imposed in abnormal conditions, became the basis of a ‘normal’, successful democracy constructed on the principle of nie wieder. At the same time these institutions serve as a constant reminder of the past, for example with anti-extremist provisions and a tradition of restraint in foreign policy. The dialectic of normality is also kept alive with generational change. Each generation discovers the horrors of the Nazi past for itself and has to fit this into its own perception of normality. To quote Grimond (1999): […] normality, and the search for a national consciousness that comes with it, requires an investigation of the past and, inevitably, this brings young Germans up against Nazism and the origins of abnormality. To underline the impact that confrontation with this past must have on younger generations in Germany, Geoffrey Wheatcroft imagines the rock and roll generation of 1950s Britain being faced with calls to prosecute men for crimes committed during the Boer War (Guardian, 27 January 2000). It is understandable that the Nazi legacy frequently provokes a strong emotional reaction among younger generations in view of its unique capacity to both shock and fascinate. It is also difficult to process in view of its historicised and ‘alien’ nature when considered from the perspective of contemporary democracy and its frequent absence from the memory narratives transmitted within families. Van der Will aptly sums up the dialectic of normality from the generational perspective: On the one hand, the submissive attitude of ‘walking around in sackcloth and ashes’ […] also seems fitting to young Germans on account of a past which shattered all parameters of civilised human interaction […]. On the other hand, this past as a whole, and particularly its presentation in the media, appears as something alien that cannot be conveyed using the standards of the present (van der Will 2000: 147–8).


The debate on Martin Walser’s Peace Prize speech The initial claims that Schröder’s SPD-Green coalition would coincide with an end to discussion of the Nazi past were silenced by a number of debates that took place within the first few months of the new government’s term in office. These debates illustrated both the dialectic of normality and the evolution of critical discourse on the Nazi past. The principal example was the controversy unleashed by a speech given by the author Martin Walser in October 1998. Walser had been awarded the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade (Friedenspreis des deutschen Buchhandels). A former member of the Gruppe 47, he belongs to a generation with direct experience of the Second World War and his work has often critically addressed the legacy of the Nazi past, in particular the division of Germany. His contribution to the latter was one of the reasons he was awarded the prize. Walser’s acceptance speech, delivered in the symbolic setting of the Paulskirche in Frankfurt in front of around 1200 prominent political and cultural representatives and televised live, provoked a heated and long-lasting controversy on Germany’s relations with its National Socialist past, which both set parameters for subsequent debates and indicated that the new SPDGreen coalition had been too hasty in referring to a neue Unbefangenheit. Critical responses to the speech tended to treat it as a simple call for an end to Holocaust remembrance in Germany and opposition to the proposed Holocaust memorial in Berlin. And yet the carefully constructed speech, which Niven terms a ‘rhetorical masterpiece’ (Niven 2002: 177), in fact contained a number of topoi, each worthy of a separate lecture, and was therefore more complex than the headlines made out. Themes ranged from the expectations placed on a political intellectual and the freedom of literary language to a plea for the release of a former GDR spy. The National Socialist legacy was not stated as the main topic, and indeed was not explicitly addressed until well into the speech. The analysis of the speech below will assess how the fierce criticism of Walser arose and whether this criticism was justified. It is difficult to arrive at a definitive interpretation of the speech as it includes a number of ambiguities and can be read in a variety of ways according to individual standpoints. Walser commenced his speech with the claim that the public would expect him to say something provocative during such a ceremony even if he had no wish to do so. Such expectations made him feel ‘restricted’ (Walser 1998b: 9–10).1 Walser’s opening comments introduced an important element of the speech: the desire to express himself in literary language rather than through the norms of a ‘soapbox speech’, and to retreat into the world of his own private memories. This plea for the personal voiced in a very public forum was at the same time one of the main problems of the speech. Moreover, whilst Walser asserted that it was impossible to ‘talk about nice things for 25 minutes’ (10) in this context, the content


of the speech suggested that this was not his intention anyway. Walser was playing with audience expectations from the start. He maintained that if he had, after all, presented a non-critical ‘potpourri of fine sentiments’ (10) he would have justified it with the argument: I shut myself off from evils that I cannot help to eradicate. I have had to learn to look away. I have various refuges, which my eyes seek out as soon as the TV screen presents the world as something unbearable. I think that this is an appropriate reaction. I do not have to be able to bear the unbearable (10–11). At this stage there was no explicit mention of the National Socialist past; this could have been the reaction of someone who finds it difficult to tolerate the visualisation of contemporary violence or evil. However, the National Socialist context was hinted at as Walser went on to use Freud’s term ‘repression’ (Verdrängen) and to assert that he could not get through the day or the night without the ability to ‘divert’ his thoughts (wegdenken) or to ‘look away’ (wegschauen) from the unbearable (11). These terms are common in connection with Vergangenheitsbewältigung as well as attitudes at the time of National Socialism. They were to ring alarm bells for critics who saw the speech as a call for the Nazi past to be erased from public discourse. These fears could have been confirmed with the comment: ‘I also do not think that everything has to be atoned for’ (11). However, again playing on audience expectations, Walser used the latter comment to illustrate the situation of Rainer Rupp, a West German who had spied for the GDR and was imprisoned after unification. For Walser, Rupp was ‘doing penance for […] German unification’, whilst former spies for West Germany had been granted immunity from imprisonment (12). Walser said that as an author he could not ‘ignore’ the situation. He went on to confirm his staunch criticism of German division. Having challenged the public expectations placed on him as a critical intellectual, Walser apparently attempted to disassociate himself from this role. The obvious paradox was that Walser was accepting a prize for his political engagement but apparently rejecting the reasons for which he had won it. He dismissed the notion that intellectuals are ‘guardians of conscience’ as ‘empty, pompous, strange’ (13), apparently renouncing the status of ‘conscience of the nation’ previously assigned to himself and other critical intellectuals by media consensus. Again paradoxically, but probably consciously, he lived up to his own criticism by delivering the kind of speech that might be expected from such an intellectual. An important theme in the speech was the privacy of individual conscience and memories. Walser maintained that ‘conscience cannot be delegated’ (13). This, as other parts of the speech, reflected views expressed in his previous work. In ‘Über freie und unfreie Rede’, for example, he stated:


‘My conscience remains unpublished’ (Walser 1994: 479). Walser appeared to be calling for a return of conscience from the public to the individual domain, implying that intellectuals should not have a monopoly on conscience. Unfortunately, he failed to draw the distinction between public and individual conscience and public and individual memory, leading many to mistake conscience for memory and conclude that Walser wanted to erase the Nazi past from public memory. Walser was, however, playing on expectations – he knew that the audience would hear the reference to the Nazi past even though he did not state it. It was only almost half way into the speech that Walser started to address the issues that provoked the most controversy. He did so via reference to the present rather than the past in voicing his incredulity at assertions that far right ideology existed in Germany and Austria. For Walser, these assertions were part of the ‘contemporary problem with conscience’ (14), in other words the fear of failed Vergangenheitsbewältigung. Walser referred to ‘a truly significant thinker’, who stated in 1992 that the public and political reaction to far right violence revealed ‘moral and political degeneration’ (14). He then mentioned an ‘equally significant writer’ who claimed that people still dreamed of ‘extermination and gas chambers’ in Salzburg (14–15). To understand the tone of the speech it is essential to establish whom Walser was attacking here using evidence rather than speculation. Walser did not ‘name names’, but both van der Will and Niven have identified the ‘thinker’ as Jürgen Habermas, matching the above quotation with an article by Habermas in Die Zeit (11 December 1992). The ‘writer’ has been identified as Thomas Bernhard (Niven 2002: 178; van der Will 2000: 172). The two perhaps retained their anonymity as Walser intended them to stand for a whole group of (left-liberal) critical intellectuals pursuing a punishing discourse on the Nazi legacy which prevents German ‘normality’. Walser himself once belonged to such a grouping, but he now claimed that he could no longer connect with their sentiments. He suggested that this could be due to his conscience being ‘too easily put to sleep’ (15), although his previous comment about ‘looking away’ would instead suggest that the pull of his conscience is too great. Extending his criticism of what he termed Meinungssoldaten (‘opinion soldiers’), Walser said that he refused to accept headlines stating, for example, that Germans happily set up sausage stands in front of burning asylum homes as he simply did not believe that they were true (15–16). He suspected that ‘those uttering such phrases want to hurt us as they think that we deserve it. […] Everyone. One restriction. All Germans’ (17). This comment suggests that Walser feels ‘victimised’ as a German, although his speech did not specify who was making the accusations. Along with the intellectuals implied above, another likely target was the German – or foreign – media. This became apparent when Walser stated that the article in question had printed ‘sausage stands in front of burning asylum homes’


in bold type (16). This common journalistic device, which summarises the main points of an article, can lead to the biased understanding or overgeneralisation that Walser was criticising. These tendencies were evident in many commentaries on Walser’s speech. For Walser, conscience is a private matter. In his speech he accused intellectuals of abusing the role of ‘conscience of the nation’ to try and salve their own private consciences in public: Could it be that in reproaching us with the disgrace [Schande], the intellectuals for a second fall under the illusion that because they have once again worked in the gruesome service of memory they are somewhat excused and, for a moment, even closer to the victims than to the perpetrators? (17) This suggests that taking the side of the victims is less about respect than improving one’s own image or casting others in a poor light. It also evokes the attempt of one community of memory (here, that of German post-war intellectuals) to mirror another (the victims of National Socialist persecution), an attempt which must fail on account of their diverging experiences. Walser implied that he could not assume this ‘victim’ role: ‘I have never considered it possible to leave the ranks of the accused’ (17). This statement is, however, rather ambiguous: does he feel guilty for being German or consider that he is made to feel guilty by those whom he criticises? It is important to raise another point here concerning Walser’s apparent targets. Certain critics considered that Walser was referring to Jewish representatives in his speech, which led to allegations of anti-semitism.2 However, the victim/perpetrator distinction in the above statement, as well as the reference to Habermas, would suggest that the targets of Walser’s ire were not Jews, but German intellectuals. If Walser’s targets were not (exclusively) Jewish, then the speech was of course not anti-semitic, although selective quoting in the press – aided by the ambiguity of the speech itself – could certainly lead to this impression. It is thus crucial to look at the overall context of Walser’s remarks. The most controversial part of the Peace Prize speech condemned media excess in relation to the National Socialist past. Walser asserted: ‘Everyone knows our historical burden, the unchanging disgrace, not a day goes by without us being reproached for it’ (17). It is easy to see why he was accused of trying to draw a line under the Nazi past: this comment suggested that he was tired of hearing about the Nazi past, although ‘our’ implied a collective association with it. Walser perceived a ‘routine of accusation’ in the media which, he claimed, repeatedly broadcast images of concentration camps (17). This ‘constant presentation of our disgrace’ led him to a state where ‘instead of being grateful […] I start looking away’ (18). This was not necessarily a call


to remove the images altogether but rather for a stop to sensationalism or excessive media exposure, which can numb the individual to the images shown. Walser has previously voiced such criticism. In ‘Unser Auschwitz’ (1965), for example, he accused the media of reducing the Frankfurt Nazi war crimes trials to soundbites and for practically making stars out of the defendants, who were portrayed as ‘beasts’ and as the embodiment of evil in a way that led the public to distance themselves from the reality of the crimes (Walser 1965: 187–203, especially 188, 195). It is of course a normal reaction for one to turn away when bombarded with horrific images. In ‘Geschichte als Zeughaus’ (1985) Walser stated: My head normally turns away as soon as I am unexpectedly confronted with a horrible image. I avoid watching open heart surgery just as much as I avoid looking at the piles of dead bodies from Buchenwald or Dachau (Walser 1985: 252). Walser’s comments could easily be interpreted as a call to draw a line under the past to make his own world more agreeable, just as he criticised other intellectuals for taking the side of the victims for this purpose. Yet his subsequent remarks in the speech suggested that it was not so much the act but rather the method of (public) remembrance that disturbed him and that this was a speech against inappropriate remembrance rather than against remembrance itself. In Walser’s view, the visualisation of the past had ulterior motives that were nothing to do with enlightenment: I am almost pleased when I think that I can detect that the motive is often no longer remembrance or not being allowed to forget but the instrumentalisation of our disgrace for present-day objectives (18). For Walser, Auschwitz had been reduced to a mere soundbite, cited for example with regard to the division and unification of Germany. Again he did not mention names but a likely target here was Günter Grass, who saw German division as justified punishment for Auschwitz. Walser’s reference to instrumentalisation evoked harsh criticism, but it was not the first time he had used it in this context. In ‘Über freie und unfreie Rede’ he stated that those who considered themselves responsible for conscience should ask themselves whether it was appropriate to instrumentalise Auschwitz (Walser 1994: 480). It would be naïve to expect that this or any past can escape instrumentalisation. The Peace Prize controversy arose because Walser was suggesting that commemoration was based on motives of selfinterest rather than a concern for remembrance, as if the media and intellectuals were profiting from the past. The question remains whether Walser was justified in his assertion of a ‘constant presentation of our disgrace’. Whilst it is true that there are many


programmes about the Third Reich period, which may lead to a distorted view, these are neither constant nor indeed the only distressing images broadcast via the media. Jeismann considers that the public is tiring of references to the Nazi past, a tendency that found vivid expression in Walser’s speech (Jeismann 2001: 176). This may have less to do with remembrance itself than with the constant debates on it, such as that provoked ironically by the Peace Prize speech itself. Walser mirrored such exasperation – and hinted at the dialectic of normality – in stating that the attempt to claim normality in contemporary Germany still represented a taboo: ‘what kind of suspicion does one encounter if one says that Germany is now completely normal, a completely standard society?’ (20) The implication was that those engaged in the discourse on the Nazi legacy posed an obstacle to normality, although of course Walser was himself adding to this discourse and this obstacle in delivering such a speech. In addition, Walser was perhaps disgruntled that even as a writer he was not ‘allowed’ to portray his perception of normality if it differed from the conventional view of the Nazi past. One detects a note of personal bitterness. Reflecting Schröder’s comment about misinterpretation, and in an apt prelude to the subsequent debate, Walser criticised the interview culture built up by the Meinungssoldaten who force the writer into Meinungsdienst (the ‘opinion service’) and ‘have […] taken things so far that writers no longer have to be read, just interviewed’ (25). He rejected criticism of a downplaying of Auschwitz in his work, for example the fact that his semiautobiographical novel Ein Springender Brunnen (1998a), which recounts a childhood in the Nazi era through the eyes of a boy, does not mention Auschwitz or the genocide of European Jews. A likely target here was Marcel Reich-Ranicki, who had publicly criticised the novel for precisely this omission. Reich-Ranicki is Jewish, but Walser’s comments related more logically to the critic’s influence as the ‘pope of literature’ (Literaturpapst) than to his Jewishness per se. After all, Walser’s defence of his intellectual and literary approach to the Nazi past in the Peace Prize speech itself had self-interested motives. Walser’s viewpoint showed the distinction between individual and national memory narratives, especially in light of the following comment from the 1988 essay ‘Über Deutschland reden’: I have the impression that I cannot deal with my memory at my own discretion. For example, I cannot educate my memory using subsequently acquired knowledge. […] The images are closed to such instruction. Nothing that I have experienced in the meantime has changed these images. […] Knowledge acquired about the murderous dictatorship is one thing, my memory is something different, although only as long as I keep it to myself. As soon as I want to share it, I notice that I cannot convey the innocence of memory. I neither have the


courage nor the ability to describe coal trucks at work during the years 1940 to 1943, as the fact that people were also transported to concentration camps in such trucks imposes itself (Walser 1988: 406–7). In other words, Walser’s individual memory is at odds with the national memory narrative shaped in the Federal Republic, which is based on increased knowledge of the Nazi regime. Walser’s indignation at criticism that he neglected to address Nazi atrocities in his book would suggest that rather than wishing to forget he seeks to remember, but in his own way, without the dictates of ritualised recollection. The Peace Prize speech continued: Auschwitz is not suited for use as a threatening routine for this purpose, a means of intimidation or moral cudgel that can be employed at will, or even just as a duty-bound ritual. Ritualisation leads to a kind of lip-service (20). Critics were justified in baulking at the use of the above terms, which appeared to degrade the many respectful and genuine initiatives to remember the victims of National Socialism. Moreover, ‘moral cudgel’ (Moralkeule) is not far from the terms Nazi-Keule (‘Nazi cudgel’) and Antisemitismus-Keule (‘anti-semitism cudgel’) used by the far right.3 Walser cited the Holocaust memorial in Berlin as an example of such instrumentalisation in concrete form; a ‘monumentalisation of disgrace’ and a further product of those who seek to dictate public conscience. He was critical of the associated ‘negative nationalism’ which, he asserted, was no better than its opposite (20). This apparent opposition to nationalism in either form would indicate that Walser is not, as some critics maintained, a proponent of a ‘shift to the right’. Whilst the concept of ‘negative nationalism’ can be applied to the left-wing focus on Vergangenheitsbewältigung it can also be attributed to the right – the Holocaust memorial was, for example, supported by Kohl (and originally opposed by Schröder). Reiterating the primacy of individual over publicly dictated conscience, Walser quoted Heidegger and Hegel to make the point that: ‘Everyone is alone with their conscience’ (21–2). He suggested that public acts of conscience were meaningless, non-authentic or merely symbolic: ‘And nothing is more alien to conscience than symbolism, however well-intentioned it may be’ (22). Here again was the same confusion between public memory and private conscience. What Walser deemed public acts of conscience are really acts of recollection, which usually urge the public to assume responsibility for the past. One is, moreover, left puzzling as to whether Walser’s stated views were themselves authentic. Walser used the example of Thomas Mann’s political and literary writings to assert that one should consider his literature rather


than his political statements as indicative of his real opinions. He said that the freedom of literary language could release him from the prescribed role of a critical intellectual and allow a proper dialogue with the reader (27). Walser seemed to be announcing his withdrawal from his role as a public conscience having realised that, as Niven puts it: […] if you put an intellectual on a rostrum, he will be seized by a kind of moral power-hunger. The only answer for the author is to return to the text, where he or she can write self-reflexively (Niven 2002: 179). However, it is unlikely that this was his true intention. Perhaps as the ultimate confirmation that Walser could not discard the mantle of the critical intellectual and its associated political role, the speech in fact concluded by appealing to the then Federal President, Roman Herzog, to amnesty Rainer Rupp. In the subsequent controversy there was virtually no comment on this political message. Reinhart Baumgart wrote that Walser ‘had considered this to be the only unexpected provocation in his speech’ (WBD: 390). Yet it is more likely that Walser predicted – and intended – that the controversy would centre on issues surrounding the German (in)ability to master the past.

Layers of interpretation: the spoken, written and researched speech Walser’s potential targets have been identified as Habermas, Grass, ReichRanicki, Bernhard and the German or foreign media. Political representatives could also be included on account of their public statements on remembrance. One could conclude that for Walser the continuation of a Vergangenheitsbewältigung discourse traditionally attributed to the left is imposing on his compatriots a sense of guilt for the Nazi past and preventing a return to normality. Furthermore, Walser could be seen as shifting (or being forced) to the right of this discourse in calling for a less punishing narrative on this past. In Niven’s view, Walser might be implying that it is the left-wing dominated discourse on the Nazi past rather than the past itself that makes Germans ‘look away’, as it is constantly forcing a state of shame on the nation as a form of collective identity. This ‘left-wing conspiracy of Vergangenheitsbewältigung’ (Niven 2002: 181) could be why Walser used vocabulary usually associated with the far right to refer to the left. In turn, the block on national identity apparently imposed by the left could provoke an aggressive nationalism amongst young people as a kind of counter-reaction against the establishment (Niven 2002: 181–2). This line of thinking poses an interesting parallel to the representatives of the vaterlose Gesellschaft among the SPD-Green government, who themselves rebelled against the establishment in the 1960s in order to secure


rather than to oppose a critical discourse on the Nazi legacy. However, younger generations contribute to the critical discourse on the Nazi legacy just as much as they may wish to ignore it. Moreover, whilst it is fair to say that the German discourse can focus excessively on the question of German guilt, various points should be added here. First, the view that the left is imposing a negative narrative does not match the attitude to the Nazi past ascribed to Schröder’s left-wing government which, as mentioned, was accused of too little rather than too much emphasis on this past. After all, Schröder defined Germany as ‘normal’ and emphasised the positive features of the Federal Republic. The lack of political input into the Walser debate also suggested that the pursuit of a debate on the Nazi legacy is more a priority for the self-styled Meinungssoldaten in the media than for political representatives. This leads to a second point: it is not necessarily just the left that is responsible for instrumentalising the negative legacy of Nazism, but rather a grouping bound by interest rather than politics, in line with the ‘communities of interpretation’ mentioned in Chapter 1. This lends weight to the notion that Geschichtspolitik is no longer as focused on the contrast between left- and right-wing perspectives. It is perhaps not too bold to state that it does not matter so much whom but rather what Walser was criticising. After all, the views condemned by Walser are not the exclusive preserve of representatives of the vaterlose Gesellschaft such as Habermas. Walser’s apparent targeting of Reich-Ranicki led to knee-jerk accusations of anti-semitism, but as mentioned there is no confirmation of an anti-semitic motive in the speech. Indeed, Reich-Ranicki defended Walser against the charge, although he did point out the potential for misinterpretation on account of the ambiguities within the speech (WBD: 321–5). Walser was rather condemning a tendency embodied by an individual, or in this case perhaps rebutting the criticism of his novel. Walser appeared to be criticising a group that could vary in terms of politics, profession, nationality or religion but shares similar views, a group that may also include Jewish representatives. However, this does not mean that Walser’s criticism was targeted solely at Jews. Such a reaction indicated the tendency to pigeonhole the protagonists in this discourse. Walser may have given a stereotypical view of left-liberal Vergangenheitsbewältigung, but at the same time his critics made the generalised assumption that this equated to an ideological shift to the right. It is important at this juncture to note the different levels of interpretation of Walser’s Peace Prize speech, which highlight the co-existence of layers of individual, collective and national recollection. The distinction should firstly be made between the delivered speech and the speech initially registered by the audience. Walser’s speech was applauded with a standing ovation from the entire audience (apart from Ignatz Bubis, the late President of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, and Bubis’s wife)


as a successful and stimulating piece of rhetoric. This would of course not have been the case had there been any generally perceived anti-semitic message. A second distinction can be drawn between the delivered speech and its initial reporting in the media, which often reduced it to a series of generalised soundbites. There is a third distinction between the written speech and its reception and analysis. Walser’s rhetoric was highly complex and the speech has to be read carefully – ideally with background knowledge – to understand the breadth of content, let alone the references. Too hasty an analysis of the speech led to both positive and negative assessments of Walser. Whilst the assessment here has found no evidence that Walser was being anti-semitic or targeting international Jewry, for critics such as Brumlik, Funke, Rensmann and Rohloff this was precisely what he was doing (Brumlik et al. 1999: 13–28, 28–127, 178–81; Rohloff 1999, especially 80–110). This says something about the climate of discourse on the National Socialist legacy in general. By consequence, a fourth distinction can be drawn between what one registered at the time or upon reflection and what one wanted to hear or read into the speech. The above critics perhaps sought to detect an anti-semitic motive as this tallied neatly with their assessment of tendencies within contemporary German political culture. A final distinction can be made between what Walser stated in his Peace Prize speech and his subsequent comments. As we have seen, cultural memory allows the appropriation of certain aspects of the narrative on the Nazi past. The interpretation of Walser’s speech depended on the dominant narrative for the communities of memory concerned, be they Jewish, German, media, political, generational, left-wing or right-wing. The at times conflicting interests of these groups exemplify the ‘wars of memory’. Consequently, the potential was rife for multiple distortions of the meaning of the delivered speech. It is true to say that both Walser and his critics were guilty, inadvertently or not, of the very ‘instrumentalisation for present-day objectives’ that they opposed. Assmann and Frevert’s comment is apt in this context: Unfortunately it has now become customary in Germany for those involved in Holocaust remembrance to mistrust each other and to blacken each other’s motives (Assmann and Frevert 1999: 71).

The impact of the speech Micha Brumlik was right to declare that a ‘new page of German Geschichtspolitik’ had been turned with Walser’s speech (WBD: 49). Up to then it had been usual for public figures to admonish too little remembrance of the Nazi past. Walser, however, had broken a taboo in seemingly suggesting that there was too much of the wrong kind of commemoration in Germany. Commentators were, and indeed continue to be, divided on whether


Walser’s remarks represented a positive or negative development in terms of German Vergangenheitsbewältigung. Proponents of the speech welcomed the chance to openly address the taboos that had previously blocked a genuine debate on the National Socialist past and asserted that Walser did not want to forget but rather to protect memory from being abused by the media and politicians (see, for example, Ulrich Raulff in WBD: 122–4). Critics of Walser’s speech, on the other hand, feared that it could fuel the arguments of the far right – interpreting it as a call for a line to be drawn under the past (Schlußstrich) for the purposes of German normalisation and national reassertion (see, for example, Brumlik in WBD: 49–51). The vehemence of the debate – and the controversies that have followed since – showed that even if the latter was Walser’s intention, he failed to realise it. Walser’s speech had an unprecedented effect. Mohr perceived emotions reminiscent of 1968 (Spiegel, 30 November 1998), whilst for Ross (1998) the Historians’ Dispute seemed ‘a mere academic feud’ in comparison. The debate unleashed by the speech was firstly an attempt on the part of the remaining members of the Third Reich generation to work through their own direct relations to the Nazi past and to secure a memory narrative for younger generations. The dispute between the protagonists was, however, more bitter than in the case of the Historians’ Dispute, as it was about legitimising personal biographies rather than theorising about interpretations of the Third Reich. This was also the first debate on an alleged shift to the right from the mainstream of German society. The controversy was a timely one, coming just after the change of government and just before the move to Berlin. It occurred also at a time when the past was under scrutiny by the media with negotiations on payments to former forced labourers as well as the discussion on the proposed Holocaust memorial in Berlin. In view of the generational change, it was fitting that this debate centre on how much memory was needed – and wanted – in the new Berlin Republic. In a sense, it was the first explicit debate on the dialectic of normality, showing both the fear and the impossibility of a Schlußstrich. To the extent that it broke taboos related to the National Socialist legacy it has been used as a point of comparison for subsequent debates. It also continued the tendency towards a popularisation of the discourse on this legacy. The Walser debate and associated media coverage took place in several phases. First, there was the initial reporting of the speech and arguments over what Walser may have meant. The second phase saw Ignatz Bubis accuse Walser of ‘intellectual arson’ and intellectual nationalism. The third phase saw the debate polarised to ‘Bubis v. Walser’ (taz, 10 November 1998), with reference to Walser’s alleged anti-semitism. In a fourth phase the focus shifted away from Walser as the debate became ‘Bubis v. Dohnanyi’ following a spirited intervention from Klaus von Dohnanyi, a former mayor of Hamburg, whose father had been in the German resistance during the Second World War. The fifth phase saw a ‘reconciliation meeting’ and a


series of more general articles and secondary literature on the implications of the speech. The Walser debate soon became more important than the actual Peace Prize acceptance speech, moving beyond its actual content to deal with broader issues concerning the nature of political culture in the Berlin Republic. Walser’s speech was itself instrumentalised as part of the debate. It is also important to note that Walser himself remained largely silent during the whole furore.

Walser versus Bubis versus Dohnanyi: a clash of communities of memory The Walser debate would not have been so intense without the controversial input from Ignatz Bubis and Klaus von Dohnanyi. Ignatz Bubis introduced a Jewish perspective to the debate. As a former victim of the National Socialist regime, his interpretation of the Peace Prize speech reflected a different individual memory narrative from Walser’s. He broke with the tradition of the 9 November commemorations to launch a stinging attack on the speech, which in his view had made Walser unworthy of the prize. Bubis quoted extensively from Walser’s speech, although only citing the controversial passages, which read by themselves added weight to Bubis’s arguments. Bubis accused Walser of ‘intellectual arson’, latent anti-semitism, intellectual nationalism and of advocating an end to remembrance of the National Socialist past. In Bubis’s view, these were all representative features of a growing trend within the contemporary intellectual climate in Germany: ‘Intellectual nationalism is on the rise and is not entirely free from subliminal anti-semitism’ (WBD: 112). However, if, as assumed here, the targets of Walser’s criticism in the Peace Prize speech are Germans, or at least protagonists of the German Vergangenheitsbewältigung discourse, then it is difficult to discern an explicitly anti-semitic message. Moreover, even if Walser were calling for less remembrance, this would not necessarily equate to anti-semitism. Nonetheless, the deliberately provocative language used in the speech does lay it open to more sinister interpretations. For Bubis, Walser represented a culture of ‘looking away’ that was reminiscent of Nazi Germany (WBD: 111). There is, however, an apparent paradox here. Not only did Walser raise the issue of remembrance in a highly symbolic public forum – the Frankfurt Paulskirche – he also stated that he could not shake off the status of ‘the accused’, which suggests that he cannot forget (see Reich-Ranicki in WBD: 323). Bubis warned that the past could repeat itself, indicating a common tendency to blend the present with the past. His concern was perhaps not so much that Walser sought to draw a line under the past but rather that he had given ammunition to those who wanted to do so. Hence, Bubis defined Walser’s claims of instrumentalisation as ‘intellectual arson’, asserting that Walser was giving


a voice to right-wing extremists (WBD: 111). Similarly, in an open letter to Walser, Elie Wiesel asked: Do you not understand that you have opened a door that others could push through, others who pursue completely different political motives and are dangerous in a completely different way? Those who suddenly declare that it is time to turn the page, to establish other priorities, in short to forget – something that you would never accept as a person or as a writer? (WBD: 398) Unsurprisingly, Walser’s speech was indeed welcomed by the far right and to his discredit, he did not openly disassociate himself from this.4 However, he seems an unlikely intellectual leader for the movement given that he specifically denied its significance in the speech itself. For Bubis, normality meant that Jews wanted to live in Germany again and that the country was democratic. Implying that Walser wanted to erase the negative history at the heart of the dialectic of normality, he continued: ‘“Normality” cannot […] mean repressing memory and living with a new anti-semitism and a new racism as characterised by far right parties’ (WBD: 112). However, the Peace Prize speech appeared to be calling for a ‘purer’ form of memory that would not be appropriated for the wrong reasons, which would imply a similarity rather than a clash in the basic outlook of Walser and Bubis. Bubis’s comments provoked a wave of interest in the press. This increased after the debate was given a further twist by Klaus von Dohnanyi. Dohnanyi seemed to take the German side against Bubis’s Jewish perspective, but at the same time made Walser’s views seem reprehensible, implying elements that were not evident in the Peace Prize speech. In the process, Dohnanyi, an SPD politician, showed the fluid boundaries between the left- and right-wing discourses on the Nazi legacy. In an article in defence of Walser published in the FAZ on 14 November, he said that Bubis did not, and perhaps as a German ‘without a guilty history’ (WBD: 147) could not, understand Walser’s speech, which was the complaint of a German – although a non-Jewish German – about the all too frequent attempts of others to use our conscience to their own advantage, to abuse and to manipulate it (WBD: 146). This implied that Walser was the victim of his own speech and his own nationality. Dohnanyi gave examples of the above such as the English tabloid press printing pictures of Kohl with a Hitler moustache or German schoolchildren being called ‘Nazis’ in the Netherlands (WBD: 147). By placing the ‘others’ in opposition to ‘our conscience’ one could also surmise that Dohnanyi thought that Walser was (rightly) referring to Jews.


Dohnanyi had a point in that Walser and Bubis belonged to different communities of memory and thus had differing experiences of the Nazi past. However, the wording allows the conclusion that for Dohnanyi the Jews seek to manipulate German conscience. Moreover, Dohnanyi suggested an unfair ‘persecution’ of Germans in general when he said that the ‘disgrace’ (Schande) of Nazi crimes affected and continued to affect Germans, who had to bear the burden at home and abroad (WBD: 146–7). He then made one of the most ill-judged and inappropriate statements of the entire debate: However, Jewish citizens in Germany should naturally also ask themselves if they would have acted so much more courageously than most other Germans if ‘only’ the handicapped, homosexuals or Roma had been deported to the extermination camps after 1933 (WBD: 148). This hypothetical question was not only an affront to Jewish suffering, but also implied that Jews have no right to assert their victim status. Dohnanyi agreed that the Nazi past was instrumentalised, for example in America and Israel, but this again could lead to the impression that he was blaming this on the Jews (WBD: 149). In another re-interpretation of the printed text of Walser’s speech, Dohnanyi appeared to be focusing on the suffering of (Jewish) Nazi victims, whilst Walser was referring to the impact on Germans in view of the country’s status as a former perpetrator of atrocities. The next stage of the debate involved exchanges between Bubis and Dohnanyi. On 16 November the FAZ published a letter from Bubis to Dohnanyi, which – quite fairly – deemed Dohnanyi’s rhetorical question ‘malicious’ (WBD: 158). Bubis refused to budge from his interpretation of Walser’s speech and said that the fact that the far right Nationalzeitung had printed it was a clear enough message about its impact. Moreover, he insisted that the tone of the speech served to instrumentalise Auschwitz, even though Walser had clearly spoken out against this in his speech. Bubis also introduced a new element – and another personal concern – to the debate in asserting that Walser’s criticism of instrumentalisation referred to the financial claims of former forced labourers. This was the first time that the stereotypical link between Jews and money had been made in the postwar German Vergangenheitsbewältigung discourse. The assertion was timely because of the compensation negotiations underway at the time, but there is no evidence in the speech to suggest Walser was referring to this, and so this element seems to have been read into the speech by Bubis.5 The next day, the FAZ published Dohnanyi’s reply to Bubis. This contained another unfortunate comment and introduced another level of confusion: he suggested that Germans were the victims of Jewish criticism, although Bubis had been responding to what he saw as German


victimisation of Jews, and Walser had indicated criticism of Germans by Germans: I think that in your position as Chairman of the Central Council of German Jews [sic!] you could treat your non-Jewish compatriots with a little more care: after all we are all vulnerable (WBD: 164). Such comments also unwisely drew a distinction between ‘Jews’ and ‘non-Jews’. After a preliminary reply in the FAZ (WBD: 174–5), Bubis gave a long interview in the Spiegel at the end of November, in which he accused both Walser and Dohnanyi of latent anti-semitism and returned to the issue of money: ‘The clear message is that the Jews make money out of everything, even out of the Germans’ guilty conscience’ (Spiegel, 30 November 1998). Bringing the dispute to a personal level – and even further from Walser’s original comments – Bubis suggested that Dohnanyi was bitter because a Jewish lawyer had stopped him from buying back his parents’ house. Dohnanyi rejected this slur in an article printed on the same day in the FAZ – indicating that the media was stirring the debate – and asked for an apology (WBD: 278). With the personalised dispute between Bubis and Dohnanyi the debate on Walser’s Peace Prize speech came to be portrayed as a German-Jewish conflict, even though Walser did not explicitly refer to Jews in his speech. Press reaction became more polarised and more critical of Walser in the course of the debate, especially after Bubis’s claims of ‘intellectual arson’, perhaps because commentators did not want to be associated with alleged anti-semitic or far right sentiment even if they actually supported Walser. This assessment contradicts critics such as Lars Rensmann, who perceived growing support for Walser (Rensmann 1999a: 55).

Irreconcilable differences The next phase of the debate was a ‘reconciliation meeting’ organised by the FAZ and attended by Walser and Bubis as well as Frank Schirrmacher and Salomon Korn from the paper’s editorial staff. The transcript was reproduced in full in the newspaper, which confirmed both the media’s role and the perceived public interest in this controversy. The meeting did afford some further insight into what Walser had actually meant in his speech. He emphasised that he had been referring to individual conscience and accusations of guilt in the media. He conceded that public commemoration was important, implying that he was not against memory but rather memory as routine. He asserted that this ‘most difficult problem of our history’ was being addressed in a routine language which meant little to people, and he doubted that public gestures could educate or develop the conscience of young people (WBD: 446). However, it seems that Walser was speaking


primarily for himself when he asserted ‘I do not want anyone dictating how I should remember’ and said that people wanted to choose their own language in dealing with the past (WBD: 446). In doing so, Walser ignored the fact that some formalised commemoration is necessary to preserve knowledge of the past, and failed to acknowledge the existence of many active memory initiatives. Walser projected a very arrogant impression during the meeting and made some comments that were clearly offensive to Bubis, which of course would have fuelled the arguments of those who saw an anti-semitic motive in the original speech. For example, he asserted that he (Walser) had dealt with the Nazi past continuously and perhaps more so than any other author of his generation adding, rather unnecessarily: Herr Bubis, I must point out that I was dealing with this subject when you were concerned with completely different matters. You turned to these problems later […] than I did (WBD: 442). The comment was inappropriate enough in suggesting that Bubis had only later decided to deal with the trauma of losing family members in the Holocaust, but it also implied a dig at Bubis’s former career as a property magnate.6 Walser justifiably pointed out that whenever there were attacks on foreigners in Germany, the media always linked them back to the Nazi past, even though such crimes also occur in other countries. However, in another personal affront, he said that Bubis’s presence at the scene of far right attacks near Rostock regenerated the spectre of National Socialism in the wrong context, and he asked in what capacity he was there: I saw your outraged, emotional face on television, framed by the glow of burning houses; that was very heroic. […] whenever you turn up the link is always made with 1933 (WBD: 451–2). Despite the ungracious phrasing Walser did perhaps have a point. Asking Jewish representatives to comment on incidences of right-wing extremism not only draws inappropriate links between past and present but also shifts the responsibility away from the German authorities.7 During the FAZ meeting Walser seemed to confirm criticism that all he wanted was to forget about the past for his own personal reasons. He told Bubis that he wanted ‘peace of mind’ and that it was up to his own conscience, and no one else, how he would achieve this (WBD: 449). The implication – during the meeting at least – was that Bubis, as a Jewish representative, was preventing Walser from reaching this ‘peace of mind’. This was seen by some as an expression of ‘intellectual anti-semitism’ (see the section on ‘Intellectual arson’ in this chapter). However, it could also have reflected Walser’s exasperation at Bubis’s inability to see his point of view,


just as Bubis failed to persuade Walser that the Peace Prize speech contained dangerous undercurrents. Both men were reluctant to change their perspectives, which were rooted in different communities of memory. The ‘reconciliation meeting’ highlighted rather than ironed out the differences between Walser and Bubis. Bubis did withdraw his claims of ‘intellectual arson’, although Walser did not want to accept the apology (WBD: 464). Perhaps the sole point of agreement was on the necessity to find ‘a new language’ for sustaining memory of the Nazi past (WBD: 462). The differences in perception between Walser and Bubis – and hence the difficulty of finding such a language – are rooted in the conflicting perspectives and memories of victim and perpetrator generations. Bubis had lost family members in the Holocaust and himself been incarcerated in a concentration camp. Bubis said that he too could not look at images of atrocities, but for very different reasons from Walser: Bubis avoided these images on account of the trauma of his experiences, whilst Walser was psychologically troubled by the facts and ‘can no longer bear the accusations’ (Welt, 4 December 1998). The meeting reinforced the difference between what was said in one community of memory and what was heard in another. This bears out Jeismann’s comment that Walser and Bubis ‘did not speak in opposing but parallel voices’ (Jeismann 2001: 178). Hence, when Walser referred to the instrumentalisation of Auschwitz, Bubis heard this as opposition to payments to forced labourers. When Bubis said that Auschwitz must not be forgotten, Walser heard that German guilt would never come to an end (see Assmann and Frevert 1999: 55). In other words, it seemed impossible to find a form of recollection that could fit the opposed narratives of victims and perpetrators. Walser himself had previously commented: ‘I am gradually realising that everyone is dealing with a different history in this debate’ (Walser 1988: 409) and acknowledged that there could be ‘70 or 80 million different versions of this guilt’ depending on one’s experience (Walser 1994: 479).

‘German lessons’ In his contribution to the Walser debate, President Herzog justifiably stated that a ‘living’ form of memory was needed which could be understood by younger generations: The issue is not just that the crimes of the so-called Third Reich are spoken about but also, and above all, whether these crimes are spoken about it in such a way that young people understand and draw the appropriate consequences (WBD: 115).8 The problem with Walser’s speech was not just ideological but lay also in the terminology he used. Nevertheless, despite some thoughtful analysis,


the media was largely to blame for the misunderstandings, citing the most ‘shocking’ aspects out of context or distorting the meaning by allowing strong personal opinions to override objective reporting. Yet Walser was also responsible in refusing to explain exactly what or whom he had meant, and particularly who was behind the supposed ‘threatening routine’ related to the Nazi past. This was something that confused even his fellow intellectuals, particularly as it hinted at an attitude that Walser had rejected in the past. For example, in an open letter to Walser in Die Zeit, Elie Wiesel admitted that he did not recognise the Walser of old in the speech and repeatedly asked whether he had correctly understood what the author was trying to say (WBD: 397–9), whilst in the same newspaper Monika Maron asked ‘Did Walser give two speeches?’ (WBD: 181–2). Writing in the Süddeutsche Zeitung, Johannes Willms criticised Walser’s evasive language for reinforcing old misunderstandings, if not creating new ones (WBD: 378–80). A few weeks after delivering the Peace Prize speech Walser did publicly address these problems in a speech at the University of Duisburg. Reciting lengthy passages from the Paulskirche speech, he commented on linguistic misinterpretation, for example with regard to his use of the word ‘disgrace’ (Schande) rather than ‘shame’ (Scham) or ‘guilt’ (Schuld). Throughout the debate, these terms were either used interchangeably or had different meanings for different commentators (on the (mis)use of these terms, see Assmann and Frevert 1999: 53–96). Bubis had accused Walser of trying to side-step the crimes of the Nazi past by using the word ‘disgrace’ rather than ‘crimes’ (Verbrechen). Walser defended himself by defining ‘disgrace’ as a nationally felt historical burden which was linked to the crimes of the past (WBD: 257). Alexander Tisˇma was also critical of Walser’s use of ‘disgrace’, seeing in the term an attempt to reject collective guilt: This is, however, fundamentally wrong as we are all responsible not only for the harm that we cause to others but also for the harm that others cause and that we do not try and prevent. […] Such negligence breeds complicity and should not lead us to feel shame but rather to try and learn more about others and to risk more for them. Anyone who is or was unable to do this – like Martin Walser in his youth, when he did not know about the persecution of Jews and other groups – and therefore feels innocent with regard to the crimes of the Nazis, should not be surprised if those who do feel a responsibility for the past cannot allow him to rob them of remembrance (WBD: 365–6). Tisˇma’s assertion is problematic not only in implying the necessity for the acceptance of collective guilt (in contradiction to the categories outlined by Karl Jaspers) but also in implying that the Meinungsoldaten are justified in levelling accusations of such guilt.


At Duisburg, Walser put the claims that he was attempting to draw a Schlußstrich down to wilful misinterpretation by intellectuals and politicians: Anyone who reads literary texts like the weather forecast or stock market reports can easily understand the opposite of what is said. […] I think that I attract these reprimands and misrepresentations because I am unable to use the colloquial language for ‘mastering the past’ that is blessed by the moral authorities (WBD: 258). Walser was, however, contradicting himself: terms used in the speech such as ‘disgrace’, ‘monumentalisation’ and ‘instrumentalisation’ do appear in the prevalent discourse, usually with the same distancing effect. Walser had framed these concepts with literary references and techniques in his speech. Frank Schirrmacher, who delivered the eulogy in the Paulskirche and was one of the staunchest supporters of the speech, defended Walser’s use of literary language, deeming the event at Duisburg a ‘German lesson’ (WBD: 249).9 Reich-Ranicki, however, was not so forgiving: in his view the speech had failed as a literary and rhetorical exercise because of its vague and illogical structure (WBD: 324).

‘Intellectual arson’? New critical discourse on the National Socialist legacy To recap: the two main charges levelled against Walser were seeking to forget the Nazi past and promoting nationalism and anti-semitism. Because of the manifold ambiguities in the speech, the evidence remains inconclusive. The call for an end to remembrance of the Nazi past would certainly mark a turnaround for Walser, who, as we have seen, has confronted the Nazi legacy in his work on numerous occasions. Moreover, as discussed, some of the remarks in the Peace Prize speech directly reflect views already stated in previous essays. The question arises as to why Walser was accused so vehemently on this occasion. Firstly, it must be said that Walser’s use of language, not just in the speech itself, but in many of his subsequent utterances, allowed such conclusions to be drawn. A further reason could be that the critics concerned recognised themselves as targets of Walser’s speech and sought to discredit what he was saying, although this would place them in the category of Meinungssoldaten trying to dominate the discourse or even align themselves with a victim narrative. Finally, it could be the case that Walser’s speech was manipulated to give expression to the neuroses related to the past that contribute to the dialectic of normality in German political culture. In other words, the criticisms Walser attracted could be said to reflect the fear that in straying from the conventional narrative of Vergangenheitsbewältigung the status quo of German political culture could be disturbed and dangerous tendencies unleashed.


This latter explanation is indicated by the broader responses to the debate, and its lengthy duration. As well as challenging taboos concerning public remembrance of the National Socialist past in the Federal Republic, the Walser debate ushered in a new critical discourse. Commentaries on the Peace Prize speech generally give a negative assessment of it as the reflection of a more nationalistic discourse in Germany and as a contribution to the consolidation of the views of the ‘New Right’ (see, for example, Rohloff 1999; Brumlik et al., 1999; and Klotz and Wiegel 1999). Such responses are evidence of the tendency towards an increasingly critical tone with regard to attitudes to the Nazi past in the Berlin Republic, which sharply contrasts with any attempts towards ‘normalisation’ or a more positive stance towards national identity. They thus highlight the dialectic of normality. One of the most permanent and pervasive consequences of Walser’s Peace Prize speech has been growing concern over the apparent desire to draw a line under the Nazi past at the public level, which is viewed within the context of a self-confident Vergangenheitspolitik that seeks to downplay past crimes, focusing instead on collective reconciliation with German history (see Funke 1999: 13–14; and Klotz 2000: 166–91). A number of illustrative publications will be cited below to examine whether the criticism attached to Walser exemplified broader tendencies towards: a) a political shift to the right; b) increased anti-semitism; c) the overlapping of past and present; and d) attempts at normalisation.

A shift to the right? Both Walser and Bubis claimed to have received thousands of letters of support. Walser stoked Bubis’s concerns by stating that the letters sent to him confirmed that he had voiced popular opinion in publicly stating what ‘everyone had previously only thought or felt’. He thus deemed his speech ‘liberating for the conscience’ (WBD: 259), although it is hard to find evidence that the German conscience was being held hostage in the first place. As already mentioned, Walser’s Peace Prize speech was welcomed by the far right press. The 25 December issue of the Nationalzeitung melodramatically referred to Martin Walser breaking a ‘taboo’: It can no longer be denied that the intellectual climate in post-war Germany is faced with a shake-up of epic proportions. […] The tone of the debate means that even stubborn proponents of Vergangenheitsbewältigung must concede that the end of a, if not the, German taboo is nigh. Confrontation with Auschwitz and the recent German past is suddenly assuming the guise of an intellectual Reformation and Martin Walser is reclaiming the freedom of conscience for the Germans as a new Luther. It was high time for this debate, which means the beginning of the end for the historiography that has dominated Germany since 1945 (cited in Klotz and Wiegel 1999: 59).10


The far right press does not of course speak for the German nation. Moreover, both the vehemence of the (anti) Walser debate and the emergence of ‘post-Walser’ debates serve as categoric negation of the above claim. Whilst the Walser debate definitely heralded a trend towards greater openness in the discourse on the Nazi legacy, there is no conclusive evidence that greater openness equates to a definitive shift to the right. There are still too many checks and balances in the political system of the Federal Republic – and thus in the discourse on the Nazi legacy – to allow this to happen. There would thus appear to be no real substance behind Gerd Wiegel’s claim that the Schröder government was associated with: a clear shift to the right […] towards the new normality of a selfconfident nation, which again offensively represents its national interests and returns to the stage of world history. In the minds of the elite, the path towards the […] Berlin Republic obviously demands a clear distancing from memory of the NS past (Klotz and Wiegel 1999: 63–4). As we have seen, a greater focus on national interests does not automatically translate into nationalism, let alone any attempt to suppress the past: a focus on present-day priorities does not mean that the past will or must be forgotten. Rensmann considers that the perceived shift to the right has failed in its attempt to erase the past from public memory. He refers to a dialectic of ‘Schlußstrich ideology’, which provides an interesting contrast with the notion of the dialectic of normality. In Rensmann’s view, the ‘hegemonial political attempts’ of recent decades to reconcile conclusively the Germans with their history have in fact reinforced recognition of the barbarism of the past. In the process, the evocation of this past has escaped political control (Rensmann 1999b: 137). For Rensmann, this situation is the unintended consequence of the desire to draw a line under the past and, as it were, to remove the negative history associated with the dialectic of normality. However, there is simply no evidence for any such ‘hegemonial political efforts’. It is rather the case that the dialectic of normality, that is, the evocation of past abnormality within the normality of contemporary Germany, is deliberately upheld in contemporary German political culture.

Allegations of anti-semitism An explicit critique of Walser’s alleged anti-semitism is recorded in the 1999 book Umkämpftes Vergessen by Micha Brumlik, Hajo Funke and Lars Rensmann (hereafter cited as UV). The authors deem the Walser debate ‘The first anti-semitism debate of the Berlin Republic’ (UV: 25) and assert that since this debate Jews have increasingly been accused of instrumentalising the Holocaust for their own purposes. They interpret Walser’s Peace


Prize speech as a nationalist ‘declaration of war’ (UV: 50) against those who wish to remember the Holocaust and thereby block attempts towards German normalisation, and they claim that it helped provoke a wave of anti-semitism unknown since 1945 (UV: 74). The argument proceeds from the false assumption that attempts to lessen the negative impact of the Nazi legacy in Germany are always rooted in anti-semitism. Like Bubis, the authors of Umkämpftes Vergessen extend the accusations levelled at Walser to the Berlin Republic as a whole. Walser is thus seen as representative of a trend towards secondary anti-semitism. This concept was first defined by Adorno as anti-Jewish feeling that arose in the post-war period because Jews represented unwelcome reminders of the Holocaust for non-Jewish Germans (UV: 25). Jews are thereby considered to prevent Germans from reconciling themselves with their history and accepting their nationhood as normal. Funke asserts that for Walser the Jew as ‘authority’ (for example Bubis) represents memory of Auschwitz in pointing to the history of National Socialism. The evocation of this memory disturbs the image of a normalised nation that is reconciled with its history (UV: 23). According to this perspective, Bubis recalled memories that Walser would rather forget. Similarly, Wiegel asserts that Germans are troubled more by the Jews than by Nazi atrocities, although he seems to contradict himself in adding that the only acceptable form of memory for Walser is one that does not recall the crimes of his parents’ and grandparents’ generation (Klotz and Wiegel 1999: 38). Wiegel notes a disparaging attitude towards former victims according to which memory of the Holocaust is made out to be a problem for the Jews, who are expected to keep out of the German past and stop posing an obstacle to German normality. However, this argument distorts the context of Walser’s speech, which was critical of German public remembrance of National Socialism and the appropriation of the victim narrative, rather than the victim community of memory itself. It also distorts the reality of the German process of confronting the Nazi past. Rensmann sees Walser as creating a community of ‘accusers’ – including Jews – who can be assigned the problem of dealing with an unwanted past but also blamed for seeking to pronounce judgement on him as a German: […] if NS history becomes a problem for the ‘others’ – the intellectuals/ Jews – who constantly (re)present it, then these individuals can be imagined as moral judges over the Germans, who at the same time dispute the Germans’ right to judge (UV: 50). This seems a fair assessment of Walser’s criticism of the Meinungssoldaten, who either perpetuate or criticise the discourse on the National Socialist past according to their own personal agendas. However, in rejecting the validity of the critical intellectuals’ role as ‘moral conscience’ Walser


seemed to want to deal with the past in his own way rather than to forget it altogether. With somewhat confusing logic, Funke attributes the conflict to two collectives: Germans against those (Jews) who are critical of Germany: Walser constructs a collective ‘we’ in opposition to another collective, those who are critical of Germany. Anti-semitism, which perceives the ‘other collective’ as an opponent and an enemy aggressor to the ‘we’ of the ‘accused’, is already structurally evident in this dichotomy. […]. In this way, Walser mobilises the ‘voice of the people’ against those who instrumentalise ‘our disgrace’ for purposes in the present – and thereby himself instrumentalises the accusation of instrumentalisation with the aim of relieving the burden of history and attacking those who commemorate Auschwitz or are forced to remember the horror on account of their personal history (UV: 17). This presumes that the ‘other’ collective is Jewish, but as stated earlier Walser appeared to be attributing instrumentalisation to a group that definitely contained Germans, but may also include Jews. The other problem with the notion of ‘collectives’ is that during the speech Walser claimed to be speaking as an individual. It would be wrong to assume that an atmosphere of political correctness pervades German-Jewish relations, although the decision to print certain articles seemed to bear out Walser’s claim that the media deliberately instrumentalises the past in order to create a scandal. In an oft-cited article in the Spiegel, which Joachim Rohloff deemed ‘one of the most evil antisemitic invectives to have been printed in the German language after 1945 apart from in the [far right] “Nationalzeitung”’ (cited in Klotz and Wiegel 1999: 31), Rudolf Augstein drew on Jewish stereotypes when referring to the instrumentalisation of the past by ‘the New York press and the sharks in legal dress’ and said that Kohl finally ‘cracked’ and allowed plans for the Holocaust memorial to go ahead (although this was not, in fact, a Jewish initiative) (WBD: 287). Also in Der Spiegel, 23 year-old Kathi-Gesa Klafke claimed that she was a victim of anti-German racism and declared that there were many who seemed to think it was bad not to be Jewish and assumed that they could control memory (WBD: 561–5). Such articles were, however, in the minority.

The overlap of past and present In the wake of the Walser debate, Johannes Klotz and Gerd Wiegel edited the 1999 publication Geistige Brandstiftung? Die Walser-Bubis Debatte. Two years later, some of the same articles were reproduced in Geistige Brandstiftung: die neue Sprache der Berliner Republik (Intellectual arson: the


new language of the Berlin Republic). The question mark was dropped, suggesting that the editors’ fears had been confirmed. Looking at the broader context behind the Walser debate, the Klotz and Wiegel thesis is that the Berlin Republic’s attempt to free itself from the legacy of National Socialism goes hand in hand with an increased demand for a Schlußstrich as well as a rise in nationalism, racism and anti-semitism. This suggests a negative side to the notion of neue Unbefangenheit. Yet on the other hand they consider that the National Socialist past still retains a pervasive influence in the present: The NS past has not been ‘mastered’; on the contrary, racism and antisemitism continue to have an impact on modern society or seem to increase in line with societal problems. There are continuities that link past and present (Klotz and Wiegel 2001: 18). Walser is criticised not only for wanting to forget the Nazi past, but also for refusing to acknowledge the other phenomenon disturbing the ‘normality’ of Germany in the present, that is far right extremism. Hajo Funke would agree: [he] denies both the phenomenon of right-wing extremism and the need to remember National Socialism. This is because both act like a thorn in the flesh against the national narcissism of the self-confident nation (UV: 23). The implied aim is to draw a line under the National Socialist past as it poses an obstacle to establishing the desired ‘normality’ in the present – a normality that is, however, marred by the spectre of right-wing extremism. According to this view, that is the reason why Walser refused to believe the report of sausage stands being set up in front of burning asylum homes. However, it should not be overlooked that the report in question was dealing with the far right’s attack on asylum seekers in the present (hence a general ‘anti foreigner’ stance), not the anti-semitic ideology of the Nazis. An increase in the influence of the far right cannot be attributed directly to Walser’s speech, nor can a direct causal link be established between the actions and motivations of the far right in the 21st century and the Nazis.

A critique of the Meinungssoldaten Umkämpftes Vergessen sometimes shocks in the intensity of its criticism, and the terminology used is certainly as complex as that used by Walser. Hence, Bubis becomes the ‘object of Walser’s manipulative aggression, of the antisemitism of a German nationalist that is not without sadism’ (UV: 24), and


Walser is accused of producing ‘a repertoire of right-wing extremist terms’ (UV: 40) as well as of ‘symbolic anti-semitism’ (UV: 66), an ‘aggressive, nationalist rejection of memory’ (UV: 66), and of supporting the ‘renationalised formation of collective identity’ (UV: 66). Rensmann refers to media articles ‘in which symbolic forms of anti-semitism convert the rejection of memory into an in part apparent anti-semitic paranoia’ (UV: 54). The problem with such analysis is that it intellectualises – and to a certain extent decontextualises – the debate. It also detects tendencies that are not necessarily there. For example, the FAZ suggested that the debate on Walser’s Peace Prize speech may be the last major dispute about memory of the horrors of the Third Reich (UV: 29–30). This surely related to the generational issues previously mentioned, but for Brumlik, Funke and Rensmann it meant an attempt to draw a line under the past. Similarly, they interpreted Schröder’s comment that Walser had articulated things that ‘a Federal Chancellor cannot say’ (UV: 29) as a call to suppress memory, when Schröder was surely referring to the greater freedom enjoyed by an intellectual.

Normalisation or the dialectic of normality? Rensmann sees Walser as part of a ‘colourful coalition of normalising voices’ (UV: 62), although like Walser he does not ‘name names’ either. For Rensmann, the whole Peace Prize speech expressed the desire to establish a new narcissistic ‘we’ that does not want to face up to Auschwitz or be constantly reminded of it by the media or critical intellectuals (UV: 37). Rensmann perceives a turning point. He asserts that previous attempts to draw a line under the Nazi past had provoked scandal or been limited to a private or semi-public arena. However, he now concludes that structured, latent and manifest attempts to reject memory of National Socialist crimes and the associated challenges to German normality have developed and become established at the public and political level (UV: 31). Yet the persistence of critical comment on such apparent tendencies suggests the opposite to be true. The dialectic of normality continues to be both the product of and agent for the continued proliferation of debates on the legacy of Nazism in Germany, based on a conflict between those wanting less ritualised remembrance and those wanting to keep memory of the National Socialist past alive as a priority within the political culture. It is also the reason why the Walser debate was not the last of its kind as many predicted at the time. Though perhaps the last major instance of a generation attempting to work through its personal experience of the Third Reich, Walser’s speech heralded a new generation of debates stemming from interpretation rather than memory of this past. These debates are largely media-based, often dominated by emotion rather than context, and challenge taboos. They are also subject to a range of set agendas based on a


critical assessment of how successful Vergangenheitsbewältigung has been. In addition, they are characterised by contributions from a younger generation which has been brought up within a cultural memory of the Nazi past and which, as we have seen, contributes to the existence of the dialectic of normality through its own confrontation with history. This may in turn explain why some of the younger generation adopt a stance similar to that of the generation of 1968 in criticising the way that the Nazi past has been dealt with, even though this past is beyond their own direct experience and memory. Finally, a May 1999 pamphlet from the ‘Initiative against the Schlußstrich’, opposing the construction of the Holocaust memorial in Berlin, illustrates an attitude that keeps the dialectic of normality alive: There is an irreconcilable conflict between the attempt to do everything in order to be just like any other nation on the one hand and, on the other hand, the creation of a memorial site to the Holocaust. […] A genuine memory would have led to the realisation that Germany can never be a nation like any other. […] The establishment of a compensation fund and the building of a memorial mark an official attempt to finally put to rest the discussion of responsibility for NS crimes. We oppose this attempt.

3 Approaches to the Dialectic of Normality

Leitverantwortung and Leidkultur During his Peace Prize acceptance speech, Walser intimated that matters of conscience should remain within the private domain. And yet a sense of national responsibility for the Nazi past continues to enter public and political debates in Germany as evidence of the dialectic of normality. There is a tendency to question the associated motives, as Walser did. However, along with its more unwelcome manifestations through excessive instrumentalisation or trivialisation of the Nazi past, the dialectic can also have a positive impact in the sense of encouraging tolerance and democracy: a bit of paranoia about the state of the nation can have a productive effect. This differentiation within the political culture of the Berlin Republic will be summed up here using the terms Leitverantwortung and Leidkultur. The term Leitverantwortung (a ‘central’ or ‘guiding’ responsibility) evokes the notion of responsibility rather than guilt for the National Socialist past and, in line with the more pragmatic relationship to this past demonstrated by a new generation of government, how reference to this responsibility can be used to enhance Germany’s profile, legitimise certain actions and secure the country’s standing among nations. Heightened emphasis on the responsibility for maintaining human rights, tolerance and democracy is thereby accompanied by open acknowledgement of German atrocities during the Third Reich and allusion to the ‘lessons’ of the past that have been learnt and that inform the political culture of the Federal Republic. Leitverantwortung has numerous manifestations. It functions at both international and national level, for example in terms of the legitimation of military intervention or prosecuting campaigns against the far right. The concept reflects Germany’s growing desire to shoulder responsibilities following the end of the Cold War and the regaining of national sovereignty. At a more abstract level, it also results from the emerging European or global memory narrative discussed in Chapter 1, whereby Auschwitz is perceived as a yardstick for evil and an incentive – at a rhetorical level at least 80

Approaches to the Dialectic of Normality 81

– to take action to prevent crimes against humanity. Within this framework, the importance of European integration and enlargement, human rights and democracy as reflections of a ‘special’ German responsibility ensuing from the Nazi past frequently occur in speeches delivered as part of German historical commemorations such as 27 January, 8 May and 9 November, as well as in debates outlining or justifying foreign policy decisions. At the same time, the concept of Leitverantwortung encompasses the perceptions and experiences of a community of memory which has been influenced, if not fully defined by the National Socialist past. In a sense, it is a blend of the negative national memory narrative resulting from the Nazi legacy and the positive narrative that encompasses the development of the Federal Republic since its foundation in 1949. Leitverantwortung also illustrates a shift of priorities in political action, whereby reference to present circumstances tends to overshadow the past. Moreover, it denotes a sense of an all-embracing public as well as a specific political responsibility for the past, shifting commemoration away from the ritualistic and establishing a more inclusive discourse. This would reflect Niven’s assessment that conscience finds a place in the contemporary discourse on both past and present with an emphasis on active memory as opposed to lip service, coupled with the notion of ‘coming to terms with the present’ (Niven 2002: 238; also see 236–40). The term Leitverantwortung is, however, not without possible negative connotations. The association with the verb leiten (to lead or to guide) could suggest nationalistic impulses or aggressive dominance. Such concerns were raised during the 2000 Leitkultur debate (discussed later in this chapter). It is therefore important to establish who or what the leiten refers to. Rather than Germany imposing a responsibility on other nations, the allusion here is to the ‘special responsibility’ imposed on Germany in addition to its usual international commitments as a result of its Nazi past. Leitverantwortung can perhaps most frequently be applied to Germany’s external relations and image. It is a convenient way of establishing a positive narrative whilst openly addressing the past, allowing Germany to ‘move on’ and indicating its rehabilitation in the world and its willingness to assume greater responsibility in international affairs. In this sense, Leitverantwortung can be seen as a logical and productive progression from the hitherto predominantly national discourse on Vergangenheitsbewältigung. Leitverantwortung is rooted in a narrative based on the values enshrined in the Federal Republic’s Basic Law, themselves a response to the negative experience of Nazism. Whilst the notion undoubtedly reflects certain tendencies in the political culture of the Berlin Republic, it is however also important to recognise its use as a rhetorical tool. The obvious danger of this concept is its instrumentalisation to justify actions for the wrong reasons, draw inappropriate parallels between past and present or even to remove the negative past from national memory altogether. One can


stretch the parameters of Leitverantwortung too far to suggest almost a perverse sense of pride in embracing the legacy of a negative past. The phenomenon is not new: already in 1946 Karl Jaspers was warning of ‘the fatal tendency to regard oneself as better than others through admitting one’s guilt’ (Jaspers 1974: 73). The point is also illustrated by HeinrichAugust Winkler for whom, following German unification, The Holocaust was brought to bear as a reason for Germany to behave fundamentally differently to other Western democracies with regard to new crimes against humanity. […] the Germans [were] selected to commit the absolute evil and [are] therefore justified, indeed dutybound, to maintain their negative record in the face of unwelcome competition (H. A. Winkler 2001). In other words, there is a fine line between accepting responsibility for the past and manipulating it in a way that can be construed as ‘negative nationalism’. Instrumentalisation with a deliberate focus on Germany’s negative national narrative has been defined as Leidkultur (a ‘culture of suffering’ or ‘culture of sorrow’). Henryk Broder presents a characteristically acerbic analysis of the phenomenon in his 2001 book www.Deutsche-Leidkultur.de. In a similar, but even more critical vein than found in Walser’s Peace Prize speech, Broder criticises the excessive reference to and instrumentalisation of the Holocaust and German guilt together with pseudo-identification with the victim narrative. Like Walser, his main criticism relates to the apparently self-interested motives of those insisting that memory be kept alive, which leads him, unhappily, to refuse acknowledgement of the many respectful and genuine attempts to remember the victims of National Socialism. Leidkultur finds expression particularly in the media, where there is sometimes unnecessary emphasis on the atrocities of the National Socialist past. Walser’s criticism of a ‘constant presentation of our disgrace’ remains valid in this respect; not so much with regard to the visualisation of horrific scenes from the concentration camps – viewers are confronted with violent images from the present on a daily basis – than the manipulation of the past to shock or generate publicity. Leidkultur is also reflected in – mainly political – debates where the Nazi legacy is instrumentalised merely to illustrate a point or opinion. As with Leitverantwortung, the term also has problematic connotations in that Leid (suffering) could suggest that German culture is based on the suffering of others or, more controversially, that Germans consider themselves victims. Additionally, in line with the ‘wars of memory’ the term Leidkultur can reflect conflict between differing approaches to the recollection of the National Socialist past, as came to the fore during the Walser debate. If


Leitverantwortung is largely about Germany’s external image, Leidkultur indicates an inward-looking, self-imposed discourse on the National Socialist legacy. This discourse indicates that the global narrative of Auschwitz will not usurp the national narrative in Germany. Leidkultur can thus be seen as another extension of Vergangenheitsbewältigung. It is largely driven by Meinungssoldaten or interest groups who continue the negative discourse on the Nazi past but assert that there have been no fruitful results from it. At the same time, paradoxically, it has a potentially productive effect in keeping Germany aware of the constant challenges to civil society. The remainder of this chapter will assess manifestations of Leitverantwortung and Leidkultur in Schröder’s SPD-Green government, taking examples from foreign and domestic policy deliberations along with public debate.

Kosovo and the international dimensions of Leitverantwortung Manifestations of Leitverantwortung are perhaps clearest at foreign policy level. The SPD-Green government’s 2000–01 annual report noted a sharpening of the profile of German foreign policy since unification. It deemed Germany a reliable partner that was able to meet its increased international responsibilities and defined the country’s foreign policy as ‘peace policy’ (Geschäftsbericht a 2002: 53). The 1999–2000 report summed up the main characteristics of this policy, which correspond to the notion of Leitverantwortung: The key elements of this policy are the respect of international law, intervention for human rights, openness to dialogue, non-aggression, confidence-building, arms control and disarmament. […] The Federal Government pursues a policy to protect and reinforce human rights (Geschäftsbericht b 2001: 64). Such sentiments came to the fore in the justification for German military intervention in the Kosovo conflict in 1999. This conflict saw NATO-led forces carry out a series of air strikes against the former Yugoslavia in an attempt to halt the humanitarian catastrophe in Kosovo, which involved a programme of ethnic cleansing of Kosovan Albanians instigated by Serb forces under Slobodan Milosˇevic´.1 Gerhard Schröder wrote the following in the 1999–2000 report: With the deployment of the Bundeswehr in Kosovo we have assumed an unprecedented international responsibility in order to end the barbarism in the heart of Europe and to defend human rights (Geschäftsbericht b 2001: 7). This was the first time that German troops had been sent into armed conflict since 1945. The debate and the decision to deploy troops marked a


caesura in Germany’s post-war foreign policy, and not only because it saw former enemies fighting on the same side. On a symbolic level, Germany can be said to have entered this war because of Auschwitz, as an apparently ‘normal’ nation that however remembers the ‘abnormality’ of its past, has learnt from it and is now committed to the ensuing responsibility. This would translate the experience of the Nazi legacy into a moral duty or vocation to intervene on the world stage and prevent another Auschwitz, defined as a violation of human rights. In a speech on Germany’s foreign policy responsibilities, Schröder hinted at a new role for the German military: […] for the first time, in this century at least, German soldiers [were] deployed to fight for truly European values. Not for blind nationalism, not to conquer other countries, not to pursue strategic interests, but rather for the highest objective there can be: to rescue human life and to preserve human rights (Schröder 1999c). The then Defence Minister, Rudolf Scharping, also summed up this sense of duty in the title of his 2001 book on the Kosovo conflict: ‘We must not look away’ (Wir dürfen nicht wegsehen). The wording ran counter to Walser’s stated need to ‘look away’ from images of atrocities. Leitverantwortung does not, however, just relate to the ‘lessons’ of the Nazi past. In his speech at the first Bundestag session in the Reichstag in April 1999, which dealt with the status of German unification, Schröder linked Germany’s relations to its eastern neighbours with German responsibility in Kosovo via the legacy of the Nazi past. He used the experience of unification to outline what he termed a ‘new German responsibility’ (Schröder 1999a), which involved committing Germany to an active policy of championing human rights throughout the European continent. In the same speech, Schröder declared that a new page in world history had been turned with European intervention in the Balkans, which was not about narrow material interests but about defending the rights and freedom of individuals. He defined Germany’s associated role thus: […] the events of the past weeks and months [have] provided dramatic evidence that Germany’s role in the world has changed. These events have shown that we now have a different and more intensive responsibility for the fate of other peoples than was the case during the years of division and directly afterwards. […] Having suffered so greatly from the division of Europe we can now prove that we bravely grasp the opportunities presented by unification. I do not just mean the opportunities presented by institutional unification, but also – and above all – the chance to establish a community of values across Europe. Hence, today


we declare our belief in a Europe based on human rights that does not exclude anyone on our continent. The implication was that Germany was acting as an equal partner within NATO and the EU in order to achieve this aim, particularly because of its experiences of two painful dictatorships. Hence, Germany’s desire to defend human rights was very much embedded within an international framework. In a policy statement on the situation in Kosovo, also in April 1999, Schröder insisted that Germany’s integration into the West was crucial to its existence and that he did not support any form of German Sonderweg. He also reiterated that Germany’s role had changed with unification: ‘We cannot evade our responsibility’ (Schröder 1999d). According to this perspective, Leitverantwortung is about Germany acting in full awareness not only of its National Socialist history and the ‘special responsibility’ that derives from it, but also, significantly, of its GDR past. This reflects an interpretation of the national memory narrative by a new generation, based not only on the Nazi past but also the experiences of the Federal Republic, including the development of stability and democracy and the overcoming of German division. Leitverantwortung goes one step further than the traditional doctrine of nie wieder in that it is bound up with solutions found in the present. For example, Schröder hinted at the economic responsibility associated with intervention in Kosovo: We do not just have a historic responsibility as a country that had two dictatorships during the last century and brought genocide and aggression to our continent. We also have a responsibility stemming from our economic power. The whole of Europe, including the Balkan region, needs a common European perspective based on peace and prosperity (Schröder 1999a). To sum up, Leitverantwortung is about Germany abandoning any selfserving notion of a Sonderweg that precludes it from action on account of its past and taking on the responsible role expected of it post-unification. This explains the following comment made by Schröder with regard to the decision on Kosovo, which also implied that this ‘special responsibility’ may not always be a welcome one: We can no longer draw on the argument ‘German history prevents us’. […] Because we created such widespread devastation in that region we are now particularly required to prevent murder, perhaps even genocide. […] Normality can also be a burden (interview in Zeit, 4 February 1999). Hans Werner Kilz has remarked that the deployment of German soldiers in the Balkans said more about Germany’s historical commitments and


feelings of guilt than its national debates on the Holocaust memorial or whether to rebuild the former Prussian palace (Stadtschloß) in the capital (SZ, 19 April 1999). Intervention in Kosovo ultimately had a more favourable impact on Germany’s image than the latter controversies, but it is important to view the matter in context. Whilst German military intervention in Kosovo can be deemed the fulfilment of a special responsibility ‘imposed’ on the country as a result of its past, it can equally be argued that this was less about breaking taboos than a sovereign nation fulfilling the international commitments expected of it. Charles Grant put it bluntly: ‘The Germans must finally overcome their historic neuroses and remodel their armed forces along British and American lines’ (CER Oct.–Nov. 1999). At the beginning of this chapter we saw that Leitverantwortung can be used as a rhetorical tool, in this case to win over the public and legitimate the government’s decision. For Schirrmacher, ‘Auschwitz’ was the predominant motivation cited in Germany for this war, in stark contrast to other countries (FAZ, 17 April 1999). It should also be pointed out that in the broad public debate on the matter, German military intervention in Kosovo did not have overwhelming public support. Opponents asserted that the government was instrumentalising the Nazi past to justify its decision and relativising former crimes in the process (see, for example, the open letter in FR, 23 April 1999; and Konkret 5/1999). The controversial WDR film Es begann mit einer Lüge (‘It began with a lie’), broadcast by ARD on 8 February 2001, claimed that the government had manipulated the facts in order to legitimate its decision. Yet it would be unfair to dismiss all references to the Nazi past as empty rhetoric. It was no foregone conclusion that military intervention would take place: the decision to send troops was only taken after soul-searching debates in the Bundestag and, above all, within the Green Party. Support for military intervention marked a difficult departure from the former stance of peace campaigner Joschka Fischer in particular. He finally achieved support for this policy following an impassioned speech at the Green party conference (Fischer 1999). The debate on intervention in Kosovo showed a transition from the moral soul-searching of Vergangenheitsbewältigung to the perceived moral duty of Leitverantwortung. In addition, it was evidence of Germany’s integration into the global narrative on Auschwitz and the Holocaust. These dimensions were already becoming apparent in the Gulf War when Hans Magnus Enzensberger famously equated Saddam Hussein with Hitler. During the conflict in Bosnia in the early 1990s there were signs that the German Nazi past was being abstracted into a symbol of evil in the present. Events in Bosnia were deemed a ‘new Holocaust’ and there was reference in the international press to ‘Death Camps’ and ‘Belsen 92’ (Levy and Sznaider 2001: 178–9). By the time of the Kosovo conflict the comparisons were such that Levy and Sznaider coined the term ‘Kosovocaust’ (Levy and Sznaider 2001: 188–95). Robin Cook spoke of Milosˇevic´’s ‘final solution’


(SZ, 21 April 1999), while Fischer said that Milosˇevic´ was not acting any differently from Hitler (taz, 13 April 1999) and Scharping referred to ‘concentration camps’ in Kosovo (taz, 1 April 1999). Such comparisons were, however, this time to Germany’s advantage. As Richard Herzinger pointed out: ‘This time Germany is on the right side, whereas the Serbs have to assume the role of Nazi Germany’ (Zeit, 8 April 1999). Such comments also highlight the potential for instrumentalising the past. Whilst the Kohl government had justified non-intervention in Bosnia and the Gulf War by referring to German militarism in the past, Auschwitz as a symbol of human rights violations, rather than Nazism as a sign of German evil, became the justification for intervention in Kosovo. The German government could draw on a universalised rather than a German narrative to justify its decision and German intervention was deemed to be about human rights and preventing genocide within the framework of international responsibility. For Levy and Sznaider, the message was ‘never again Auschwitz’ rather than ‘never again war’ (Levy and Sznaider 2001: 190). Whereas the Second World War remains a symbol of German militarism, the more abstract ‘Auschwitz’ could be used in this case as a symbol to promote human rights. There was of course reason enough to intervene in Kosovo without reference to the Holocaust. Matthias Küntzel perceives a more sinister motive in the German government’s decision, asserting that ‘war propaganda’ was used as a way of drawing a line under the Nazi past: If Kosovo were equated with Auschwitz, even to a small extent, then Germany would be rehabilitated as a completely normal nation that has darker elements in its history just like any other country. If Kosovo were equated with Auschwitz, even to a small extent, a kind of Holocaust would be the reality today in at least a dozen other countries and a whole series of further wars of conquest would thereby be legitimated in theory. […] However, the excessive reference to Auschwitz as a reason to go to war makes it more important than ever to reiterate that the defining feature of the Holocaust was the industrial extermination of the Jews (Küntzel 1999: 173–4). Küntzel is, of course, right in pointing out the dangers of losing sight of the historical reality of the Holocaust, and thereby lessening the impact of this unique atrocity. The all too ready comparisons with Auschwitz have a distancing effect, acting as a kind of punctuation in an argument for overall European responsibility rather than pointing to the specifics of history. However, whilst Küntzel’s point in relation to other countries may be valid, the analogy does not work in all cases – Kosovo led to intervention but genocide in Rwanda, for example, did not. Moreover, if intervention took place with the aim of preventing a humanitarian disaster, then the comparisons with Auschwitz, however abstract, were surely permissible.


It is important to view the Kosovo conflict as a continuation of post-war atrocities rather than as a mirror of events in the Third Reich. It is equally the case that Auschwitz is not an appropriate reference point for all foreign policy contexts. Indeed, it has remained very much in the margins of responses to conflicts since Kosovo, a clear example being the reaction to the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001. This example raises another point: Leitverantwortung does not necessarily require direct reference to the Nazi past, as it ensues from the values developed in the history of the postwar Federal Republic as a response to Nazism, which can now be considered an independent part of this political culture. Andreas Krause saw the German reaction to the September 11 attacks as evidence that the Federal Republic no longer draws its identity from confrontation with the past but rather from its role in the international community (BZ, 15–16 September 2001). The perspective is somewhat optimistic, for a critical discourse on the negative legacy of Nazism remains a dominant feature of political culture, albeit not always as a restrictive force. However, one can state with confidence that at the international level Germany is no longer explicitly associated with its National Socialist past. It is perhaps precisely because of the critical debate on the Nazi legacy that this rehabilitation of German foreign policy has occurred. In a speech in support of America delivered in front of 200,000 people at the Brandenburg Gate on 14 September 2001, President Rau used phrases that could well have come from the campaign against Nazi Germany just 50 years before, such as ‘fanaticism destroys any culture’ and ‘everyone has the right to recognition and dignity’ (Welt, 14 September 2001). The focus was thus on modern Germany’s role in articulating values such as democracy and tolerance. Significantly, the commemorations on 9 November 2001 focused not on recent German history but on the ‘war on terror’. This reflects the clear trend for present circumstances to overshadow the past of historical commemoration, partly as a result of the shift to cultural memory. The majority decision in the Bundestag to send troops to Afghanistan at the end of December 2001 marked another milestone in the foreign policy of the Berlin Republic. References to Auschwitz were notable by their absence: intervention was justified on account of Germany’s international responsibilities and in particular in view of its promise of solidarity with the US. The decision did not centre on questions related to the Nazi past but was instead marked by quite ‘normal’ political tensions concerning the future of the SPD-Green coalition, which was threatened by opposition from the predominantly pacifist Greens.2 Schröder was pragmatic in stating that the vote on military intervention was not a ‘question of conscience’ (Tagesspiegel, 11 November 2001) but stemmed rather from Germany’s role within the international alliance. In other words, the decision was about assuming responsibility without the need for reference to the Nazi past. This reflects Schröder’s assertion of ‘a more developed self-understanding in


German foreign policy’ which involved direct responsibility and action rather than ‘secondary assistance’ (Schröder 2001). For Jochen Thies, the Afghanistan decision suggested that German foreign policy had reached ‘normality’ (Thies 2002: 152). The irony was, of course, that this took place under a government led by members of the generation of 1968 who would have been reluctant to commit themselves to such military intervention in the past. The media remained sceptical about Germany’s possible contribution to this conflict. Bernd Ulrich, for example, reiterated Germany’s traditional role as ‘economic giant, political dwarf’ (Tagesspiegel, 21 September 2001). Not surprisingly, the decision attracted a good deal of public protest, although this had more to do with Bush’s apparently hegemonic approach than fear of the past repeating itself. The affair showed that Germany can now make foreign policy decisions based on current political interests and without constantly looking back to the past.

Leitverantwortung as a matter of image Leitverantwortung is partly to do with necessity, that is, a unified Germany accepting increased responsibility on the international stage. Yet, as we have seen, it is also a way of promoting Germany’s image at home and abroad. During the SPD-Green coalition’s time in office, both Schröder and Fischer showed their skills at linking responsibility for the past with German political interests in the present, notably the eastward enlargement of the EU. When Fischer spoke of the importance of supporting enlargement as compensation for the dreadful experience of war and division in the 20th century in a famous speech on the future of Europe at Berlin’s Humboldt University in May 2000, he surely also had in mind the economic and political advantages that enlargement could bring to Germany (Fischer 2000). Schröder made it clear that enlargement was just as much about the present as it was about the past: ‘Enlargement is a dictate of our historical responsibility towards these countries, but also makes political and economic sense’ (Schröder 1999e; also see Geschäftsbericht a 2002: 66). The SPD-Green coalition was at pains to promote the new capital as a bridge between east and west with Schröder deeming Berlin a symbol of the deepening and widening of the European integration process (Schröder 1998). To remain with the theme of enlargement, a good example of how historical commemorations are used as an opportunity to outline present priorities came with Schröder’s speech on 8 May 2000. As is usual with such commemorations, he emphasised collective responsibility for the past. In addition, he underlined the existence of the dialectic of normality in stating that peace and tolerance had to be constantly fought for and that the development of these values in post-war Germany was bound up with the horrors of the years prior to 1945 (Schröder 2000b). However, an


important element of the speech, which indicated a more active approach to commemoration, was the assertion of a historical duty to work towards integration with Central and Eastern Europe. With almost Kohl-like pathos Schröder declared that European integration was the answer to war. He went on to suggest the existence of a European memory narrative in proposing 8 May 1945 as a justification for European integration: The process of European integration has not been able to undo the Zivilisationsbruch […]. On the contrary, memory of this Zivilisationsbruch is one of the intellectual roots of this process. […] 55 years after the war, with European division finally overcome, our historic task is more than ever to reach out to our neighbours in Central and Eastern Europe in the spirit of integration and on the basis of our common European values (Schröder 2000b). Rather tenuously, he stated that the ‘lessons’ of 8 May, that is the requirement of building a peaceful, united Europe, highlighted the need to prepare Europe for enlargement, for example through institutional reform. The example of this speech indicates that while ritualised commemoration of the Nazi past continues, in some cases it has nothing to do with routine, but is instead the occasion to publicise a specific political agenda. There is obviously a danger that the past could be relativised by focusing on its European impact rather than its German origins. The conventional language of ritual commemoration framing such speeches is essential to counter this. Under the SPD-Green coalition there was a perceptible aim to profile Germany as an appealing, peaceable country that is not dominated by its past, efforts which have continued under the Grand Coalition elected in 2005 (see Chapter 6). Schröder described the capital as a ‘bright and exciting’ city for young Germans and Europeans who associate it with school trips, football or the Love Parade (Schröder 1998). A good example of such national profiling was provided at the world exhibition EXPO 2000 in Hanover. The brochure for the German pavilion underlined the political, personal and PR vision behind the exhibition, with allusions to the notion of Leitverantwortung: Many visitors […] have perceptions of our country reflecting the experiences that the world has had with Germany in the past century. A lot has happened in the past 50 years. The world has changed more rapidly than ever before, but so has Germany. The German pavilion, entitled ‘Germany – Bridges to the Future’ presents an image of the new Germany. It is the image of an open, welcoming, modern state that is aware of its responsibility in the world and for its history (EXPO 2000: 3). The pavilion included a section devoted to individuals who had marked German culture and history in a positive way in the 20th century as well as


a film intended to demonstrate the blend of old and new and the exciting sense of change characterising the Berlin Republic. It clearly sought to demonstrate that Germany was a country looking to the future and proud of its present, although still mindful of its past: the brochure urged visitors as well as organisers to ‘make efforts in the future to ensure that Germany remains a lively, open country that is aware of its past and oriented to the future’ (EXPO 2000: 3). It appears that with the growing distance from the National Socialist past the ‘lessons learnt’ by the Federal Republic can pave the way for the positive marketing of Germany. Thus, for example, in July 2003 the GoetheInstitut organised a conference of cultural and business representatives under the title ‘Branding Germany’. The objective was to improve the country’s image abroad by shaking off negative stereotypes focussed on Germany’s Nazi past. As a further example, in November 1999 Joschka Fischer called for a thorough reform of German foreign cultural policy, especially to highlight the country’s focus on democratisation and human rights (taz, 30 November 1999).

Leitverantwortung as imposed responsibility: compensation for former forced labourers So far Leitverantwortung has been defined as a way of citing a ‘special responsibility’ for Germany’s negative past in order to legitimise actions in the present and to enhance the country’s image. This can encourage a positive national narrative. Yet there are also cases where responsibility is ‘imposed’ upon Germany from outside by taking it to task for apparently failing to face up to its Nazi past, in the process underlining the problematic legacy of this past. One of the first tasks of the newly-elected SPDGreen coalition, for example, was to negotiate an agreement with the US on compensation for former forced labourers. The German negotiators were arguably more concerned with protecting the country’s image and economic interests in the present than remembering the past, but the focus was naturally placed on the crimes committed by the Nazis. The debate on compensation showed various tendencies defined thus far, including the dialectic of normality, instrumentalisation, and the conflict and layering of different national memories and interpretations of the Nazi legacy. The US negotiators appropriated this legacy on behalf of the former victims – most of whom were in fact non-Jews from Eastern Europe – with reference to the Holocaust. The German government tried to profile its role along the lines of Leitverantwortung, claiming its willingness to make amends for the past, although at the same time emphasising its economic interests in the present. German commentators mainly took the side of the victims, seeing the reluctance of German industry to pay compensation as another failed instance of Vergangenheitsbewältigung (see, for example,


U. Winkler 2001).3 Some German companies declared the payments a moral duty, whilst others opposed them with the argument that the Nazi past was not part of their history or heritage. The authentic voice of the victims was rarely heard, as the issue became a boardroom battle that ultimately had little to do with a historical legacy. A fund to compensate former forced labourers was originally set up in 1998 by 12 German companies, including Volkswagen and Siemens, who were faced with class action lawsuits against them. Following bitter and drawn-out negotiations, in August 2000 the SPD-Green coalition passed a law establishing the foundation ‘Memory, Responsibility and Future’ to manage the compensation payments along with a number of partner organisations. The law pledged a sum of DM10 billion (approx. €5 billion) in compensation; 5 billion to come from the German government and 5 billion from German industry.4 The name given to the foundation and the speeches made in the Bundestag upon its establishment suggest the continuing influence of the notion of Leitverantwortung in acknowledging responsibility for the past as part of present and future activities (the speeches are reproduced in Tribüne 2000: 108–20). Schröder insisted that the agreement was not just about finance but aimed to preserve the memory of Auschwitz as a real not an abstract event, hence the ‘Memory’ part of the foundation’s title. ‘Responsibility’ refers to responsibility towards former victims and future generations whilst ‘Future’ concerns action to prevent such crimes ever happening again. Another part of the foundation, the ‘Responsibility and Future’ fund, will continue after all payments have been processed. This body finances projects dealing with the history of totalitarianism, promotes youth exchanges and humanitarian cooperation and aims to identify human rights violations throughout the world.5 Drawing a direct link between past and present, as well as alluding to Leitverantwortung, Schröder stated that these projects would provide a link to the German and European past and also point to the future. He stressed the importance of passing on the lessons of the past century to future generations in view of contemporary conflicts such as those in Kosovo and Chechnya (Schröder 2000c). The annual reports of the German government for 1999–2000 and 2000–01 and even Schröder’s millennium speech all proudly referred to the agreement as a sign of Germany facing up to its historic and moral responsibility. Reconciling former forced labourers with Germany of course matches the goal of promoting relations with Eastern Europe. All of this paints Germany’s role in a very positive light, and yet this was surely one case where there was a perceptible difference between the stated and actual motives for Leitverantwortung. It is questionable whether the payments would ever have been made without external pressure and the threat of legal action. Whilst the government’s annual reports mentioned the moral responsibility of German companies, the main agenda became clear in the


other stated aim: to block claims against German businesses that were endangering German-American industrial relations and the bilateral relationship between the two countries in general. Hence, when the German Embassy in London deemed the agreement an example of the ‘friendly relationship between Germany and the USA’ (Embassy FRG 1999), this was probably more an expression of veiled relief at the conclusion to the negotiations. Germany’s reputation and economic success in the US had, after all, been put at risk with the threat of economic boycotts against Germany if payment was not forthcoming. The call for compensation in America was accompanied by a series of full-page adverts linking German companies with prominent Nazis. Bayer was, for example, linked with Josef Mengele, the notorious Nazi doctor in an advert captioned ‘Bayer’s biggest headache’ (U. Winkler 2001: 27). Schröder was pragmatic about the direct (i.e. financial) implications of the agreement: We […] are fulfilling a responsibility that German history has unmistakably placed upon all our shoulders. The issue is to work through one of the darkest chapters of our recent past, initially in wholly practical terms (Schröder 2000c). He made no secret of the fact that his prime concern was the welfare of German businesses abroad, stating in his inaugural speech to the Bundestag in 1998: ‘Where compensation for injustice is not the issue we will protect our businesses, and therefore their employees, both in Germany and abroad’ (Schröder 1998). Similarly, Wolfgang Gibowski, the spokesman for German industry, declared that the payments were not a purely humanitarian and altruistic gesture (SZ, 8 May 2000). Such comments gave the impression of an ordinary trade war, which would suggest that the generosity behind the payments was distinctly ambivalent. Not only were there difficulties in raising the money, German companies further delayed the procedure by insisting that they should be protected from any such lawsuits in the future. The payments began in May 2001 once this guarantee had been obtained, but there was further controversy over the apparently unfavourable exchange rate used to convert German marks into Polish zloty to pay out compensation to former forced labourers in Poland, as well as what to do with the interest accruing on the billions due from German industry. These negotiations showed that Germany’s image can still be tarnished by its Nazi past. They were not the last of their kind. 2001 also saw proposals to compensate the homosexual victims of National Socialism and former forced labourers in the medical field. In September of the same year, an association of former victims of the Nazi regime in Greece demanded considerable reparations from Germany and threatened to auction off the


premises of the Goethe-Institut, German School and German Archaeological Institute in Athens if they did not receive payment, although the German government ultimately won its appeal. In the case of compensation to former forced labourers, the negotiators for the forced labourers exploited the image of Germany as pariah nation to achieve a successful conclusion, an image at odds with the values inherent in the political culture of the Federal Republic. In turn, German critics applied a discourse of failed Vergangenheitsbewältigung to discuss what for all parties was more a battle over money and diplomatic relations than an exercise in dealing with the past.

Leitverantwortung and the campaign against the far right As further demonstration of the many layers of interpretation related to the National Socialist legacy, media coverage of the negotiations on payments to former forced labourers coincided with extensive reports on the increase in far right violence in Germany. The threat posed by right-wing extremism was a dominant theme in summer 2000. A succession of events including a neoNazi march through the Brandenburg Gate, two murders with a far right motive and an attack on a synagogue in Düsseldorf – though the latter was ultimately proven to be the work of Palestinian sympathisers – culminated in Gerhard Schröder’s call for a ‘Revolt of the Decent People’ (Aufstand der Anständigen) and a debate on whether the far right NPD party should be banned. 2000 can be said to have marked a change in the discourse on the National Socialist legacy, where ritual memory was overshadowed by presentday issues affecting German society and its image abroad. The campaign against the far right shows how the principles of Leitverantwortung are applied at national level as an extension of the values associated with the Basic Law and the political culture of the Federal Republic. The public’s role in the campaign confirms that these principles go further than abstract political rhetoric to encompass active forms of commemoration. It is firstly important to give an overview of the actual problem posed by the far right to see if it is inflated by the media, as Walser had suggested in his Peace Prize speech. Various bodies issue data on the far right: here the primary source will be the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, which produces an annual report (Verfassungsschutzbericht).6 The early post-unification period saw a rapid increase in violent acts with a far right motive from 178 in 1990 to 1485 in 1992. The numbers then fell before rising again in 1995 to reach 746 in 1999. The importance assigned to the problem of the far right and the call for action against it were made clear in the introduction to the 2000 Verfassungsschutzbericht: The vast majority of citizens in our country subscribe to the fundamental principles of our constitution and support democracy and


constitutional law. However, this report also shows that, as before, our constitutional state and internal security are threatened by individual groups, organisations and parties pursuing anti-constitutional objectives. Right-wing extremists – the numbers have unfortunately increased in recent years – but also left-wing extremists are attacking our state. […] We have a common responsibility to defend democracy, freedom and peace in our society against racism, anti-semitism and any form of extremism (Verfassungsschutzbericht 2000: 3).7 The 2000 report noted an almost 8 per cent rise in the number of violent far right extremists from 9000 in 1999 to 9700 in 2000. At the end of 2000 there were 144 far right organisations in Germany, an increase of ten since 1999, and an estimated 50,900 right-wing extremists. Far right parties had around 36,500 members. These figures should not, however, be taken as a definitive total as many people of a far right persuasion do not belong to any organisation. In 2000 there were 15,951 registered crimes with a presumed or proven far right motive, compared with 10,037 in 1999. About half of the criminals were from the former East Germany: in 2000 there were 2.21 far right crimes committed per 100,000 inhabitants in East Germany, as against 0.95 in the West. However, Hamburg had the fourth largest percentage in Germany with 2.47 far right crimes committed per 100,000 inhabitants. Whilst the most common perpetrators of far right crime are young east German males with a low level of education or poor employment perspectives, Armin Pfahl-Traughber is right to refer to an ‘allGerman phenomenon’ (Pfahl-Traughber 2000: 12). There is a tendency in the press to round up the figures on the far right and to engage in a degree of scaremongering. For instance, the 2000 Shell study reported that the number of young right-wing extremists was less than assumed, but from this Der Spiegel concluded that 27 per cent were highly hostile to foreigners (as noted in FAZ, 28 March 2000). Whilst one should be wary of the figures, the frequency of even minor far right offences nevertheless does confirm this as an unwelcome feature of the Berlin Republic. Fears of an institutionalisation of far right populism in Germany came to the fore when Ronald Schill’s Party for Law and Order Offensive (Partei Rechtsstaatlicher Offensive) won 20 per cent of the vote in the Hamburg elections in September 2001 and entered a right-wing coalition. This was more a manifestation of a general rise in far right populism, common in many other EU countries at the time and based on antiimmigration views and ‘economic racism’, than an indication of a specifically German development; moreover the five per cent hurdle requiring a party to win five per cent of the vote to win seats makes it extremely unlikely that the party will ever enter mainstream politics in Germany. Nonetheless, in the Bundestag Schill was publicly rebuked for his xenophobic statements and Schröder used the example to warn against far right populism in


Germany. If, as Niven points out, the National Socialist past represents everything that contemporary Germany does not want to be (Niven 2002: 5), any apparent return to the negative characteristics of the past – however tenuous the link – will ring alarm bells within the political culture. This is perhaps why the problem attracts greater media attention than in other countries. It is important to distinguish between anti-semitism and far right sentiment in Germany. Paul Spiegel, Chairman of the Central Council of Jews in Germany from 2000–06, frequently warned against the rise in antisemitism. The 2000 Verfassungsschutzbericht noted an increase in attacks on Jewish cemeteries and memorial sites and in general anti-semitic acts of violence, which is certainly cause for concern. However, the majority (64 per cent) of violent attacks attributed to right-wing extremists were directed against foreigners. Although the far right propound an anti-semitic stance, which also encompasses revisionism of the National Socialist past, the target body of their violence is foreigners in general and immigrants in particular. Comparisons with the Nazi past do not then always provide the answers to the far right. Whilst the call to remember the past in order to prevent such crimes recurring in the present is not always strictly appropriate, it can, however, have an impact. The Schröder government may have been accused of attempting to draw a line under the National Socialist past, but it did support many measures to combat the far right, suggesting an active response to the legacy of this past. The importance of the campaign against the far right for the government’s agenda – and, by association, Germany’s external image – was well illustrated by a speech delivered by Schröder on the 50th anniversary of the EKO steelworks in Eisenhüttenstadt in August 2000. He gave an overview of the situation in the new Bundesländer, covering issues such as unemployment and the proposed tax reform, but he also devoted a fair part of the speech to the problem of the far right: We cannot and must not tolerate the fact that in our country people are chased through the streets, beaten up or even murdered because of their language, religion or the colour of their skin. State and society must take clear and vigorous measures against this. […] Far right orgies of violence, xenophobic excesses and attacks on minorities are damaging to our country. They threaten peace within our country, but they also mar Germany’s image abroad (Schröder 2000d). The issue featured in the government’s annual reports for 1999–2000 and 2000–01 and was a focus of domestic and judicial policy. As well as sponsoring various public initiatives against the far right, including a cinema campaign,8 in May 2000 the government founded the ‘Alliance for Democracy and Tolerance’ (Bündnis für Demokratie und Toleranz), which


comprises a broad range of national, regional and local initiatives.9 The open reference to the problem in reports used to market government strategy and its inclusion even in Schröder’s millennium speech showed that it was not being ignored.

9 November 2000: a public expression of Leitverantwortung References to contemporary right-wing extremism as a reason not to forget the Nazi past are increasingly common and indicate a shift in the priorities and role attached to this past as it is becomes part of cultural memory. Whilst the debates on the legacy of National Socialism continue apace, to a certain extent they are now overshadowed by more contemporary concerns. A key example of this was the 9 November 2000 demonstration ‘Taking a Stand for Humanity and Tolerance’ (Wir stehen auf für Menschlichkeit und Toleranz) which brought some 200,000 people onto the streets of Berlin to protest against intolerance and racism, largely as a response to the escalation of far right violence that summer. The demonstration was organised by political representatives, the Protestant and Catholic churches in Germany, the Jewish community in Berlin, German trade unions and workers’ associations. Thus the event did not stem from a single interest group and, moreover, it was not about emphasising German guilt. The demonstration perhaps attracted so much support as it was a way for the public to acknowledge the past through action in the present. This was a determinedly popular event rather than one inspired by politicians. President Johannes Rau and Paul Spiegel rather than party-political leaders were chosen to speak although as indicated below, Spiegel did reveal a political agenda. Publicity for the demonstration called for a humane, open and tolerant Germany, where people could live peacefully together whatever their religion, culture or skin colour. It condemned hatred, violence, anti-semitism, racism and xenophobia, as well as attacks on synagogues or other religious or cultural institutions. The demonstration soon attracted prominent support and a good deal of media coverage; the Berliner Zeitung, for example, featured one well-known figure per day on its front page stating his or her reasons for attending. The public was urged not to ignore or show indifference to incidences of racism or persecution but to demonstrate the courage to stand up for their beliefs. The timing of the demonstration formed an obvious link between the recent attacks on German synagogues and the bleak events of 9 November 1938. However, in practice the annual commemoration of Kristallnacht (as well as the collapse of the Berlin Wall in 1989) remained very much in the background. The few articles giving a historical analysis of the various fateful ‘9 Novembers’ (1918, 1923, 1938 and 1989) seemed strangely anachronistic: this event was about active remembrance.


The demonstration was about openly rejecting the far right in Germany but also largely about the image Germany wished to project to the outside world. In an advert for the Berliner Morgenpost at the time Michel Friedman, the then Vice-President of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, was quoted as saying that Germany had to ‘show its true colours’ (Gesicht zeigen) or else lose face. Rau and Spiegel also raised the issue of Germany’s image in their speeches at the event. Spiegel underlined the hierarchy of interpretations of recent German history, stressing that the joy of unification should not overshadow remembrance of Kristallnacht. However, his main message, which dominated media reports, was about violence and intolerance against foreigners and minority groups in the present rather than recollection of the persecution of Jews in the past. In the process, he indicated a shift in priorities in the short period since the Walser debate. Whilst the latter had been provoked by the idea of ‘looking away’ from the National Socialist past, this was about not ‘looking away’ from the contemporary problem of the far right. Spiegel believed that the majority of Germans opposed the far right, but stressed that this majority must no longer be silent or ignore or play down what was happening in Germany. Again moving on from the Walser debate, he implicitly criticised the instrumentalisation of the legacy of the Nazi past for present-day purposes, with particular reference to the immigration issue as well as the Leitkultur debate (see p. 108). In this context, he urged politicians to stop the use of inflammatory populist language (P. Spiegel 2000). Whilst Walser had perceived an over-emphasis on the problem of the far right, Johannes Rau deemed far right attacks an insult to Germany and to all respectable Germans and said that each attack on a synagogue was ‘an attack on us all’. Walser had referred to the ‘disgrace’ of National Socialism, suggesting a collective burden on Germany resulting from the past. Rau asserted that contemporary attacks on foreigners, the homeless or the handicapped were ‘a disgrace to our country’, which implied that action was required to combat a present-day burden (Rau 2000).10 The demonstration made headlines in all the main national newspapers, gaining more column inches than the 9 November commemorations usually do and with the focus very much on the gesture of the masses against right-wing extremism and xenophobia. The response was positive overall. There was, however, cynicism from some commentators with regard to the motives behind, and the impact of, the demonstration. Both Jean-Paul Picaper and Henryk Broder, for example, saw the demonstration as an attempt to assuage the guilt related to the lack of widespread resistance to the Nazi regime: the urge for people to show Zivilcourage (the courage of their convictions) in 2000 was seen as compensation for a failure to show it in the past (Welt, 9 November 2000; Broder 2001: 24). However, this assertion not only suggested a direct link between past and present but also wrongly pointed to the continued legacy of collective guilt for the Nazi


past. Moreover, it implied that the public at the demonstration were there to repent for 1938, whereas the purpose of the event was to take a stand against the far right in the present. This was particularly the case for the large numbers of young people at the demonstration, for whom the increase in right-wing extremism is more dominant than the Nazi past within communicative memory. The call for active protest against the unwelcome echoes of a negative past seemed to provoke a greater public response than the conventions of ritualised commemoration. At the same time, the display of Zivilcourage in the present should be seen as just that and not necessarily linked to the traumas of the Nazi past. The fact that this event – and others throughout Germany – were principally an expression of public opinion indicated that the values associated with Leitverantwortung go beyond political initiatives. A further criticism, voiced, for example, by Wolfgang Storz and Herbert Kremp, was that the political classes were pushing the responsibility onto others to veil the fact that they had done nothing to solve the problem of the far right (FR, 6 November 2000; Welt, 11 November 2000). The ‘Revolt of the Decent People’ is admittedly easier demanded than achieved. However, as mentioned above, the SPD-Green government was behind many initiatives to campaign against the far right. To this extent, the 9 November demonstration confirmed the efficacy of the checks and balances that are in place to make sure that Germany keeps on the path of tolerance and democracy. Moreover, the demonstration gave prominence to the debate about a potential banning of the NPD: two days after the event, the Bundesrat voted in favour of launching a legal case to prohibit the party, a move that was supported by the government.

Leitverantwortung in practice – pedagogical and political education initiatives The above would suggest that national memory of the National Socialist past now functions on two levels. On the one hand, there is the ritualised form of cultural memory through speeches, commemorations and so on which remains necessary both for formal remembrance and to show respect for the victims. Running parallel to this – and sometimes crossing over with it – is a kind of ‘active memory’ focusing on political and democratic education and applying – indirectly or directly – the ‘lessons’ of the Nazi past to challenges in the present. The active uses of the past are becoming increasingly more dominant, as demonstrated by the emergence of a growing number of organisations campaigning against racism and for tolerance. Moreover, those organisations that aim to keep memory of the National Socialist past alive now frequently place this past into the context of the present as well as providing historical information. Such active memory of the National Socialist


past perhaps raises more attention than ‘passive’ memory and can be a positive way of generating historical consciousness as well as awareness of its application in the present. In his speech at the International Holocaust conference in Stockholm, Gerhard Schröder indicated the kind of links between past and present that can be made in the context of political education: Nobody can and nobody wants to hold the German youth of today liable for the deeds for which they bear no responsibility. But we should and must show them the terrible crimes of the past and name examples of how injustice can be resisted. For it is precisely these examples of resistance to terror and injustice that can serve as role models for the young people of today. […] For this reason all those who have demonstrated their wish as citizens for freedom and tolerance, for example by holding candle-lit vigils on Germany’s streets, have my respect. So too do all those people, mostly unknown, who do not look away when skinheads or extreme right-wingers verbally or indeed physically abuse foreigners or disabled people (Schröder 2000a). Inherent in such an approach is of course the danger of drawing comparisons too readily or relativising or distorting the past by aligning it too much with the present. Whilst it would be wrong to attribute the problem of right-wing extremism to a lack of education on the National Socialist period, it is also not necessarily the case that teaching of this period will provide an ultimate antidote to the problem. The debates on the far right and National Socialism should not then be fused into one. Such comparisons are, however, inevitable, particularly with generational change and as the Nazi dictatorship recedes ever further into the past. It is beyond the scope of this book to discuss how schools deal with the National Socialist period in Germany, but it is interesting to note the development of certain new principles and priorities for political education.11 With the advantage of both the passage of time and hindsight, political education can now cover the history of Vergangenheitsbewältigung along with the history of National Socialism, in other words how the Nazi past has impacted on developments in the Federal Republic. A resulting shift in the pedagogical narrative to a broader, more global approach is indicated by the term ‘Holocaust education’, which covers ‘human rights and democracy as well as anti-racist education’ (Pingel 2001: 4, 8) and suggests an education based on the principles of Leitverantwortung. Working on this premise, Ido Abram and Matthias Heyl have incorporated Adorno’s concept of ‘Education after Auschwitz’ (Erziehung nach Auschwitz) (Adorno 1969: 85–101) into a version of history that can be applied to contemporary political education. ‘Education’ refers to educating people in the history of National Socialism and the good and bad sides of human nature. ‘After’ means understanding this history in the


context of contemporary atrocities, and ‘Auschwitz’ requires an understanding of the perpetrators and horror of the Holocaust as well as the mechanisms and circumstances that made it possible (Abram and Heyl 1996).

‘Active memory’ initiatives There are a wide range of political educational initiatives in Germany dealing with the history or legacy of the National Socialist past. The following examples from Berlin give a snapshot of different approaches. There are firstly organisations dealing directly with the National Socialist past. An example of this is the House of the Wannsee Conference in Berlin which is both a memorial and an educational site. The permanent exhibition details the origins and development of National Socialism and Jewish persecution between 1933 and 1939 as well as the deportation and murder of European Jews during the Second World War. Aware of how difficult it is to ‘explain’ the Holocaust, the pedagogical team has developed various educational concepts for different target groups. All are based on the guiding principle of ‘active learning’, whereby participants are encouraged to engage in critical analysis and dialogue. For instance, school classes often research one part of the exhibition in small groups and then present it back to their classmates. This approach avoids the pupils being swamped with too much information and also means that facts are communicated in a way that they can understand. Adults are invited to consider issues relating to the Holocaust through the perspective of their profession, for example how the judicial or financial administration was involved in the ‘final solution’ (for details, see Wannsee 2000; and Gryglewski and Kreutzmüller 2000).12 A second group of political education initiatives is more obviously oriented to the present. Action Reconciliation Service for Peace (Aktion Sühnezeichen Friedensdienste or ASF) was founded in 1958 as a voluntary Christian organisation seeking to confront the era of National Socialism in German history and to seek reconciliation and an active dialogue with Germany’s East European neighbours. It aims to raise understanding of how the Holocaust happened, its continued impact in the present, and how to combat contemporary manifestations of racism, anti-semitism and xenophobia. The focus of this organisation is on learning from the past in order to promote concrete action in the present: For ASF, the critical confrontation with National Socialism and its crimes represents both a reason and an obligation to take concrete action in the present. With its services for peace ASF seeks to make people aware of the continued impact of history and to counter contemporary manifestations of intolerance, hatred and indifference (ASF brochure: no date).13 ASF organises volunteer placements abroad, promotes international cooperation and works with memorial sites and museums. It is also active in


the campaign against the far right and anti-semitism. Notably, it produces press releases and provides a forum for debate on the conflict in the Middle East, showing how the organisation’s profile has changed with the times. The organisation has continued support from young people, which is interesting, bearing in mind that one of the founding principles of the organisation is the recognition of German guilt. A third group of initiatives includes those concerned with both the GDR and Nazi pasts. One of the most prominent is Against Oblivion, for Democracy (Gegen Vergessen. Für Demokratie), founded in 1993 by former political victims of Nazism and the GDR. It combines various layers of the national memory narrative (the Nazi and GDR pasts and the development of the Federal Republic) in declaring its mission: […] to defend our country against extremist violence, the relativisation of National Socialist crimes, xenophobia and denigration, […] to keep memory of the past alive and to strengthen the liberal, democratic principles of our country (Gegen Vergessen, brochure: undated).14 As a final example, the Berlin Youth Circle (Landesjugendring Berlin) organises political-historical tours of Berlin for young people with a focus on the history of National Socialism. Again the emphasis is on active memory with a focus on the implications of history in the present. Accordingly, the organisation’s brochure declares the aim ‘to confront German history, especially the Nazi period, and to take a firm stand against anti-semitism, racism and the far right’ (Landesjugendring Berlin 1997).15

Initiatives against the far right: Gesichtzeigen The organisations described thus far have used the National Socialist and/or GDR pasts as the basis for political education and initiatives, drawing ready comparisons between present-day concerns and the importance of ‘remembering’ the National Socialist period. However, recent years have also seen the establishment of many organisations with similar guiding principles (democracy, tolerance, anti-racism), but which operate from a clear motive in the present, primarily the campaign against the far right, with no obvious allusions to the National Socialist past. The motives driving such organisations can be said to stem from the principles of Leitverantwortung developed in the Federal Republic. To give some examples, the ‘Emergency Entrance’ (Noteingang) scheme allows those at threat from racial violence to escape into a public building bearing a special symbol and STEP21 is a youth initiative promoting democratic values. The SPD-Green government set up a programme to assist neo-Nazis wishing to leave the far right scene. The organisation Exit Deutschland also assists such individuals. There have also been some prominent media campaigns, for example ‘Courage


against Far Right Violence’ (Mut gegen rechte Gewalt) sponsored by Stern magazine.16 Another good example is the Berlin-based organisation Gesichtzeigen: Aktion weltoffenes Deutschland e.V. (Show Your True Colours: Campaign for an Open and Tolerant Germany) which was established in 2000 to run and sponsor campaigns against racism, xenophobia and far right violence.17 Amid the call for Germans to take a stand against the far right, it launched a national poster and cinema campaign in autumn 2000 featuring the slogan ‘Far right violence is spreading like wildfire. Do not just stand by without doing anything’. This campaign featured everyday office or family scenes with flames spreading unnoticed, indicating that the far right is a growing concern. The organisation produced a ‘Handbook for Zivilcourage’ giving information and tips on the campaign against the far right (Frohloff 2001). The initiatives listed are as wide-ranging as ‘Get drunk to combat the far right’ and ‘Street football to promote tolerance’. Some of the advice is somewhat tenuous and perhaps over-optimistic: it is difficult to ‘learn’ Zivilcourage from a handbook. However, it does show the broad range of institutional and public support for such campaigns. Gesichtzeigen’s manifesto focuses on contemporary issues. However, its brochure does also hark back to Article One of the Basic Law as ‘the most important lesson that we Germans have learnt from the past. Human dignity is the priority’. Moreover, it focuses on the values of Leitverantwortung: We are now finally living in a civilised, enlightened, democratic society. This is the standard that we want to defend in order to guarantee peaceful co-existence in Germany (Gesichtzeigen: undated). With the advantage of prominent supporters and a strong image, Gesichtzeigen was able to raise DM1 million (ca. €500,000) in its first year. However, for director Sophia Oppermann, the problem is that political and media reaction comes in ‘waves’ rather than being constant: for example with the September 11 attacks attention switched to other concerns.18

Leidkultur and the ‘hysterical Republic’ The manifestations of Leitverantwortung discussed so far have shown that the instrumentalisation of the National Socialist legacy can have a productive impact on the present. It would of course be naïve to note only productive effects: as pointed out at the start of this chapter, the negative aspects of the dialectic of normality continue to come to light as Leidkultur where there is excessive emphasis on the legacy of Nazism for more dubious motives. In this sense, Leidkultur can be seen as a negative progression from Vergangenheitsbewältigung. As outlined by Walser in his Peace


Prize speech, Germany can thereby be portrayed as a victim of its past or else undue emphasis can be placed on the process of coming to terms with the past and on German guilt. Leidkultur also arises from the ‘wars of memory’, that is the conflicting interests of various groups seeking to highlight a particular memory narrative. Extending the view attributed to Walser, though in contrast to most German critics, Henryk Broder suggests that there is too much ‘remembrance’ and for the wrong reasons in Germany. Whilst Walser targeted the Meinungssoldaten, Broder is suspicious of the motives of what he terms ‘remembrance workers’ (Gedenkarbeiter) and ‘mourning workers’ (Trauerarbeiter) (Broder 2001: 61; subsequent references given as page numbers). He justifiably criticises the use of ‘Auschwitz’ as a soundbite, for example with reference to an anti-abortion demonstration in Augsburg which used the slogan ‘Is Auschwitz over?’ followed by ‘Yesterday Holocaust – today: Babycaust’ (45). There is, however, a subtle difference in the views of Walser and Broder. Whilst Walser suggested that there was too much emphasis on German atrocities in the past, Broder implies that there is an excessive focus on Jewish victimhood in Germany. He objects to the treatment of Jews as a subject of German fascination in what he terms the ‘Post-Shoah business of dabblers in Jewish studies’ (108). Broder has a point with his criticism that Jews are frequently called upon to interpret German problems, particularly that of the far right which, as we have seen, cannot be traced back simply to the Nazi past: The Jews are responsible for making sure that the legacy of National Socialism is dealt with properly in Germany. This is why Paul Spiegel always has to issue a statement when a swastika is daubed on a wall (8). Whilst it would be unfair to interpret this tendency as a reflection of secondary anti-semitism, it does display a reluctance to look for answers in the German present, or perhaps a deep-seated desire not to confront the past. Broder’s book contains correspondence with the producers of the talkshow ‘Koschwitz’ who asked Broder and the Turkish Green MP Cem Özdemir to take part in an edition dealing with the far right. The show was scheduled to take place just after Özdemir had been on a visit to Auschwitz. Deliberately playing on German sensitivities, Broder wanted to know why they had chosen him and Özdemir rather than ‘Aryans’ to discuss the far right and asked if a visit to Auschwitz was a prerequisite for understanding the topic (66–74). As another example, he was asked to give a lecture, entitled ‘After the Shoah. Is there a Jewish identity in Germany?’ about anti-semitism, philo-semitism and Zionism, especially after unification. Broder wished to ask instead: […] is there a German identity in Germany? And if so, why is this chiefly expressed through questions about Jewish identity? Why after the


Shoah are so many Germans still so fascinated by Jews and Jewishness? Horst Mahler [a leading spokesman for the NPD] in his way and they in their own (110). An ‘identity crisis’ may provide one of the reasons for the perpetuation of Leidkultur. Leitverantwortung stems from a post-war political narrative where a favourable image is drawn from achievements based on a series of moral values rather than on definably national characteristics. Positive assertions of German national identity are still viewed with caution at the level of political discourse. However, there is a shift in focus. When Walser referred to the problem of describing Germans as ‘normal’ he was evoking a memory narrative that encapsulated the Third Reich period. However, the problem is now raised by a different generation whose view of the world is more dominated by post-war Vergangenheitsbewältigung and the impact of unification. Hence, Leidkultur does not exclusively involve direct allusions to the Nazi past, such as the media excesses noted by Walser, but also makes indirect references which indicate an apparently persistent negative legacy in the present. The so-called ‘Joseph affair’ provides an example of this tendency. A six year-old half-Iraqi boy from the eastern German town of Sebnitz drowned in mysterious circumstances in an outdoor swimming pool in autumn 2000. His mother asserted that he had been murdered by far right criminals. This led to media furore, a visit from Schröder, and proclamations of a far right curse in (east) Germany which evoked the fateful shadows of the Nazi past, even though it later emerged that the boy’s death had been an accident and that the mother had bribed people to tell her version of events (Spiegel, 4 December 2000). By this stage, however, it had become difficult to distinguish real events from what was being claimed in the media. The above issue of the Spiegel summed up the mood with the apt cover ‘The Hysterical Republic. Mad Cow Disease and Fear of Nazis: between Trivialisation and Exaggeration’.

The Leitkultur and Nationalstolz debates The notion of a ‘hysterical Republic’ frequently occurs in contemporary political debates in Germany. The so-called Leitkultur and Nationalstolz debates on German identity and patriotism in October 2000 and March 2001 respectively bore traits of Leidkultur through inappropriate instrumentalisation of the Nazi legacy and, significantly, the grafting of this legacy onto a debate which originally had a different pretext. Like the debate on Walser’s Peace Prize speech they addressed the problem of how to reconcile Germany’s negative past with a ‘normal’ present. Yet they were different in having less to do with the direct memory and history of National Socialism than its legacy in present-day political culture; that is,


they were debates of cultural rather than communicative memory, or debates led by different generational communities of memory. These were also German rather than German-Jewish debates. They built on views expressed during the Peace Prize debate through the stated – rather than implied – desire from some quarters to start identifying with the country again after decades where patriotism could stretch to the constitution but no further. For the purposes of clarity, the Leitkultur and Nationalstolz debates will be regarded separately here, but they should be understood as part of a network of interlinking themes making up the layers of interpretation of the Nazi legacy in contemporary Germany. The two debates occurred at the same time as negotiations on compensation for former forced labourers, the debate on immigration and asylum and the campaign against the far right, which could of course confuse the underlying context. They also demonstrated the dominant ‘waves’ of the Nazi legacy: at a time when the far right was a prominent theme, the Leitkultur and Nationalstolz debates concerned Germany’s relations to foreigners and to its own national identity.

The Leitkultur debate The Leitkultur debate was triggered by the CDU politician Friedrich Merz at the end of October 2000. Merz had raised eyebrows during the debate between the Christian Democratic Party (CDU) and its Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union (CSU) on immigration and asylum, for example by suggesting a quota of 200,000 foreigners to be allowed into Germany per year. However, the greatest controversy arose from his statement that foreigners intending to stay permanently in Germany should adhere to certain rules and principles, which he referred to as a freiheitliche deutsche Leitkultur (a liberal German ‘leading culture’) (Welt, 11 November 2000). The term Leitkultur was from the start ambiguous; it could refer to German culture as the dominant culture or the dominant culture within Germany. This was evident in the numerous interpretations that promptly arose, ranging from language to landscape to Angela Merkel’s formulation: ‘potato soup’ (Zeit, 7 December 2000). The term in fact comes from Bassam Tibi, a political scientist of Syrian origin who lectures in Germany. In his book Europa ohne Identität? Die Krise der multikulturellen Gesellschaft (1998) Tibi states that heterogeneous immigrant societies such as Germany do need a Leitkultur to facilitate integration. The term does not imply specifically national characteristics or symbols but rather the ideas of the European Enlightenment. For Tibi, Leitkultur involves democracy, human rights and the separation of religion and politics in a civil society. In addition, he advocates a ‘Euro-Islam’ oriented to western values, that is a mix of Verfassungspatriotismus and a liberal interpretation of Islam for Muslims living in Europe.


Reference to Tibi’s definition could have sparked a productive discussion on the welfare and integration of foreigners in multi-ethnic Germany. Unfortunately, although there was some media analysis on this subject (see, for example, SZ, 2–3 December 2000; Welt, 2 and 8 November 2000; and Zeit, 9 November 2000), Tibi’s definition was generally ignored and Leitkultur taken out of context to become a purely national and largely media-fuelled debate on what it meant to be German and the aspects of ‘German-ness’ that foreigners in the country should be expected to take on. This debate revealed the tendency to polarise topics such as integration into a discussion of German national identity. Die Welt, for example, ran a series entitled ‘What is German?’ featuring a variety of contributors. These articles tended to follow the ideological battle lines drawn up in the Historians’ Dispute, but with reference to contemporary circumstances, for example the concern that open promotion of German national identity would be grist to the mill of the far right. This was the first post-war debate on German identity in relation to the integration of foreigners. To this extent, it showed that with the change to cultural memory of the National Socialist past comes the scope for a broader thematic spread of debates, which are freer in not focusing on questions of German guilt or historical specifics. Yet at the same time the debate was marked by the dialectic of normality: alarm about the meaning and implications of the term – particularly the notion of stipulating which foreigners could stay in Germany and imposing a certain culture on them – brought about allusions to the Nazi past. The issue was essentially about Germans reassessing the problematic nature of German identity rather than about how Germany is seen from a foreigner’s perspective. In other words, the debate shifted from its original context as part of the immigration debate to the familiar German discourse on the Nazi legacy. It is not the intention here to equate the terms Leitkultur and Leidkultur. However, it would be reasonable to suggest that Leidkultur, as a negative manifestation of the dialectic of normality, is one of the ingredients of German Leitkultur. Similarly, the concept of Leitverantwortung, as one aspect of contemporary German political culture, could be a feature of the country’s Leitkultur. There is nothing wrong in defining a list of prominent national characteristics or values, although the entries will of course usually differ from person to person. The main problem with Leitkultur, hinted at above, was the term itself – and the fact it was used in the context of the already charged immigration debate. The association with the verb leiten could suggest that German culture was superior over others. The term naturally led to an association with anti-foreigner or far right sentiment, implying that German (nationalistic) rather than general administrative criteria would be imposed as a condition for integration. There is probably some truth in the point made by both Wolf Biermann and Wolfgang Thierse that the concept was bound up with economic concerns, i.e. the


reluctance on the part of the affluent western EU to welcome people from poorer (non-European) countries.19 This would of course put the Leitkultur debate into the context of similar discussions on multiculturalism in other West European countries. However, as we have seen, the debate was ultimately more about Germany itself than the foreigners wishing to live there. Used in relation to Germany, Leitkultur suggests a single dominant culture, which, as Marion Dönhoff pointed out, wrongly implies that the country has maintained constant national characteristics throughout history (Zeit, 9 November 2000). Such an interpretation would do Germany no favours as it would not reflect the change to democracy after the Nazi period. The concept of Leitkultur applied in the course of this debate ultimately pointed to a post1949 narrative. However, this narrative is neither purely national nor static. One should differentiate, for example, between the Leitkultur of East and West Germany, as well as between various regional, local and ethnic identities in Germany. In other words, Germany embraces a range of Leitkulturen. Wolf Biermann criticised the term Leitkultur in claiming that any culture that had to be ‘managed’ from above was nothing more than a catalogue of rules, or ‘bureaucratised barbarism’ (Welt, 8 November 2000). Some critics proposed alternatives such as ‘cultural nation’ (Kulturnation), or ‘constitutional culture’ (Verfassungskultur), although these clearly avoided any positive reference to national identity. The most appropriate term perhaps came from Michael Naumann, who referred to a ‘national culture’ (Nationalkultur) comprising the cultural traditions of a nation that are, however, not nationalistic (BZ, 23–26 December 2000).

Leitkultur as ‘moral cudgel’ Biermann’s prediction that Leitkultur would be the ‘faux pas of the year’ (Welt, 8 November 2000) was initially confirmed. Merz’s term provoked a split within the CDU and became a source of embarrassment, for example at the 9 November demonstration, where banners with slogans criticising or parodying the term could be seen, for example ‘Leitkultur has brown [i.e. far right] undertones’; ‘Only shallow thinkers need a Leitkultur’; or ‘Never again a Leitkultur of terror! CDU ban?’ At the demonstration, Paul Spiegel earned rapturous applause for the following: What is all this talk of a German Leitkultur? Is it German Leitkultur to chase foreigners, set fire to synagogues or murder the homeless? Does the term refer to culture or to the values of Western democratic civilisation that we have anchored in our Basic Law? (P. Spiegel 2000) Spiegel was of course instrumentalising the debate to illustrate his own concerns about the increase in right-wing extremism, although his words


also served to warn against the potential abuse of such terminology. ‘Values’ seems a more acceptable – though innocuous – alternative to Leitkultur. Angela Merkel later insisted that there was no contradiction between the two terms (Welt, 11 November 2000). However, Biermann was also right in referring to an ‘electioneering term’ (Welt, 8 November 2000). Leitkultur was later to become a strategic tool for the party to win popular support. After initially being taken out of the CDU’s position paper on immigration and following many conflicting reports in the press, on 4 November 2000 the term reappeared in a revised version produced by Peter Müller, chairman of the CDU immigration committee and Wolfgang Bosbach, Vice-Chairman of the CDU-CSU parliamentary group.20 There was a slight – but significant – shift in terminology: rather than Merz’s ‘German Leitkultur’ the paper committed foreigners living in Germany to a ‘Leitkultur in Germany’ (Tagesspiegel, 4 November 2000). This did make the term more palatable in distancing it from any whiff of nationalism. In any case, the term had now been stripped of its potentially dangerous connotations and pared down to the surely self-evident meaning of following the constitution and prevailing social, cultural and democratic standards, learning the German language, showing loyalty to the values of the state and, most problematically, adapting to western Christian values. This essentially turned the Leitkultur debate into a discussion of Verfassungspatriotismus, or the German identity that had developed since 1949: Sigmar Gabriel, for example, stated that Leitkultur was outlined in the first 20 articles of the Basic Law (FR, 4 November 2000). The new definition would seem to run parallel to some of the principles of Leitverantwortung, but there is a difference. Leitverantwortung is predicated on an open acknowledgement of a negative past; however, from the CDU’s paper (reported in the Frankfurter Rundschau), one could be forgiven for forgetting the preceding decades of problematic Vergangenheitsbewältigung, and for subscribing to the view that 1945 marked a Stunde Null: Immigration and integration policy can only be successful if we are secure in our own national and cultural identity. In our view, the basis for this identity is an open-minded patriotism. The identity of our German nation is characterised by our constitutional system and a common history, language and culture. […] In the course of history we Germans have developed our national identity and culture according to the principles of European civilisation. This identity and culture have manifested themselves in our language, arts, customs and conventions, our understanding of law and democracy, freedom and civic duty. Germany belongs to the value systems of the Western Christian world. We are part of the European community of culture (FR, 8 November 2000). The new formula for Leitkultur seemed to be patriotism and pride in national traditions minus any aggressively nationalist elements or any


allusion to the negative national memory narrative. However, by this stage the meaning and context of Leitkultur mattered less than its emergence as a kind of ‘moral cudgel’ with which the CDU could attack the coalition. The context was not the representation of Auschwitz as Walser had meant it, but it did reflect Walser’s critique of the Meinungssoldaten in alluding to the unforgiving narrative of Vergangenheitsbewältigung established by the leftliberals from the 1960s onwards. Hence, the CDU could claim itself to be the party of patriotic national identity whilst accusing the left-wing for having, as Angela Merkel put it, ‘a disturbed relationship to their fatherland’ (Welt, 2 November 2000). Interestingly, Merkel, who had distanced herself from the term Leitkultur at the start, suddenly became aware of its political usefulness and became a passionate defender of concepts such as ‘nation’ and ‘fatherland’, championing a positive national identity. The use of such concepts extended the views attributed to Walser by his critics. More than anything, the political squabble surrounding Leitkultur showed a common tendency in ‘post-Walser’ debates to appropriate issues of national identity for cross-party criticism. At the time, the CDU was not only digging up the past of some of the former 1968 generation in government to cast aspersions on their suitability to rule the country, but also criticising the SPD for shifting to the left and cooperating with the PDS (Party of Democratic Socialism; the successor party to the Socialist Unity Party (SED) in the GDR). There was a rather undignified spat about which party had made the biggest contribution to the unification process, with the CDU asserting that the left had opposed it and thereby showed its ‘mental block’ with regard to the nation. The SPD and PDS ended up in coalition government in Berlin in 2001, which dominated the CDU’s speeches on the ‘Day of German Unity’ that year. All this is further demonstration of the existence of further conflicting layers of interpretation in the national memory narrative, based on the experience and perception of the unification process as well as the Nazi period. Meanwhile, the governing coalition declared that the CDU was shifting to the right and by association linked it with the rise of the far right. Schröder called the Leitkultur debate ‘grotesque’ in view of the increase in far right extremism (Spiegel Online, 16 October 2000), the Greens accused Merz of a ‘racist campaign’ (Spiegel Online, 22 October 2000), whilst Franz Müntefering asserted that ‘German nationalist tones’ were on the rise in the CDU (Welt, 1 November 2000). Müntefering’s comments were borne out to a certain extent by the opposition to a multicultural society voiced by certain members of the CDU-CSU and expressions of support for Merz from the far right, which saw his stance as a brake against the shift to the left of the CDU (see, for example, Spiegel Online, 20 October 2000). As with the Walser debate, it is important here to distinguish between the different agendas and levels of interpretation. Whilst some media commentators may have genuinely wanted to find a definition for Leitkultur, on the whole the politicians used it as a way of criticising the


opposition, in what Thierse has described as a tendency to personalise and scandalise political issues and to assign blame (Zitty, 4/2001). If referred to at all, the National Socialist past was a means to support an argument and so the debate moved away from any specific historical context.

The Nationalstolz debate Just as the Leitkultur debate seemed to have fizzled out, it re-emerged in a more aggressive form with the Nationalstolz (national pride) debate in spring 2001. Like the Leitkultur debate, this touched the raw nerve of German national memory and was blown out of all proportion for political purposes. Yet whilst the Leitkultur debate had at least yielded some insights into the need to consider the best way of integrating foreigners in Germany, this controversy was purely centred on German national identity. It was triggered by the Green Environment Minister, Jürgen Trittin. In a radio interview in March 2001, Trittin declared that Laurenz Meyer, General Secretary of the CDU, not only had the looks but also the mentality of a skinhead in his response to Meyer’s assertion that he was proud to be German in an interview with Focus magazine (see FAZ, 17 March 2001; and, for the interview with Meyer, Focus, 28 October 2000).21 Whatever the context, Trittin’s comments were unwise: in condemning Meyer for his appearance he was dangerously close to the kind of prejudice exercised by skinheads themselves. Understandably, Trittin was sharply rebuked by the CDU-CSU as well as the government. Meyer wrote to Trittin the next day urging him to retract the remark, asserting that Trittin had irresponsibly instrumentalised right-wing extremism and also relativised it by directing it against democratic political opponents (FR, 15 March 2001). In his reply Trittin avoided an apology – despite saying that he had not meant to hurt Meyer personally – and indeed heightened the dispute by accusing Meyer and the CDU of a jingoistic emphasis on all things German and by claiming that in expressing national pride in the way he did, Meyer was drawing on ‘the most popular slogans on the T-shirts of skinheads’ (BZ, 17–18 March 2001). In implying that Germans should not use the phrase ‘I am proud to be German’ (Ich bin stolz, Deutscher zu sein) to refer to their own country, Trittin was using a narrative of Leidkultur just as much as Meyer was in asserting the right to be allowed to express pride for being German. The CDU-CSU parliamentary group sent a letter to Schröder demanding Trittin’s resignation. It said that Trittin was unfit for office, for he had […] likened [Meyer and the CDU-CSU] to right-wing extremists in a defamatory way. Minister Trittin has thereby abandoned the basic consensus of democracy in Germany. The continued instrumentalisation of political extremism, especially of right-wing extremist ideology and violence, for the purpose of political confrontation with the CDU/CSU is


irreconcilable with the duties of a Federal Minister (reported in FR, 15 March 2001). Trittin eventually apologised after pressure from Schröder, although he refused to retract the comment that the CDU was shifting to the right. The CDU for its part opted to keep the debate alive, aware of its potential for political gain.

Media reactions Perhaps even more so than the term Leitkultur, Nationalstolz provoked a debate that should never have been. It is unlikely that Trittin intended to provoke such controversy. Following brief initial reports on the facts of the dispute, the affair was soon displaced from its original context. The media gleefully asked stars ranging from the singer Peter Maffay to the Formula One champion Michael Schumacher whether they were proud to be German, hoping for a good – or controversial – quote (see, for example, the interview with Schumacher in Zeit (Leben), 11 April 2001). Pages were dedicated to definitions of patriotism all over the world; the Frankfurter Rundschau, for example, produced a list of associated vocabulary and a dossier of articles on its website, whilst the historian Lothar Burchardt set about developing some alternative terms, including ‘I think it’s OK to be German’, ‘German? I like it’, and ‘It is good to be in Germany’ (FAZ, 21 March 2001). Bild turned out to be a particularly staunch supporter of German patriotism with a range of articles as well as a phone-in which attracted almost 15,000 responses on one day. Herbert Riehl-Heyse laughed off ‘the silliest debate of the season’, referring to a Bild reader who declared herself proud of Germany because of its rye bread and a journalist who was annoyed to find that although FDP leader Guido Westerwelle declared himself proud to be German he did not have a German flag on his desk (SZ, 24–25 March 2001). However, at this juncture, it is again important to draw a distinction between the different agendas at stake. For a newspaper like Bild, the idea of national pride could be expressed through good beer, garden gnomes or sporting achievements, in other words a kind of ‘popular’ nationalism that does not conjure up the darker pages of German history. Gustav Seibt rather cruelly pointed out: In today’s Germany, nationalism […] is something for the lower classes. Its social status corresponds to that of tracksuits, Ballermann [a German tour operator] and holidays on Majorca. This is what makes it so appealing to politicians and the tabloids (Zeit, 29 March 2001). The last sentence is the most revealing. The political intentions behind this debate were to win votes and undermine the opposition, and the CDU at


least was prepared to appeal to popular nationalist sentiment for this purpose. The desire to keep the political debate on the boil was shown, for example, by the ready disclosure of the content of the letters between Meyer and Trittin to the media and the wealth of unnamed sources giving insider knowledge on internal developments in the debate. In general, the media was critical of the political instrumentalisation of national pride even if it did not agree with Trittin’s remarks; but it must also be said that the media gave the affair undue coverage. As with the Leitkultur debate, there were implied references to Germany’s negative past in the broader debate, which made no major reference to Trittin and suggested an agenda added to the original context of his comments. Hence, factual headlines such as ‘Trouble for Trittin’ (FAZ, 21 March 2001) or ‘Argument over skinhead comments’ (SZ, 17–18 March 2001) were accompanied by more general subheadings such as ‘Dispute on pride, patriotism and right-wing extremism’ (FAZ, 21 March 2001) or ‘Patriotism dispute’ (SZ, 21 March 2001). Perhaps indicative of foreign views of Germany, an article by Kate Connolly in the Observer on 25 March, titled ‘Germans split on right to be proud’, used the somewhat dramatic subheading: ‘The Right beats a patriotic drum as a troubled nation faces its history.’ This article signalled the sub-text that had entered the debate: ‘A bout of soul-searching is troubling Germany as it tries to define the acceptable face of patriotism in a country where nationalism still has an ugly resonance.’ Interestingly, Connolly put the dispute into the context of a challenge to German identity posed by the introduction of the euro to replace the DM which, as we have seen, was a feature of the positive political narrative established in the post-war period. The problems still associated with patriotism in Germany compared to other countries are hinted at by a comparison with the UK. The UK government had no qualms in promoting the notion of national pride in its campaign to win over the British citizens to the idea of Europe in autumn 2000. In view of the forthcoming UK elections and the EU summit in Nice, Tony Blair’s focus groups apparently told him that the party did not come across as patriotic enough and so had an Achilles heel that the conservatives could take advantage of. Blair wrote to his cabinet to inform them of the new stance they should take: an ‘enlightened patriotism’ rather than the ‘narrow-minded nationalism’ or ‘misguided patriotism’ he attributed to the Tories. Bearing in mind the widespread mental split between Britain and Europe, Foreign Minister Robin Cook tried to win the public’s support for European integration by asserting that one could be a patriot and a European at the same time and that the most patriotic way of expressing one’s national interests was within the framework of the European Union (see SZ, 28 November 2000). The Nationalstolz debate was significant in openly addressing a concept that had hitherto been taboo, or at least viewed with extreme caution, in


the mainstream political culture of post-war Germany. Yet as with the Leitkultur debate, the problem with Nationalstolz in Germany was one of terminology as well as a certain amount of paranoia with regard to the past. There is nothing wrong with patriotism but in this case it was wrongly polarised into aggressive nationalism on the one hand and hatred for one’s country on the other. Whilst the main intentions behind the debate reflected contemporary political agendas, it nonetheless produced some ugly echoes. For Stefan Dietrich, Meyer had provided a painful and unwelcome reminder that Germans had been ‘cut off’ from their national identity and that without this identity the integration of foreigners was not feasible (FAZ, 19 March 2001). However, the CDU seemed to be advocating a kind of ethnic pride that went further than the political and social values encompassed in its definition of Leitkultur. The exaggerated tone of the debate at the same time revealed the dialectic of normality, as can be denoted from Heribert Prantl’s apt assessment: Whenever the Germans want to be normal they show how abnormal they are. Whenever they allegedly just want to be like those in other countries, pandemonium ensues in Germany. A national feeling should be self-evident and not imposed. […] It is quite the opposite in Germany. When Germanness is the issue, things get agitated. Politicians then call on Germans to think in a more ‘relaxed’ way, they try to define a Leitkultur, there is praise for a ‘healthy national feeling’ and an unhealthy debate is unleashed. German patriotism is then assessed and considered insufficient (SZ, 20 March 2001).

The political dimensions of Nationalstolz The Nationalstolz debate showed the power and prompt tendency of the media to whip up such campaigns. And yet this debate was not just driven by the media; it turned into a party political affair. The CDU-CSU used it as the occasion for another attack on the 1968 generation in government by focusing on the left’s traditionally negative perception of national identity and thus harking back to the Vergangenheitsbewältigung discourse. It claimed that its principal criticism of Trittin was not necessarily his statement against Meyer but his indifferent relationship to his country. In other words, the CDU-CSU wanted to brand the coalition as a ‘society without a fatherland’ (FAZ, 20 March 2001), thereby playing on Mitscherlich’s term ‘society without a father’ (often associated with the 1968 generation), in order to damage its image. For Edo Reents, the right-wing did not miss a single opportunity to ‘hold a gun to the head’ of the Social Democrats on the matter (SZ, 21 March 2001). The Nationalstolz debate clearly showed additional layers of interpretation referring to both the GDR and National Socialist pasts, as well


as to present circumstances. For example, Merkel called for a ‘rather less restricted and burdened attitude’ towards the (Nazi) German past (SZ, 20 March 2001), indicating a greater openness in the discourse since the Walser debate. The CDU-CSU used the dispute as an opportunity to condemn the SPD for shifting to the left by cooperating with the PDS, thereby conjuring up the GDR past. Finally, in trying to reclaim the phrase ‘I am proud to be German’ the CDU risked being associated, as we have seen, with the contemporary phenomenon of right-wing extremism. One of the main uses of the debate was for electioneering purposes. Trittin’s remark had been made less than two weeks before Land elections in Baden-Württemberg and Rheinland-Pfalz, the latter being particularly difficult territory for the Greens. The conservatives hoped to turn it to their advantage by playing the fatherland card. It was of course also a way of diverting public attention from the scandal related to the revelation of illegal donations made to the CDU. Some local residents in Rheinland-Pfalz started collecting signatures calling for Trittin’s resignation and set up an anti-Trittin stand. However, the initiative backfired when the NPD offered to distribute its own stickers with the slogan ‘I am proud to be German’. The Greens did in fact fare badly in the elections, losing over four per cent in Baden-Württemberg. How far this can be put down to Trittin’s comment is uncertain, although Claudia Roth, the Green Party’s chairwoman, did cite what she termed the CDU’s ‘mean campaign’ (SZ, 26 March 2001) against Trittin as one of the reasons. Even after the elections the papers continued to devote space to the debate, demonstrating the fact that it was no longer about Trittin. An article by Guido Westerwelle published in the FAZ on 19 March brought together all the associated confusion and hidden agendas. The article was bravely headlined ‘I’m proud to be a German’, although the title was printed in English, indicating that the German use of the phrase is still controversial. Westerwelle confirmed that the question posed in the Nationalstolz debate was the same as in previous reflections on Vergangenheitsbewältigung: ‘Are we allowed to be proud of our country, can one show this pride or is it necessary, on account of Germany’s historical guilt, to suppress any such pride?’ He then indicated another agenda, the campaign against the generation of 1968 in an attempt to weaken the coalition, using the argument that the left had never made peace with the concept of the nation. Trittin, he asserted, was someone who had constantly rejected the German nation during his political career. Westerwelle’s concept of national pride and the German nation focused on the post-1949 period, which at the same time seemed to underline the negative national history prior to this. However, for Westerwelle the Verfassungspatriotismus intrinsic to the post-1949 development of West German democracy was not enough; he asserted that in order for Germany to assume its role as a bridge between east and west the country needed to feel emotional pride as well. He


stressed that this should not, however, be associated with far right sentiment: Anyone who denies people the right to be proud of their own country uproots them. Young people who wish to identify with their country must not be left to the right-wing extremists. Westerwelle declared the right to express pride for being a German in Europe, just like other nations. However, the associated notion that Germany was still being punished for its Nazi past now seemed anachronistic. There is a link here with the Walser debate. Walser was accused of courting applause from the far right for wanting the Nazi past to be forgotten and for exaggerating the extent and impact of negative references to this past in contemporary Germany. Yet it is uncertain whether the public at large feels the need to reclaim far right slogans for themselves, or whether they feel that they are still being punished for the crimes of the past. An editorial in the FAZ on 21 March commented: According to Westerwelle, Germans […] no longer want to go around with a ‘guilty conscience, bowed heads and stooped gait’ just because they are German. Oh Westerwelle, we really do not need a second Walser. Where then are these stooped creatures who allegedly populate the Federal Republic? Moreover, the SPD-Green coalition’s use of the ideas associated with Leitverantwortung to enhance Germany’s image suggests that the left does not have such a problem with national identity as the right would like to make out.

The ‘Patriotism Debate’ in the Bundestag In the course of the Nationalstolz debate, declarations of national pride and patriotism became de rigeur for politicians. The CSU and FDP even called for President Rau’s resignation after he said that one could be ‘pleased or thankful’ to be German but that one could only be proud of one’s own achievements (SZ, 17–18 March 2001). Schröder was also required to comment on the national pride issue. Like Rau, he focused on political rather than ethnic criteria in declaring himself in favour of an enlightened patriotism: ‘I am proud of the people’s achievements and of democratic culture. And in this sense I am a German patriot who is proud of his country’ (SZ, 20 March 2001). During a stormy session in the Bundestag on 16 March the CDU-CSU called for a debate on the relation of democratic parties to the far right and the nation – as well as whether Trittin should resign. Again there were allusions to both past and present narratives. The


CSU delegate Michael Glos, for example, brandished Willy Brandt’s 1972 campaign poster ‘Germans, we can be proud of our country’ and suggested that it was high time for Germans to stop going around in ‘sackcloth and ashes’ (SZ, 17–18 March 2001). The ‘Patriotism Debate’ took place in a packed chamber on 29 March 2001. Although ostensibly about whether or not Trittin should resign (the vote was ultimately in his favour), in the end it was not about him at all. Instead delegates from all parties scrambled to outdo each other in declaring how proud they were of their nation, indicating the increasingly blurred boundaries between left- and right-wing Geschichtspolitik and illustrating Heribert Prantl’s wry reference to a ‘national populist Snow White competition: “mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the most German of them all?”’ (SZ, 22 March 2001). Friedrich Merz, for example, was of the view that 50 years after the war Germans had the right to be proud of their country and those (i.e. Trittin and his government) who thought otherwise had a hate relationship with it. Somewhat dubiously, he insisted that the terms Heimat, ‘fatherland’ and ‘nation’ did not echo far right vocabulary but reflected a natural sense of identity based on the reality of life in Germany. Merz asserted that anyone who denigrated these terms robbed people of part of their identity and drove them towards the (extreme) right (see SZ and BZ, 30 March 2001). Kerstin Müller from the Greens said that she loved her country and was proud of everything that had been achieved there (Tagesspiegel, 30 March 2001). However, she also made the valid counter-argument that the CDUCSU provided encouragement for the far right by provoking such debates and advocated caution, at the same time pointing to the legacy of Nazism: ‘As Germans with our past we simply cannot and should not sound off about national pride in such an uninhibited way’ (Welt, 30 March 2001). The debate thus assumed the conventional pattern of all the recent Vergangenheitsbewältigung debates, that is, arguments for normalisation versus constant negative reference to the past. The German deliberations on national pride were taking place just as figures were released showing a rise in violent far right crime and an increase in membership of the NPD (FAZ, 30 March 2001). The day after the Bundestag’s ‘Patriotism Debate’, the Bundestag and Bundesrat followed the government in lodging an application with the Federal Constitutional Court for the prohibition of the NPD; the first time that all three levels of government had proposed a party ban.22 As further evidence of the layers of narrative on the National Socialist legacy, the day after national pride had hit the front pages the potential prohibition of the NPD was making headlines. However, the Bundestag chamber was half-empty for the NPD vote. Delegates seemed happy to declare national pride based on past achievements, but declined to consider the one aspect that negates this pride in the present.


The Bundestag’s ‘Patriotism Debate’ took place as Schröder was in America visiting George Bush. Ironically, while Schröder was preparing to declare himself leader of a new ‘self-confident nation which is sure of itself’ and one of his colleagues was quoted as saying that Germany no longer wanted to be associated with the ‘leftovers’ of the last century but rather treated as a sovereign partner with a role in shaping the future (BZ, 30 March 2001) the Bundestag was reverberating with the echoes of precisely such ‘leftovers’ in the form of a still defective Vergangenheitsbewältigung – a continuing proof of the dialectic of normality.

4 The Holocaust Memorial in Berlin

Cultural remembrance in post-war Germany The previous chapter discussed manifestations of the dialectic of normality in the Berlin Republic in terms of politics and political education. This chapter will consider how the dialectic of normality is expressed through cultural representation, using the example of the lengthy controversy surrounding the construction of a national Holocaust memorial in Berlin. This controversy merits consideration for several reasons. First, it reflected the difficulty of representing aspects of the National Socialist past in aesthetic form. This factor is especially significant in view of the shift from communicative to cultural memory and the need to find adequate forms of preserving knowledge of this past. Second, the debate on the Holocaust memorial concerned the image that the Berlin Republic wishes to project to the outside world and, by consequence, the choices made regarding the representation of the layers of its history. Third, the debate was indicative of tendencies in contemporary Geschichtspolitik and, as such, as significant as its end purpose. In other words, the Holocaust memorial is not just a vehicle for ritual remembrance but also a symbol of the public debate on Vergangenheitsbewältigung. Fourth, the controversy involved ‘wars of memory’ between various groups seeking to shape cultural memory at national level. Opinions on the memorial may well have been influenced by the views of such groups just as much as by aesthetic concerns. Public involvement in the project in turn showed it to be more than a political issue. Finally, the Holocaust memorial can be said to exemplify the dialectic of normality in concrete form. Depending on one’s viewpoint, it is either an expression of Leitverantwortung or Leidkultur – or indeed an interplay of both – whether paving over the past or openly addressing it. Before turning to the debate on the Holocaust memorial, it is useful to examine the national role of constructed forms of memory and the related problems unique to Germany. National memory assumes concrete 119


form in public sites of memory including museums, memorial sites and monuments. These forms will be grouped here under the term ‘cultural remembrance’. As James E. Young points out, and particularly significant in the case of Germany, at issue is not just aesthetics but also the discourse and activity that bring these forms into being, the changing responses of the observer and the way that they are used for political, religious or other purposes (Young 1993: ix, xi). Without this ‘dialogue’ with the observer or a place within a national narrative, cultural remembrance would remain inert, ‘mere stones in the landscape’ (Young 1993: 2). For Young, cultural remembrance generates ‘collected memories’ in bearing witness to the changing and pluralist discourse on the past (Young 1993: xi.). This implies multiple interpretations. National monuments and memorials traditionally commemorate heroic deeds and great leaders. However, Young rightly points to a shift in the function of such sites in the 20th century following the tragedies of the First and Second World War, which challenged the notion of purely positive national myths and initiated ‘anti-heroic’ forms of commemoration (Tagesspiegel, 10 April 1997). Cultural remembrance has faced particular challenges in post-1945 Germany with the National Socialist past, and particularly the Holocaust, continuing to encounter what Saul Friedländer terms ‘the limits of representation’ (Friedländer 1992), calling the viability of conventional forms into question. Post-war Germany is unique in having established a dense topography of cultural remembrance focusing largely on the victims of its former crimes. This of course produces a different resonance to monuments and memorials in countries such as the USA and Israel. The fact of a former perpetrator country remembering its victims poses a set of unique problems in Germany, for example whether to remember victim groups individually or together and whether certain victims should have priority over others. In addition, there is the issue of how, or whether, to remember German military or civilian casualties or, for example, the suffering of the expellees (Vertriebenen). A related consideration is how to draw an adequate and non-revisionist distinction between the victims of Nazism and Stalinism and, since unification, how to remember the victims of the East German regime. Cultural remembrance of the Third Reich period in Germany assumes the form of authentic sites of memory, for example the former concentration camps, or constructed sites of memory, for example monuments or museums. The distinction is important: the former bear witness to a specific period in the past – now fixed in time – whilst the latter provide an interpretation of that period, for example a memorial site constructed within a former concentration camp. Pierre Nora draws the distinction between milieux de mémoire as authentic sites of memory reflecting actual experience, and lieux de mémoire as constructed forms of memory revealing

The Holocaust Memorial in Berlin 121

the interpretation of a historical period by subsequent generations concerned not to let it fade from popular consciousness (Nora 1992: 6). He defines the lieux de mémoire in somewhat negative terms as ‘vestiges’, ‘illusions of eternity’ and ‘the rituals of a ritual-less society’; the product of a culture obsessed with preserving memory as it fades into history (Nora 1992: 6–7). However, such sites can serve the legitimate aim of preserving knowledge of the past: constructed remembrance is not necessarily inappropriate remembrance. Moreover, the aids to memory represented by the lieux de mémoire are an inevitable consequence of the transition from communicative to cultural memory. The distinction between milieux de mémoire and lieux de mémoire is not as clear-cut as it may seem. A museum, for example, could be regarded as a mixture of the two: its location a lieu de mémoire but the objects within evoking a milieu de mémoire to the visitor. In terms of the Nazi past, the blend and possible confusion between authentic and constructed cultural remembrance is particularly clear in the case of the sites of the former concentration camps and is indicated by the usual term Gedenkstätte (memorial site), defined as a: […] place of ritual remembrance […] of persons or events which are fundamental to the self-understanding of a societal group. The value of the memory purveyed by such a site is generally linked to concrete traces of a historical event. […] The authenticity of the site and its documentation is generally in conflict with the aura created by symbolic and aesthetic representation, museum-like features and the conservation of the site (Schnell 2000: 173). Many of the former Nazi concentration camps have been turned into Gedenkstätten since the end of the war, with the addition of lieux de mémoire including memorials and exhibitions. In the process, an interpretation of history is added to the original site. A large number of concentration camps were of course razed to the ground before capitulation. Some were redesigned in the post-war period, resulting in a different milieu de mémoire from the original. Sachsenhausen and Buchenwald, for example, bear the strong symbols of the GDR period superimposed on the original sites. The changing features of these sites have themselves built up layers of memory with time, leading to constant re-interpretations, and reflecting the changing priorities of the national discourse. These additions are necessary to allow Young’s ‘dialogue’ between observer and site and between present and past. However, Young also states the risk that the visitor may ‘mistake the debris of history for history itself’ (Young 1994: 24). Although they recall the past function of the site and indeed show it as it was to a certain extent, these are not actual concentration camps, even though the visitor may have the


feeling of stepping back into history. As Hanno Rauterberg points out, a visit to a memorial site still depends on transmitted perceptions: The extermination camps are surrounded by an aura of authenticity. However, only the things there are authentic, the meaning and memory cannot be. […] Hence, the past is also a construct of the present at memorial sites (Zeit, 10 January 1997). Lieux de mémoire are assigned a particular narrative by those who conceive them. In this sense, they reflect an interplay between present-day interests and historical narratives. Such sites may not be able to preserve a certain version of memory indefinitely. Just as the course of national memory discourses is unpredictable, a memorial may change or lose meaning in time, despite its officially designated function. Andreas Huyssen’s remark is relevant in terms of memorials and monuments related to the National Socialist legacy: […] the promise of permanence a monument in stone will suggest is always built on quicksand. Some monuments are joyously toppled at times of social upheaval; others preserve memory in its most ossified form, either as myth or as cliché. Yet others stand simply as figures of forgetting, their meaning and original purpose eroded by the passage of time (in Young 1994: 9). Cultural remembrance of the National Socialist past can influence or adapt the historical narrative as much as it is intended to represent it. As will be seen with the Holocaust memorial in Berlin, the associated discourse often overshadows – and continually re-interprets – the aesthetic end product. At the same time, it is by no means a foregone conclusion that the current prominence ascribed to memorial sites and monuments related to the National Socialist period in Germany will continue. There are contrasting views on the relevance and impact of cultural remembrance in the Berlin Republic. Some would argue that it places undue emphasis on the negative past, whilst others maintain that monuments, memorials and so on should be a ‘thorn in the side’ prompting reflection on the past and, moreover, that their material presence will preserve remembrance. Another view is that existing authentic sites of memory do not need supplementing with constructed forms of memory. These constructed forms can on the one hand involve citizens and state in a dialogue on how best to ‘remember’ a certain period, but there is also the concern that once they are built they become part of the landscape and cancel out the perceived need to deal with the past in question. Finally, there is the argument that monuments and memorials should justifiably allow Germany some kind of respite from the burden of its past in transfer-


ring this to the medium of ritual remembrance. According to this view, the existence of monuments and memorials is in itself proof that the associated past will not be forgotten.

Geschichtskultur The pattern of cultural remembrance of the National Socialist past in Germany runs parallel to the political discourse on the period: initial confrontation, a long period of silence followed by increasing interest and initiatives, and then a new range of challenges brought about by unification.1 The first monuments to the victims of National Socialism in Germany were set up by the victims themselves. Within days of liberation, former concentration camp prisoners at Bergen-Belsen, Buchenwald and Dachau had erected makeshift memorials from the remains of the camps. Allied soldiers put up stone markers to their fallen comrades; religious and political groups held remembrance ceremonies; and lists of names and memorial books were produced. As we have seen, despite these early attempts to secure remembrance of the victims of National Socialism, the division of Germany and the onset of the Cold War not only brought other issues to the forefront but also transformed national memory into a propaganda tool. In the process, the suffering of Jewish victims in particular was largely bracketed out of cultural remembrance in both East and West Germany. In the GDR, a large number of monuments and memorial plaques were set up to commemorate ‘anti-fascist’ heroes and the Communist resistance. The former Nazi concentration camps at Buchenwald and Sachsenhausen became official national sites of memory, propounding a one-sided narrative of anti-fascism, heroic Communist resistance and socialist values (on memorial sites in the GDR see, for example, Niven 2002: 19–26; and Fulbrook 1999: 28–35). In West Germany, whilst official commemorations initially often conflated National Socialist and Stalinist crimes, the first memorials were dedicated to the victims of Nazi injustice and to the resistance, for example the Memorial to the Victims of the Hitler Dictatorship set up at the former National Socialist prison and execution site at Plötzensee in 1952. From the mid-1950s, former victims of the Nazi regime called for monuments to be erected on the sites of the former concentration camps. However, these individual and group initiatives often had a long battle for institutional recognition at local, regional or national level. With the exception of the memorial site and documentation centre at Dachau, opened in 1965, and at Bergen-Belsen (1966), little official attempt was made to ensure visible public recollection of the crimes of the National Socialist past and German involvement in them; this would have gone against the grain of the ‘normalising’ political discourse of the time. Some authentic sites of memory were even given a new function post-war; for example the House of the Wannsee Conference became a country house for school visits.


The situation started to change in West Germany in the 1970s with a variety of initiatives seeking to explore and recall the National Socialist past. These stemmed from the growing interest in local and regional history – especially Alltagsgeschichte – and of course the emergence of a new generation. From the mid-1980s there was a veritable boom in cultural remembrance: a growing number of history groups researched the National Socialist history of particular towns; citizens helped to restore synagogues and pushed for the opening of memorial sites. In addition to this public interest, there was of course a defined need for official cultural remembrance with various dates such as the 50th anniversaries of Hitler assuming power (1983) and Kristallnacht (1988) and the 40th anniversary of German capitulation (1985). A broad topography of memory now exists throughout Germany, with new initiatives underway all the time. Parallel with the shift in the overall discourse, the main focus is on the Jewish victims of National Socialism, although groups representing homosexuals and the Sinti and Roma, for example, have also campaigned for national memorials. The increased interest in generating cultural remembrance of the victims of National Socialism can be said to follow the shift in focus from guilt to responsibility encapsulated by the notion of Leitverantwortung, along with political education and public involvement in commemoration. Moreover, as with the dialectic of normality, it appears that the impetus for cultural remembrance comes largely from within Germany, rather than being expected from other countries. Another tendency is a greater experimentation with form, encouraging individualised reflection. Young refers to ‘antimonuments’ (Young 1994: 37), constructions which question their own existence and challenge conventional forms of memory. An early example was the ‘Harburg Monument Against Fascism’ designed by Jochen Gerz and Esther Shalev-Gerz. Between 1986 and 1993, visitors were invited to inscribe their names on this twelve metre high lead-covered column in Hamburg. It was gradually sunk into the ground before disappearing altogether (Young 1993: 27–48; Young 1994: 69–77). A more recent example is Hans Haacke’s Der Bevölkerung (To the Population) installation for the new Reichstag. The inscription was set into a concrete basin, which was filled with earth and vegetation from all the federal states. The vegetation will gradually grow over the words. The inscription stands in contrast to the inscription Dem Deutschen Volke (To the German People) on the front of the Reichstag and, as Niven points out, indicates a more inclusive narrative that does not just relate to ethnic Germans (Niven 2002: 241–2). It could also be said to mirror the different layers of interpretation making up the German national memory narrative on the Nazi past: the regional level from the vegetation, the national level from the location, and the global level from the inscription and openness to visitors. The growth in cultural remembrance of the National Socialist past through the preservation of milieux de mémoire and the construction of lieux de


mémoire, together with the associated debates conducted at all levels of society, are illustrations of a form of historical consciousness within a political culture that Jörn Rüsen sums up as Geschichtskultur. This involves: Manifestations of an all-embracing, shared confrontation with the past […] the term highlights the various strategies adopted by academic research, school and extra-curricular education, leisure pursuits and other procedures for public historical memory so that they can all be viewed as part of a single perspective. In this way, the term also synthesises universities, museums, schools, administration, the mass media and other cultural institutions into a group of collective memory sites and integrates the role of education, entertainment, legitimation, criticism, diversion, enlightenment and other forms of memory into the broad unity of historical memory (Rüsen 1994: 4). Geschichtskultur has aesthetic, political and cognitive aspects. The Holocaust memorial in Berlin, for example, is about an aesthetic statement, a political debate and the transmission of a certain narrative about the past. Another important term in this context is Erinnerungskultur, a way of collectively recalling the past within society through aesthetics and culture (Reichel 1995: 331). Both concepts reflect the growing interest in the past in a media-based society. The allusion to active debate takes these representations of the past beyond the level of ritual. At political level, Geschichtskultur has been used in the attempt to promote a certain narrative of the past.

A memorial concept for unified Germany: The Enquete-Kommission With unification, Germany was faced with a dual problem with regard to cultural remembrance: firstly what to preserve in official memory, and secondly how to represent the Nazi and GDR periods without conflating or relativising them or giving one precedence over the other. A committee known as the Enquete-Kommission was set up by the Bundestag in 1995 to establish ways of dealing with the legacy of the SED regime in unified Germany. Significantly, the Enquete-Kommission’s final report included a Gedenkstättenkonzept (memorial site concept) which represented the first official political strategy for Geschichtskultur in unified Germany and gave the Gedenkstätten state recognition. The report states the importance of remembering the continuing legacy of Germany’s Nazi and GDR pasts for the national and democratic selfunderstanding of Germany, rather than just for the purposes of static or state-dictated ritual. These pasts are also said to influence Germany’s relations with other countries and, hinting at the notion of Leitverantwortung, to give it a special responsibility post-unification (Enquete-Kommission


1998: 303–4; subsequent references given as page numbers). The Gedenkstätten are considered to play a major role in this context, although the following quotation from the report signals the danger of conflating the two pasts: Gedenkstätten recalling the National Socialist and Communist dictatorships play an important role in democratic Erinnerungskultur. They are an irreplaceable testament to the memory of terror, repression and resistance. They symbolise the recognition and moral rehabilitation afforded to the victims of dictatorships by the democratic state (227). Section 4 of the report implies the active role of state and citizens in cultural remembrance. The particular significance of the Gedenkstätten: […] stems from the authenticity of the historical location. Directly confronted with the visible traces of history, people are more receptive to this history and to what happened at these sites and beyond. Mourning, remembrance and learning are intrinsically linked at these sites (241). As milieux de mémoire the Gedenkstätten will generally have an emotional impact on the visitor, often because of the sheer scale and emptiness of the site, with mere suggestions of what was there before. As lieux de mémoire they also provide useful pedagogical resources. The report considers the Gedenkstätten to have an important role in political education, for example in campaigns against the far right. However, reference should be made here to a comment made by Günter Morsch, Director of the memorial site at Sachsenhausen, that schools send pupils to these sites with the unrealistic expectation that they will learn everything and be ‘immunised’ against tendencies such as support for far right ideology within the space of a twohour tour. He adds that many young people with far right leanings are very well informed about the history of the concentration camp sites but see this as confirmation of National Socialist superiority rather than of an evil regime.2 Significantly, the report refers to the National Socialist memorial sites as European sites representing a European rather than an exclusively German Erinnerungskultur (244). This points to the Europeanisation of the legacy of National Socialism. The Communist legacy too is considered to have European significance, particularly for other post-Communist societies, which can follow Germany’s experience of dealing with the legacy of dictatorship. On the one hand, this indicates that the principles of Leitverantwortung are rooted in 1989 as well as 1945. A more cynical view is that the focus on a European narrative reflects the aim for a greater degree of abstraction, whereby the Holocaust and the division of Europe are portrayed as a general European (rather than a specific German) responsibility. The reference to Europeanisation is, however, borne out in the fact that memorial


sites outside Germany have their own national-based narratives alongside any global interpretation. The Enquete-Kommission’s report acknowledges German national responsibility for the Gedenkstätten, and lists certain sites which are to receive 50 per cent state funding.3 The report was important not only in giving state sanctioning to cultural remembrance, but also in proposing a fairly defined strategy that integrates this form of remembrance with the democratic development and perceived responsibility of unified Germany. Memorial sites are regarded as part of the cultural landscape in Germany and funded as such. Funding was indeed increased by DM10 million (ca. €5 million) under the SPD-Green coalition’s 2000 Gedenkstättenkonzept (Bundespresseamt 2000). One criticism of the report was that it imposed a West German view of the GDR past, for example with blanket criticism of the GDR’s culture of memory (see, for example, PDS 1998). It is certainly true that monuments and initiatives for the victims of National Socialism still attain greater prominence and funding than those for the victims of the GDR period. Whether this is due to a deliberate policy or a greater public interest in the National Socialist period is open to debate.

Berlin as topography of memory The Enquete-Kommission’s report deems Berlin a national symbol of the remembrance of two dictatorships and their victims as well as of a unified, democratic Germany (244–5). Berlin is an excellent illustration of the layering of memory, with architectural references to the Prussian, Nazi and GDR pasts. Some symbolise the history of two or more of these periods, for example the Neue Wache, the Reichstag and the Topography of Terror. Various government buildings are representative of this multi-layering, for example the present Foreign Office used to be the Reichsbank and then housed the central committee of the SED during the GDR period. The report points out the significance: In moving into Berlin’s historic buildings the Federal Government and Bundestag are also directly confronted with the history of these buildings and their former functions during the Weimar Republic and the National Socialist and SED dictatorships. In part, this awareness of the history of the buildings is the very reason why they have been chosen to house the federal institutions. […] The deliberate confrontation with the history of these and other government and parliamentary buildings in Berlin is just as much a part of democratic Erinnerungskultur as the funding of Gedenkstätten (245). This echoes Schröder’s comments on the move from Bonn to Berlin in April 1999, portraying the past as an integral part of the present and also a


basis for responsibility. One of the most difficult – and still ongoing – challenges of unification is to decide how to represent Berlin’s multi-faceted history. Political and cultural decision-makers have the difficult task of balancing the image of a forward-looking European metropolis with a multi-layered, often negative, historical legacy. Post-unification Berlin has become a kind of showcase for the country’s perceptions of the Nazi and GDR pasts and political statements and decisions on cultural remembrance in the new capital are interpreted in this light. The issue of what to preserve and how best to remember has become more urgent with increased temporal distance from the National Socialist past and the need to provide awareness of this history to present and future generations. At the same time, it has become subject to competition or hierarchisation as various groups seek to shape memory on their own terms. The complex and often contentious decision-making processes involved in shaping the new capital are visualised in the thought-provoking films Berlin Babylon (2001) and Berlin: Sinfonie einer Großstadt (2002). In 2000, the architect Daniel Libeskind remarked that Germany was still so traumatised by its past that the new Berlin dared not assert itself and was thus bland and boring (Telegraph, 14 September 2000). Yet on the contrary, since its dedication as the new capital of Germany, Berlin has attracted international interest and frequent acclaim through its architectural renaissance. The message that the new capital would seem to be communicating is one of remembrance and reinvention. On the one hand, the (re)development of sites such as the government quarter, Potsdamer Platz and Hackescher Markt show the city attempting to present itself as a new and vibrant metropolis. And yet the capital also functions as a living memorial site, with the preservation of existing sites of memory and plaques and monuments all over the city. Berlin is unique in presenting residents and visitors with pointers to a predominantly negative past. Consequently, its historical monuments are not triumphant but rather reflections of shame, shock and, significantly, civic or public incentive. Many of Berlin’s memorial sites underline the dialectic of normality within the everyday life of the city. To cite a few examples, a metal hoarding at the bustling Wittenbergplatz underground station, opposite the KaDeWe department store, lists the names of the Nazi concentration and extermination camps under the heading ‘Sites of terror that we must never forget’. In 1993, in the district of Schöneberg, a community of 16,000 Jews prior to 1933, Renata Stih and Frieder Schnock erected a series of 80 normallooking signs throughout the streets in order to strike home the everyday discrimination at the time of National Socialism. The signs have a brightcoloured simple picture on one side, for example opera glasses, a dog, a bottle of milk or a telephone. On the other side one reads the corresponding anti-Jewish decree from the 1930s or 1940s, for example Jews are not allowed to go to the theatre, Jews are not allowed to keep pets, Jews are not


allowed to buy milk, or telephone lines to Jewish households will be cut off. A further example is the ‘Empty Library’ memorial by the Israeli concept artist Micha Ullman, located on Bebelplatz opposite the Humboldt University, which recalls the Nazi burning of banned literature in May 1933. One looks down through a glass panel to see a series of empty bookshelves in an underground room. In 2001 this monument was at the heart of a lengthy dispute over the construction of a new underground car park in Berlin, which would have meant temporarily covering up the monument and building the car park around it. This indicates that such monuments are not just a forgotten or ignored part of the city’s architecture.

Setting the dialectic in stone: the Holocaust memorial in Berlin The longest and most controversial debate on cultural remembrance of the Nazi past was generated by the proposal to build a central Holocaust memorial in Berlin. On 25 June 1999 the Bundestag approved the proposal to build a Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe on an area measuring approximately 19,000 m2 between Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate and the ultramodern commercial complex at Potsdamer Platz, a mere stone’s throw away from the site of Hitler’s bunker and the former Reich Chancellery. The Bundestag decision gave political sanctioning to a citizens’ initiative established in 1988. Designed by the American Jewish architect Peter Eisenman, the memorial consists of around 2700 concrete pillars or stelae, 0.95 m deep and 2.38 m wide, set into an uneven surface at close intervals of around 0.92 m and at different heights. The site can be entered from all four sides and has no marked pathways. A flight of steps on the south-east side lead down to an underground Information Centre (Ort der Information), designed by Dagmar von Wilcken. This comprises a series of rooms over an area of around 800 m2. The entrance foyer gives information on Jewish persecution in the period 1933–45. The first room aims to show the European dimensions of the Holocaust with inscriptions of the number of Holocaust victims on illuminated panels set into the ground, as well as survivor testimony. The second room contains biographies of 15 Jewish families from different countries who were victims of the Holocaust on pillars leading down from the ceiling to mirror those above ground. This is followed by the ‘Room of Names’, where the names and brief biographies of Jewish Holocaust victims are read out continuously and projected onto the walls; and a ‘Room of Places’ with information about other concentration and extermination camps. The exit foyer contains computer terminals with details of memorial sites in Berlin, Germany and the rest of Europe. The Holocaust memorial completes a ‘triangle of memory’ at the heart of the new capital, in the vicinity of the government quarter. Whilst this memorial represents the Jewish victims of the Nazi regime, the Topography of Terror, an exhibition built around the authentic remains of Nazi


View of the Holocaust Memorial in Berlin


View from within the Holocaust Memorial in Berlin


administrative buildings, focuses on perpetrator history. The third point of the triangle is the Jewish Museum, which charts the development of Jewish-German life. The Holocaust memorial has proved the most problematic and controversial of the three, not least because of its form. As mentioned, national monuments traditionally celebrate positive or heroic achievements, whereas the Holocaust memorial is a reminder of a profoundly negative past. Building a memorial in Germany to remember the Jewish victims of Nazi genocide is unique in being the first time that a nation has, as it were, devoted a central monument to its crimes. A further problem is posed by the exclusivity of the memorial, which is dedicated solely to the murdered Jews of Europe rather than to all victim groups. The project was, however, not a Jewish but an almost exclusively German one, which in turn hinted at a hidden agenda, for example the usurping of a Jewish narrative of victimhood. A national Holocaust memorial suggests a politically advocated narrative based on the Holocaust, albeit a selective vision of it. For some commentators, the memorial is largely redundant in a city that already breathes history from every pore. Opponents of the project wished to see the considerable funding put towards maintaining authentic sites of memory in Germany such as the former concentration camps. As a monumental and permanent demonstration of the dialectic of normality in the centre of the new capital, the Holocaust memorial attained a major public profile before even being built. The debate, spanning some seventeen years, was as monumental as the project itself, generating thousands of newspaper articles and hours of media coverage and revealing personal interests and animosity, pompous rhetoric, a good dose of satire and some bizarre aesthetic concepts. The debate was conducted at all levels of society, becoming a kind of public monument to the German discourse on Vergangenheitsbewältigung. It illustrated the politicisation – and politics – of cultural remembrance of the National Socialist past in post-unification Germany, in particular in the new capital, as well as the frequent clash of interests involved (on the history of the memorial, see Leggewie and Meyer 2005; Heimrod et al. 1999; Cullen 1999; and Jeismann 1999).

The history of the Holocaust memorial The Holocaust memorial was originally proposed in 1988 by the Berlin journalist Lea Rosh in the SPD journal Vorwärts. The inspiration came after a visit by Rosh and the historian Eberhard Jäckel to the Yad Vashem memorial in Israel to film a documentary about the Holocaust. Both agreed that there should also be a memorial to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust in the country of the perpetrators. The uneasy combination of an exclusive narrative and implications of collective guilt were thus inherent in the project from the start. The memorial was initially promoted in the frame-


work of the citizens’ initiative Perspektive Berlin e.V., founded in 1988 and chaired by Rosh. Its appeal for the memorial stated: Half a century has passed since the Nazis’ rise to power and the murder of the Jews of Europe. However, on German soil, in the country of the perpetrators, there is to date no central memorial site remembering this unique genocide and no memorial remembering the victims. This is a disgrace (Perspektive Berlin 1995: 14). The construction of the memorial was declared the responsibility of both East and West Germany, although German division made a single central memorial impossible at the time. The appeal was signed by 25 prominent figures, among them political representatives such as Willy Brandt and Otto Schily and the writers Christa Wolf and Günter Grass, although several of these were later to state their opposition to the project. 10,000 signatures were collected from the general public. Rosh stated that the citizens’ initiative was: something new and unprecedented. It shows that people in Germany are willing to repent […] This willingness to repent shows that guilt and responsibility are being taken on in so far as subsequent generations are able to do so. There is a growing willingness to acknowledge the uniqueness of the murder of the Jews of Europe (Rosh 1995: 6). This statement reflects Rosh’s basic stance on the memorial and some of the main points of contention since it was proposed. Rosh constantly marketed the project as a citizens’ initiative which went beyond any gesture from the state, but this was not reflected in mass public support, which in turn called into question Rosh’s assumption of a ‘willingness to repent’, with its implication of collective guilt. The proposed location for the memorial was the Prinz Albrecht terrain, the former administrative centre of the National Socialist regime, but this proposal was blocked by the initiative campaigning for an ‘active museum’ on this site, which was to become the Topography of Terror. The new choice was the former Ministers’ Gardens between the Brandenburg Gate and Potsdamer Platz. In 1989, Rosh formed the private ‘Association [Förderkreis] for the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe’. After initial opposition, the memorial won the support of Kohl and the Berlin Senate in 1992. In 1994 an open competition organised by the Berlin Senate’s Department for Construction attracted 528 designs of varying quality, which were put on public display. Some of the designs indeed reached gruesome – or bizarre – heights, including a monument made of combs donated by the visitors, a big wheel with freight trucks instead of seats and a ‘bus stop’, from which coaches would leave for scheduled visits to concentration camps and other sites of destruction in Germany and elsewhere in Europe. One design


proposed a giant empty vessel for the blood of the murdered, whilst another proposed blowing up the Brandenburg Gate and using the stone to build a monument. Another entry went as far as to justify the DM15 million cost involved by calculating this as DM2.5 per murdered Holocaust victim (on the designs, see Spiegel, 24 April 1995 and 24 August 1998; and Heimrod et al. 1999). The designs perhaps suffered from the vague remit of the competition, which presented a rather blurred historical context in terms of the location of the memorial: Its location in the vicinity of the Reich Chancellery, Hitler’s seat of power, points to the perpetrators, but also to their subjugation and disarmament. Finally, this site marks nearly 40 years of division between the two Germanys (cited in Cullen 1999: 264). This suggested a memorial pointing more to the perpetrators and the resistance than the victims. Moreover, the tender posed a seemingly insurmountable artistic challenge: Today’s artistic capabilities should provide a symbiotic link between the move towards mourning, shock and respect and the reflection on shame and guilt. Knowledge should be able to grow, also for a future of peace, freedom, equality and tolerance (cited in Cullen 1999: 264). The deliberations of the 15-member jury representing the three decisionmaking parties (Förderkreis, central government [Bund] and the federal state [Land] Berlin) were in any case fraught with disputes, which marred the dignity of the project and justified Young’s comment that ‘while the memorial debate has generated plenty of shame in Germans, it is largely the shame they feel for an unseemly argument – not for the mass murder once committed in their name’ (Young 1999: 57). After failing to reach a conclusive decision, the jury nominated two finalists. Rosh favoured the design by a group of artists led by Christine Jakob-Marks. This comprised a 100 m by 100 m slightly tilted memorial slab into which the names of 4.5 million Jewish Holocaust victims were to be gradually engraved. Eighteen boulders three to four metres in height from Masada in Israel would be placed on the memorial slab to symbolise the 18 countries from which Jews were murdered in the Holocaust. However, the design was criticised for its monumental nature, its resemblance to a gravestone, its upward tilt suggesting Christian resurrection and the anonymity of the names – plus the difficulty of establishing which names to engrave on it. It was subsequently vetoed by Kohl. The issue was dropped until 1997, when three colloquia of around 70 international experts, including cultural and artistic representatives, historians, critics and curators, were organised by


the Berlin Senate’s Department for Education, Research and Culture – at considerable cost – to discuss the plans for the Holocaust memorial. Some grave objections were raised with regard to the vagueness and exclusivity of the concept, the location and the fact that the project lay outside the parameters of memorial site cooperation (as well as the Gedenkstättenkonzept). However, these concerns were ultimately disregarded. A second competition was then held featuring 19 selected international entrants chosen by a committee of five members appointed by the Berlin Senate. This approach justifiably provoked criticism of decisions being made behind closed doors and not involving the citizens. The committee did define a clearer concept for the memorial, although this was not without its problems. James Young, one of the committee members, deemed the memorial a commemorative rather than a pedagogical space which would reflect contemporary perceptions of memory: This would not be a space for memory designed by the killers themselves, as the concentration camp sites inevitably are, but one designed specifically as a memorial site, one denoting the current generation’s deliberate attempt to remember. […] It is not merely the passive recognition and preservation of the past. It is a deliberate act of remembrance, a strong statement that memory must be created for the next generation, not only preserved (Young 1999: 55–6). It is hard to reconcile Young’s insistence that the memorial will create memory for the future with his assertion that it is a commemorative space. The latter suggests ritualistic remembrance rather than the pedagogical aspects needed to ‘create’ any kind of appropriate memory narrative. The memory ‘created’ of course reflects the priorities of the generational community of memory responsible. The amended competition text stressed that the memorial would embody German remembrance of the murder of European Jewry. It also gave a rather laboured justification of why the memorial was to be exclusively for Jewish victims, implying a hierarchisation of victimhood: The frequently used term ‘Holocaust memorial’ is inaccurate because the term Holocaust stands for the National Socialist genocide as a whole, that is, the genocide of Jews and also the Sinti and Roma. […] The mass murder of the Jews was […] a crime sui generis […] The uniqueness of the murder of the Jews of Europe is the reason for a separate memorial (cited in Cullen 1999: 266–7). The assertion of exclusivity is problematic: the genocide of European Jewry was unique but so was the Holocaust overall; to exclude other victim groups from a memorial to recall the Holocaust seems unjust. The use of terminology


also merits comment. Since the second competition, the memorial has officially been known as the ‘Memorial [Denkmal] to the Murdered Jews of Europe’. However, the most common reference in the media was ‘Holocaust-Mahnmal’, perhaps as a sign that the Holocaust is immediately associated with the murder of Jews. Whilst both Denkmal and Mahnmal can refer to monuments or memorials there is a difference in meaning. Denkmal suggests passive reflection and indeed associations with celebration and triumph, but Mahnmal implies an active reminder or warning to future generations as well as a marker of death or tragedy and therefore seems more appropriate for the memorial in Berlin. The entries were presented at the beginning of 1998. The jury chose four finalists – Peter Eisenman/Richard Serra, Daniel Libeskind, Jochen Gerz and Gesine Weinmiller. The jury unanimously approved Eisenman’s design, which comprised a series of 4000 concrete stelae, and recommended it to Kohl and the Förderkreis (Serra was later to withdraw from the project). Both accepted the design, Kohl merely stipulating that the number of stelae be reduced to 2500. However, no final decision was taken. Eberhard Diepgen, the governing mayor of Berlin, who was against the memorial, blocked a decision, deeming the design ‘too arbitrary and monumental’ (taz, 17 August 1998) and claiming that he could raise enough votes to suspend the proposal indefinitely. The matter was eventually postponed to avoid it becoming a campaign issue in the federal elections of autumn 1998. The arrival of Schröder’s SPD-Green coalition in power did not mark an end to the plans as had been expected, the project having been associated with the CDU and apparently at odds with neue Unbefangenheit. Instead the debate continued with a vengeance, regaining prominence when Martin Walser referred to the memorial as a ‘memorialisation of shame’ in his Peace Prize speech. In the face of considerable opposition to Eisenman’s design, in January 1999 the newly-appointed State Minister for Culture, Michael Naumann, managed to negotiate a compromise with the architect, having retracted an unfortunate comparison between the memorial and the architecture of Albert Speer (SZ, 22 July 1998). The resulting ‘integrated model’, would comprise a scaled-down memorial with between 1800 and 2100 stelae as well as a ‘House of Remembrance’ connected by a glass tunnel and containing an archive, underground exhibition space and a Genocide Watch institute. This would be flanked by a 100 m by 20 m glass and steel wall. The overly ambitious plan was to fill this with one million publications on the destruction of European Jewry (Spiegel, 20 January 1999). Despite opposition from the heads of the Berlin and Brandenburg memorial sites and Lea Rosh, general approval was voiced for the amended design. However, the press started to wonder whether the original competition had thereby been laid to rest before the mandatory coalition vote


on whether or not to accept the winning design. Young insisted that the amended proposal was never intended as a completely new design but rather a gesture of thanks from the architect for having been chosen to realise the project (Young 1999: 68–70). A more cynical view, put forward by one of Eisenman’s team, was that Naumann was trying to stamp his own grand pedagogical and personal view of history onto the memorial.4 Naumann was optimistic that the project would go ahead. However, it hit a legal snarl. Firstly, the competition had not been formally concluded and secondly, amendment of the Eisenman design violated the terms of the tender, which stipulated that a memorial (not a museum) must be built. Moreover, the cost far exceeded the funds allocated. At the end of April 1999, Naumann suggested a cheaper, scaled-down alternative. In what was seen as a delaying tactic, the Berlin Senate had decided in March to suspend the competition and its own decision until the Bundestag had expressed an opinion. The government chose to assign the matter to the Bundestag, against the wishes of Rosh, who wanted the memorial to be an expression of public will rather than a national symbol. Ultimately, the Förderkreis had no voting power over the decision at all. The last chance that those outside political circles had to influence the procedure was at a public meeting convened in March by the Bundestag Committee on Culture and Media to determine what the Bundestag was to vote on. The Bundestag was criticised for having taken the responsibility for the memorial out of the hands of the Förderkreis. The Berlin ‘Initiative against the Schlußstrich’ staged a demonstration at the end of May to protest against the ‘instrumentalisation’ and ‘functionalisation’ of the memorial by the German government which, it claimed, was turning the memorial into a national symbol to serve its own aims. It had a point, but the irony was that the Bundestag was being forced to vote on a project that it had not proposed and that many of its members did not support. In any case, the Bundestag had more legitimation in voting on behalf of the public than the Förderkreis, which had not operated a democratic process: a non-elected committee had drawn up the shortlist of candidates, contradicting the assertion that this was a citizens’ initiative (Young 2000: 222). The culture committee in the Bundestag began to debate six memorial designs in April 1999. ‘Eisenman I’ was the original memorial without any additions; ‘Eisenman II’ the memorial supplemented by a small information centre; and ‘Eisenman III’ was the integrated Naumann concept. A fourth design, proposed by the SPD politician Richard Schröder, comprised two 12 metre high steel obelisks with ‘thou shalt not kill’ inscribed on them in Hebrew and several other languages.5 A fifth proposal had no specific design but supported a ‘Memorial to the victims of National Socialist crimes against humanity’, thus a memorial for all victims of


National Socialism and not just the Jews. The final alternative was to abandon the plans altogether and instead give extra funding to the former concentration camps. The debates failed to produce a consensus. Further delay was envisaged when Kurt Biedenkopf, Prime Minister of Saxony, proposed that the Länder be included in the decision-making procedure. Rosh’s patience was wearing thin. In May, members of the Förderkreis put up posters of Jewish persecution with the heading ‘The site is here’ on the fencing surrounding the site for the memorial, which soon housed an array of posters and graffiti, with slogans ranging from ‘Never again war’ to the highly appropriate ‘The debate is the memorial’. To put an end to the stalemate, towards the end of June Naumann declared that the competition had come to a ‘negative conclusion’ (BZ, 24 June 1999), meaning that the Bundestag was free to go ahead and take a decision. A SPD-Green majority vote in the culture committee recommended that only two alternatives be voted on: Schröder’s obelisks and ‘Eisenman II’. This limitation of choice provoked criticism from the opposition, justifiably so as the coalition government was now influencing the end decision on a project which it had initially opposed. The almost four-hour Bundestag debate took place in a sober atmosphere described by Wulf Schmiese as ‘surprisingly dispassionate’ (Welt, 26 June 1999). Schröder was not present. Speeches for and against the memorial combined elements of the traditional guilt discourse and the perceived need to be politically correct, but this was very much a cross-party – and cross-generational – issue, with the opinions expressed those of individuals rather than their parties. Some delegates considered that the memorial should disturb visitors and keep open the wound of the Nazi legacy, others thought that it represented a sign of reconciliation and wanted the wound to be closed. Some welcomed the symbolism of the memorial, whilst others thought it too abstract. Some supported a memorial just for the Jews, whilst others thought that it should be dedicated to all victims of the Holocaust. Suggested alternatives to the proposed designs included an international Jewish university, using the Neue Wache memorial, funding German-Jewish youth projects and preserving existing memorial sites (contributions to the Bundestag debate are reproduced in DP, 9 July 1999). Four hundred and thirty-nine of the 559 delegates present voted in favour of a memorial, with 115 against and five abstentions. Three hundred and twenty-five voted in favour of the memorial being for the Jews alone, although 218 voted for a memorial for all Holocaust victims. ‘Eisenman II’ was the chosen design, gaining 314 votes. A public foundation comprising representatives from the federal government, the Bundestag, the Berlin senate, the Förderkreis, the directors of memorial institutions and representatives from German-Jewish organisations and victim groups


was set up to oversee the building of the memorial and the information centre. The rather vague text of the Bundestag decision suggested a memorial that could indeed be for Jewish and non-Jewish victims of the Holocaust, as well as promoting the values enshrined in the Basic Law: With the memorial we want to – honour the murdered victims; – keep alive the memory of these inconceivable events in German history; – admonish all future generations never again to violate human rights, to defend the democratic constitutional state at all times, to secure equality before the law for all people and to resist all forms of dictatorship and regimes based on violence.6 The project was beset with controversies and delays following the decision and despite a ceremony in January 1999 to mark the start of construction, work did not actually begin until April 2003. There were initial problems with access as the memorial site borders on the security zone around the US embassy. Even Eisenman’s design was subject to change. In January 2002 the architect stopped the tender for the manufacture of the concrete stelae as he wanted to use slate instead. In autumn 2003 came the biggest setback yet, when it was established that Degussa, the company awarded the tender to produce a graffiti-resistant coating for the stelae, was a sister company of Degesch, which produced Cyclon B during the Second World War. In another twist, it was revealed that the chemical company Woermann, which had supplied a substance added to the concrete in the slabs already built, was a sister company of Degussa (Zeit, 13 November 2003). Building came to a standstill whilst the debate raged through the media and the memorial foundation as to whether the project should continue. It was eventually decided that Degussa could carry out the work and building could resume, although the reputation of the memorial had been dealt a severe blow. The Holocaust memorial was inaugurated on 10 May 2005 at a ceremony with 1200 invited guests and worldwide media presence. Rosh fuelled further controversy after announcing that she wanted to bury a tooth from a Jewish concentration camp victim that she had found at Belzec inside one of the stelae (BZ, 13 May 2005). As could be expected, media reports on the impact of the memorial were mixed. However, the memorial has undoubtedly been a success in terms of attracting visitors from all over the world: a million people had visited the Information Centre by June 2007 (Bundesregierung 2007); many more will have seen the memorial alone. In his speech at the opening, Thierse stressed that this ‘open work of art’ would not mark an end to remembrance (Thierse 2005). Indeed, questions


still remain about the role of the memorial within the memorial landscape of the capital.

Marketing the memorial It was initially planned to split the €27.6 million cost of constructing the memorial and Information Centre between central government, the Land Berlin and the Förderkreis, but in practice the project was paid for out of the federal budget as neither Berlin nor the Förderkreis were able to raise sufficient funds. However, the Förderkreis did run a number of – at times bizarre or controversial – schemes in the attempt to drum up both support and money for the memorial and to encourage the public to engage with the project. At the start of the campaign Rosh was given free airtime for a TV advert, advertising space in the press, bank slips for donations, and Bertelsmann paid for five million brochures. The Flintstein initiative of November 2000 called on people to purchase a stone with Denk-Stein (memory stone) painted on it for DM50, whilst the ‘light installation’ concept promised that for every donation made towards the memorial one light would be illuminated on the site. The latter schemes were attempts to secure the memorial as a public initiative, but seemed to suggest the possibility (or necessity) of buying absolution from an assumed collective guilt and also portrayed the memorial as a kind of collective art project. July 2001 saw Rosh’s most controversial fund-raising campaign. Visitors and residents of Berlin were suddenly confronted by a giant 15 m by 30 m poster hoarding bearing the words ‘the Holocaust never happened’, set against a photograph of idyllic mountain and lake scenery. To confirm that these were not the words of a far right campaign one had to read more closely to see in smaller text: ‘Many people still believe this. In 20 years there could be even more. Therefore please donate to the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe’. The image also featured in the press and on free postcards for bars and cinemas. The poster campaign was unveiled by Lea Rosh and various prominent figures including Klaus Wowereit, mayor of Berlin. Rosh asserted that the poster campaign was intended to rouse those people indifferent to the memorial, whilst Wowereit said that in a media-based world provocation was necessary to arouse attention (Tagesspiegel, 2 August 2001). The poster certainly put the memorial back on the agenda but there were many negative reactions. Andreas Nachama, former chairman of Berlin’s Jewish community, called for the Förderkreis to withdraw from the project (Tagesspiegel, 4 August 2001). The memorial foundation and representatives of the memorial sites distanced themselves from the campaign and a group of 150 intellectuals voiced their opposition (taz, 23 July 2001). The Berlin public prosecutor started an investigation into incitement, whilst a Jewish concentration camp survivor lodged a complaint with the police, deeming


the poster offensive. Rosh thereupon brought the campaign into further disrepute by calling his claims ‘ridiculous’, although she later defended herself by stating that she did not mean the man himself but rather the claims that the Förderkreis was associated with Holocaust denial (interview in Tagesspiegel, 2 August 2001). The poster was eventually taken down at the beginning of August after pressure from, amongst others, Paul Spiegel, who said that it had encouraged the far right. The ZDF programme ‘Frontal 21’ had indeed shown the right-wing extremist Manfred Roeder posing in front of the poster with his own banner ‘crimes of the Wehrmacht neither’ in response to the slogan ‘the Holocaust never happened’ (7 August 2001). The NPD later used the slogan for its campaign during the Berlin elections. The poster was replaced by another hoarding bearing the slogan ‘The future needs memory’. Broder deemed the fundraising scheme an attempt to ‘build a memorial to the ambition of its promoters’ and asserted that Rosh was seeking a place in the Guinness Book of Records ‘for a truly unique achievement: using absurd methods to keep us talking about an absurd project’ (Tagesspiegel, 3 August 2001). Rosh responded that she merely wanted to get the public to identify with the project (Tagesspiegel, 6 August 2001). Her success rate was indicated by a survey in which 81.2 per cent declared themselves opposed to the memorial (Tagesspiegel, 24 July 2001). Despite all the publicity, the campaign only generated between 5000 and 10,000 DM (€2500–5000) in donations. In Tsafir Cohen’s view, the memorial’s promoters felt that they had to market the project with PR methods and make the Holocaust part of the global commercialisation process because ‘the Holocaust is boring’. The poster campaign thus fitted into the trend of avoiding direct marketing techniques and instead creating artificial images that appeal to the eye of the observer (taz, 19 July 2001). It is certainly true that with an expanded topography of memory, not just in Germany but internationally, there is increased competition for attention as well as funding when it comes to cultural remembrance of the National Socialist past. The question remains whether it was appropriate to market the Holocaust memorial using methods normally used for consumer products. Campaigning for a Holocaust memorial with the mantra of Holocaust denial was perhaps breaching one taboo too many as well as wrongly implying a direct link between past and present. The ‘celebrity endorsement’ of Claudia Schiffer lending her voice in a TV fundraising campaign in autumn 2002 also seemed inappropriate in selling the memorial as a ‘product’.

Beyond aesthetics: the memorial and Geschichtskultur The controversy on the Holocaust memorial showed the extreme difficulty of finding a consensus on how Germany should keep alive the memory of


this most problematic of pasts and thereby follows the schema of post-war Vergangenheitsbewältigung debates discussed thus far. Not unjustifiably, Habermas deemed the memorial debate evidence ‘that the memory of the Holocaust remains a constitutive feature of the ethico-political selfunderstanding of the citizens of the Federal Republic’ (cited in Young 1994: 199), in other words that the dialectic of normality is entrenched in German political culture. In addressing the question whether there can be any adequate or appropriate aesthetic form of representing the Holocaust and mourning its victims, the memorial controversy however went one step further than short-lived media debates. After all, the controversy preceded a (literally) concrete and permanent manifestation of post-unification German identity. Moreover, the Bundestag decision portrayed it as a political symbol rather than just a piece of contested architecture. Up to unification, the Berlin Wall had – for the left-liberals at least – served as a kind of Holocaust memorial, however distant from the truth the ‘punishment for Auschwitz’ argument was in reality. Hanno Loewry saw the Holocaust memorial as an attempt to give unified Germany a central point of reference in remembering its common denominator (Zeit, 12 March 1998). This common denominator has of course proved the biggest obstacle to forming a positive national narrative post-1945. The memorial has also been deemed part of the ‘founding myth of the Berlin Republic’ (Zeit, 3 December 1998). This implies a regressive national narrative based on the negative aspects of the dialectic of normality and at odds with the positive political rhetoric of Leitverantwortung. A memorial that recalls the atrocities of the Third Reich would seem to perpetuate the negative legacy of Nazism in Germany. Yet as a construct of the present it can also be used for the purposes of Geschichtspolitik. The debate on the Holocaust memorial was not the first example of Geschichtspolitik being applied to a cultural agenda. Kohl’s term in office coincided with the boom in cultural remembrance already described. Kohl used this as an opportunity to further his own political agenda which, as we have seen, involved recasting German identity in a more positive light. The associated projects were at times highly contested. Kohl came under fire for the Neue Wache (New Guardhouse) concept in particular. This monument on Unter den Linden in Berlin was originally built in 1816–18 by Karl-Friedrich Schinkel in honour of Friedrich Wilhelm III and Prussia’s 1814 victory over Napoleon. In 1931 it became a memorial to the victims of the First World War; the Nazis later turned it into a ‘Reich memorial’, and in 1956 the GDR government established it as a memorial for the victims of fascism and militarism. With unification, the Neue Wache was used by Kohl as part of the aim to refashion a new, unified – and more positive – national memory in Germany. In 1993, the site was newly dedicated as the ‘Central Memorial of the Federal Republic of Germany to the Victims of War and Tyranny’. Neither the name nor the memorial


plaque mention National Socialism explicitly. The victim groups mentioned include civilian and military casualties of war, those who died as a result of persecution or imprisonment, the millions of murdered Jews, the Sinti and Roma, homosexuals, those killed for their political or religious beliefs, and those who died in resistance to totalitarian regimes both before and after 1945. The absence of an explicit reference to National Socialism led to criticism that the concept was an attempt to whitewash Nazi crimes, equate the victims and perpetrators of Nazism and to fuse Third Reich and GDR history into one so as to suggest common victimhood and solidarity rather than guilt. Further criticism centred on the addition of a large replica of Käthe Kollwitz’s ‘Pietà’ (mother with dead son) sculpture, which was seen as making mourning universal and abstract as well as ignoring masculine military sacrifice. This Christian motif was also regarded as inappropriate in view of the number of Jewish victims of National Socialism (on criticism of the Neue Wache, see Kattago 1998). In defence of the Neue Wache, however, it does refer directly to groups persecuted under National Socialism, including the Jews and the Sinti and Roma. The predominance of the narrative on National Socialism, and especially the Holocaust, in Germany would surely make these references clear to most visitors, even if not stated explicitly. Moreover, the universal inscription is inclusive, recalling all the victims of National Socialism as well as implying a continuing responsibility and respect towards victims in the present and future. It would indeed not be entirely out of place as a Holocaust memorial. Some commentators viewed Kohl’s championing of the Holocaust memorial as an attempt to make amends for the Neue Wache (see, for example, Koselleck 1999 and Spiegel, 24 August 1998), although the solution is by no means ideal in only considering the Jewish victims of the Third Reich, and the form is also contested: Konrad Schuller for instance notes Christian motifs in the Information Centre (FAZ, 31 March 2001). Indicative of the change in attitudes towards the Nazi legacy, Kohl’s successor Schröder casually remarked that the Holocaust memorial should be a place ‘where one likes to go’, a comment for which Kohl ‘would have been torn apart’ (both citations from Spiegel, 30 November 1998). Quizzed about this apparently flippant remark, Schröder clarified his view in stating that the memorial should be: A place of remembrance for those who cannot have their own memories. In addition, it is a place to confront this period of history. […] People without their own memories – that concerns my generation and the generations to come – should be able to walk around without a guilt complex (interview in Zeit, 4 February 1999). Schröder’s use of terminology is interesting – and potentially controversial – here. In stating that those born after the war should not have a guilt


complex, he seemed to be implying that the war generation should (or do). In addition, it is difficult to imagine how a memorial site can generate remembrance among those outside the relevant community of memory; the most it can do is inform. In a 2002 speech Schröder did acknowledge both the problems and importance of cultural memory for present and future generations. He stated that the question of how to remember would remain a contentious issue, but that museums and memorials were necessary to support historical memory (Schröder 2002a). Once the debate on the Holocaust memorial entered the political arena it of course assumed much greater significance both within and outside Germany; this was to be a political decision on how Germany perceived its relations to and responsibility for the National Socialist past. The result was considered a national memorial, a manifestation of state-sanctioned memory. Perhaps with this in mind, Schröder asserted that the memorial would give ‘an appropriate, visible and powerful form’ to memory of the Holocaust and German society’s acknowledgement of its historical responsibility (Schröder 2002b). Admittedly, the outcome of the political debate on the memorial was more or less predictable from the start. Both Schröder and Kohl stated that if they had opposed it they would have been accused of attempting to draw a line under the past. Advocates of the memorial were criticised for wishing to continue the wages of guilt in Germany, just as much as its detractors were accused of wanting to draw a line under the past. This ‘no-win’ situation is well illustrated in an article by Lars Rensmann, which is critical of both sides (Rensmann 1999b). Rensmann did not oppose the memorial but did not think that it could or should replace efforts to work through the Nazi past. Perhaps not too far from the truth, he considered the Bundestag decision not as a genuine gesture of remembrance but rather as a forced change of heart based on the political realisation that it would not be opportune to reject the memorial. Rensmann placed the political debate on the Holocaust memorial within the context of tendencies he perceived during the Walser controversy, that is, the attempt to draw a line under the past and to formulate a more nationalistic and self-confident identity in Germany, indeed to ‘nationalise’ memory. This was the case whether one was for or against the memorial. Hence, the Bundestag debate ‘wavered […] between the barely veiled rejection of memory and the attempt to find an “official” rhetoric of remembrance for these events’ (Rensmann 1999b: 147). However, it should be reiterated that the proposal for the memorial came from one interest group and the issue only later became a national one. Moreover, a nationalist motive would surely have rejected the memorial, which highlights the problems of post-war German identity. Admittedly, some unfortunate comments were made during the debate, both in support of and opposition to the memorial. Günter Nooke (CDUCSU), for example, said that Germans should not keep rubbing salt in


the wound of the death of millions of Jews. In support of the project, he strangely asserted that ‘the construction of a memorial […] shows us the positive sides of German history’ (cited in Rensmann 1999b: 156). Similarly, Wolfgang Thierse deemed the memorial a symbol that ‘we Germans are taking leave of this terrible century with no damage to our reputation’ (FAZ, 29 June 1999). The memorial is surely more likely to evoke shock and abhorrence for Germany’s Nazi past than to win praise for its post-war rehabilitation. In opposition to the memorial, Martin Hohmann (CDU) said that no other country had worked through the past and paid reparations like Germany: ‘Almost three generations of penance up to now. It should not be six or seven. To this extent, the memorial would also be a monumental expression of our inability to forgive ourselves’ (cited in Rensmann 1999b: 161). In doing so, he drew on the unsubstantiated assertion that Germany was still being punished for the past, as well as ignoring the memorial’s intended purpose: not forgiveness for Germany but remembrance of the victims of the Holocaust. Equally inappropriately, Antje Vollmer from the Greens suggested that the memorial was a way to attract tourists to the new capital (Spiegel, 17 April 1999). Views expressed on the Holocaust memorial are inevitably coloured not only by aesthetic judgement but also, significantly, by preconceptions about the way Germany has dealt with its Nazi past. Rensmann’s preconceptions were clear – and reiterate his critique of Walser’s Peace Prize speech – when he asserted that opposition to the memorial was part of an ‘anti-semitic mobilisation’ (Rensmann 1999b: 141). This view was too polarised in implying that those against the memorial were prejudiced against Jews, particularly as Rensmann also said that those who supported the memorial did so for nationalist reasons. Moreover, the project did not enjoy overwhelming support from Jewish representatives: Ignatz Bubis for one was ambivalent (Zeit, 2 April 1998). In addition, there is no conclusive evidence for Rensmann’s claim that one third of the Bundestag speeches showed ‘aggressive repression’ of the past (Rensmann 1999b: 164). One should not be too quick to condemn the political rhetoric of this debate. Bundestag representatives were arguably not the most suited to discussing designs for cultural remembrance in the new capital, but many did seem to have given the matter a good deal of thought. The context of the comments should also be noted. Rensmann criticised Sylvia Bonitz (CDU-CSU) for stating that the memorial would usher in an era of reconciliation (Rensmann 1999b: 156), but her contribution actually emphasised the continued burden of the past: […] we Germans are today judged according to whether we want to face our past, whether we want to remember the victims of this past and whether our heads and our hearts have understood the importance of this


symbol – an outstretched hand, as it were – on the path to reconciliation. […] Nothing, not even a memorial, will remove the burden of the crimes of the National Socialist period of our German past (DP, 9 July 1999). Moreover, opposition to the memorial should not be interpreted as opposition to remembrance of the National Socialist past per se, particularly as the aesthetic judgement involved is so subjective. As mentioned, some Bundestag representatives preferred alternatives to the memorial, which Rensmann unfairly labels as indicative of a desire to draw a line under the past (Rensmann 1999b: 158–60). Representatives from the memorial sites were largely opposed to the Holocaust memorial, not only because of its pedagogical implications but also in the concern that it would detract from the authentic sites of memory in Germany – as well as siphon off much needed funding.

Victimhood, guilt or pride? The memorial and Leidkultur Rensmann accused supporters of the memorial of negative nationalism and of appropriating Jewish remembrance (Rensmann 1999b: 142). Moreover, he saw a contradiction between the tendency to repress the reality of both Jewish victimhood and German crimes and the desire of the children of the perpetrator generation to remember these victims through the memorial (Rensmann 1999b: 144). Rensmann is one of Walser’s harshest critics and yet these comments are not too far removed from the sentiment in the Peace Prize speech, in which Walser cited the memorial as one way in which Auschwitz is instrumentalised by Meinungssoldaten who use it to dictate conscience in public and thereby assuage private guilt. Rhetoric in support of the memorial was certainly not devoid of moralistic or self-righteous elements. It seemed that in addressing the ‘taboo’ issue of the Holocaust and proclaiming ‘guilt’ for it, one could thereby deflect this guilt, disassociate oneself from the National Socialist past and even associate oneself with the victims. In the process, one could have been talking about the sins of another nation altogether. This in turn associated the memorial with Leidkultur. In this context, Broder parodied the 1997 colloquium of experts in Berlin where, he claimed, participants spoke earnestly about shame, guilt, mourning and responsibility before engaging in a lively discussion over lunch as to who had been appointed to which memorial committee and why (Spiegel, 7 April 1997). In the course of the memorial debate the Jewish victims certainly seemed to be forgotten at times and one was left wondering for whose benefit the memorial was being built. During the Bundestag debate, Wolfgang Thierse said ‘We are not building this memorial for the Jews, but for us’ (DP, 9 July 1999). In an article in Die Zeit (31 March 1999), Habermas deemed the memorial a key to German national identity, ‘the chief aim cannot be to also remember the Jewish victims in the country of the perpetrators’.


Admittedly, these observations echo the problems of German cultural remembrance of the National Socialist past outlined earlier, but at the same time they evoke a memorial celebrating the efforts of former perpetrators rather than mourning the victims. Lea Rosh in particular has always insisted that the memorial is a German not a Jewish affair. She was quoted as telling Heinz Galinski, then President of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, ‘Keep out of it, the children of the perpetrators are building the memorial, not the Jews. But it would be nice if you could give it the nod’ (Rensmann 1999b: 142). Rosh has been a tireless campaigner for the memorial, but more than anyone else involved in the project, she has come under fire for her apparent personal motivation – as well as her abrupt manner. Asked about the impact that the memorial was intended to have on the visitor, she replied that as long as she had ‘her’ memorial, people could think about their dinner or their birthday for all she cared. In response to the question why the memorial excluded victim groups such as the Communists she stated that people could go to Buchenwald to remember them, thus contradicting her claim that there should be a central place of mourning in the capital.7 In line with Walser’s critique of the Meinungssoldaten, opponents of the memorial considered the motivation behind it to be less the transmission of knowledge of the Holocaust than the salving of a guilty conscience or, as one critic deemed it, ‘a major project to eliminate remembrance’ (Weber 1995: 163). With the shift to cultural memory, the project was perhaps more about pushing national conscience out of the public forum. For Jane Kramer, a vehement critic of the project, the memorial was a sign that Germans wanted to be rid of the duty to remember: in building memorials, memory could be relegated to ceremonial occasions without encroaching on everyday life (Zeit, 3 November 1995). To contradict Kramer’s view, one does wonder why memorials are built at all if the aim to forget is paramount, for they do serve as permanent pointers to the past. Nonetheless, a Holocaust memorial built by Germans for Germans does suggest motives beyond mere contrition for the past. Viewed in this light, the memorial could be seen as an expression of assertive national pride in the ‘lessons learnt’ from the Nazi past, reflecting Broder’s view of Germans as ‘champions of mourning’ (Spiegel, 17 April 1995). A good example comes from Arno Widmann, who writes that the memorial: […] is less about remembering the murdered Jews than how well Germans born after the war have learnt to deal with their parents’ and grandparents’ guilt. With the memorial the Berlin Republic shows it has learnt the right lessons from the past, that it knows how much it owes to itself, the world and the victims, that it is finally able to mourn. The Holocaust memorial is not about bowing heads. It is our pride (BZ, 3 August 1999). As well as representing how post-war generations have learnt to live with the past, the memorial may also mark the desire of these generations to


shake off the assumed guilt placed on their shoulders and, more importantly, to define history in its own terms. The ultimate irony of the whole debate came in 1998 when bulldozers dug up former Nazi bunkers to prepare the site for the memorial. Peter Strieder, the Berlin senator responsible, justified this by stating: ‘We know enough about the lives of major Nazis’ (Spiegel, 16 February 1998). This seemed to confirm Broder’s earlier assessment that Germans were keen to prove that the Nazis really had lost the war (Spiegel, 17 April 1995).

The memorial as ‘experience’ Eisenman was apparently surprised at the intensity of the German controversy surrounding the Holocaust memorial, but imagined that it was his design rather than the project that provoked it (interview in FAZ, 22 September 2002).8 It was surely both, but Eisenman’s priority would have been the reaction to his design. Monuments naturally reflect an architect’s interpretation of a subject. The danger with the Holocaust memorial, as with the Jewish Museum, is that the architectural concepts employed in the design can confuse its purpose. Eisenman’s vision behind the memorial was in any case rather contradictory. He said that it stood for a break in German history, a chapter that could never be closed, but also implied that a line should be drawn under this history: ‘Berlin should not be made into a monument of its own past. We must live and grow in the present. We cannot afford to be nostalgic for a past which no longer exists’ (Tagesspiegel, 14 June 1998). Eisenman’s design challenges the conventions of cultural remembrance. The memorial has no entrance, exit or signage. It is intended to inspire physical feelings of loneliness, disorientation and eeriness; an inspiration Eisenman apparently gained from the cornfields of Iowa (interview in Zeit, 10 December 1998). However, the abstract form of the memorial means that it does not present a clear narrative or any explanation. It is uncertain whether this ‘concrete cornfield’ will provoke visitors into reflecting on the Holocaust. Moreover, it is important to note that whatever the motivation for the Holocaust memorial, its actual impact is inevitably determined by what visitors see and their aesthetic judgement, not what they have heard about it, especially in view of the sheer scale of the site. Whilst the Holocaust memorial has shifted in popular perception from a citizens’ initiative to a national symbol, for Eisenman the site is about individual experience (Zeit, 10 December 1998). Young also perceives an individualised approach, stating that visitors will create their own ‘memory spaces’ (Tagesspiegel, 22 August 1998). Multiple interpretations of the memorial are inevitable; however the risk is that they will not be coupled with an understanding of the history the memorial is meant to represent. Eisenman’s concept would seem to promote Walser’s view of the pre-


valence of personal memory and conscience over routine commemoration. Naturally, the memorial cannot evoke authentic memories for most visitors. Nonetheless, Eisenman appears to ascribe to the memorial the power to bring the past back to life: When walking through the field of stelae the shadows of the past come to life without being presented visually. Our design makes the collective and individual subconscious a reality. It is provocative to view one’s own subconscious (FAZ, 22 September 2002). It is presumptuous to assume that the visitor can conjure up images of the Holocaust with no adequate visual aids. Moreover, the reference to conscience implies that visitors have the Holocaust on their (individual) consciences. Extremely optimistically, and with gruesome sentiment, Eisenman asserts that in 50 or 100 years the feeling will be the same to even uninformed visitors: In 50 years time, a Japanese visitor with no prior knowledge will feel something as soon as he enters the memorial. Perhaps he will feel what it is like to go into the gas chambers (Tagesspiegel, 14 June 1998). The perceived ‘experience’ of going into a gas chamber of course cannot be authentic, or probably even conceivable, for the visitor, and it cheapens the memory of the real victims of the Holocaust. Eisenman may see this experience as part of the overall ‘user-friendly’ nature of the memorial. He wanted people to express themselves freely on the site, even spraying graffiti if they wished. Somewhat contrary to the above statement, having visited the memorial after it opened, he declared himself pleased with the ‘cheerful atmosphere’ (Tagesspiegel, 21 June 2005). Likewise, Young refers to a ‘humane’ memorial with a surface perfect for playing or lying on (Tagesspiegel, 22 August 1998). These sentiments are echoed by the memorial’s website (www.holocaust-denkmal.de), which reassures potential visitors that even though they may feel a sense of disorientation (this is understandable in view of the uneven surface and the height of the stelae, some of which reach 4.7 m) because the site is in proportion they will not feel overwhelmed. The obvious risk is that the site becomes a venue for leisure and amusement rather than reflection. An article in Der Spiegel (24 August 1998) rightly predicted a scenario where busloads of tourists and schoolchildren would treat the memorial like a maze. After the opening, the press reported on visitors running through the stelae, laughing and shouting, or picnicking at the site, and printed photos of young visitors jumping from pillar to pillar (see, for example, Zeit, 25 May 2005 and 2 June 2005). Despite his favourable impression of the Holocaust memorial, elsewhere Young has


written: ‘Once we assign monumental form to memory, we have to some degree divested ourselves of the obligation to remember’ (cited in Hartman 1994: 2). Whilst the debate on the Holocaust memorial kept the subject alive, the danger is that now built its meaning will fall by the wayside as it becomes an integral part of the city, now flanked by a row of shops selling food and souvenirs. The memorial may end up as nothing but a stop on the Berlin tourist trail rather than a place for serious confrontation with the past – especially on account of its central location. Concerned that the memorial will not fulfil its pedagogical function, both Diepgen and Wowereit have made the impracticable suggestion that visitors first be sent to the Information Centre, which is difficult to locate (FAZ, 18 May 2005; Tagesspiegel, 19 May 2005). The Centre does provide factual information, but the authentic sites of memory in the capital already serve this function. Moreover, the prime focus of the Centre is on Jewish victimhood rather than the National Socialist period in context, which in turn feeds the tendency to reduce the Second World War – and indeed German history – to one word, ‘Auschwitz’. There is evidence of some backtracking in terms of the role of the memorial. The website states the aim of integrating details of non-Jewish victims into the Information Centre so as to avoid hierarchisation and stresses its portal function in pointing to the authentic sites of memory. These efforts however seem like a case of too little too late bearing in mind the memorial’s official dedication to the Jews alone and the fact that the visitors’ first (and probably most lasting) impression will come from the memorial itself rather than the Information Centre. The controversy on the Holocaust memorial was not the last of its kind: national memorials are also planned to the Sinti and Roma and homosexual victims of National Socialism.9 The risk is not only a saturation of memorials in the capital but also that the authentic past will lose its meaning. Rensmann is pessimistic: he predicts that the discourse on the past may become a trivial matter ‘like transport policy or the weather’ (Rensmann 1999b: 165). Here again Rensmann seems to concur with Walser, who considered the Nazi past to have become a matter for ‘lip-service’ rather than genuine reflection. On the other hand, Huyssen states that only in involving a monument in public discourse can the danger of ‘ossification’ be avoided (in Young 1994: 16). To this extent, the lively debate on the memorial was productive in keeping national memory of the Third Reich period alive. This debate showed that memory of the National Socialist past cannot be prescribed to the public or permanently cast in stone – whether by a citizens’ initiative or the state. Perhaps the most valid question is what kind of remembrance or behaviour is appropriate on this site, which does not lend itself to conventional commemoration on account of its location and abstraction. Is silence required, for example, or can the site be both enjoyed as a public space and acknowledged as a


permanent reminder of a negative past? The questions are open-ended and ongoing. As Henning Sussebach points out, whilst the memorial says nothing it can still fill a whole page of a newspaper (Zeit, 2 June 2005).

Life beyond the Holocaust: the Jewish Museum The Holocaust memorial generated a great deal of bad publicity not only on account of its monumental form and its uncomfortable message of German guilt and Jewish suffering, but also because of the often undignified way in which the debate was conducted. The other two corners of the ‘triangle of memory’ at the heart of unified Berlin have not been without controversy but have gained more overall support. The Topography of Terror openly confronts the perpetrator history of National Socialism whilst the Jewish Museum attempts to focus on Jewish life rather than suffering. The Jewish Museum differs from the Holocaust memorial in that it was originally proposed at Land level rather than as a citizens’ initiative. However, like the memorial the museum has since become a national project and thus another pointer to the national memory narrative in postunification Germany. This was underlined when the museum became a government foundation in 2001, receiving DM24 million (approx. €12 million) a year (Tagesspiegel, 5 September 2001). Like Eisenman’s memorial, the Jewish Museum poses aesthetic and intellectual challenges as a result of the complex architectural concepts employed in the design and the aim of showing the emptiness left in Germany following the persecution and genocide of the Jews. However, the debate on the museum was never as contentious as that surrounding the memorial and reaction to the finished building was overwhelmingly positive. As well as being more didactic than the Holocaust memorial, the museum also has a more global appeal, reflecting the internationalised narrative on the Holocaust. Perhaps most importantly for its success, it can be placed into the German narrative of Leitverantwortung rather than the Leidkultur attached to the Holocaust memorial. It focuses not just on the Holocaust but on German-Jewish history as a whole. Nonetheless, common (mis)conceptions about Jewishness dictate that the Holocaust and Jewish persecution dominate its impact. Just as the Holocaust memorial challenges the conventions of cultural remembrance in its dedication to the victims of a former perpetrator country, so the Jewish Museum is unique in documenting the absence rather than the presence of Jewish life in Berlin and how this has shaped the history of the city. Allusions to Jewish victimhood are thus apparent from the outset. The proposal to build a Jewish Museum in Berlin dates back to 1962. A Jewish section in the Berlin Museum was opened in 1978 but it was not until ten years later that the Berlin Senate agreed to finance a Jewish


Museum. A competition was held to find a design, based on an open invitation to German architects and 12 invited international architects. The museum was to focus on three main areas: Jewish religion, customs and ritual objects; the development of the Jewish community in Germany and its later destruction by the Nazis; and the life and work of Jews who made their mark on Berlin. At the same time, the challenge was to address the void that had made the museum necessary in the first place. The competition attracted 165 entries. The winning design came from the Polish-born American Jewish architect Daniel Libeskind, who proposed an ‘integrated model’, which told the history of the Jews in the context of the city’s history. The DM120 million (€60 million) museum building was constructed from 1992–98. Michael Blumenthal, a former US treasury secretary, became Director of the museum in 1997. The empty museum building opened to the public in 1999 and was a magnet to visitors even before the addition of the exhibits and its official opening two years later. It was indeed muted that the addition of artefacts would spoil the construction that seemed to fulfil the role of a Holocaust memorial better than the one proposed by Lea Rosh. Libeskind’s museum is an intellectual and architectural challenge. Viewed from above, the zinc-plated construction looks like a lightning flash and has been compared to a deconstructed Star of David. Inside the building are a criss-cross section of axes as well as six empty spaces or ‘voids’ intended to show the destruction of Jewish life in Germany under National Socialism. The discontinuity of form suggests that past and present cannot be reconciled. Every part of the museum has a symbolic meaning which one cannot fully appreciate without prior knowledge of the concepts. As just one example, Libeskind created a ‘metaphysical map of Berlin’ comprising the residences of famous Jews. These names and addresses were linked and used to plot an ‘irrational matrix’ used in the design (Young 2000: 166–7). In this way, the memory of the Jewish presence in Berlin helped generate the form of the building. The museum does make up for the complexities of the architectural concepts with extensive factual information. The permanent exhibition charts Jewish life and traditions in Germany from Roman times up to the present day. There are many biographies and personal objects such as family letters and photos, and a good deal of emphasis is placed on explaining Jewish culture and religion. The museum shows the contribution Jews have made to German life, as well as the irreparable loss caused by the Jewish persecution under the Nazi regime. Yet the intended emphasis is on Jewish life rather than death, the latter having tended to be the focus in German memorial initiatives up to present. Hence, just one of the 14 sections in the permanent exhibition addresses the Nazi era. The Jewish Museum has been an undeniable success: according to its website, there had been three million visitors by January 2006.10 The


The Jewish Museum in Berlin


museum is perhaps so popular because it describes all aspects of Jewishness in addition to tapping into the widespread interest in the Holocaust. Moreover, it deliberately pursues a narrative that is not as punishing as that behind the Holocaust memorial or a Gedenkstätte. According to Michael Blumenthal: We want to tell a story so we wrote a script like in a film with the high and low points of the 2000-year history. We don’t have much that is funny, but it is not always a sad museum (Independent, 8 September 2001). This points to a re-writing of the German narrative according to a global (or Americanised) layer of interpretation. Those behind the layout were not afraid to use populist techniques to put across a message. According to Jutta Strauss, Academic Director of the museum’s interactive Learning Center: ‘We are […] not afraid to tell well-prepared stories. These can make people more enthusiastic about the past’ (interview in Welt, 7 September 2001). Ken Gorbey, the New Zealander responsible for designing the exhibition, had no qualms about declaring the Jewish Museum part of the international ‘museum industry’ (BZ, 10 September 2001). There were concerns that the museum would present a ‘Disneyland’ view of history and trivialise the past. However, these were largely dispelled once it was opened. The main criticism relates to the sheer scale of the museum, which cannot be viewed in detail during one visit (see, for example, taz and BZ, both 11 September 2001).

A Jewish museum or a Holocaust museum? Despite the museum’s aim of focusing on Jewish life and tradition in Germany, the visitor is aware of the Holocaust from the start. The building indeed appears to be divided into two museums; a Holocaust museum on the ground floor and a museum of Jewish history on the first. The ‘voids’ constantly emphasise a negative absence, which for Libeskind runs centrally through the contemporary culture of Berlin (LES, 9 February 1999). The ground floor of the museum contains three pathways. Before following the ‘axis of continuity’ and climbing a flight of steep steps up to the permanent exhibition, the visitor crosses the ‘axis of exile’ and the ‘axis of the Holocaust’. The walls contain the names of the countries where crimes against Jews took place and the countries of exile. Glass panels contain documents and personal objects from Jewish victims of Nazi persecution. The ‘axis of exile’ leads to the Garden of Exile, a mass of 49 concrete pillars filled with earth and planted with willows and set into an uneven ground. 48 of the pillars are filled with earth from Berlin and the last with earth from Jerusalem. The garden is intended to show the disorientation of exile. The ‘axis of the Holocaust’ leads to the ‘Void of the Holocaust’, a 24m high unheated concrete tower lit only


by a tiny skylight. The space is not soundproofed and lets in noise from outside the building. This void perhaps takes the museum too far into the realms of ‘experience’. As the heavy steel door closes slowly behind them, visitors undoubtedly sense claustrophobia and unease as they stand in the darkness, but this ‘experience’ is of course inauthentic. The layout of the ground floor of the museum means that even before reaching the permanent exhibition, which deals with the whole spectrum of German-Jewish history, the Holocaust and Jewish persecution dominate the narrative. Whilst this is not a Holocaust museum, it is a museum dominated by this negative history: the initial sections are like a pre-history of the Holocaust.

The Jewish Museum and Leitverantwortung Despite this negative subtext, the Jewish Museum has been heralded as a way of promoting a more positive German narrative for the future, as a kind of cultural embodiment of Leitverantwortung. For Libeskind: The most important thing is to bring hope, to show that history goes on but in a responsible way. We must not hide it. Nor must we banalise it. The new Germany is going on, but it is connected to the past in a very positive way (Telegraph, 27 June 1998). The danger of this interpretation is that the museum, like the Holocaust memorial, could be seen as an attempt to rehabilitate Germany, salve a guilty conscience and draw a line under the past. The opening ceremony on 9 September 2001 was reserved for 850 invited guests from the economic, political and cultural elite. Volker Müller saw this ‘mixture of state ceremony and gala event’ as evidence of the attempt to demonstrate a more relaxed and ‘normal’ attitude towards the past and towards the Jewish community (BZ, 10 September 2001). There was criticism that the event had become something of an entertainment spectacle: according to the Berliner Zeitung (10 September 2001) many of the guests barely cast a glance at the exhibition but spent the evening chatting with friends instead. The eagerly anticipated opening of the museum, reported around the world, was nonetheless a good example of the way that an assumed Leitverantwortung can enhance Germany’s image, in sharp contrast to the Leidkultur associated with the Holocaust memorial. This came to the fore in the speeches given by Johannes Rau and Michael Blumenthal. Significantly, Rau stressed that the museum was about 2000 years of German-Jewish history rather than the Holocaust alone: The Jewish Museum in Berlin does not aim to be a Holocaust museum, nor should it be. This is the right decision, and an important one. Today many people, and not just younger generations, only know one thing


about the history of the Jews in Germany and Europe: that the National Socialists planned and implemented the mass murder of European Jews. We must keep memory of this catastrophe alive. This building, and the exhibition we are opening today, fulfils this need. However, this should not lead us to the wrong conclusion that the Holocaust was the sum of German-Jewish history. […] If we become familiar with this history in its entirety, we will be even more aware of the deep loss that we also inflicted upon ourselves with the Holocaust (Rau 2001). He also indicated the museum’s global resonance in its aim of teaching visitors about the dangers of prejudice and the importance of tolerance. Michael Blumenthal’s speech suggested that after decades of political ‘memory work’ a more positive narrative could emerge for Germans as well as Jews after the Holocaust. He deemed the museum a sign that united Germany was facing up to its historic responsibility. He earned great applause for the following words, which seemed particularly pertinent following the September 11 terrorist attacks just two days later: The unified Federal Republic of Germany is the biggest economic power in Europe and one of the most important nations in the world. In facing the past, attempting to provide compensation [to former forced labourers] and promoting this museum and other, comparable institutions in your capital you have set an example and obtained the moral right to be one of the leading voices in the global struggle against racism and for religious tolerance, for the rights of all minorities and for human rights in general. I hope that the Federal Republic assumes this role with energy and unity. […] This is a major opportunity for present and future generations in Germany (speech reproduced in Jungle Welt, 10 September 2001). In line with its global appeal, Blumenthal stressed that the museum was for Germans, Jews and non-Jews alike (DK, 11 September 2001), unlike the Holocaust memorial which, as mentioned, has been ascribed a German focus. A global narrative was also reflected in the reviews. Volker Müller referred to a ‘global cultural event’ (BZ, 10 September 2001), Gerald Felber to a ‘symbol for the future and for tolerance’ (DNN, 11 September 2001), and Elisabeth Binder to ‘a new phase of German-Jewish history’ (Tagesspiegel, 10 September 2001). Klaus Harpprecht alluded to the museum’s focus on life and hope in an article entitled ‘A house of life’ (Zeit, 13 September 2001), whilst an editorial in Der Tagesspiegel underlined the positive message that the museum could give as a national symbol: ‘This is the place where history becomes both an experience and a reference point for action in the present’ (10 September 2001). The Jewish Museum is a welcome addition to a topography of memory in Berlin dominated by pointers to Jewish suffering and victimhood. However, as discussed, the overwhelming narrative presented by this museum


is still the Holocaust, primarily because this is the context in which Jews have been viewed in Germany in the post-war decades. As with the Holocaust memorial, the Jewish Museum is then indicative of and restricted within the dialectic of normality in the new capital. Tom Freudenheim, Deputy Director of the Jewish Museum between 1998 and 2000, indicated this in stating: I look forward to the day when this wonderful building becomes an integral part of the museum landscape, and by this I mean when its exhibitions can be criticised. That will only happen when the Germans are no longer afraid of being branded anti-semitic for any not completely positive comment on Jewish affairs (Tagesspiegel, 7 September 2001).

History from the perpetrator perspective: the Topography of Terror The Holocaust memorial and the Jewish museum represent a narrative which, despite the best efforts of the Jewish museum, focuses on Jewish victimhood. As the third point of the ‘memory triangle’ at the heart of Berlin, the Topography of Terror differs as it is an authentic site of memory with a focus on perpetrator history. The development and layout of this site is representative of the layers of memory in the German capital and the changing discourse on the National Socialist past. Like the Holocaust memorial, it developed from a citizens’ initiative. The Topography of Terror is located on the site of the former Prinz Albrecht terrain in the centre of Berlin, once a complex of palatial buildings and the administrative power centre of the Nazi regime. The buildings were badly damaged towards the end of the war and most were torn down from 1949–56. The original significance of the site was soon forgotten, especially with the building of the Berlin Wall in 1961, which ran through the site. The disused area could be said to symbolise the repression of the Nazi period at the time. It was only ‘rediscovered’ at the end of the 1970s when architectural tours were organised on the site. By 1980, citizens and victims groups were calling for a monument to be built. In 1983 the Berlin senate launched a competition to find a design. Interestingly, the criteria stressed the importance of reshaping the site for reasons of memory but also urban development: As we go about reconstructing this area, it will be our task to proceed with contemporary history in mind whilst also providing a place for contemplation. Yet at the same time we must not miss the opportunity to give the Kreuzberg district a terrain where life can unfold and leisure is possible (Young 1993: 86). The ideal design would acknowledge the history of the location but also include facilities such as a park, playground or exercise area. This suggests


the notion of ‘living with the past’, accepting the dialectic of normality in the capital. Such a remit is, however, very hard to fulfil without relativising the past or alienating visitors from the site. The competition attracted 194 entries and in April 1984 the first prize was awarded to a radical design by a team headed by Jürgen Wenzel and Nikolaus Lang. This in fact precluded a ‘normal’ use of the site. The design envisaged sealing the site with sheets of cast iron, broken up with holes in which lines of hundreds of chestnut trees would be planted. Several thousand of the iron sheets would have SS documents superimposed on them. Following opposition to the design it was never realised. Moreover, in 1986 a dig on the site uncovered the foundations of the basement and kitchen areas of the former Gestapo headquarters as well as the remains of Gestapo prison cells. It seemed inappropriate to cover up this milieu de mémoire and it was decided to establish an ‘active museum’ rather than a memorial on the site. A temporary exhibition and documentation centre on the SS and the function of the buildings on the Prinz-Albrecht terrain opened in 1987 to coincide with the 750th anniversary of Berlin, incorporating the original foundations. Significantly, the aim was not only to demonstrate the historical importance of the site but also to show attempts to repress it in the early post-war period. The site is thus an excellent example of the layering of memory. With increasing visitor numbers, in 1990 an expert commission convened by the Berlin Senate recommended building an international exhibition, documentation and visitor centre on the site. In 1992, the Topography of Terror Foundation was established with the aim of providing information about National Socialism and encouraging active confrontation with this period of history. Three years later it became an independent foundation under public law sponsored by the Land Berlin and central government.11 The Swiss architect Peter Zumthor won the competition to design the new documentation centre. In contrast to Eisenman and Libeskind, his design relied on the authentic site rather than symbolic concepts. It comprised a long, two-storey building made of concrete and glass. A ceremony on 8 May 1995 marked the start of construction, but the project soon ran into difficulties. The DM36 million allocated by the Land Berlin and central government had to be increased to 45 million, then by another 20 million as it turned out that the building was more complex and time-consuming than imagined. A building freeze was imposed in March 2000. A revised cost estimate of DM76 million (€38.8 million) was submitted in spring 2001. The government established this as a ceiling cost and pledged to provide half the money, but the project was ultimately halted in June 2004. Costs had spiralled to such an extent that it was considered cheaper to commission a new competition than to continue (see taz and Tagesspiegel, both 27 January 2004). Reinhard Rürup, the Director of the Topography of


The Topography of Terror in Berlin (the photograph shows the outdoor exhibition with one of the remaining stretches of Berlin Wall in the background)


Terror foundation, resigned at the end of April 2004, unhappy at the impact the delay had had on the site. He was also critical at what he viewed as the prioritisation of the Jewish Museum and Holocaust memorial by central government (Rürup 2004). This indicates the ‘wars of memory’ between memorial sites, but also suggests that there is perhaps more interest in portraying a narrative of victimhood than of perpetrators in the new capital. These developments also underlined the financial burden associated with attempts to preserve memory. In April 2005, the government launched an open competition to find a new design for the documentation centre. The design by the Berlin architects Heinle, Wischler and Partners was announced as the winning entry in January 2006. It envisages a single-storey, glass and steel building housing the exhibition, seminar rooms and a basement-level library. The design was praised for fulfilling its remit without any ‘theatricals’ – and thus avoiding controversy. The new building is to be deliberately non-monumental and non-symbolic, therefore not interfering with the historical significance of the authentic site (Tagesspiegel and Welt, both 26 January 2006). Building is set to commence in 2007 and to take two years, at an estimated cost of €15 million. Although the Topography of Terror exhibition has been purely open air since 1997 awaiting the new documentation centre, this has not deterred visitors, attracting over 300,000 in 2003 (Rürup 2004).12 Its location, right among the original foundations of the former Gestapo headquarters as well as adjacent to a long strip of remaining Berlin Wall, adds to its impact. As a mixture between a milieu de mémoire and lieu de mémoire, the Topography of Terror is effective in using the foundations as the backdrop to chart the history of the site from 1732 to the present, including the rise of Nazism, the persecution of Jews and other groups, the impact of the National Socialist regime in Germany and Europe and the resistance in Berlin. The exhibition also details the history of the site after the war, including the construction of the exhibition. This gives an insight into the changing process of Vergangenheitsbewältigung and the public involvement in the development of the site. The site also presents a number of other temporary exhibitions. In 2002, for example, there was a display of photographs of the everyday persecution of Jews in the Third Reich, as well as an exhibition giving biographies of victims of right-wing extremism since unification, the latter reflecting the tendency to discuss the Nazi legacy in the context of present-day issues. For Young, the Topography of Terror is effective in ensuring a constant dialogue on memory: The memorial here is comprised not by material space and ruins, but by memory-work itself. Left unresolved, the memorial project at the Gestapo-Gelände flourishes precisely because it contests memory – because


it continues to challenge, exasperate, edify, and invite visitors into a dialogue between themselves and their past (Young 1993: 90). The site then signifies public engagement with the past rather than a fixed national symbol. The new documentation centre will undoubtedly provide a far greater range of information, but the ‘authentic’ impact of the site may be lost.

The planned redevelopment of the SS-Truppenlager in Oranienburg Monuments and memorial sites are generally set apart from the fabric of daily life. As a final example of cultural remembrance, the plans to redevelop the former SS-Truppenlager (SS troop complex) in Oranienburg represent an initiative to incorporate an area for recreation and work with a monument to the past. Oranienburg, in the outskirts of Berlin, was the location of Sachsenhausen, the Nazis’ ‘prototype’ concentration camp built in 1936. After the war, the Soviet secret police firstly used the site as a detention camp and in 1961 it became the GDR’s third national monument and memorial site. The present memorial site provides a clear illustration of the interplay of post-war narratives and the problems of remembering and representing the crimes of the Nazis and the Soviets without relativisation or inappropriate comparison. Following guidelines from the Enquete-Kommission opposing ‘unified’ remembrance of the Nazi and GDR pasts, the site has successfully adopted a concept that addresses the various layers of its history (on the post-unification development of Sachsenhausen, see Morsch 2001). One of the exhibitions details the changes to the site under the GDR and how it showed an anti-fascist perspective of the Nazi period. Further exhibitions describe Jewish life in the camp, the concentration camp inspectorate and the Soviet camp. The site thus covers the Nazi, Soviet and GDR uses of the site, although Günter Morsch, Director of the memorial site, would confirm that the Nazi past still presents the greatest interest to visitors.13 What most visitors to the memorial site at Sachsenhausen do not know is that it forms but a small section within a triangular shaped site which once housed the SS-Truppenlager, a broad complex of SS administration and training buildings and accommodation, later used by the GDR police and National People’s Army (NVA). Many of the buildings are still standing: the ‘T-Building’, where the concentration camp inspectorate was located until 1945, for example, became the Oranienburg finance office in 1992. After 1990, there was a debate on what to do with this area. In light of the economic challenges of unification, this debate was not only about preserving the past but also how to utilise the site for the advantage of citizens in the present.


In 1993, the town of Oranienburg approved an entry by the Viennese architect Hermann Czech in a competition to redevelop the site. Czech planned a ‘re-urbanisation’ with new apartments and industry. However, the plans were dropped following concern that this would lead to a trivialisation of the site. Daniel Libeskind was awarded a special prize for his entry, which ignored the terms of the competition and proposed a radical rehaul of the site, covering it with lines, razing the SS and NVA buildings to the ground and placing them under water. The design attracted a lot of attention and – somewhat surprisingly – the decision was taken to adopt it in a revised form which would not flood the site or destroy the buildings, but mark them so that visitors would be aware of their historical significance. One of the main elements in the new design was the ‘hope incision’, a row of new public buildings running through the centre of the site, including, for example, a post-graduate university or a German Centre for Human Rights. The design and feasibility study were discussed during a three-day symposium entitled ‘Sites of Crimes between History and Urban Development’ and organised by the Brandenburg Memorial Site Foundation in February 2001. The plans initially received enthusiastic support and the Mayor of Oranienburg said that they would go ahead as soon as possible. However, the second day coincided with a newspaper article stating the opposition of the Brandenburg Department for Monuments (Landesdenkmalsamt) to the plans, as valuable buildings would be destroyed in the redevelopment process and the remaining buildings robbed of their historical significance. Detlef Karg from this department was supported by Michael Cullen, who questioned whether architectural intervention was needed to bring the topography of the site to life. Doubts were also expressed as to how easy it would be to market the site as an economic location and to attract institutions there bearing in mind its negative history. Libeskind’s design sought to integrate a negative past with a positive present, highlighting both sides of the dialectic of normality. It thereby accurately mirrored the problematic course of the German narrative on the Nazi legacy and the difficulty of representing the Nazi past in cultural form.

5 The ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’

An epilogue to the Nationalstolz debate Chapter 2 discussed the neue Unbefangenheit associated with the start of Schröder’s SPD-Green government and the debate on Martin Walser’s Peace Prize speech as evidence of challenges both to conventional thinking on the National Socialist past and the existence of the dialectic of normality. This chapter will assess the climate of the discourse at the end of the first term of the SPD-Green coalition in 2002. It is first useful to revisit the ideas of Schröder and Walser. On 8 May 2002, both took part in a public debate in Berlin on the subject of ‘Nation, Patriotism and Democratic Culture’. This debate reconfirmed some of the tendencies outlined thus far: Schröder standing for a neue Unbefangenheit but also Leitverantwortung based on cultural memory of the Nazi past and Walser defending a personal interpretation of this past. Somewhat controversially, the 8 May commemoration was used as an occasion for the SPD to present a positive national narrative, echoing some of the sentiments used by the CDU during the Nationalstolz debate and thereby offering further evidence of the blurring of the conventional distinction between left-wing and right-wing uses of Geschichtspolitik. Having involved Grass and Habermas in his 1997 election campaign, Schröder’s 2002 invitation to Walser raised eyebrows, as the author was still associated with an allegedly nationalist or anti-semitic agenda four years after the Peace Prize controversy. Although Walser has written extensively about the German nation, his contribution to this discussion was inevitably coloured by perceptions of his Peace Prize speech. Moreover, the event took place at a time of escalating tension in the Middle East, with growing criticism of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s policy arousing fears of anti-semitism across Europe. Although there appears to be no discernible anti-semitic motive in the Peace Prize speech, Schröder’s open association with Walser ran the risk of giving credence to the anti-semitic views attributed to Walser by certain critics, as well as implying that Schröder wished to see a Schlußstrich drawn under the National Socialist past. Yet it was surely above all an indication that Schröder did not associate Walser with anti-semitism; it is highly unlikely that he would have shared a public podium with an advocate of such prejudice. 163


Ultimately, the Schröder-Walser debate was not a fraught affair, although it did reinforce the distinct layers of interpretation associated with different generational communities of memory. Schröder opened his speech with the traditional rhetoric of commemoration, honouring the victims of Nazism and the resistance movement (Schröder 2002a; further references are to this source). His focus was, however, the social democratic notion of patriotism in Germany, as embodied by a nation based on democracy, freedom and justice rather than formal notions of territory or ethnicity. Significantly, Schröder now subscribed to the notion of Nationalstolz, but in the context of Leitverantwortung rather than nationalism, and as a matter for the left rather than the right, although of course the values he referred to are not just attributable to the SPD: Today we Social Democrats can proudly say ‘yes’ to Germany, because this is a Germany built on the values of freedom, justice, solidarity and participation. German Social Democrats have always fought for these values. Our national pride [Nationalstolz] is a pride in the people in Germany and their achievements. It is in full awareness of the horrific periods of our history that we are proud of democracy and prosperity, of the peaceful process of unification and of the standing we enjoy on the basis of our responsibility in the world. Schröder’s statement took the notion of Verfassungspatriotismus a stage further. This type of pride could be justified by openly acknowledging the positive and negative sides of German history rather than relying on the political narrative built up in the post-1949 period. In this sense, Schröder asserted that a complete historical consciousness and a ‘self-critical selfconfidence’ were crucial for Germany’s role within Europe. He went on to revisit the ideas associated with neue Unbefangenheit stated in his inaugural speech as Chancellor, underlining the importance of Germany’s European identity to counter any claims of a new German nationalism: Our self-confidence as a democratic nation that does not have to feel superior to others, but not inferior either; is also shaped by our relations with our neighbours. This and this alone, is our ‘destiny’: our geographical position in the heart of Europe, which gives us a particular responsibility for Europe. According to this viewpoint, Germany’s central role as a bridge in Europe and its good relations with its European neighbours give reason for national pride and patriotism. It is, however, striking that Schröder appeared to define Germany’s ‘special responsibility’ for Europe in terms of geographical position rather then the history resulting from the Second World War and German division.

The ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’ 165

Whilst Schröder outlined the social democratic notion of patriotism, Walser took the opportunity to defend some of the views he had put forward in his Peace Prize speech, not least a personal rather than a factual interpretation of history, as indicated by the title ‘On a Historical Feeling’ (the speech is reproduced in FAZ, 10 May 2002). Walser essentially repeated his response to criticism of his literary perspective, asserting that any book presenting history as if it were always going to lead to Auschwitz was praised in Germany, whereas a book that concluded that the course of history may have been different was accused of trivialising Auschwitz. He also restated his views on conscience being a matter for the individual as well as his criticism of the instrumentalisation of Auschwitz by the Meinungssoldaten: We should concern ourselves with our own conscience, not that of others. The nation’s ‘guardians of conscience’ have […] created a jargon of consternation, which in my experience makes younger generations more adept at lip service than sensitive to matters of conscience. However, the speech suggested another dimension to the views expressed in the Peace Prize speech. Walser acknowledged Germany’s problematic relationship to national identity on account of the war, but implied that his or any generation should not be bound to silence about their experiences. He appeared to reject the notion of Auschwitz as a cornerstone of the development of the Federal Republic and the reason for the division of Germany, arguing for example that German division was a response to the Cold War rather than punishment for Auschwitz. He seemed to want to interpret the nation according to his own (positive) terms, which did not place Germany in the shadow of Auschwitz or consider Auschwitz an inevitable product of German history. He was right to oppose the ahistorical view that ‘all roads lead to Auschwitz’ put forward by certain voices in the post-war German discourse. However, his argument appeared to enter the realms of historical revisionism with the assessment that Germany had suffered disproportionately from the consequences of the First World War: Without this war there would have been no Versailles, without Versailles no Hitler, without Hitler no World War Two, without World War Two none of the elements that define our awareness or feelings when we think about Germany. The most important link in the historical chain remains: without Versailles no Hitler […] Versailles was of course not the only reason for 1933, but we can certainly say that Versailles was one of the reasons for Hitler’s success. This statement echoes too closely the apologist view of the Third Reich attributed to neo-conservative historians like Ernst Nolte and could be


interpreted as a strategy to lessen the burden of the German past. Probably with this in mind, Schröder distanced himself from these remarks. During this debate, both Schröder and Walser were suggesting that a positive national feeling can and should exist in Germany. However, their premise was different: for Schröder this was because of the past and for Walser it was in spite of the past. Whilst Schröder emphasised the virtues of Germany as a ‘normal’ nation aware of its history, Walser looked backwards to what the German nation could have been like without the negative legacy of Auschwitz. This summed up two important tendencies within the German discourse on the Nazi past: on the one hand to openly acknowledge the past but not see it as an obstacle; and on the other hand to consider Germany to be still suffused with the Nazi legacy.

The Finkelstein debate – a new layer of interpretation? In the course of the first term of the SPD-Green coalition a neue Unbefangenheit emerged with regard to the terms if not the themes of the discourse on the Nazi legacy in Germany. Taboos continued to be challenged, notably the ‘final’ post-war taboo of German criticism of Jews. This has led to the controversial assertion that one can now publicly voice private sentiments that were not ‘allowed’ before, although the ‘taboos’ addressed are not always as clear cut as they may appear. One consequence of this tendency is a new layer of interpretation within the German discourse, one which questions the conventional distinction between victim and perpetrator. The discourse on the Nazi past continues to have popular appeal and is extensively monopolised by the media. In the process, the complexities of National Socialist history regularly become a means to illustrate a theme, for example the alleged resurgence of anti-semitism. However, the dialectic of normality is still evident, frequently as a deliberate mechanism: attempts at a more open discourse are countered by the evocation of the negative narrative on the Nazi legacy, which serves to put a brake on any definitive shift away from the conventional Vergangenheitsbewältigung discourse. The neue Unbefangenheit in the terms of the discourse on the National Socialist legacy was illustrated by the debate surrounding the German publication of Norman Finkelstein’s The Holocaust Industry in February 2001. The debates analysed so far all originated in Germany and expressed national layers of interpretation. Finkelstein’s book, on the other hand, presented an American narrative that challenged the global myth of Auschwitz as a yardstick for evil and the Jewish narrative of victimhood. To sum up the main arguments, Finkelstein, an American Jew, maintains that American Jewish elites and organisations such as the Jewish Claims Conference, the American Jewish Committee and the World Jewish Congress are exploiting the suffering of millions in the Holocaust in order to make political, and particularly financial gain in the present. Those behind the resulting ‘Holocaust indus-


try’ inflate the number of Holocaust survivors in order to blackmail and extort compensation from European countries, including Germany, but put the money received into their own coffers rather than give it to the genuine victims. Controversially, Finkelstein claims that it is these Jews who are the main fomenters of anti-semitism in Europe as their extortion tactics provoke hatred. Moreover, in falsifying the historical record they paradoxically become Holocaust deniers (Finkelstein 2000, especially 81–139). There are grains of truth in Finkelstein’s argument, but there is also much to criticise. He makes many unsubstantiated or unreferenced claims and his motives are clearly influenced by an anti-Zionist bias as well as the fact that his own parents suffered under Nazism, his mother receiving little compensation. Finkelstein was of course himself subscribing to the ‘Holocaust industry’ by publishing his views. Furthermore, although controversial, Finkelstein’s arguments are not completely new – Tim Cole’s Images of the Holocaust (1999) and Peter Novick’s The Holocaust and Collective Memory (2001) both deal with a kind of ‘Holocaust industry’, although they are not as unforgiving towards Jews. The globalised narrative of Auschwitz implies that a ‘Holocaust industry’ is not just a Jewish, or American, phenomenon. As we have seen, instrumentalisation of the Holocaust does occur in Germany. However, the term ‘Holocaust industry’ is inappropriate in this case as there are no discernible financial motives, except perhaps media awareness that the Holocaust sells. In addition, the objective is often to promote rather than to exploit remembrance of the Holocaust. For Henryk Broder: Of course there is a Holocaust industry, in the USA as well as in Germany. However, it does not, as Finkelstein claims, stem from a ‘conspiracy’ of the Jewish elite but is rather a joint venture between Jews and non-Jews who milk the Holocaust all they can (Broder 2001: 63). The above can be read in the light of the analysis of Walser’s Peace Prize speech. Walser had inferred a kind of ‘Holocaust industry’ in Germany with his assertion of the ‘constant representation of our disgrace’, but whilst various groups and individuals were clearly implied in his speech, the lack of specific reference suggested that his criticism could apply to Germans or Jews. However, it should be noted that Walser’s criticism of instrumentalisation ensued from the perspective of a German community of memory and his criticism was targeted primarily at German manipulation of the Nazi past. In addition, if Walser was referring to a ‘Holocaust industry’, it was not one based on material greed but rather on the attempt to redress apparent inadequacies in dealing with the Nazi past. Finkelstein’s arguments, on the other hand, concerned the alleged instrumentalisation of the victim narrative by an American-Jewish community of memory. His


book was thereby evidence of the global, ‘de-Germanised’ layer of interpretation of the Nazi legacy. Some of Finkelstein’s arguments could have been used to Germany’s advantage to pursue a less punishing narrative, especially as his position as an American Jew meant that he could express views that would have provoked charges of anti-semitism if they had come from a non-Jewish German. Whilst Finkelstein does not deny German guilt for the Holocaust, he asserts that the country has fulfilled its obligations in terms of reparations but is now being blackmailed into paying more, and is thus a victim of the American-Jewish ‘extortion racket’ (Finkelstein 2000: 89). Finkelstein’s reference to German guilt conveniently defends his arguments against charges of Holocaust denial or far right sympathies, and so could potentially make them palatable to a German audience, although the undoubted delays in compensation payments on the part of German industry cast doubts on Finkelstein’s claim that Germany has shown a genuine sense of historical responsibility. In addition, Finkelstein asserts that the US has no right to lecture Germany about morality: whilst Germans struggle daily with the legacy of their former crimes, the US has not acknowledged its own responsibility for the atrocities it committed in Vietnam but continues to accuse Germany of not facing up to the past.1 In 1996, Daniel Goldhagen provoked public acclaim although much academic controversy for his book Hitler’s Willing Executioners which linked the Third Reich generation with ‘eliminationist anti-semitism’ (for the media response, see DAAD 1998). Public reaction in Germany perhaps reflected the desire of younger generations to distance themselves from the guilt associated with the ‘perpetrator generation’, particularly as it offered a ‘simple’ explanation for the Holocaust. Finkelstein’s views on Jewish exploitation of the Holocaust could have been seen as another method of achieving this distance and thus promoting a Schlußstrich. However, the German debate instead became another extension of the discourse on an apparently failed Vergangenheitsbewältigung, focusing on aspects of the book that could be applied to the German context and ignoring others. This suggests that even when a different national layer of interpretation is filtered into the German discourse the German national layer of memory – with its negative associations – remains dominant. Hence, whilst the US and UK reviews of the book focused on Finkelstein’s arguments and academic credentials according to their American context, in Germany the debate tended to revert to the perpetrator narrative. This was in turn evidence of a discrepancy between what was written and how it was interpreted, as already noted with the Peace Prize controversy. Interestingly, there was scant consideration of some of the more ‘academic’ aspects of the book, for example Finkelstein’s reasoning behind the development of the Holocaust as an American myth in the wake of the Six-Day War in 1967, which is found in Chapter 1 or, particularly pertinent


to Germany, the question of the uniqueness of the Holocaust. In Chapter 2 of The Holocaust Industry Finkelstein rejects what he sees as the Jewish monopoly on the Holocaust as a unique phenomenon, arguing that the specifically unique features of the Holocaust do not preclude comparisons with other genocides, which in turn do not represent Holocaust denial. This could have led to a rethink of the ideas put forward in the Historians’ Dispute and, as Philipp Blom points out, challenged the foundation myth of the post-war Federal Republic, at the heart of which is the Holocaust as a unique, incomprehensible and ‘untouchable’ phenomenon (BZ, 11 August 2000). However, it was rather the case that critics perceived an erosion of this foundation myth, but in the process reinforced its existence. The so-called ‘Finkelstein Debate’ in Germany arose within a day of the book’s publication in 2001 and rapidly turned into a media circus, involving a series of talkshows featuring critics who had not all read the book but still vociferously criticised each other’s opinions, together with some hastily compiled publications (see, for example, Steinberger 2001; Piper 2001; and Suhrmann 2001). The media’s interest in promoting a scandal was clear: few column inches were devoted to the German version of Peter Novick’s more academic but less controversial The Holocaust in American Life, which came out around the same time. Another reason was that Finkelstein’s book could be more readily applied to contemporary events in Germany. Whilst the controversy did challenge the conventional discourse on the Nazi legacy, in practice the Finkelstein debate was more about the German present than the past: there was less consideration of commemoration and remembrance than during the debate on Walser’s Peace Prize speech, for example. Finkelstein’s theses were generally translated into a criticism of the delay in payments to former forced labourers, with a focus on the implied guilt and unwillingness of German industry to meet its moral obligations rather than a discussion of whether American-Jewish organisations were exploiting the Holocaust to extort these payments. German industry was thus made out to be a perpetrator rather than the victim of a ‘Holocaust industry’. This viewpoint dovetailed into the perceived shift to the right outlined in Chapter 2. For Ulrike Winkler: The Federal Republic and its high-performing economy are made out to be the true victims who need protecting from ‘corrupt’ Jews. […] Such views are nothing new in this country. Finkelstein assumes that many respectable Germans will ‘privately support’ his thesis that Germany is being blackmailed. In the meantime, many are supporting it in public (U. Winkler 2001: 35). Finkelstein’s arguments were thereby applied to the debate on the far right, with open references to current anti-semitism. Concern that The Holocaust


Industry would fuel support for the far right was behind the decision to postpone and then re-edit an SWR television documentary on the controversy, although this was anything but a glowing portrait of Finkelstein. Lars Rensmann maintained that through its affirmation of Finkelstein’s views the mainstream of the Berlin Republic was adopting a stance previously only associated with the far right. Finkelstein had become ‘a Jewish alibi who can be cited and discussed in polite society’, a motivation for German secondary anti-semitism and by consequence part of a drive to repress the Nazi past (Rensmann 2001: 123, 145; emphasis in original). However, apart from some rather manipulated and outdated statistics, Rensmann had little evidence to back up his claim.2 Indeed, the criticism seemed disproportionate to the alleged tendencies; there was in fact little open public support for Finkelstein’s theses. As with Walser’s Peace Prize speech, this was also a case where the political level was criticised for allegedly supporting controversial theses advocating a shift to the right when it had not openly participated in the debate. The debate was instead steered by groups of Meinungssoldaten in the media who, like Winkler and Rensmann, have an apparent interest in pushing a certain view of contemporary German political culture. The reaction to Finkelstein’s book tour in Berlin in February 2001 clearly showed the aforementioned German layers of interpretation applied to his book, with the focus placed on the problem of the far right and the compensation negotiations. Finkelstein’s appearance was overshadowed by the presence of a group of young protesters holding banners declaring ‘German perpetrators are not victims’ and ‘Holocaust Industry = Siemens and Deutsche Bank’. The protest referred to the involvement of these companies in forced labour during the Second World War and their delay in paying compensation. Finkelstein was ultimately forgotten as the crowd turned on a small group of neo-Nazi supporters who began chanting Nazi slogans. The event was sold out and attracted a good deal of media attention, demonstrating that the controversial issues Finkelstein had raised – and how Germany should deal with them in view of its past – continue to attract public attention. The sensitivity of these issues was indicated by the reluctance of the German participants in the debate, who included the historian Peter Steinbach and the writers Raphael Seligmann and Stan Nadolny, to discuss the book in clear terms or to say anything that could be quoted against them in the press. On one level, the Finkelstein debate demonstrated the media’s capacity to shore up controversy with regard to the Nazi past. However, there was another aspect which merits attention. In line with the neue Unbefangenheit relating to the terms of the discourse on this past, Finkelstein’s book was referred to as a ‘breath of fresh air’ by Lorenz Jäger in the FAZ (7 February 2001). It was now seemingly acceptable to refer to a Holocaust industry – albeit operating at an international rather than a German level. There may


be no definitive shift to the right, but the Finkelstein debate was indicative of a more open discussion of former ‘taboos’ associated with the legacy of the Holocaust within German political culture. This in turn posed a challenge to the conventional norms of remembrance of the Nazi genocide of European Jews. Whilst Finkelstein blamed American Jews for the Holocaust industry, the German debate touched on whether it was allowable for Germans to criticise Jews in any context. For Peter Steinbach, this was the first time that the genocide of Jews had been subject to a re-evaluation in post-war Germany (Tagesspiegel, 10 February 2001). This question was explored further in the 2002 ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’.

The ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’ Manifesting itself in the political and literary arenas, the 2002 ‘AntiSemitism Dispute’ (Antisemitismusstreit) challenged one of the final taboos established in Germany’s post-war narrative – that is criticism of Israel and Jews – and tested the moral parameters of this narrative to the limit. In this sense, the controversy took the issues raised by the debates on Walser’s Peace Prize speech and Finkelstein’s The Holocaust Industry a stage further, with (secondary) anti-semitism the actual theme rather than an associated tendency. It is important to restate the distinction between anti-semitism and secondary anti-semitism. Anti-semitism relates to hostility towards Jews at any time, whereas secondary anti-semitism, as discussed in Chapter 2, refers to hostility towards Jews on account of them posing an unwelcome reminder of the Holocaust. With these definitions in mind, the political ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’ stemmed from comments made by Jürgen Möllemann (FDP) on the Israel-Palestine conflict and questioned German attitudes to Jews in the present, in particular whether these were antisemitic, but not whether they harked back to the Nazi past. However, the literary part of the controversy, sparked off by a new novel by Martin Walser (Tod eines Kritikers (2002); discussed later in this chapter) reverted back to the debate on this past and the allegations of secondary antisemitism stemming from Walser’s critique of Vergangenheitsbewältigung during his Peace Prize speech, that is the suggestion that Jews serve to underline German guilt for the Holocaust and thereby attract hostility. Stephan Hebel states the points of controversy raised by the ‘AntiSemitism Dispute’ as well as the implied links made between past and present: Jürgen Möllemann and Martin Walser are allowing an undercurrent into the public discourse, one which has been present up to now at the Stammtisch or within radical right-wing subculture, but limited to private remarks. […] If we look critically at Möllemann’s comments, we see that the message is: ‘I am not anti-semitic, but the Jews should leave


me in peace.’ No one expects Germans to creep about every day doubled over by the burden of the past. However, it is important to stress that anyone who, from historical experience, is aware of the dangers to democracy, should avoid any repetition of these dangers for their own interests. Jürgen W. Möllemann and Martin Walser can be regarded as a threat to democracy as they deliberately ignore this message (FR, 3 June 2002). Significantly, the above quotation also exemplifies the problematic association between Möllemann and Walser that was pushed by the media. Despite having no part in the political side of the debate, Walser was implicated with Möllemann and both became representatives of an apparently damaging trend in German political culture.

The Möllemann debate The ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’ was initially provoked by Jürgen Möllemann, then FDP Vice-Chairman and Head of the FDP in North Rhine-Westphalia. On 16 May 2002 he sparked the controversy during an interview with the TV channel ZDF when he commented: I fear that hardly anyone has stirred up the anti-semitism that unfortunately exists here in Germany and needs combating, more than Mr Sharon, and in Germany a certain Herr Friedman in particular with his intolerant and spiteful manner. […] One should be able to criticise Sharon’s policies without being branded in that way [i.e. as anti-semitic] (reported in Welt, 7 June 2002). In addition, Möllemann endorsed the application of Jamal Karsli to join the FDP parliamentary group in North Rhine-Westphalia. Karsli, a Syrianborn former Green MP in the parliament of this region, is a harsh critic of Israel who left the Greens in opposition to what he saw as Fischer’s proIsrael stance. Karsli has compared Ariel Sharon’s policies with ‘Nazi methods’ and accused the media of a pro-Zionist bias (Welt, 7 June 2002). Möllemann himself was President of the German-Arab Society and implied support to Palestinian suicide bombers, saying that he too would resist violently if his country were similarly occupied (Zeit, 15 April 2002). Möllemann’s actions led to a bitter dispute with the Central Council of Jews in Germany and overshadowed the visit of the FDP leader Guido Westerwelle to Israel at the end of May, when Sharon expressed discomfort at the increase in anti-semitism in Germany and elsewhere in Europe (BZ, 28 May 2002). Following an ultimatum from Westerwelle, Karsli withdrew ‘voluntarily’ from the FDP in North Rhine-Westphalia at the beginning of June 2002. Westerwelle attempted to smooth the waters by assuring the


media that his party was not anti-semitic. Möllemann eventually apologised to German Jews, although not for his criticism of Sharon and specifically not to Michel Friedman (Welt, 7 June 2002). The debate promptly monopolised the media. Like the other public debates examined so far, the controversy was extended from what Möllemann had actually said to broader issues of post-war national identity. An edited volume by Nea Weissberg-Bob (2002) was quickly brought out on the ‘new anti-semitism’ in Germany, dedicated ‘in solidarity’ to Michel Friedman and with the stated aim of protecting democratic civil rights in Germany. Yet the strength of the reaction to Möllemann’s comment suggested that these rights were very much alive. The title of the book, Was ich den Juden schon immer mal sagen wollte [‘What I have always wanted to say to the Jews’] not only implied that Jews have an outsider status in Germany but also made it clear that the focus for the discussion was not Möllemann’s criticism of Israeli policy but the alleged re-appearance of anti-semitism in Germany.

(Secondary) anti-semitism For Weissberg-Bob, the Möllemann debate centred on the question ‘How much anti-semitism can German democracy take?’ (Weissberg-Bob 2002: 15). It is first necessary to distinguish between the German debate on antisemitism and criticism of Ariel Sharon. The latter can be seen in the context of international politics, whilst the former was a national debate drawing on the Nazi legacy. Criticism of Sharon is certainly not unknown in Germany or elsewhere, and on the surface it would seem an exaggeration to accuse Möllemann of anti-semitism. However, for Paul Spiegel, Möllemann’s statement was ‘the worst insult a political party has delivered in the history of the Federal Republic since the Holocaust’ (Weissberg-Bob 2002: 34). Möllemann had provoked scandal for several reasons. First, he had made a direct and personal attack on Friedman, a representative of the Jewish community, unfairly associating him with the problems in the Middle East. In turn, Möllemann’s comment appeared to be a direct expression of secondary anti-semitism. In implying that Sharon and Friedman were themselves responsible for arousing anti-semitism, it could be inferred – however ludicrously – that Jews were responsible for their own fate in the Holocaust – and for reminding Germans of it. Although this was a common criticism of Möllemann, it wrongly conflates past and present as well as anti-semitism and secondary anti-semitism. Criticism of Sharon’s policies in the present does not necessarily equate to secondary anti-semitism, which stems from reactions to the Nazi past, or indeed to anti-semitism, which is not necessarily the same as an anti-Israel stance. In other words, contemporary events in the Middle East cannot be judged by applying the parameters of the German past. Like Walser and


Finkelstein before him, it is likely that Möllemann was aware of the potential impact of his statement, but it is important to note that it was made in the context of the Israel-Palestine debate and reflected his interpretation of contemporary events – whatever his private thoughts about the Nazi past might have been. However, the Nazi past was brought to bear and, as with the Finkelstein debate, the German national memory narrative asserted itself as the dominant discourse. The problem was that although Möllemann was not talking about the Nazi past, the mention of the Central Council of Jews in Germany brought Germany’s relations with Jews and to the Holocaust to the forefront and thus ensured this would become a specifically German debate which referred to the National Socialist past. Hence, as Joachim Günter points out, whilst the Möllemann debate started with criticism of Israel, its import was intensified with reference to the Central Council (NZZ, 31 May 2002). Some of the claims of anti-semitism associated with the Möllemann debate were certainly exaggerated and could be taken as examples of Leidkultur. Klaus Schütz, for example, considered it a sign of ‘clear and unadulterated anti-semitism’ that out of more than 50 German TV presenters and more than 150 countries in the world, just two Jewish men had been singled out for criticism (Weissberg-Bob 2002: 9), whereas Pit Goldschmidt went as far as to link the FDP’s Projekt 18% campaign, which signalled the aim to achieve 18 per cent of the vote in the Bundestag elections, with the neo-Nazi code for Adolf Hitler (1 standing for the first letter of the alphabet, A, 8 for the eighth letter, H) (Weissberg-Bob 2002: 113).

Breaking taboos The contributors to the book Was ich den Juden schon immer mal sagen wollte share the view that whilst open anti-semitism is not permissible in contemporary Germany, it is nevertheless expressed in a veiled form that everyone understands, characterised with sly comments such as ‘I’ve nothing against Jews, but…’ or ‘We are surely allowed to criticise Israel’ (Weissberg-Bob 2002: 8, 57). The question remains as to whether German criticism of Israel or Jewish representatives equates to anti-semitism, and, whether avoidance of such criticism highlights continuing problems in German-Jewish relations. This is linked to another important element of the Möllemann debate; that of taboos apparently being broken. Möllemann insisted: ‘We have to express things that other politicians render taboo for whatever reason’ (FTD, 25 May 2002). It is, however, necessary to investigate whether he was in fact challenging a taboo and, if so, what this taboo was. The taboo was generally interpreted as German criticism of Israel and/or Jewish representatives in post-war Germany. Möllemann was seen as breaking this taboo in implying that Germans should be ‘allowed’ to criticise Sharon’s policies and to state their true opinions. As mentioned, criticism


of Sharon’s policies is not unknown in Germany and so would seem permissible’ rather than taboo. Yet it was the interpretation of Möllemann’s comment and its association with Friedman that touched a taboo, that is how much criticism Germans are ‘allowed’ to voice about Jews or Israel bearing in mind the Nazi past. In a sense, a taboo was created by alluding to this past. The controversy was further evidence of the dominance of the negative national layer of interpretation of the Nazi legacy. The assumption that German criticism of Jews has an anti-semitic motive indeed suggests that neue Unbefangenheit is itself taboo or has shallow roots. The ensuing vicious circle was illustrated by Robert Leicht: When can we finally criticise Israel? This question carries the undertone: when will we Germans finally stop having to hold our tongues? How long will we have to keep thinking about the crimes of our predecessors? Well, as long as Israel exists, for this state is only there because the actions of us Germans during the NS period led to its rapid foundation. And so this circular argument continues (Zeit, 23 May 2002). Möllemann himself raised the spectre of the Nazi past by stating that barely anyone in Germany dared publicly criticise Israel because of feelings of guilt: ‘The whole nation ducks away from the issue’ (FR, 31 May 2002). Harking back to Walser’s Peace Prize speech and Westerwelle’s contribution to the Nationalstolz debate, this remark wrongly implied that Germany is constantly battling with and being punished for the Nazi past. Furthermore, the assertion that Germany is obliged to maintain silence on certain issues not only confuses anti-semitism and anti-Israeli feeling, but also gives the unfortunate impression that if Germans were ‘allowed’ to speak freely they would voice anti-semitic as well as anti-Israeli statements. According to Richard Herzinger: The inhibited notion that one is not allowed to say certain things as a German tends to provoke the opposite reaction. In addition, it implies that Germany’s pro-Israel stance is false and that one would actually say something different were one not burdened by historical guilt (Zeit, 9 May 2002). One could conclude that a taboo is deliberately imposed in Germany to mask negative opinions of Israel (or Jews). Möllemann’s comment could be taken to mean that this taboo is imposed by the Central Council of Jews. Thomas Haury perceived the following logic, tracing a link with secondary anti-semitism: Möllemann gives a virtuoso performance […] in anti-semitic and nationalist sentiment. In his opinion, the media influence of the Jews,


personified by Michel Friedman and the ‘feelings of guilt’ perpetuated by Jews, is so extensive that no one in Germany, not even the Foreign Minister, can say what they actually think. Möllemann portrays himself as the innocent who is persecuted by Jews, as someone who does not let unjustified accusations of anti-semitism stop him from voicing the views of the people. Such a populist approach clearly points to a secondary – and specifically German – anti-semitism (FR, 31 May 2002). Haury’s reference to the media suggested that Friedman, a prominent media figure, was viewed as one of the Meinungssoldaten whom Walser held responsible for perpetuating a negative narrative on the Nazi legacy in Germany in order to muzzle ‘true’ public opinion. However, as was made apparent with Walser’s Peace Prize speech, the Meinungssoldaten are not necessarily Jewish; it is the non-Jewish German media that is primarily responsible for posing an uncomfortable reminder of the Nazi past and thus for imposing taboos. It would be too much of a generalisation to suppose that Möllemann was speaking for ‘all’ Germans who felt unjustly bound by apparently Jewishimposed taboos. However, Herzinger did make a legitimate point in this context. In his view, it goes without saying that Germans are ‘allowed’ to criticise Israeli policy. However, the problem is that Möllemann and those of a similar mindset imply that Israel (=Jews) are responsible both for the crisis in the Middle East and for installing a ‘taboo zone’ in Germany which plays on German guilt for the past in the attempt to deflect criticism of current Israeli policies. This can easily be interpreted as anti-Jewish sentiment (Zeit, 23 May 2002). Rensmann and Funke were right to point out that the real taboo at stake in this dispute was not that of criticising Jews but of anti-semitism in Germany (Weissberg-Bob 2002: 40–1).

Reversing the victim-perpetrator distinction Herzinger’s point above, along with Haury’s reference to ‘Möllemann as the innocent who is persecuted by Jews’, coincides with another aspect associated with the Möllemann debate, that is a reversal of the conventional victim-perpetrator distinction in post-war Germany. Whilst Finkelstein accused American Jews of exploiting the Holocaust at the expense of Germany, Möllemann could be seen as portraying Jews as perpetrators in the Middle East and Germans as victims of a censorship on opinion imposed by the Holocaust. For Haury, the focus on Jews as perpetrators in the present is a mechanism both to justify anti-semitism and to draw a line under the Nazi past: For over half a century, anti-semitism has faced the problem of having to justify hatred of Jews in view of the millions of Jews who were mur-


dered. […] Therefore Jews are required to be perpetrators, not victims. It has been possible to evoke the new ‘Jewish perpetrators’ since the foundation of the state of Israel in 1948. One claims to merely criticise Israeli politics, not to oppose Jews. However, hostility to Israel motivated by anti-semitism differs in many respects to ‘normal’ criticism of any state. […] The point is confirmed by all the debates on the legacy of the past in recent years. The mechanism is always the same. The Germans are made out to be the innocent victims and the Jews the guilty perpetrators. Consequently, the Jews can again be blamed for causing antisemitism. […] Equating Israel with National Socialism produces further ideological added value within this specifically German situation. Not only are the Jews made out to be guilty perpetrators but at the same time the irksome German past is disposed of (FR, 31 May 2002). To contradict the above, it would be wrong to attribute an anti-semitic tendency to all German debates on the Nazi legacy. As we have seen, the discourse in contemporary Germany highlights the negative aspects of this legacy in order to raise the problems associated with German guilt rather than to portray Germans as victims. In addition, Haury seems to suggest that the German discourse on the Nazi legacy is a German-Jewish one, whereas this is only one aspect of many complex themes. Of the debates discussed so far, only the Peace Prize controversy led to an ‘authentically’ German-Jewish debate with the input of Ignatz Bubis; other debates have been made out to be German-Jewish debates by the media. Haury’s viewpoint also ignores the – perhaps excessive – focus on Germans as perpetrators that has developed with the emergence of the Holocaust as a dominant feature of German national memory. Haury’s comment serves to emphasise the negative aspects of the German narrative by claiming that they have been overturned. Whilst this would appear to go against the leading currents of contemporary German political culture, there are, however, tendencies to suggest a displacement, if not a turnaround, in the German victim-perpetrator narrative, reflecting the concept of neue Unbefangenheit, the increasing layers of interpretation of the Nazi legacy and a more individualised approach to the past. This displacement can firstly be noted in a less restricted vocabulary, which evokes comparisons between Israeli policy and the Nazi past. In previous years it would, for example, have been unthinkable to accuse Israel of an ‘unbridled war of extermination’ as the former CDU Minister Norbert Blüm did in spring 2002 (Zeit, 15 April 2002). In the same year, the American Jewish Committee commissioned a study on German media reporting on the situation in the Middle East and noted: […] anti-semitic elements which, moreover, always evoke the German past. This often occurs through projecting the criticism of fascism onto


Jews and Israel (the comparison between Sharon and Hitler). The German past is relativised in the process (Zeit, 30 May 2002). For the American-Jewish Committee this was proof of veiled anti-semitism. However, the results were perhaps less about emphasising Germans as victims or Jews as perpetrators than employing terms which are no longer just associated with Nazism to criticise the current situation. There is, after all, the tendency to draw such comparisons between past and present atrocities, as already noted with the example of the wars in Kosovo and the Gulf.

Failed Vergangenheitsbewältigung? The Möllemann debate confirmed the point that whilst the terms of the discourse on the Nazi legacy have become more open they are often tempered by the dialectic of normality. The controversy therefore fitted into the discourse on failed Vergangenheitsbewältigung surrounding Walser’s Peace Prize speech, despite the context and protagonists being at such a distance from the actual Third Reich generation. Karin Weimann viewed the debate as evidence that most Germans wished to turn their backs on the Nazi legacy and placed it in the context of a relativisation of history exemplified by emphasis on German victimhood. She also asserted that guilt for Nazism has been denied or repressed within individual families (Weissberg-Bob 2002: 83). Whilst this was a common assessment in the 1960s, it wrongly suggests that the Nazi legacy is ‘inherited’ in the sense of collective guilt being passed on from one generation to the next. Moreover, with the passage of time direct experience of the Nazi past is increasingly lacking within families. Weissberg-Bob also drew an inappropriate link between the Möllemann debate and the past: This aggressive public debate again showed the belated emotional impact of National Socialist destruction on the second generation, as well as on the grandchildren of NS perpetrators, of so-called ‘fellow travellers’ [Mitläufer] or ‘bystanders’, or of those formerly persecuted, the Nazi victims (Weissberg-Bob 2002: 19). To contradict this viewpoint, not only was the pretext of the Möllemann debate a contemporary situation rather than the Nazi past, but the debate was conducted by a generation that is less, not more burdened by the Nazi past and one guided by cultural rather than communicative memory. Weissberg-Bob’s interpretation of the Möllemann debate suggests a continuation of the critical narrative of the generation of 1968. However, despite the constants in the national discourse, it cannot be assumed that this generational discourse will be retained in the same form by the next generational community of memory.


Political consequences As the Möllemann debate was associated with a perceived shift to the right it required a political response. Claudia Roth from the Greens expressed concern that apparently anti-semitic rhetoric had been used by a political leader for the first time in the Federal Republic: ‘We do not want to live in a country where “champagne anti-semitism” enters political circles’ (Weissberg-Bob 2002: 60). Möllemann’s comments did associate the FDP with the views of the ‘New Right’, although this was not the first time that his party had been linked with right of centre views (see Spiegel, 3 June 2002). Westerwelle did not help matters with the dubious claim that his party sought to help the democratic process by winning over ‘protest voters’ who would usually vote for the far right (FTD, 25 May 2002). Like the Nationalstolz debate, the Möllemann affair attained political prominence and had its political uses, especially as it took place in a general election year. Both the SPD-Green coalition and the CDU-CSU accused the FDP of using anti-Israel and anti-semitic devices to target far right voters and publicly distanced themselves from such tactics. A number of surveys suggested that the FDP’s reputation had been damaged by the affair (see, for example, Spiegel, 10 June 2002). Just before the election in September 2002, Möllemann then re-ignited the ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’ with a controversial campaign flyer, which expressed his wish to see an independent Palestine and again criticised Sharon, Israeli policy and Michel Friedman. This led Möllemann’s own party to call for his resignation. The flyer was also associated with a party funding scandal. Möllemann claimed that he had financed it with his own resources but it was alleged that a special account set up to pay for the flyers contained illegal (undisclosed) party donations. Möllemann finally resigned as chairman of the FDP in North-Rhine Westphalia and vice-chairman of the FDP on 20 October 2002. He committed suicide in June 2003 whilst being investigated for fraud and tax evasion. The same month, Friedman himself was embroiled in controversy when it was alleged that he had taken cocaine in the presence of Ukrainian call girls smuggled into Germany as part of a prostitution ring. He was charged with cocaine possession and resigned from all of his public offices, including that of ViceChairman of the Central Council of Jews in Germany. The widely publicised scandal dealt a severe blow to Friedman’s credibility, not least because of the morally rigorous stance he had adopted when interviewing politicians during his TV talk show Vorsicht Friedman! (Look out – Friedman!). The political response to the Möllemann affair confirmed the existence of checks and balances installed in the post-war Federal Republic. The focus remained on maintaining the status quo of German-Jewish relations rather than addressing ‘taboo’ issues. That these issues could potentially tarnish Germany’s image was indicated by a speech given by Joschka Fischer on 29 May 2002 upon receiving an honorary doctorate from the University of


Haifa. Realising perhaps the need to build bridges after the Möllemann affair, he insisted that Israel could rely on Germany as a partner and friend and expressed shame that Jews might feel uncomfortable in Germany. His words mirrored the conventional left-liberal view of Vergangenheitsbewältigung: I feel ashamed when Jewish compatriots in my country feel abandoned again. And I feel even more ashamed when German Jews today seriously ask themselves whether it was a mistake to stay in Germany. […] An understanding approach towards the survivors and their children, towards their sensitivity and vulnerability has nothing to do with establishing so-called ‘taboos’. It is rather about our duty, a duty which has applied to all democrats in my country up to now. […] Our history teaches us that all forms of anti-semitism must meet with our firm resistance […] The response to the darkest chapter of our history can only be a positive one in two respects: first, a growing Jewish community in Germany which can live in safety and peace, and second an Israel where people can live safely, free from terror and violence (Fischer 2002). Like Walser and Bubis before him, Möllemann declared that he had received thousands of letters of support. Yet did the Möllemann affair reflect an increased anti-semitism in Germany? An Infratest survey published in the Spiegel on 10 June 2002 gave no grounds for major concern, although as with any survey it is necessary to bear in mind that the views presented may be influenced by the questions asked. The main danger would seem to be the relativisation or distortion of the past, particularly among younger generations. For example, 25 per cent of those questioned stated that Israel was pursuing a Middle East policy that was little different from Nazi policy against the Jews, and 35 per cent of 18–29 year-olds saw a link between current Israeli policy and Nazi genocide. These views were not necessarily a reflection of anti-semitism but rather confirmation of the frequent (inappropriate) comparisons made between past and present atrocities. After all, the young people who criticised Israel the most were also the most critical of anti-semitism. Moreover, the vast majority of respondents (76 per cent) stated that Israelis and Palestinians were equally to blame for the conflict in the Middle East. The obvious conclusion to be drawn is that younger generations in particular do not, in fact, see the German past as a hindrance that prevents them from voicing their views on Israel. Nevertheless, some taboos remain. Whilst 70 per cent of those questioned said that Germans should be allowed to criticise Israeli policy, a fairly large minority of 29 per cent said that they should refrain from doing so because of Germany’s historical responsibility. Almost six decades since the end of the Second World War, more and more Germans considered that they had a particular


responsibility towards the Jews (49 per cent; a 16 per cent rise compared to a survey in 1991). At the same time, 71 per cent of Germans said that they did not dare give a truthful opinion about Jews; a rise of 7 per cent compared to 1996. This answer of course suggests a loaded question: it is possible that respondents were afraid to state what they truly thought for fear of being branded anti-semitic. Given the sensitivities of the topic, the results of the survey were, not surprisingly, contradictory. One explanation could lie in a confusion of terminology and associations: whilst ready comparisons are made between Israeli and Nazi crimes, mention of Jews provokes an association with the Nazi past and the Holocaust.

Tod eines Kritikers: the second Martin Walser debate The political squabble surrounding Möllemann’s comments was extended into the cultural sphere with the controversy surrounding Martin Walser’s novel Tod eines Kritikers (Death of a Critic). The FAZ was due to publish extracts from the novel in June 2002, prior to its publication. However, editor Frank Schirrmacher published an open letter to Walser in the newspaper on 29 May stating his refusal to do so, deeming the book ‘a document of hatred’ full of anti-semitic clichés. Schirrmacher’s letter provoked an immediate reaction in the press. As with Finkelstein’s The Holocaust Industry, the subsequent debate was initially based solely on Schirrmacher’s opinion, as reviewers had not yet seen the book. To sum up the plot, the novel concerns a famous literary critic, André Ehrl-König, who has his own TV review show where he praises or damns new books. During one of the shows he condemns a new publication by the author Hans Lach. Lach later gatecrashes a party at Ehrl-König’s villa and launches a tirade against him before being ejected. Ehrl-König disappears the same night. His blood-stained yellow cashmere pullover is found in his abandoned Jaguar and a murder hunt is launched. Lach is eventually arrested and confesses to murder, but Ehrl-König’s wife then says that she was the culprit. Ehrl-König ultimately turns up alive and well, having spent the past week with his lover. Lach later runs off to Fuerteventura with the publisher’s wife. Whilst the above merely suggests a rather implausible mix of adventure story, romance, comedy and thriller, Schirrmacher’s criticism centred on the fact that Ehrl-König was Jewish and an obvious caricature of the Jewish ‘pope of literature’ Marcel Reich-Ranicki. Reich-Ranicki had his own highly successful TV book review programme, Literarisches Quartett and had narrowly escaped death in the Holocaust. It was Ehrl-König’s Jewishness and the death motif that offended Schirrmacher, who considered Walser to be ‘fantasising about murdering a Holocaust survivor’ (FR, 31 May 2002). To back up his argument, Schirrmacher cited certain lines in the book which,


in his opinion, are reminiscent of anti-semitic propaganda. One of the most contested passages was that in which Lach declares ‘The retaliation will commence at midnight tonight’ (Walser 2002: 48), which echoes Hitler’s words before the Nazi attack on Poland in 1939. In his letter to Walser, Schirrmacher wrote: […] this is not about the murder of a critic as a critic […] It is about the murder of a Jew […] Adolf Hitler’s declaration of war on Poland, which you parody so ridiculously in your novel, was also a declaration of war on Marcel Reich-Ranicki and his family, who were living in Poland at the time (FAZ, 29 May 2002). Following Schirrmacher’s lead, the Feuilletons spent weeks analysing the potentially anti-semitic content and impact of the novel (on the debate and associated scandal, see Borchmeyer and Kiesel 2003; also Butler in TLS, 19 July 2002). It should, however, be noted that the controversy and the subsequent commentaries were provoked by interpretations of a work of fiction, which was largely read through a political prism. The verdict was mixed, but most critics regarded Tod eines Kritikers as a bad book rather than an anti-semitic one. One of the few critics to treat the book in aesthetic terms, Thomas Steinfeld, for example, did not see EhrlKönig’s Jewishness as an integral theme and considered the character in literary rather than biographical terms (SZ, 31 May 2002). This perspective was consolidated by Gustav Seibt, who pointed out that EhrlKönig had already appeared in Walser’s 1993 work Ohne einander (SZ, 31 May 2002). Other critics treated the book as a roman à clef. Lothar Müller viewed the novel as a vicious attack on Reich-Ranicki and other media critics, although not an anti-Jewish work (SZ, 31 May 2002). For Ulrich Greiner, Walser would have been anti-semitic had he caricatured Reich-Ranicki because he is Jewish but he did so although he is Jewish (Zeit, 6 June 2002). Some critics, however, accused Walser of deliberately evoking the Nazi legacy and playing with anti-semitic clichés. Reich-Ranicki himself not only declared the novel ‘poor literature’ but perceived a ‘really obvious anti-semitic outburst’ (NZZ, 31 May 2002). Such assessments were typical in that they often went beyond the framework of the novel to present a critique of contemporary German political culture. For Marius Meller, Walser was not only playing irresponsibly with anti-semitic clichés in the attempt to settle personal scores with Reich-Ranicki, but had also drawn a direct link in the novel between the neurotic sense of guilt and shame continuing to disturb the German psyche and individual and collective fantasies about committing murder. Accordingly, the ‘German question’ formed a distasteful motif in the novel (FR, 31 May 2002). As a further example, Uwe Wittstock saw the book as more than just revenge on a


powerful and unpopular critic. In his view, it represented a deliberate breach of the post-war taboos already evoked during the Möllemann debate: On close inspection the novel poses the question as to whether the uninhibited German approach towards the Jewish community has now gone so far that a Jew who suffered in the Holocaust can be clearly portrayed as a caricature and a target for murder fantasies. Of course Jews are no better people than anyone else […]. However, the critic André Ehrl-König in Walser’s novel is not a person but a corrupt, vulgar, vain, randy monster. He personifies a Jew as a figure of hate. Walser has thereby crossed a boundary of post-war German history – and Walser is far too intelligent and experienced a writer not to notice this. He wanted to cross the line and he wanted the associated political scandal (Welt, 4 June 2002). The last sentence is significant. Walser’s response to his critics did little to contradict the claim that he had deliberately provoked a scandal, from which he and his publisher profited: Suhrkamp brought forward the publication date and the novel became a bestseller. Unlike with his Peace Prize speech, Walser was ready to defend the novel in the media, taking part in a number of interviews. However, he rejected the claims of anti-semitism or playing on German relations to the Holocaust, insisting that no one at his publishing house had considered the book anti-semitic (see the interviews with Walser in Spiegel, 3 June 2002; and taz, 11 June 2002). Walser turned on the media for its constant criticism of how individuals dealt with the National Socialist past, echoing his Meinungssoldaten claim: I would never, never, ever have thought that this book would be associated with the Holocaust. If I had, then I would never have written it. […] If you always interpret sentences, wherever they are written, in terms of the Holocaust, then rather a lot of sentences will seem very strange, I can assure you of that (FR, 31 May 2002). Walser insisted that he had merely written a satire of the media industry, where the author is powerless and the critic all powerful, and rightly pointed out that the murder never actually takes place in the novel. He admitted that Ehrl-König was modelled on Reich-Ranicki, but claimed that the criticism was related to his profession and character rather than his Jewishness (see the interview with Walser in taz, 30 May 2002; and Walser’s article in SZ, 31 May 2002). As a novelist, Walser is of course not bound by conventions that curb, say, a politician’s expression of views. In addition, he may have wished to take literary revenge on Reich-Ranicki, who has often criticised Walser’s


work. However, as Elke Schmitter writes, whilst a satire usually gives its author free rein, it is difficult to write a satire about Jews without being accused of anti-semitism (Spiegel, 3 June 2002). This especially applies to Walser in the wake of his Peace Prize speech. The public now almost expect him to pronounce anti-semitic views, a clear example of the distinction between what is said, how it is interpreted and what is deliberately read into it. Whilst his views in the Paulskirche speech could be defended as a plea for the validity of personal memories of the Nazi past, it is hard to believe that the motives behind Tod eines Kritikers were entirely innocent. Although this is not an antisemitic novel, Walser nevertheless provided a framework that allowed for such an interpretation. The question remains as to whether his motive was to create publicity, take revenge on Reich-Ranicki, satirise the media industry or to challenge taboos. The reception of the novel did seem to suggest that it is impossible for Germans to write about Jews without the connection promptly being made with the Holocaust. As with the Peace Prize controversy, Walser did not help his own cause. He stated that Schirrmacher was himself antisemitic for picking out certain terms in the novel and compared his methods to those of Goebbels (FR, 31 May 2002; NZZ, 6 June 2002). He had, moreover, previously said of Reich-Ranicki: ‘The authors are the victims and he is the perpetrator. Each author whom he treats in this way could say to him: Herr Reich-Ranicki, in this relationship I am the Jew’ (SZ, 31 May 2002). Such comments suggest a deliberate attempt to reverse the conventional victimperpetrator distinction.

Parallels with the Möllemann debate The controversy over Tod eines Kritikers revisited the views of Vergangenheitsbewältigung expressed during the debate on Walser’s Peace Prize speech, even though the book did not concern remembrance of the Nazi past. As with the Peace Prize, this dispute was also less about content than context, centring on whether Walser, and in turn German society, were anti-semitic. It fanned the flames of the Möllemann debate and perhaps would not have been as controversial without the preceding political ‘AntiSemitism Dispute’. There were differences between the two sides of the ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’: Tod eines Kritikers was said to exploit anti-Jewish clichés from the past whereas the Möllemann debate stemmed from contemporary politics. However, both explored some parallel themes, including a perceived political and intellectual ‘shift to the right’, the notion of failed Vergangenheitsbewältigung and the challenge to taboos. With regard to the ‘shift to the right’, Thomas Assheuer thought the novel followed the pattern set by Walser’s Peace Prize speech: Walser has written a score for long-standing views and given them a voice. […] things are now being said that the far right has always


thought, namely that a self-confident nation will only be possible once memory of Auschwitz is buried permanently as a specific Jewish memory (Zeit, 6 June 2002). Assheuer was wrongly implying that a theme of Tod eines Kritikers was an attempt to draw a Schlußstrich under the Nazi legacy. Moreover, the voices Assheuer referred to were certainly absent from the broader media debate, which used Möllemann’s comment and Walser’s novel as a springboard to question the success of German Vergangenheitsbewältigung, thus departing from the original context of both. Consequently, the 3 June issue of Der Spiegel produced a front cover featuring a picture of Hitler and the caption ‘Playing with fire. How much past can the present take?’ The associated article referred to a ‘risky game with German history’ and a ‘dispute about how to deal with the past’ and perceived a strategy to break down the taboo associated with the Holocaust, even though neither Möllemann nor Walser had referred to it directly. The 6 June edition of Stern also considered the issue of taboos with the headline: ‘What are we allowed to say in Germany?’ At first glance, the headline suggests exasperation at the muzzle of political correctness in Germany. However, it is useful to revisit this question. In an article in the Süddeutsche Zeitung (7 June 2002), Habermas considered that although the ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’ was led by a younger generation, the notion of breaking taboos merely reflected an old narrative, that is the idea that Germans, burdened by allegations of collective guilt, still had to find a more open approach to their history by liberating themselves from the ‘taboo’ of the Holocaust imposed by the Allies after the war. In his view, the accusations of anti-semitism were not about breaking taboos but rather a feared threat to the system of values anchored in the Federal Republic. This would suggest the continuation of the negative national narrative from one generation to the next. However, Habermas welcomed the change towards greater openness in the discourse. He asserted that it had taken a determined political struggle and generational change to finally liberalise published opinion and the mentality of large sections of the population in Germany. The widespread condemnation of anti-semitism did not then reflect blind opposition but the result of collective learning processes. Habermas’s perspective would allow a link to be made between neue Unbefangenheit, the principles of Leitverantwortung and a more mature political culture.

A clash of Meinungssoldaten The second Walser debate was very much driven by Meinungssoldaten and in this sense confirmed the view of the media industry Walser said he wished to portray in the novel. Paradoxically, of course, Walser’s profile as a ‘voice of the nation’ puts him too among the ranks of the


Meinungssoldaten. This debate can be said to reflect the opposition between different groups of Meinungssoldaten, in turn reflecting different interpretations and agendas concerning the Nazi legacy. Whilst Walser’s Peace Prize speech had criticised a group which perpetuated a punishing narrative on the past, this group itself accused other Meinungssoldaten of attempting to draw a line under the past. Schirrmacher’s motives should be questioned as much as those of the author. He insisted that he had to go public to avoid the claim that Reich-Ranicki wanted to ban the novel (FR, 3 June 2002). However, one wonders why he did not voice his criticisms in private to the publisher rather than in an open letter that would guarantee a debate – not to mention publicity for himself and his newspaper. For Peter Michalzik, the question whether or not Walser was anti-semitic was disappearing in the mire of a debate dominated and prescribed by a group of intellectuals: We are dealing with a group that is better primed than the German football team. […] Its members have long provided an influential voice in the public discourse in Germany, to their own and the country’s advantage. As long as one can remember they have been accustomed to directing the Feuilleton controversies that revolve around this group. […] Personal animosity and insults play just as important a role as matters of content (FR, 31 May 2002). This point, which echoes Walser’s criticism of the Meinungssoldaten, is not unjustified. In claiming that Walser was motivated by anti-semitism, Schirrmacher was setting the agenda for the debate. This backs up the view that the real issue was not anti-semitism but who controls the debate and according to which parameters. Ulrich Greiner described the general atmosphere of suspicion, whereby according to Schirrmacher anyone who did not consider Tod eines Kritikers anti-semitic was himself anti-semitic, but according to Walser anyone who did consider the novel anti-semitic was anti-semitic: ‘Seen in these terms, everyone is anti-semitic in Germany’ (Zeit, 6 June 2002). Hans-Ulrich Jörges rightly stated that the tone set by the ‘Schirrmacher’ group of Meinungssoldaten was over-exaggerated: The alarm sounded by the political and media elite is so loud that it would seem as if all the barriers to Jewish hatred had been broken down and a new disaster were wafting up from the bloody German primeval soup (Stern, 6 June 2002). However, he did note the influx of readers’ letters following the pattern ‘finally someone has spoken out…’ (although this in itself raises the question as to who selects the letters to be published). The campaign of the Meinungssoldaten may then have backfired in injecting too much ‘political correctness’ into the discourse on the Nazi legacy. Jörges drew the interest-


ing conclusion that Walser and Möllemann were not linked by antisemitism, but by the desire to break the grip of the generation of 1968 on this discourse: [Walser and Möllemann] are fighting a battle against the thought police of political correctness. This battle is defined by the undoubtedly stimulating question: What is one allowed to say in Germany – who establishes which taboos? (Stern, 6 June 2002) Yet it is clear that the ‘thought police’ are not composed exclusively of members of the generation of 1968: this would go against the neue Unbefangenheit propounded by the leaders of the Berlin Republic, for example. The ‘thought police’ is rather, as in the first Walser debate, a loose grouping of like-minded individuals, possibly of different ages and political backgrounds. For Natan Sznaider, Germany’s ‘new responsibility’ for maintaining human rights within the globalised narrative of Auschwitz provokes a conflict between those who wish to maintain the German monopoly on guilt and those who wish to liberate themselves from guilt and indeed give free rein to anti-semitic views (FR, 10 June 2002). This suggests that neue Unbefangenheit is a double-edged sword. During the ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’, the neue Unbefangenheit in the German discourse was still tempered by the boundaries of the dialectic of normality. The question remains as to how far the boundaries of neue Unbefangenheit should be allowed to stretch and, by association, where these boundaries end and a blurring of historical accuracy begins. Peter Steinbach has voiced the concern that Germany is losing the historical understanding that dominated earlier Vergangenheitsbewältigung debates. He fears that if opinions start to replace facts then there may be a return to the views of those whom Adorno called the ‘unteachables’ (Unbelehrbaren) who in the early post-war period equated the murder of the Jews with the Allied bombing raids on Germany: in other words a return to a regressive national narrative (Tagesspiegel, 10 February 2001).

The debate on German victimhood The controversial turnaround in the conventional victim-perpetrator distinction discussed in the context of the Möllemann debate was to come to the fore again in October 2003, which saw the most direct condemnation of Jews so far in relation to the Nazi legacy. In a speech in Fulda, the CDU politician Martin Hohmann implied that Jews as well as Germans were a ‘perpetrator people’ (Tätervolk): ‘Do the Jewish people, whom we only perceive in the role of victims, not also have a dark chapter in recent history – or were Jews solely victims, those who suffered?’ (Hohmann 2003). He not only linked Jews with Communism and Bolshevism, claiming that they


had played a significant role in the terror of the Russian revolution, but compared Nazis and Jews (as Bolshevists) by stating that both had cut themselves off from religion. Moreover, he implied that Germans were victims of Nazism in not being able to shake off assertions of collective guilt and the label of ‘perpetrator’, despite making amends for the past. Hohmann appeared to be building on the thesis voiced by Nolte in the Historians’ Dispute, suggesting that Jews were partly responsible for the Bolshevist terror and thereby relativising the Holocaust. His remarks were publicly condemned and he became the first CDU member to be voted out of the party’s parliamentary group in the history of the Bundestag, although it must be noted that his comments did enjoy support from some CDU members. Hohmann showed himself to be unrepentant during an interview for the programme ‘Frontal 21’ broadcast by ZDF. Indeed, he cited a letter from Bundeswehr General Reinhard Günzel, which praised the speech and said that it would have struck a chord with many Germans. Günzel was immediately fired by Defence Minister Peter Struck for his ‘misguided’ comments (on the affair see, for example, Zeit, 6 November 2003; and FTD, 5 and 11 November 2003). Public reactions to the Hohmann affair were similar to those provoked by the Walser and Möllemann debates, with the stated concern that antisemitism and the Schlußstrich had entered the political mainstream coupled with a strong political – and media – backlash which would seem to negate these tendencies. It is of course difficult to establish the level of private support for Hohmann’s sentiments, and statistics can be misleading. Following a Forsa survey in the wake of the Hohmann affair, ASF, for example, issued a press release entitled ‘One in five Germans are antisemitic’. However, in the same survey 36 per cent of Germans considered German-Jewish relations to have improved.3 The sensitivities evident during the ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’ were also reconfirmed by the debate surrounding the German publication of the book After the Terror in 2003. The book, written by the American Ted Honderich, assesses the causes of the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001. It provoked international controversy for its views on the Israel-Palestine conflict, particularly the claim that Palestinian terror against the Israelis was morally justified. The German debate again focused on the ‘taboo’ of German criticism of Jews after the Holocaust. In this case, the perceived taboo was so strong that free expression was halted: the German publisher Suhrkamp (which had produced Walser’s Tod eines Kritikers) stopped publication after criticism that the book was anti-semitic (Information Philosophie 2003). At the time of the ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’ a further example of a turnaround in the conventional victim-perpetrator narrative was evident, this being the debate on German victimhood at the hands of the Allies during the Second World War. Whilst controversial, this layer of interpretation


has entered the cultural mainstream. In 1999, Winfried G. Sebald’s Luftkrieg und Literatur, a published version of a series of lectures given at Zurich University in 1997, provoked heated debate with the thesis that post-war German literature had failed to explore the theme of the devastation wrought by the Allied bombing raids. The new millennium in particular has seen an increase in publications, documentaries and debates on German wartime suffering (see, for example, Niven 2006 and Kettenacker 2003). These have chiefly focused on the fate of the expellees – the millions of ethnic Germans forced to leave their homes in Eastern Europe at the end of the war – and of German civilians affected by Allied bombing raids, although there are other elements such as the treatment of German prisoners of war and civilian experiences of occupation. A few months before the ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’ there was a debate surrounding Günter Grass’s 2002 novel Im Krebsgang (Crabwalk), which recounts the plight of German refugees and wounded soldiers aboard the Wilhelm Gustloff, which was sunk by a Russian submarine in 1945. At the end of 2002, Jörg Friedrich attracted publicity and controversy with Der Brand, a graphic account of the Allied bombing raids which was serialised in the tabloid Bild, thus popularising the debate. Controversially, Der Brand describes the suffering of German civilians using terms usually associated with the Holocaust such as ‘extermination’, ‘crematoria’ and ‘gas chambers’. The book then not only poses the question as to whether the bombing raids were morally justified but also whether the suffering of Germans during the Second World War can be put on par with that of the Jews. Friedrich was inevitably accused of revisionism and of representing extreme right-wing views. Whilst the debate on German victimhood may appear to challenge taboos, as with the Möllemann affair this taboo appears artificial. German victimhood was thematised in the early years of the Federal Republic and German expellees have had their own organisations since the end of the war. Although largely silenced at public level from the late 1960s as the narrative of Vergangenheitsbewältigung took hold, German suffering did not disappear from familial narratives. The question is why German victimhood has attracted such public interest in the new millennium and whether it represents a conclusive shift in perceptions of the Nazi legacy. Generational change has undoubtedly played a role. Hans-Joachim Noack has suggested that emphasis on the crimes of the Nazis is now passé amongst the ‘unburdened younger generation’ who are more interested in the German victim narrative (Spiegel, 25 March 2002). This interest arguably has less to do with ignoring the atrocities of the past than with exploring an aspect of the Nazi legacy that is usually silenced within the national memory narrative, and perhaps filling in the gaps in family biographies. Moreover, the combination of extra information on the Nazi past, the passage of time and the tendency towards an individualisation of memory inevitably lead to further layers of interpretation concerning this past. By consequence, a


more inclusive perspective on victimhood in the Second World War is perhaps inevitable. The interest in German victimhood can also be explained in the context of what Norbert Frei refers to as a ‘decade of witnesses’ since 1995, whereby both historical accounts and the media have placed greater emphasis on personal stories and experiences of the Third Reich than on social or political circumstances. The risk of course is that factual reality takes second place to interpretation (Frei 2005: 9–10). The narrative of German victimhood could also be seen as a throwback to the distortions in communicative memory transmission between familial generations. The memory narratives imparted to younger generations by their grandparents, who may have been too young themselves to understand the implications of the Third Reich, may well depart from the national memory narrative. Herzinger refers to an Emnid survey on how the Third Reich generation recounted their experiences of the Second World War, according to which 26 per cent of Germans helped the persecuted, 13 per cent were in the resistance, 17 per cent always spoke out against injustice, and only 3 per cent were anti-semitic, with a mere 1 per cent actually involved in Nazi crimes. Although this goes against the detailed accounts of the Third Reich period provided by schools and historical accounts, Herzinger asserts that it is hard to make the link between the two narratives at play: ‘The restructuring of historical events within familial memory means that one likens one’s self-image to the moral status of the victims’ (Zeit, 13 November 2003).4 Younger generations are perhaps readier to accept the narrative of German victimhood with the dissipation of the generational conflict on guilt. Interest in German victimhood could of course also reflect a distancing tactic: it is easier to identify with a narrative of German victimhood than to address the Holocaust. Moreover, as one possible consequence of the controversy surrounding Walser’s Peace Prize speech – and perhaps an explanation of the views of those such as Möllemann – if Germans consider themselves victims of post-war Vergangenheitsbewältigung, that is of a politically correct discourse focusing on guilt, they may welcome the narrative of German suffering (Niven 2006: 10–11). It should be noted that the debate on German victimhood has included contributions from representatives of the left-wing generation of 1968, such as Friedrich (2004) and Grass (2002), who were once so critical of the actions of their parents’ generation during the Second World War. Their involvement not only emphasises the blurring between the conventional left- and right-wing views of recent history but also suggests that the Left has to a certain extent come to terms with Germany’s Nazi past, no longer fears that it will cease to inform political culture and is aware of the need for a complete narrative on this past. It is this perspective that perhaps signals a conclusive shift in the discourse on the Nazi legacy. According to Frei, the children of the ‘perpetrator generation’ are increasingly attempt-


ing to understand their parents’ role under National Socialism in order to reconcile themselves with their own family history (Frei 2005: 15). There does appear to be a new trend in writing about the Nazi legacy, which focuses on the motivation of the perpetrators and seeks to find out the truth about the war generation’s experiences (see Bode 2005; and Lorenz 2005). Discussions of German victimhood should also be viewed in a European context. German unification and the EU accession of Germany’s eastern neighbours have contributed to a more open assessment of the treatment of Germans at the end of the war in the attempt to forge a common European history (Crawshaw 2004: 154). The discussion of German victimhood could also be a product of Legitimationskultur: references to German suffering appear more acceptable if other countries admit to the murkier sides of their past. German suffering can also find a place in the globalised narrative of the Holocaust centred on evil, suffering and human rights violations. In this respect, Joachim Günter refers to Germany’s ‘entry into international victim culture’ (cited in Taberner 2005: 152). The narrative of German victimhood is naturally not without grounds; suffering would feature in the recollections of various communities of memory who experienced the Third Reich period. An awareness of the history of the expellees in particular can provide valuable insights into developments in post-war Europe that affected millions of civilians. Moreover, it is important to note that the narrative of German victimhood does not preclude the narrative of Jewish victimhood or portray Jews as perpetrators. The overall consensus on the atrocities of the Nazi regime means that German victimhood can be discussed in addition to, rather than denying, the Holocaust and without reference to a far right agenda. The narrative of German victimhood should then ideally co-exist with the respective narratives of German atrocities, Jewish suffering and military combat, although at the same time it is crucial that it be seen in its proper context as a product of a war waged by a dictatorial German regime. There is, however, a problem in applying this sub-community of memory to the national memory narrative, as this could imply a myth of collective German innocence. Reference to German suffering in Allied bombing raids, for example, could be taken to imply that all Germans were innocent victims or images of German expellees could evoke a sense of human pity that blurs the historical context. The most obvious risk of the extension of the discourse on German victimhood is that German responsibility for the war and the Holocaust is relativised or the extent of German suffering exaggerated. There could even be a return to the 1950s viewpoint that Hitler alone was responsible for the war. In this context, Ole Frahm notes a tendency to consider Germans not just as victims of the war but also of Allied occupation policy, which blamed them for crimes against the Jews, and to imply that Germans had ‘suffered’ from the shock of the revelation of the truth about the concentration camps (Frahm 2004: 374).5


The co-existence of the narrative of German victimhood alongside other aspects of the Nazi legacy could form part of a more balanced discourse on this legacy. However, critical voices in the media have made it out to be an over-arching narrative deliberately put forward for the purposes of relativising German history, even though the consensus on the evil of the National Socialist regime is surely too strong to allow this approach to take hold. The debate on German victimhood shows how far things have come since Walser’s Peace Prize speech, where the author alluded to the criticism levelled at Ein Springender Brunnen for failing to mention Auschwitz. However, it would be an exaggeration to suggest German victimhood as a dominant narrative in contemporary German political culture: debates and initiatives concerning remembrance still retain a focus on the negative legacy of National Socialism.

A new German Sonderweg? The increased openness in the German discourse on the Nazi legacy finds some parallels in the perceptions of Germany’s international role among the country’s political leaders. Germany’s response to the September 11 terrorist attacks, for example, intimated that the National Socialist past was ceasing to be a defining force in German foreign policy. Germany’s reaction to the situation in Iraq in 2002 was further evidence of this tendency, but it also showed the continued presence of the dialectic of normality. Schröder won a wafer-thin victory in the September 2002 elections. This was largely attributed to his prompt response to severe flooding in eastern Germany and his unmoveable stance against an American-led war in Iraq. After the ‘unlimited solidarity’ he had promised to the US following September 11, Schröder used opposition to the Iraq war as an electioneering tool. Germany, like other European countries, had various reasons for non-intervention, but the German stance was significant in focusing on present-day national interests without reference to the Nazi legacy. This legacy was, however, not entirely absent from the election campaign, where some of the terminology used was reminiscent of the debate on neue Unbefangenheit. At an election rally Schröder referred to a new German Sonderweg, opening his speech with the words: ‘It is true, we have made our own way forward, our German path [deutscher Weg]’ (cited in Elsässer 2003: 13). The term deutscher Weg was originally coined by SPD General Secretary Franz Müntefering who expressed his opposition to a war in Iraq thus: ‘We will not get involved in war ventures. We are following a German path and will not be beholden to anyone’ (cited in Elsässer 2003: 12). For Müntefering the term possessed a financial dimension, implying an end to ‘chequebook diplomacy’. Schröder hinted at a domestic policy agenda beyond the issue of foreign policy, for example his


preference for the German social welfare system rather than US-style capitalism (Elsässer 2003: 13). It was decided to place the term at the core of the election campaign, probably because of widespread public opposition to the war, although perhaps also to generate a positive sense of national identity based on social democratic values. Bild published a text by Schröder entitled ‘My vision of Germany’, which restated the positive associations of Leitverantwortung: Our Germany is a confident country. It is proud of its own traditions and open to the diversity of other cultures. […] Our Germany enjoys respect and standing in the world, because we act as a partner and set an example, because we are building a Europe of the people and because we are securing and helping to protect peace and human rights throughout the world (Elsässer 2003: 14). Read in context, there is little wrong with the term deutscher Weg. As with his inaugural speech in 1998, Schröder was not promoting a nationalist agenda but rather the view that as a ‘normal’ nation Germany should take its own decisions. However, together with phrases such as ‘our Germany’, ‘the German model’ and ‘let’s get Germany to set a new direction’ (Welt, 6 August 2002) the term drew comparisons with the fraught German Sonderweg along with the unsubstantiated view that Germany following its own path (i.e. turning away from America and the west) would equate to a rise in dangerous nationalism. Jürgen Elsässer deals with the ‘new’ German Sonderweg in the 2003 book Der deutsche Sonderweg. Historische Last und politische Herausforderung (The German Sonderweg. Historical Burden and Political Challenge). The title is indicative of the dialectic of normality: if Germany is going to strike its own path, this is one that links the burden of the past with political responsibility in the present. Germany’s actions with regard to the Iraq crisis were not related to its past, but the link was made by Schröder’s critics in Germany and other countries, which suggests that the dialectic of normality is an imposed mechanism. With regard to intervention in Kosovo, Schröder had insisted that Germany did not want to follow a Sonderweg. In this case, the Chancellor’s more confident approach that did not refer implicitly to the principle of nie wieder and, moreover, went against some of Germany’s international partners, reawakened the ‘German question’. The government was taking a risk with the term bearing in mind the capacity of the opposition and the media to stir up the past. The slogan deutscher Weg was successful in the election campaign, although this was probably more due to public opposition to the war than to any revival of German nationalism. Yet ultimately the concept did not work to the government’s advantage. Germany’s position damaged relations with the


United States, which deteriorated further when Justice Minister Herta Däubler-Gmelin likened President Bush’s actions in Iraq to those of Adolf Hitler, a comment which outraged the White House and led to her resignation (Independent, 21 September 2002). When Schröder was returned as Chancellor in September 2002 President Bush eschewed the etiquette of international diplomacy in neglecting to send his congratulations by telephone. Despite rejecting accusations of nationalism, opposition to Schröder’s stance grew after the election. The press labelled him a ‘pacifist in a spiked helmet’ (Elsässer 2003: 16) and he encountered criticism from his opponents in the Bundestag and his own party, even from Fischer, for apparently abandoning one of the principles of post-war foreign policy, that is to never embark on another German Sonderweg (Elsässer 2003: 15). According to Elmar Brok, the old fears of a German Sonderweg were even circulating at EU level, threatening Germany with isolation as a result (Welt, 16 September 2002). Hans-Dietrich Genscher accused Schröder of a jingoistic emphasis on Germanness and said that the term deutscher Weg went against ‘the focus on a common European approach that has gained the trust of our neighbours’ (Elsässer 2003: 14–15). Interestingly, whilst the right had vaunted Nationalstolz in 2001, it was now opposed to Schröder’s choice of vocabulary, drawing on the nie wieder argument more traditionally attributed to the left, perhaps to underline its own more pro-American stance. Stoiber declared ‘Never again war! And never again a German Sonderweg!’ (Elsässer 2003: 16–17), whilst Kohl accused Schröder of: wickedly playing on people’s fears. […] We know that a German Sonderweg must never occur again. It is crucial for us Germans that we contribute to securing peace together with our European and American allies. […] If Gerhard Schröder proclaims a German path for obvious electioneering purposes and with recourse to old SPD-Green antiAmerican rhetoric we will long bear the consequences of this ill-advised policy (interview in Welt, 25 January 2003). The fears of a new German Sonderweg were clearly exaggerated and perhaps deliberately stoked up the febrile political atmosphere caused by Schröder’s tenuous grip on power. Germany has the right to take its own foreign policy decisions and the country has proved itself a reliable international partner both since 1949 and unification in 1989–90. The assertion that Schröder wished to turn his back on the Federal Republic’s post-war alliances totally ignored his constant references to the importance of European integration and Germany’s anchoring within Europe. Other countries openly expressed their opposition to the war; indeed one could refer to a Sonderweg adopted by the countries of ‘old Europe’ in contrast to the more pro-US ‘new Europe’. In practice, the criticism of Germany was motivated more by contemporary politics than the Nazi legacy but it also reflected the


tightrope that the governments of united Germany still have to walk when faced with this legacy. Eckhard Fuhr well illustrates this difficulty in escaping the shadows of the past: Other western nations become isolated as a result of exaggerated election campaigns. Their governments make political mistakes and damage diplomatic relations. […] However, in such cases the Germans are inevitably saddled with a debate on who they actually are. Germany may have deployed several thousand soldiers internationally, but this does not alter the fact that a clear no to military intervention in Iraq will not be seen as a political mistake but as proof of a ‘relapse’ into a Sonderweg (Welt, 26 September 2002).

6 Sixty Years On: Commemoration and a New Government

The 60th anniversary of the end of World War Two The final year of the Schröder government coincided with a major wave of commemoration marking sixty years since the end of the Second World War. The commemorations, including the anniversaries of the D-Day landings, the liberation of Auschwitz and German capitulation, were indication of the global, European and national layers of interpretation outlined thus far. Moreover, they confirmed the tendency for remembrance of the past to be marked by references to contemporary events. Each commemoration struck a slightly different tone. The ceremony at Auschwitz was decidedly international in its scope and coverage. The D-Day commemorations had a particularly European dimension in providing an occasion to reflect on the post-war development of Europe, to integrate the new EU member states from Eastern Europe into a European community of memory and to seal Germany’s rehabilitation as a reliable and equal partner in Europe. The 8 May was more about national reflections on the end of the war. The 60th anniversary commemorations were a chance for Germany to take stock of its post-war development. However, both the Auschwitz and 8 May commemorations were dominated by debates on the far right. In addition, the increased prominence of the narrative of German victimhood presented an awkward parallel narrative to the remembrance of the victims of National Socialist persecution. These were the first commemorations where this layer of interpretation featured in the public domain at the same time as open acknowledgement of German crimes. The unifying factor of these international, European and national perspectives was the awareness that these might be the last ‘major’ commemorations involving the survivors of the Second World War. The implicit question was how long the Nazi past would continue to be remembered and how long it would continue to have an impact or to play an admonitory role. By extension, in Germany this challenged the durability of the Geschichtspolitik of the SPD-Green government, which had placed the open 196

Sixty Years On: Commemoration and a New Government 197

confrontation with the legacy of Auschwitz at its core. The 60th anniversary commemorations underlined the Holocaust’s position within an international culture of remembrance. The issue was how long authentic memory of this history could be preserved, especially in view of the fact that the next generation will have no family members with direct memory of the National Socialist regime. For Bernd Ulrich, since the last major commemorations in 1995, events such as the 11 September terrorist attacks had heralded the inevitable shift of the Nazi past into history (Zeit, 27 January 2005).

The 2004 D-Day commemorations The 60th anniversary commemorations began in June 2004 with the anniversary of the D-Day landings. Germany’s role in these commemorations suggested that the principles of Leitverantwortung have aided Germany’s rehabilitation at international level. Schröder was invited to the ceremonies in Normandy as the first post-war German leader to participate in this annual commemoration. The reactions to his attendance were positive overall, with the focus placed on the democratic development of post-war Germany rather than the crimes of the Third Reich (see, for example, Spiegel Online, 7 June 2004; and Welt, 5 and 7 June 2004). These commemorations showed the instrumentalisation of the past at an international level, with comparisons being made between the war in Iraq and the Second World War and international leaders alluding to their countries’ current stance on the ‘war on terror’. Hence, the French President Jacques Chirac emphasised the importance of the UN and the American President George Bush spoke of unity between the US and its European allies (Chirac 2004a; Bush 2004). A prime focus of the commemorations was, however, the reconciliation between former enemies. Chirac praised Franco-German cooperation, whilst the UK Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said that Schröder’s presence showed the progress made in the post-war period in terms of European integration (Chirac 2004b; BZ, 5 June 2004), progress which had been further emphasised by the EU enlargement to the East one month before the D-Day commemorations. As well as representing a milestone in terms of reconciliation, the occasion indicated that Germany has been integrated into a European narrative of the 20th century rather than standing alone as a pariah nation. Schröder addressed both national and European layers of interpretation in his speeches at the D-Day commemorations. At a German-French ceremony at Caen, he emphasised Germany’s path towards democracy in the post-war period, the importance of the Franco-German alliance and the role of the two countries in the construction of a new Europe. He reiterated that Germany’s responsibility for its history translated into a particular commitment to combat racism, anti-semitism and totalitarianism, but also


stressed that Germany’s former enemies now viewed his country as a stable democracy and an equal partner: ‘I do not represent the old Germany of those dark years. My country has found the path back to the civilised community of nations’ (Schröder 2004). Interestingly, Schröder introduced a personal element into his speech by stating that he had never known his father, who had been killed in Rumania during the war. In a sense, this equated the personal consequences of the war for many of his generation with those of the other countries present. Frei was critical of what he perceived as an attempt to present Germans as victims (Frei 2005: 17). Elsewhere, Schröder went as far as to state that his attendance at the D-Day commemorations represented the end of the post-war period (see Guardian, 4 June 2004). Cynically speaking, this comment could be viewed as an attempt to put Germany on the side of the Allies, a tendency which Niven perceived with regard to Kohl’s Chancellorship (Niven 2002: 109). Yet on the other hand it was justified in view of the eastward enlargement of the EU in May 2004, which for many marked the true end of the division occasioned by the Second World War. The presence of Russian and Polish representatives at the D-Day commemorations reinforced the notion – however illusory – of a unified Europe which may have different memories of the past but shares common values and a common desire for peace in the present. Moreover, Schröder’s comment above by no means implied an end to Germany’s national narrative on the Nazi legacy. The D-Day commemorations indeed demonstrated conflicting – and shifting – interpretations of this legacy in Germany. As part of his itinerary in France, Schröder laid a wreath at an international graveyard at Ranville, which includes the graves of 300 German soldiers. He had probably wanted to avoid a repeat of the Bitburg debacle. However, he was criticised by the right-wing press, especially Bild, as well as the CSU and FDP for not visiting the graveyard at La Cambe, where German Waffen-SS soldiers are buried (BM, 6 June 2004). Schröder criticised the instrumentalisation of this sensitive issue for party political purposes (Bundesregierung 2004a and 2004b). He seemed to want to focus on the forward-looking principles of Leitverantwortung rather than the Right’s allusion to the German trauma of capitulation. In an interview with Bild am Sonntag (6 June 2004) he asserted: ‘The Allied victory was not a victory over Germany but a victory for Germany’. In addition, he stated that as Germany had learnt from the crimes of the past it had the right to contribute to peace policy in the 21st century. Pre-1945 German history cannot be written off as negative exceptionalism. However, as we have seen, the concept of Leitverantwortung is a way for the generation of 1968 to make peace with the idea of the nation, acknowledging the negative past but also pointing to post-war values and achievements. Admittedly, the resulting narrative is more akin to Verfassungspatriotismus than the conventional notion of patriotism.


27 January 2005: an international commemoration The following year, 2005, also saw the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi concentration and extermination camps. Whilst the D-Day commemorations had emphasised the bravery of the Allies against the Nazi regime but also the development of political understanding and partnership between former enemies since 1945, these commemorations recalled the utter desolation of the Holocaust and focused on the victims. By far the biggest priority was afforded to the commemorations at Auschwitz on 27 January. In line with the camp’s evolution into a global paradigm of evil, the Auschwitz commemorations were attended by world leaders as well as survivors, bringing together representatives of the liberators, liberated, perpetrators and victims. The ceremony was broadcast around the world along with harrowing images of persecution and the liberation of the camps. The fact that German President Horst Köhler was not invited to speak at the ceremony indicated the continued association of Germany with National Socialist crimes. However, this was not made apparent in the worldwide media coverage, which highlighted the international dimensions of the event. Hence, the focus was not on Germany’s role in perpetrating the genocide but on the Holocaust as the ultimate evil; this was an occasion to recall universal suffering. The BBC news coverage of the Auschwitz commemorations, for example, did not refer specifically to Germany. Media coverage also placed emphasis on the ‘need’ to remember, perhaps because, as Ian Traynor pointed out, this was the ‘largest and last such commemoration of the wickedness that humans can inflict on one another’, a ‘last act of catharsis’ for many of those present (Guardian, 28 January 2005). The risk was that the event would be viewed as a world catastrophe rather than a primarily Jewish catastrophe, although specific references to Germany did not seem necessary to comprehend the tragedy of loss and destruction at the time. Many newspapers decried the world’s failure to learn the lessons of the Holocaust, stressing that genocides have happened since the war (see, for example, Guardian, 28 January 2005). In addition, the Auschwitz commemoration to a certain extent became a political platform, which also contributed to its ‘de-Germanised’ impact. As with the D-Day ceremonies, political leaders drew parallels with contemporary events such as the humanitarian crisis in Darfur or the ‘war on terror’. The Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin for example declared that terrorism was the new fascism: ‘We can only preserve our civilisation by […] rallying against the common enemy, like we did in the second world war.’ Israeli and Jewish leaders focused on the problem of contemporary anti-Jewish prejudice and Holocaust denial, especially in Europe and George Bush also used the occasion to call for efforts against anti-semitism (all citations from Guardian,


28 January 2005). Such statements demonstrated how the past can fit a number of agendas in the present, although the use of Auschwitz as a ‘warning from history’ does not necessarily translate into direct action. That the Holocaust has entered international consciousness was confirmed when the UN General Assembly marked the anniversary for the first time at a special session in New York on 24 January 2005, acknowledging how the Holocaust had shaped its mission. The session was initiated by the Israelis with the support of the US. On 1 November the same year, the UN designated 27 January as the ‘International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust’. The associated Resolution encourages educational programmes on the Holocaust with the aim of preventing future acts of genocide, and rejects Holocaust denial (UN 2005). In his speech on 24 January, the then UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan stressed both the importance and the difficulty of learning from the past. At the time, a UN committee was investigating whether atrocities in Darfur should be classed as genocide or crimes against humanity. Annan referred to the situation in Darfur, stating that the world had failed to act on more than one occasion since the Holocaust, and warning against silence in the face of crimes carried out by inhumane regimes (Annan 2005). Significantly, whilst Annan made no direct reference to Germany as a perpetrator nation, in his speech at the UN General Assembly Joschka Fischer directly addressed German responsibility for the Holocaust, which he referred to as the ‘low point of German history’. He stressed the continued need to combat anti-semitism in Germany and openly acknowledged Auschwitz as a cornerstone of post-war political culture in Germany: As a symbol of genocide and the contempt for human life Auschwitz will always be written into the history of mankind and into the history of my nation. […] This barbaric crime will always be part of German history. For my country it stands for the absolute low point of morality, an unprecedented breakdown in civilisation. The new, democratic Germany has drawn lessons from this. It is deeply marked by the historical and moral responsibility for Auschwitz (Fischer 2005). The Auschwitz commemorations also held special significance at European level, especially in view of the recent EU enlargement. Ceremonies at EU level suggested that World War Two is increasingly seen as part of a common history of unified Europe rather than just a German responsibility. The European Parliament marked 27 January with a minute’s silence and voted on a joint motion for a resolution to commemorate the liberation of Auschwitz. There were also proposals to make the Holocaust a compulsory subject in schools and to prohibit Nazi symbols at EU level. One of the incentives for the latter was the scandal provoked by Prince Harry’s unfor-


tunate appearance in a Nazi costume at a fancy dress party in England (Tagesspiegel and taz, 28 January 2005). However, this commemoration also emphasised the difficulty in shaping a European memory narrative in view of the differing national memories and ideological perspectives at stake. The ‘wars of memory’ became clear with a dispute on the wording of the resolution. Perturbed about references to Auschwitz as a Polish camp, the Polish MEP Michal Tomasz said that the resolution should refer to death camps ‘built by the Germans’ rather than ‘Hitler’s Nazi death camps’ (Spiegel Online, 24 January 2005). This in turn provoked opposition from German MEPs, who perceived a condemnation of all Germans as Nazis. Ultimately, the German MEP Martin Schulz proposed a compromise formulation: Auschwitz was described in the resolution as ‘Nazi Germany’s death camp’ (Spiegel Online, 27 January 2005). The European Parliament Resolution on remembrance of the Holocaust, antisemitism and racism was adopted with 617 votes and 10 abstentions. The title of the resolution drew a clear link between past and present and indicated how reference to the Holocaust can underline a broad political agenda. The text deems the 27 January commemoration: not only a major occasion for European citizens to remember and condemn the enormous horror and tragedy of the Holocaust, but also for addressing the disturbing rise in anti-Semitism and especially antiSemitic incidents in Europe, and for learning anew the wider lessons about the dangers of victimising people on the base of race, ethnic origin, religion, political or sexual orientation, or social classification (EP 2005). The proposal to establish 27 January as European Holocaust Memorial Day would provide an institutional basis for these aims. Different layers of national interpretation were also clear in the statements made in various European countries to mark the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. In line with Legitimationskultur, there were declarations of responsibility for past crimes. Among others, President Ferenc Gyurcsany of Hungary criticised the behaviour of his country’s government during the war, when 350,000 Hungarian Jews were murdered at Auschwitz (Spiegel Online, 27 January 2005), Chirac inaugurated a new Holocaust memorial museum in Paris, and the Italian Foreign Minister Gianfranco Fini stressed Italian responsibility for the persecution and murder of Jews during the war (Spiegel Online, 26 January 2005). However, some declarations caused controversy. Andreas Mölzer, an Austrian MEP from the right-wing Freedom Party, denied that his country bore responsibility for the Holocaust and walked out of the European Parliament vote on the Auschwitz resolution (Spiegel Online, 27 January 2005). In addition, no members of the Austrian government were present at the ceremony in Auschwitz.


In the UK the Holocaust Memorial Day ceremony was led by the Queen. Stephen Bates described the ceremony as a mix of ‘profound religious reflection’ and ‘incongruous banality’ with emotional music and readings but also reflections by Sven Goran Eriksson (Guardian, 28 January 2005). This ceremony was more about the Holocaust as a universal evil than national identity. However, it was bound up with two events that linked the Holocaust to a national perspective: firstly, the scandal caused by Prince Harry wearing a Nazi costume, and secondly comments by the London Mayor Ken Livingstone, who refused to apologise after likening a Jewish reporter to a concentration camp guard. Both caused strong reactions and showed that debate on the legacy of the Holocaust can take place in a decontextualised forum, without reference to Germany. The 2005 Holocaust Memorial Day also revealed the potential for ‘wars of memory’ within a country. The Muslim Council of Britain said that the commemoration should instead be called Genocide Memorial Day so as to make no distinction between genocides and to focus on current human rights abuses (Guardian, 27 January 2005). There was also evidence of the instrumentalisation of the Holocaust for a national political agenda. The Sunday Telegraph published an editorial on 23 January 2005 associating Nazi policies on sterilisation with the UK rules on abortion which, it claimed, were close to the ‘moral abyss’ of National Socialism. The ‘de-Germanised’ European and international narratives evident at the 27 January 2005 commemorations could have been used by Germany to draw a line under its specific responsibility for the Holocaust. However, in a speech to the International Auschwitz Committee – so, like Fischer, to an international audience – Schröder made no attempt to veil this responsibility. Indeed, he rejected the ‘old talk of “the demon Hitler”’, stressing that ‘Nazi ideology was willed by people and carried out by people’ (Schröder 2005). Luke Harding regarded this shift away from any abstract notion of evil as a ‘ground-breaking admission’ (Guardian, 26 January 2005). In the same speech, Schröder declared that the memory of war and genocide was part of our constitution […] it is part of our national identity. […] The memory of the National Socialist period is a moral duty. We owe this not only to the victims, the survivors and their families; we also owe it to ourselves. Schröder’s speech summed up the SPD-Green government’s attitude to the Nazi past: Germany was not afraid to acknowledge its crimes but nor to praise post-war Germany either. He stressed the importance of combating neo-Nazism and relativisation of the Holocaust, but also stated that Germany was confronting its past at all levels of society and spoke proudly of the growth of Germany’s Jewish community. President Horst Köhler also


emphasised the positive and negative aspects of the Nazi legacy in an emotional speech at the Knesset in Jerusalem which was, however, boycotted by some members of the Israeli parliament as he spoke in German. Köhler also deemed the Holocaust part of German identity. He emphasised the need to preserve the story of the survivors and to pass lessons of the past from one generation to the next: ‘The faces of the victims must never leave us’ (Köhler 2005a). However, he also praised the development of relations between Germany and Israel. In Germany, the Auschwitz commemorations were an occasion for national self-reflection on the significance of the anniversary. Bernd Ulrich acknowledged that the left-liberal interpretation of the Nazi past was now firmly anchored in German society: Auschwitz was viewed as a unique and German phenomenon for which Germans bore responsibility. However, he also perceived the risk of this past being considered ‘without feeling pain, without feeling really insecure as a German and as a human being.’ This could of course be a product of ‘normalisation’. Ulrich feared that National Socialism would become ‘folklore’, its media presentation banal and nonthreatening. Moreover, he opposed attempts at a rationalisation of this past: ‘There is one rule on dealing with Auschwitz: if it is not profoundly disturbing then something is wrong’ (Zeit, 27 January 2005). The point is an interesting one in that one of the aims of the post-war discourse on National Socialism has indeed been to explain how the atrocities could have happened.

Counter-commemoration: the far right and German victimhood German considerations on the legacy of Auschwitz in January 2005 fed directly into a political debate on present-day issues with a controversy sparked by the far right. The far right had made headlines in autumn 2004 when the NPD (National Democratic Party) won nine per cent of the votes in Saxony and the DVU (German People’s Union) six per cent of the votes in Brandenburg. Both parties thus entered their respective state parliaments for the first time. The NPD was to overshadow the commemorations marking the liberation of Auschwitz, not only fuelling the debate on German victimhood but also putting it on the side of the far right. The controversy was provoked when 12 NPD delegates in the Saxony parliament walked out of a minute’s silence for the victims of National Socialism in Dresden. In an impassioned speech, Holger Apfel, the chairman of the NPD in Saxony, accused the Allies of perpetrating a ‘bombing Holocaust’ against the Germans during World War Two and described the bombing of Dresden as ‘industrial mass murder’ (FAZ, 21 January 2005). Apfel claimed that the number of victims of National Socialism was exaggerated whilst those of Dresden were underplayed. He called for an official memorial day and


monuments to German victims as well as a foundation to the victims of air raids in Saxony. Klaus-Jürgen Menzel, also an NPD delegate in Saxony, denied German guilt and claimed ludicrously that the Second World War had been forced upon the Germans by the Americans (SZ, 26 January 2005). The actions of the NPD dominated the speeches given on 27 January, as indicated by headlines such as ‘“The largest Jewish cemetery”, 60th anniversary of concentration camp liberation / condemnation of NPD actions in Dresden’ (FR, 28 January 2005). In addition, DVU delegates were banned from a ceremony at Sachsenhausen as they had wanted to compare Nazi and Soviet victims of the camp (BZ, 28 January 2005). Criticism of the NPD’s actions dominated the Bundestag commemoration. Thierse warned that the views of the NPD were prevalent in parts of German society: ‘Neonazis are back in the German parliament. That is a disgrace and it poses an enormous challenge for us all’ (Tagesspiegel, 27 January 2005). He insisted that the Verfassungsschutz should go on the offensive against the NPD, whilst the Holocaust survivor Arno Lustiger won applause for suggesting that it was time to ban the party (Spiegel Online, 27 January 2005). As we have seen, the campaign against the far right is important for Germany’s image; and it was especially so during a week when the whole world was remembering the liberation of Auschwitz. Schröder said that the NPD’s actions did not reflect the image of a Germany that has learnt from its history, is opposed to racism and anti-semitism and seeks to prove its tolerance and openness. It was important to stress the danger the far right posed to peace within Germany but also to the external reputation of the country (Spiegel Online, 24 January 2005). Attempts by around 4000 NPD demonstrators to exploit the 60th anniversary of the British bombing of Dresden in February 2005 were condemned by press and public alike and did not succeed in disrupting the event, which was attended by some 60,000 citizens. The strong public and political reaction against the NPD is indication of an active remembrance focusing on the lessons of the past. As Kurt Kister points out, ‘nothing moves this country more than the period of its deepest disgrace’ (SZ, 28 January 2005). Yet at the same time, support for a narrative of German victimhood does not just come from the far right. Queen Elizabeth’s visit to Dresden in November 2004 led to a campaign by Bild calling for her to apologise for the Dresden bombings and for the ‘massacre’ of civilians in Dresden and other cities (see Guardian, 3 November 2004), which again turned the tables on the victim-perpetrator relationship while popularising the issue. Moreover, in February 2005, ZDF screened the two-part series Dresden, the most expensive TV drama ever made in Germany. Dresden reconstructed the destruction of the city by British bombing raids in February 1945, with some graphic scenes, including archive footage. This drama was a brave attempt to portray German victimhood during the


Second World War, but the impact was lost in an implausible and melodramatic plot featuring a shot-down British RAF pilot who falls in love with a German nurse. Also indicative of a rather contradictory attitude towards guilt and victimhood, Stern published the headline ‘Must Germans still feel guilty?’ (27 January 2005), which hinted at Phantomschmerz (the unsubstantiated view that Germans are still being unfairly punished for the Nazi past) as well as the desire for a Schlußstrich. Most of the politicians and intellectuals interviewed for the accompanying article spoke of responsibility rather than guilt for the past. However, in a Forsa study of 100 Germans commissioned by Stern, one in five Germans said that they felt personal guilt for the Holocaust and 47 per cent considered that Germans had a special responsibility towards Jews, which did not seem to back up an increased focus on German victimhood (reported in Netzzeitung, 26 January 2005). Further evidence of this ambivalence was demonstrated by Schröder agreeing to open the controversial Friedrich Christian Flick art exhibition in Berlin in September 2004. The Flick family profited from some 50,000 forced labourers during the war and never paid compensation. Schröder defended Friedrich Christian Flick, the grandson, for presenting the exhibition and said that he was undoubtedly attempting to assume responsibility for his family’s actions. Moreover, Schröder accused the numerous opponents of the exhibition of self-righteousness (Tagesspiegel, 22 September 2004). During the Auschwitz commemorations, a group of 240 intellectuals published a letter in the FAZ calling for the closure of the exhibition, criticising Schröder for drawing a line under remembrance of the Holocaust and for representing a ‘normalisation regime’ in the Berlin Republic (Spiegel Online, 26 January 2005). Yet on the other hand, Hans-Ulrich Jörges had referred to a ‘Schlußstrich from the left’, seemingly welcoming the fact that Schröder was putting an end to ‘self-chastisement’ linked to the past (Stern, 4 November 2004).

8 May 2005: a public commemoration The 2005 anniversary of the end of the Second World War was more of a national than an international affair and not as prominent in the media as the Auschwitz commemorations, suggesting that the Holocaust provides more of a unifying narrative than the end of the war itself. In Germany, the commemoration was very much bound up with active recollection of the Nazi past and Leitverantwortung, with the campaign against the far right having a direct impact on decision-making. The 8 May commemorations coincided with the opening of the Holocaust memorial on 10 May, which inextricably associated the end of the war with the Holocaust. However, this occasion was overshadowed by the NPD’s plans to march through the Brandenburg Gate on 8 May and past the Holocaust memorial on 10 May. As evidence of the layering of interpretations of the Nazi legacy, whilst


Germany was remembering the victims of Auschwitz in January 2005, there were also discussions on plans to change the Versammlungsrecht (law on the right of assembly) in order to prevent the planned NPD march (BZ, 26 January 2005). Interior Minister Otto Schily sought to ban any events which glorified or relativised the Nazi past, as well as demonstrations or rallies at sites commemorating the victims of organised persecution. The proposals were difficult to implement in view of the Basic Law, which established the right of assembly (Versammlungsfreiheit) as a reaction against National Socialist repression. Nonetheless, on 18 March 2005 the Bundesrat adopted the Bundestag’s bill on a stricter Versammlungsrecht, according to which rallies that dishonour the victims of persecution are prohibited at historically significant sites, including all Gedenkstätten and the Holocaust memorial. In addition, the criminal law on incitement was extended so that not only Holocaust denial or relativisation are punishable but also public glorification, justification or relativisation of the National Socialist regime (Bundesregierung 2005a). Once more, the move was partly initiated by concerns for Germany’s image: footage of neo-Nazis marching through the Brandenburg Gate would undoubtedly have been broadcast around the world, with a potential impact on tourism and the economy in the capital. In their 8 May speeches, Schröder and Köhler referred both to Germany’s negative past and its successful path towards democracy in the post-war period. During a visit to Moscow, Schröder published an article in a Russian newspaper asking Russians to forgive the crimes of Hitler’s Germany against the former Soviet Union (Bundesregierung 2005b). By contrast, Köhler declared ‘We have found ourselves again as a nation. […] Today we have good reason to be proud of our country’ (Köhler 2005b). However, as on 9 November 2000, the official commemorations were very much overshadowed by a public expression of Leitverantwortung and focused very much on the present. Despite the new Versammlungsrecht, there were fears that the NPD would spoil the commemorations as it had legally registered a major rally in central Berlin on the theme of German suffering. The NPD planned to meet at Alexanderplatz and then march as far as Unter den Linden. However, the far right demonstrators were prevented from entering Unter den Linden by a group of 10,000 protesters, who refused to move, and they ultimately had to abandon their parade. The protest against the far right took place in the context of the ‘Day for Democracy’, an event organised by the Berlin Senate, left-wing parties, trade unions and churches. The day was planned as public demonstration of remembrance, tolerance and opposition to racism and xenophobia (WAMS, 1 May 2005), but also as a celebration: Germans were urged to view 8 May 1945 as a day of liberation. Celebrities, including Boris Becker, spoke at the Brandenburg Gate, where there was music and other entertainment. Roger Boyes summed up the day’s events as ‘a triumph of old Germany over new Germany’ (Times, 9 May 2005) and it certainly showed the strength of public engagement against any threat to post-war values.


From Schröder to Merkel As we have seen, the second term of Schröder’s government saw the progression of an increasingly unrestricted discourse on the Nazi legacy in Germany, although this continued to be tempered by the dialectic of normality. The free discussion of taboos such as secondary anti-semitism took the dialectic of normality one stage further: normality in the present was countered by reactions to Vergangenheitsbewältigung rather than to the Nazi past itself. Neue Unbefangenheit was perhaps not such a dominant feature of the Schröder government as it was made out to be, especially as references to Auschwitz found continued reference in political decision-making. However, there were signs that the generation of the SPD-Green government had adopted a more forgiving or reassured attitude towards the Nazi past. In a 2003 interview, Fischer stated the following: Responsibility for our history forms the basis of our democracy. […] The mistrust that characterised my generation for many years […] has dissipated. However, […] the same does not apply to the need for vigilance, for example with regard to all forms of anti-semitism and the discrimination against minorities. […] I am not fearful for the essence of our country. Incidentally, I also say that to all those who either consider that such historical revisionism could work or that it will lead to fatal consequences. I no longer share this concern (Zeit, 28 August 2003). September 2005 saw general elections take place early after Schröder called, and lost, a vote of confidence. Angela Merkel (CDU) beat Schröder by a tiny margin after a neck-and-neck campaign and subsequently became Chancellor of a CDU-SPD Grand Coalition. This government’s start in power differed from that of the SPD-Green coalition: there was no talk of generational change or a break with the National Socialist past. The focus was instead on the need to find a way out of Germany’s economic crisis, especially under a potentially unstable coalition, as well as Merkel’s position as Germany’s first female Chancellor, her East German background and whether as a ‘new Thatcher’ she would orchestrate an upturn in the country’s fortunes. Merkel certainly made an impressive beginning, with the highest ratings of any post-war Chancellor. She won international approval and sought to heal the rift with the US and the UK.

Foreign policy after Fischer On 27 January 2006, the Bundestag President Norbert Lammert rebuked the Holocaust denial of the Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinajad and stressed that German history would continue to influence the country’s political actions (Lammert 2006). However, the question arises as to how


the Geschichtspolitik of the Grand Coalition differs from that of its predecessors and, in particular, whether Auschwitz will cease to be regarded as the cornerstone of German society. Merkel’s upbringing in the GDR may, after all, have led her to have a different interpretation of the Nazi past than the members of the generation of 1968 in the SPD-Green government. With the departure of Fischer, it is doubtful that German foreign policy will continue to be legitimated by references to the Nazi past. Nonetheless, in her early speeches, Merkel seemed to be continuing the rhetoric of Leitverantwortung, with a focus on democracy and freedom but also a more confident approach that promoted German interests. In her inaugural speech as Chancellor, for example, she stated ‘We can become a strong partner in Europe and the world again. […] It is clear […] that as the new Federal Government we will clearly represent German interests’ (Merkel 2005). She has also mirrored Schröder’s rhetoric on responsibility for the Nazi past. In an interview with Welt am Sonntag (20 August 2006) she stated: ‘Our policies are based on the experience that war and the contempt for human life must never occur again. It is our task to promote this policy’. As we have seen, German foreign policy no longer requires direct references to the Nazi past. However, this past inevitably entered foreign policy considerations in summer 2006 with a debate on whether German troops should be sent to Lebanon to help ease the crisis in the Middle East. In the above interview, Merkel supported intervention with reference to Germany’s ‘special responsibility’ to secure stability in Israel: ‘We cannot stand back as we have a special responsibility towards Israel. Israel’s right to existence is part of the raison d’être of the German state’. A majority in the Bundestag voted to send troops to Lebanon as part of a UN peacekeeping mission. Defence Minister Franz Josef Jung spoke of a ‘mandate of historical significance’ (Bundesregierung 2006a and 2006b). German troops were given the task of preventing arms smuggling along the Lebanese sea border. However, in the interview with Welt am Sonntag Merkel pointed out that for understandable ‘historic reasons’ there was no question of either a military operation or the involvement of German ground troops in Israel, even though the Israeli Prime Minister had said that he would support this. The decision on intervention was not without controversy: there was a brief revival of the ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’, with claims in the German media that an anti-Israel stance equated to anti-semitism (see, for example, Egmond Prill in Welt, 1 August 2006).

A return to the 1950s? At first glance, the approach to the Nazi past under the Grand Coalition would not seem to differ greatly from that under the SPD-Green coalition. Yet there are tendencies that point to a shift towards a more conventional right-wing Geschichtspolitik. This shift, however, is not necessarily attributable to a specific political agenda alone – particularly in view of the sharing


of power in the Grand Coalition – but may instead reflect other elements such as a broadening of narratives on the past. In June 2006, Merkel opened the new permanent exhibition in the German Historical Museum in Berlin entitled ‘German History in Images and Testimonials from Two Millennia’. The exhibition, which shows 1000 years of German history, had originally been planned by Helmut Kohl. Whilst the Third Reich is a major focus, the objective is also to show the positive sides of the country’s history and that German history is about more than Hitler (Bundesregierung 2006c). The exhibition also aims to present unified German history within a European context. In her speech, Merkel stated the importance of confronting the Nazi period in order to move on into the future, perhaps suggesting that this past can eventually be left behind. Most significantly, she stated the objective of presenting a ‘common history […] Hence, a common memory can be formed from a divided German memory’ (Merkel 2006). On the one hand, an inclusive narrative is to be welcomed, but on the other hand this approach entails the risk of blurring the experiences of East and West Germany prior to unification. If the exhibition to a certain extent revives the Geschichtspolitik of the 1980s, one can even refer to a ‘return to the 1950s’. In November 2005, the TV channel ARD started a series entitled ‘Our 1950s’ (Unsere 50er Jahre), which used the biographies of a range of Germans to cast a nostalgic look back at the decade of the economic miracle, with a focus on the German determination that things must change for the better. Similarly, in 2006 Der Spiegel produced a special edition on the 1950s (Spiegel Special, 1/2006), which mentioned the Nazi past but also focused on German suffering at the end of the war.1 The essential difference to the 1950s is of course that the Nazi past has now been extensively confronted in Germany.

The Centre against Expulsions As a political aspect of the ‘return to the 1950s’, the Merkel government has provided far greater support for discussions of German victimhood, especially the fate of the expellees, than was evident under the SPD-Green coalition. During the commemorations on 8 May 2005, Horst Köhler stated that all victims of the Second World War, including Germans, should be remembered: We mourn all of the victims of Germany – the victims of violence initiated by Germany, and the victims of the violence directed against Germany. We mourn all victims, because we want to be just to all peoples, including our own (Köhler 2005b). Angela Merkel was present at the annual Day of the Expellees (Tag der Vertriebenen) prior to the general elections that year. Significantly, in her inaugural speech as Chancellor, she gave political backing to the narrative


of German victimhood in supporting remembrance of the expellees through the construction of a centre in Berlin: In the spirit of reconciliation, we also want to set a visible example in Berlin in order to remember the injustice of the expulsions, and we will do this in a European context. […] This has a link with our own historical self-understanding (Merkel 2005). Merkel was referring to the controversial proposal to establish a Centre against Expulsions (Zentrum gegen Vertreibungen) in the new capital, which would document the history of German and other European expellees in the 20th century. As with the Holocaust memorial, the proposal stemmed from a non-governmental initiative. The independent Foundation against Expulsions (Stiftung gegen Vertreibungen) was set up in September 2000 and is chaired by the CDU politician Erika Steinbach, who also heads the League of German Expellees (Bund der Vertriebenen). The idea for the Foundation came from the League of German Expellees, which considered it necessary ‘not to remain with our individual suffering and personal, traumatic memories, but instead to create an instrument that serves to proscribe expulsion and genocide as a political tool’ (ZGVa). The Foundation has four main aims. The first is to create a centre in Berlin to document the history of over 15 million ethnic Germans expelled from Central, Eastern and Southern Europe after the Second World War. Secondly, the Foundation seeks to highlight the changes in the Federal Republic resulting from the post-war integration of the expellees. It describes this integration as a ‘magnificent achievement that is largely unknown in this country and has barely been confronted’, not mentioning the difficulties and initial hostility caused by this process. The third aim is to chart the history of expulsions and genocide in other European countries in the 20th century. Finally, the Foundation awards prizes to individuals or groups who campaign against the violation of human rights caused by genocide or expulsion (ZGVb). The proposal for a national-led centre was opposed by the SPD-Green government. Joschka Fischer, for example, said that he would only support such a project in a European context and rightly pointed out its dangers: We cannot speak about expulsions without mentioning what came before. Otherwise we will engage in a completely erroneous debate that claims that the Germans were also victims. Such a debate relativises historical guilt and leads to the ominous confrontation with a distorted perception of history, which neither corresponds to reality nor to our European interests (interview in Zeit, 28 August 2003). In July 2002 the Bundestag tabled a motion ‘On an Europe-oriented Centre against Expulsions’ (Bundestag 2002). The following year, President Rau


and the Polish President Kwasniewski signed the ‘Danzig Declaration’, which aimed to open up a European dialogue on the theme of expulsions. In February 2005, Culture Minister Christina Weiss established a ‘European Network on Memory and Solidarity’ to promote cooperation and reconciliation between Germany and its East European neighbours through joint research, exhibitions and museum projects. Weiss stated: ‘We want to expand the narrow national perspective and create a European perspective on the common past’ (Weiss 2005). She also emphasised that the objective of the Network, based in Warsaw, was not to focus exclusively on flight and expulsion but also to remember the National Socialist regime, the Communist dictatorships and the suffering of the civilian population. This rather ‘catch-all’ approach does, however, allow for a joint European dialogue on both victims and perpetrators. Disappointingly, only Germany, Poland, Slovakia and Hungary joined the Network upon its foundation. The November 2005 Coalition Treaty asserted the importance of dealing with the history of forced migration and expulsions and envisaged the foundation of a centre in Berlin to document this history (Bundesregierung 2005c). This was a compromise decision between the CDU-CSU and the SPD, which stated that the centre should only be established in connection with the European Network; however in practice the projects remain separate. Despite its claim to promote reconciliation and understanding between nations ‘in solidarity with all victims of expulsion and genocide’ (ZGVc), the Centre against Expulsions has caused tension between Germany and Eastern Europe, primarily because of its proposed location in Berlin and for placing German victims alongside East European ones. Poland and the Czech Republic in particular have accused Germany of focusing on national priorities, attempting to displace guilt and blurring the historical context of the expulsions (see ASF 2004a). As well as souring diplomatic relations, there have been unwelcome political consequences of the proposal for a Centre against Expulsions. In Germany, the Prussian Claims Society (Preussischer Treuhand) is considering lawsuits to settle 30,000 property claims from former German expellees concerning property in Poland seized at the end of the war.2 In retaliation, there have been proposals from Warsaw and Poznan to claim reparations against Germany for damage caused during the Second World War. As already stated, the history of the expellees is an integral part of the overall narrative on the National Socialist past for both Germany and Europe. However, it is also a very sensitive one for Germany’s East European neighbours. The proposal has understandably raised concerns that the Centre’s focus on a group of victims that includes Germans will downplay or even erase the German perpetrator narrative. A location in Berlin will inevitably highlight injustices committed against Germans during the war. The first aim of the Foundation is, as mentioned, to recall the history of German expellees, which suggests a national rather than a


European perspective. The proposed layout does little to contradict this view: the first section would cover the ‘Fate of Germans expelled from their homeland’ and contain a ‘requiem rotunda’ providing ‘space for mourning, sympathy and forgiveness’ (ZGVc). In addition, there is a problem in the juxtaposition of ‘expulsion and genocide’ in the plans, which could be interpreted as conflating Germans and Jews as victims of the Holocaust. Steinbach has also come under fire for her unmoving, and often disputed, stance on the Centre, a stance which recalls that of Lea Rosh with regard to the Holocaust memorial. A Polish news magazine went as far as to create a mock-up photo of her dressed in a Nazi uniform and straddling Gerhard Schröder (see Spiegel Online, 10 August 2006). Steinbach has deemed the Foundation ‘a purely German body’ and maintains that expulsions are a part of German identity and therefore the establishment of the Centre a German duty (Welt, 3 November 2005; Deutsche Welle, 27 October 2005). In 2003, Steinbach asserted that Schröder was ‘afraid of our neighbours’ in response to his reservations about the project. She continued: ‘Our European neighbours have to live with the fact that Germans were expelled and they should stand back if Germany wants to remember the German victims’ (WAMS, 17 August 2003). Such comments are unlikely to win over sceptics. The controversy over the Centre against Expulsions has not dampened public interest in the history of the expellees. In 2006, the exhibition ‘Flight, Expulsion, Integration’ at the German Historical Museum in Berlin documented European expulsions in the 20th century, including the Armenian genocide in 1915–17, the expulsion of Germans after 1945 and expulsions from the former Yugoslavia, along with more recent examples from Afghanistan and Africa. The expulsion of Jews was seen as a foundation of the Holocaust and the exhibition was careful to present the expulsion of Germans as being a result of the crimes of the Nazi regime. Jörg Lau praised the exhibition for giving a balanced impression that clearly defined the reasons and motives for the expulsions without serving any political agendas: ‘it never emotionalises the theme at the cost of historical truth’ (Zeit, 8 December 2005). Hence, one could feel sympathy for German expellees without losing site of the criminality of the Nazi regime, which had led to their plight. Culture Minister Bernd Neumann defined two reasons for the exhibition: Firstly, across generations in Germany there is a need for memory and knowledge about the circumstances and causes of expulsion. This interest should not be viewed suspiciously as indication of an apparent desire to reinterpret German history, rather it should be understood as a sign of the different East and West German experiences and interpretations. Secondly, the exhibition can generate a general interest in the countries of origin of the expellees […] for all of this is part of German history,


which is not just a memory for us but also an admonition for the future (Neumann 2006a). He focused on the European dimensions of the theme and declared that the exhibition and a joint confrontation with this period of history could lead to European reconciliation and understanding. Yet he also lent his support to a national Centre against Expulsions, deeming the exhibition a starting point for a ‘visible symbol’ in Berlin to remember the expulsions. The reference to a ‘visible symbol’ is problematic in recalling the intention behind the Holocaust memorial. Moreover, Neumann suggested that a rethink of history may be underway, speaking of the need ‘to question the past […] in relation to a changing present, to assess its significance for our lives today, to reflect, perhaps also to re-evaluate it’. He insisted that this had nothing to do with relativisation, but such ‘re-evaluation’ in the context of the exhibition could of course lead to an interpretation of post-war European history based on common victimhood. A second exhibition on the expellees proved much more controversial and re-opened the political debate on the Centre against Expulsions. In August 2006, the exhibition Erzwungene Wege (Enforced Paths) opened in the Kronprinzenpalais in Berlin. This exhibition was organised by the Foundation for the Centre against Expulsions. It also documented the history of expulsions in the 20th century. The CDU-CSU saw it as justification for a Centre against Expulsions: Jochen-Konrad Fromme deemed it an ‘excellent business card’ for the plans. However, the SPD was highly critical and accused the League of German Expellees of bringing the plans into disrepute (Tagesspiegel, 10 August 2006). The exhibition indeed attracted protests from both the left and right of the political spectrum. Left-wing protesters heckled Steinbach during her opening speech and carried placards declaring ‘Fight historical revisionism, don’t exhibit it’ (Spiegel Online, 10 August 2006). There was also harsh criticism from Poland, which claimed that the exhibition did not clearly describe the reasons for the post-war expulsions of Germans. The Polish Culture Minister, Krzysztof Olendzki, asserted that the exhibition ‘pushes aside the responsibility of the German state for the crimes it committed during the Second World War’ (Deutsche Welle, 10 August 2006), whilst the Polish Prime Minister, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, said that it relativised history (Spiegel Online, 10 August 2006). Writing in Die Zeit (10 August 2006), Günter Hofmann considered the exhibition an attempt to lessen the burden of German history and maintained that it was damaging to German-Polish relations. However, in the same newspaper, Jens Jessen stated that the criticism was undeserved and that the exhibition presented the history of expulsions in a European context which, after all, was also the approach taken in the German Historical Museum (Zeit, 17 August 2006). Criticism of this exhibition was more likely attributable to the opinions and politics regarding the planned


Centre against Expulsions, and especially Steinbach, than to the content itself. This viewpoint was supported by Kaczynski’s comment: ‘We would like anything associated with the name of Frau Steinbach to come to an end as soon as possible, as this does not bode well for Poland, Germany or Europe’; and Steinbach’s response: ‘We are doing our best to deal fairly and reasonably with our neighbours’ (Spiegel Online and Deutsche Welle, 10 August 2006). Whether or not a Centre against Expulsions is built in Berlin, the ‘wars of memory’ on German victimhood seem set to continue for the foreseeable future. At the end of May 2006 the Sudeten Germans held their annual meeting under the motto ‘Expulsion is genocide’ (Tagesspiegel, 31 May 2006). In September 2006, Hermann Schäfer, head of the government’s department for culture and media, opened the Weimar Arts Festival with a speech that did not refer to the victims of the nearby Buchenwald camp under Nazism but instead to the Germans who had suffered the consequences of expulsion. The speech required an official government apology (the speech is reproduced in Tagesspiegel, 29 August 2006; also see Tagesspiegel, 30 August 2006). Horst Köhler tried to make amends in his speech at the ‘Heimat Day’ of the League of German Expellees the same month, stating the need to focus on a European memory. However, his words had little effect in Poland: Kaczynski described Köhler’s very attendance at the event as ‘one of the most disturbing things to have happened recently in Germany’ (Tagesspiegel, 3 September 2006). Erika Steinbach continued to fuel the debate in pressing for the Centre against Expulsions as well as a national commemoration of the expellees and in speaking of the ‘hurtful’ Polish response to the exhibition Erzwungene Wege. It is doubtful that any narrative presented by a Centre against Expulsions would in fact displace the central focus on the negative aspects of National Socialism, especially with the dominance of the Holocaust memorial within the cultural landscape of Berlin. However, the associated debate is further indication that the ‘sub-narrative’ of German victimhood is viewed in isolation rather than as part of the Nazi legacy as a whole, and perhaps also that the national narrative does not allow for a shift in its ‘top layers’. Moreover, the manner in which the debate has been conducted has negated the chance of creating an inclusive European narrative on the theme.

The East German past – a West German concern? Another issue to gain prominence under the Grand Coalition is whether the GDR past has been dealt with appropriately and how this past should be remembered in relation to the National Socialist regime. Linked with these considerations is the question whether measures to deal with the GDR past are dominated by a West German narrative or whether there are attempts to laud


the West German process of Vergangenheitsbewältigung over an apparently deficient process in the East. As happened with the Nazi past in the 1960s, with the passage of time the GDR period is undergoing a change in perspective because of the emergence of new generations. For Ulrich Herbert: We are currently experiencing the shift from the direct confrontation of those who experienced the GDR to a professionalisation in dealing with GDR history. The number of those with direct experience is decreasing; for the younger generation, that is around one third of society, the GDR is already a transmitted history (Tagesspiegel, 15 May 2006). Herbert adds that young Germans find it difficult to comprehend the extent of state intrusion into the private lives of GDR citizens as, like the Nazi period, it is so alien to their own experiences. Moreover, the discourse on the GDR legacy has an added dimension in that many West Germans do not readily identify with the GDR past as part of their history. For Joachim Gauck, the GDR has not entered the culture of remembrance to the extent that the Nazi past did in West Germany after 1968 following discussions of guilt and responsibility: ‘we have simply not had this period of debate to create greater awareness with regard to the Communist dictatorship’ (Bundestag 2005). In May 2005 Christina Weiss, Culture Minister under the SPD-Green coalition, charged a committee of experts with the task of creating a Historical Association to Reappraise SED Injustice (Geschichtsverbund zur Aufarbeitung des SED-Unrechts) to examine how the GDR past had been dealt with in unified Germany. The committee’s findings were to be used as the basis of a revised Gedenkstättenkonzept relating to the Nazi and GDR periods, which already hinted at a comparison between the two. The committee presented its report in May 2006. The report praised the state of research and documentation regarding the GDR past but noted that there was still a division between East and West German interpretations of this past. In addition, teaching on the GDR was often neglected in schools and trivialised in the media and research and commemoration of the period were underfinanced. The committee also considered that the documentation of state repression took precedence over issues related to resistance, adaptation, ideology and everyday life under the SED dictatorship. The committee recommended a concept focusing on three areas: ‘Regime, Resistance and Society’; ‘Surveillance and Persecution’ and ‘Division and the Border’. Such a concept would, according to the report, present a differentiated picture of the SED dictatorship and its society in the historical context of the 20th century (Bundestag 2006). However, the committee’s proposals were not universally welcomed. The main criticism was that the focus on everyday life in the GDR rather than the political system would relativise the extent of repression under


the dictatorship. Hubertus Knabe, Director of the Gedenkstätte at the former Stasi (East German secret police) prison in Berlin-Hohenschönhausen criticised what he saw as an attempt ‘to provide state funding for Ostalgie’ [‘ostalgia’; or nostalgia for the former East Germany] (Welt, 16 May 2006), whilst Horst Möller, Director of the Munich Institute of Contemporary History, tartly remarked that ‘Typical for the GDR was the Stasi, not the crèche’ (taz, 8 June 2006). Yet the opposing argument could be applied: an exclusive focus on the political aspects could lead to an incomplete picture of the SED regime, and especially the resistance against it. Perhaps the motive was indeed to cast the West German state (and its process of Vergangenheitsbewältigung) in a better light. The CDU Culture Minister, Bernd Neumann, stated that confrontation with the SED dictatorship was a government priority but that the focus must be on the injustice of the regime and, moreover, ‘we must not allow the perpetrators to style themselves into victims’ (Neumann 2006b). Such insistence on the criminal nature of the SED regime marks an interesting contrast to the parallel debate on German victimhood, as if the GDR past cannot be forgiven but the German victims of Nazism deserve clemency. It also calls for an attitude that was not present in the early years of the Federal Republic, when many former perpetrators were rehabilitated. Richard Schröder made the interesting point that the debate on dealing with the GDR past had thus far been dominated by West German voices, along the lines of ‘We will master your past as we have already mastered ours’ (Welt, 8 June 2006). Such an approach not only seems hypocritical in view of West Germany’s initial failure to come to terms with its past but also inappropriate in view of the specific challenges associated with the GDR past. The discourse on remembrance of the GDR past has revealed the ‘wars of memory’ between East and West German interpretations of the National Socialist period and post-war Vergangenheitsbewältigung. One associated tendency is a conflict over the representation of the victims of Nazi and Soviet repression, which echoes the arguments raised in the Historians’ Dispute in the 1980s. In May 2006, Jörg Schönbohm, the Interior Minister of Brandenburg, provoked controversy for allegedly relativising the suffering of concentration camp prisoners under the Nazi regime. At a ceremony marking the liberation of the camp at Sachsenhausen he said that all victims of the camp should be remembered, including those ‘who were imprisoned here after 1945, just as deprived of rights as the concentration camp victims’ (Tagesspiegel, 9 May 2006), thereby alluding to the period when the camp was controlled by the Soviet secret service. One of the most vocal critics of these comments was Hans Rentmeister, who worked at the memorial site. Ironically, he later had to resign over the affair when it emerged that he had previously worked for the Stasi. The Schönbohm controversy reflected two levels of interpretation. A conventional West German perspective might argue that victims of National


Socialism should not be equated to victims of the Soviets, although an equally valid counter-argument is that the injustice suffered at the camp after 1945 should not be forgotten. By contrast, a conventional East German perspective might be unwilling to admit to the existence of postwar Soviet repression. Werner von Bebber viewed the criticism of Schönbohm as reminiscent of ‘a declaration of GDR anti-fascism that does not want to admit to the Red terror’ (Tagesspiegel, 9 May 2006). The Schönbohm incident highlighted the difficulty of adequately commemorating two pasts in unified Germany. As both become cultural memory there is a real danger of blurring the Nazi and GDR pasts into one totalitarian history. In addition, the controversy added another dimension to the discourse on Germans as victims in referring to German victims not of the Allies or the Nazis, but the SED and the Soviets.

The problems of memorialising the ‘double past’ The 2005 Coalition Treaty stated the importance of ‘appropriately considering both dictatorships in Germany’ (Bundesregierung 2005c). The challenges of representing what Niven (2002) refers to as the ‘double past’ through cultural remembrance are also bound up with the ‘wars of memory’. On the one hand, there seem to be attempts to erase memory of the GDR past, in Berlin at least. After years of debate, in January 2006 the Bundestag controversially voted to knock down the People’s Palace (Palast der Republik) – the former GDR government building in Berlin – and replace it with a reconstruction of the Prussian palace once located on the site. This is a good example of the problems encountered in deciding which aspects of Berlin’s history to preserve or highlight. Yet one could also deduce an unwillingness to commemorate the GDR, or perhaps more accurately the desire to focus on a more triumphant narrative.3 On the other hand, there is a tendency to conflate the victims of Nazism with those of the Soviet and GDR regimes, as highlighted by the Schönbohm affair. In January 2004, the Central Council of Jews in Germany and groups representing victims of Nazism broke ties with the Saxony Memorial Site Foundation following a proposed Gedenkstättenkonzept which was considered to relativise the past by linking National Socialist, Stalinist and Stasi crimes under the rubric ‘political dictatorship’ (Zentralrat 2004). The debate intensified with the announcement that the CDU-CSU wished to adopt the concept at federal level with a new Gedenkstättengesetz promoting ‘Memorial sites on the history of dictatorship in Germany – a universal concept for the dignified remembrance of all victims of both German dictatorships’ (Bundestag 2004). The proposal was criticised for seeking to relativise both the GDR and Nazi pasts under the umbrella term ‘history of dictatorship’. There was concern that the law would fail to draw a clear and accurate distinction between the characteristics, dimensions and spheres of


influence of the two regimes and instead pursue an indiscriminate narrative of totalitarianism that equated all victims (see Knigge 2004). Whilst remembrance of the GDR past and its victims does need a more concrete focus, a concept that appears to view the National Socialist and GDR pasts as two sides of the same totalitarian coin cannot adequately or accurately commemorate either past. The CDU-CSU proposal was discussed in the culture committee of the Bundestag in February 2005. Gauck urged participants not to turn the affair into a conventional dispute on left or right-wing perspectives of Vergangenheitsbewältigung (Bundestag 2005).4 Similarly, Knabe saw a danger in playing one dictatorship off against the other or drawing comparisons between victims of the Nazi and GDR regimes. For this reason, the SPD and Greens strongly opposed the proposal, also on account of the contemporary political situation: Proposals which threaten to play off victim groups against one another and which attempt to use history for political purposes must not be tolerated, particularly in view of the rise in right-wing extremism and neo-Nazism in Germany (SPD/Bündnis 90 2005). Thomas Lutz asserted that the recollection of different victim groups must be kept separate, even within an overall Gedenkstättenkonzept, whilst Bernd Faulenbach pointed out that the differing ‘weights’ of the two pasts would inevitably lead to differences in terms of remembrance. However, Knabe made the interesting point that regarding the GDR and Nazi periods in isolation may prevent young people from drawing any links from these pasts to the present or appreciating the challenges faced under both regimes. In terms of resistance, for example, he said that one should not just refer to Sophie Scholl, who had resisted the Nazis, but also mention those such as Herbert Belter, who was sentenced to death for distributing flyers in the GDR. A further criticism with regard to the CDU-CSU proposal was that public memory was being appropriated by governments, forcing a division between state and individual remembrance, which echoes Walser’s arguments in his Peace Prize speech (see Brebeck 2004). Memorial site representatives feared a ‘renationalisation of Erinnerungskultur’ which would erase the necessarily European dimensions of the remembrance of National Socialism (Knigge 2004). Opposition to a ‘renationalisation’ of memory suggests the desire to maintain a global narrative on the Nazi legacy or to preclude a German monopoly on memory. A focus on the ‘double dictatorship’ in Germany could of course prioritise German suffering and fail to emphasise the international dimensions of victimhood under Nazism compared with national repression under the SED. Interestingly, the CDU proposal also called for funding for national memorial sites commemorating German victims of expulsion and Allied


bombing raids during the Second World War. Although reported less in the media at the time, this aspect of the proposal is potentially even more controversial as it would theoretically put German victims of bombing raids and expulsions on the same level as victims of racial persecution. The CDU proposal was ultimately rejected, but in June 2006 Hermann Schäfer advocated an integrated memorial concept with three pillars: one related to the Nazi regime, one to the SED regime and one to the expellees (Tagesspiegel, 25 June 2006). This proposal again gives rise to the concern that all victims will be regarded on the same footing.

New patriotism, old neuroses: Summer 2006 Germany hosted the FIFA World Cup between June and July 2006. The official slogan Die Welt zu Gast bei Freunden, which was translated as ‘A Time to Make Friends’, indicated the desire to market Germany as a tolerant and welcoming country no longer tainted by its Nazi past. Prior to the tournament, a range of initiatives were launched at considerable expense in order to boost the country’s image. Roger Boyes referred to ‘one of the most ambitious rebranding campaigns of modern times: the selling of Germany as a country at ease with itself’ (Times, 3 June 2006). One such initiative was ‘Germany – Land of Ideas’, which showcased German inventiveness and creativity with the aim of presenting the positive sides of the country. Sponsored by the German government and industry, the initiative’s patron was President Horst Köhler, who used the term ‘land of ideas’ in his inaugural speech, and the ‘face’ of the campaign was Claudia Schiffer. ‘Land of Ideas’ highlighted German inventions such as the car, aspirin and spiked running shoes, companies such as BASF and famous Germans such as Einstein. Visitors to Berlin could see a ‘Walk of Ideas’ consisting of six giant sculptures, for example ‘Modern Book Printing’, a sculpture of books by some of Germany’s most famous authors to celebrate the invention of the printing press by Johannes Gutenberg. The initiative has continued since the World Cup.5 The rather odd campaign Du bist Deutschland (You are Germany) encouraged Germans to embrace the positive aspects of the country, fulfil their potential and pursue their dreams. A series of TV and newspaper adverts used the names of famous Germans to bring home the point. For example, the poster Du bist Albert Einstein (You are Albert Einstein) encouraged Germans to have confidence in their intellectual abilities and the determination to ‘reach for the stars’.6 Despite these efforts, the shadows of the past did start to loom with reports of an increase in far right violence in Germany, including attacks on a Turkish-born member of the Berlin Linkspartei (Left Party) and an Ethiopian-born German. In addition, the NPD planned to raise its profile by staging a number of rallies during the World Cup. The situation escalated when Uwe Carsten-Heye, the new chairman of Gesichtzeigen, stated


that blacks and Asians risked their lives by entering so-called ‘No go areas’ controlled by neo-Nazi groups; comments which were reported in the British press (for example, Metro, 18 May 2006). Yet the genuine concern that neo-Nazis would tarnish Germany’s image during the World Cup was to prove unfounded. The atmosphere in Germany during the tournament indeed ran counter to expectations. The event was not only a resounding success in terms of organisation but was also accompanied by unprecedented and visible displays of German national pride. German flags waved from balconies and cars and German supporters decorated themselves in the national colours and sang along to the national anthem. This was a patriotic celebration but without threatening nationalist undertones, the mood summed up with terms such as ‘pop patriotism’ or ‘party patriotism’ (taz, 8 July 2006). The country would indeed have seemed far less ‘normal’ had there been no German flags on display. The fact that many foreigners living in Germany had put up the German flag alongside their own national flag was interpreted as a positive message in terms of integration. One of the most obvious – and significant – effects of the celebrations was to break the association of national symbols and slogans with far right extremism. Bild became the champion of pop patriotism, thereby reclaiming these symbols for the general public. It adopted headlines such as Schwarz-rot-geil! (‘Black, red, cool!’), referring to the colours of the German flag, and encouraged its readers to compose new verses for the national anthem (Bild, 21 June 2006). Germany’s ‘new’ patriotism also went hand in hand with a shift in the country’s image abroad. Prior to the tournament, Martin Kettle was pessimistic about British attitudes to Germany: […] in spite of the noble efforts to prevent it, we face a month of waiting for the inevitable moment when the terraces or the press proudly vomit a surfeit of war-obsessed, Nazi-fixated anti-German excess onto our national living-room carpet (Guardian, 3 June 2006). However, on this occasion references to Hitler and the Nazi past were in the minority. Instead, a range of articles detailed Germany’s renaissance as a creative and multicultural country. Luke Harding noted a ‘feelgood factor’ associated with the election of Angela Merkel and the ‘new self-confidence’ of a younger generation no longer burdened by the Nazi past (Observer, 14 May 2006). Rob Hughes viewed the World Cup as ‘Germany’s moment to forget the war’ (Sunday Times, 25 June 2006) and even the Sun ran the headline ‘Love is in The Herr. England Fans Love the Germans’ (Tagesspiegel, 23 June 2006). During the tournament, the focus was on the overall friendly and tolerant atmosphere and German flag waving was seen as unusual, but not a threat. Roger Boyes saw Germany as reaching normality ‘after 60 years of shame’ (Times, 20 June 2006), a comment which indicates just how closely other


countries usually identify Germany with its Nazi past. Yet the ‘new’ Germany presented to foreign fans was certainly not one that had erased its negative history. The German media reported on foreign supporters visiting former concentration camps (for example, BZ, 29 June 2006), whilst in Berlin the initiative Berliner Unterwelten (Berlin Underground) produced an information board showing the location of Hitler’s bunker in response to frequent requests by tourists. Lea Rosh initiated a campaign for the removal of the Nazi sculptures still decorating Berlin’s Olympiastadium – one of the match venues – as in her view they glorified the Nazi past. However, Rob Hughes commented that the stadium had been ‘remodelled to display, not hide, history’ (Sunday Times, 25 June 2006). Whilst interest in Germany’s Nazi past has not abated, fans experienced a side of the country that they had perhaps not expected. The dialectic of normality was thereby presented – and perhaps accepted – as part of the country’s social and political landscape. In Germany, the so-called Patriotism Debate (Patriotismus-Debatte) occupied almost as many column inches as the World Cup itself. There was a marked difference to the 2001 Nationalstolz debate as the ‘new’ patriotism was not bound up with a political agenda or used to instrumentalise the Nazi past, but driven by the public. The issue was less whether one dare to be proud to be German bearing in mind the Nazi past, than how and why the apparent taboo on expressing national pride had been lifted. Media commentators appeared somewhat at a loss to interpret the situation. Some appeared surprised, or relieved, that Germans were capable of a patriotism that did not escalate into anything more dangerous. Others treated the mood with a good dose of irony. Reinhard Mohr, for example, wrote a humorous daily column in the online version of the Spiegel measuring the nation’s degree of patriotism on a Klinsimeter, a scale named after the German manager Jürgen Klinsmann. Reading between the lines, there were some implicit references to the ‘lessons of the past’ that sounded an underlying note of caution. In an interview with Bild, Horst Köhler welcomed the fact that Germans were identifying with the country but justified this by alluding to the politically correct notion of post-1945 Verfassungspatriotismus: ‘We are well on the way […] to becoming proud of our achievements since 1945. […] I am proud of this country, also because we have learnt from history’ (5 July 2006). This suggests that at the political level at least the new patriotism was not as ‘uninhibited’ as Angela Merkel claimed (Sonntagszeitung, 11 July 2006), although Bild ignored the subtleties and titled the Köhler interview ‘I am glad that I am no longer the only one with a flag on my car’. However, the new patriotism was not without its detractors. For example, the left-wing teaching union GEW published a pamphlet for schools entitled ‘Arguments against the Deutschlandlied (German national anthem) – past and present of a dreadful eulogy to the German nation’. The pamphlet


asserted that the national anthem relativised the German past and aroused nationalism and memories of the Second World War (Spiegel Online, 16 and 17 June 2006). The PDS politician Julia Bonk went even further by claiming that the patriotic waving of the German flag normalised the crimes of Nazism (Jungle Welt, 29 June 2006). Such comments were missing the point. One can understand why older Germans may be reticent to display national symbols in view of the taboos associated with them in the post-war period. However, the new patriotism was primarily about fans celebrating football; it neither had a political motive nor was it about rewriting history or drawing a line under the Nazi past. The mood was largely attributable to the excitement of the tournament and the unexpected success of the national football team. Indeed, a direct link was made between patriotism and the German team’s chances. Bild used the term Klinsipatriotismus (Klinsmann patriotism) whilst the footballer Christoph Metzelder said that the prerequisites for success were preparation, team spirit, luck and ‘a good dose of patriotism’ (Bild, 12 June 2006). The popular patriotism of the World Cup offered a brief respite from reality. At a time of unrest in the Grand Coalition, tax increases and continued concern about the economy, Oliver Santen declared: ‘We need this optimism’ (Bild, 13 June 2006). Jürgen Krönig was among the commentators who considered the World Cup as a step towards a more normal image for Germany (Zeit, 20 June 2006). Perhaps the implications went deeper than this. For Stefan Reinecke, the new patriotism negated the conventional left-wing view that any whiff of nationalism would signal a return to the barbaric past. Yet at the same time, he identified a ‘postnational patriotism’ born of the Nazi legacy and a fragmented sense of identity, something which guarded the country against feelings of superiority or national aggression (taz, 8 July 2006). The term ‘postnational patriotism’ may be an over-analysis of the popular displays of national pride during the World Cup. Nonetheless, it adequately reflects an acceptance of the dialectic of normality whereby one can be proud of Germany but also repulsed by Hitler. The rebranding of Germany along these lines could, as Roger Boyes puts it, ‘cut away the ground from under the feet of the neo-Nazis who thrive in an atmosphere of historical taboos and over-cautious political correctness’ (Times, 3 June 2006). Yet at the same time, the terms ‘postnational’ and ‘rebranding’ suggest the promotion of a national identity based on Germany as a product rather than according to conventional criteria. This approach was evident both in the campaigns carried out prior to the World Cup and in an number of 2006 bestsellers promoting a positive sense of national identity as a means to secure the German brand and compete in the globalised economy. These publications include Erich J. Lejeune’s Schluss mit Angst. Für mehr Vertrauen in Deutschlands Zukunft (Time to stop


being afraid. Why we should have faith in Germany’s future), Henrik Müller’s Wirtschaftsfaktor Patriotismus (Patriotism as an economic factor) and Florian Langenscheidt’s Das Beste an Deutschland. 250 Gründe, unser Land heute zu lieben (Germany’s best. 250 reasons to love our country). Langenscheidt lists 250 aspects of which Germany can be proud, from the postal service to beer to the constitution. He advocates a more selfconfident attitude to prevent the country from sinking into mediocrity. Rudolph Speth argued that these publications and campaigns had underlying political motives, for example to encourage the public to accept economic reforms (HBS 2006). His view was backed up by Merkel’s assertion that ‘reform and patriotism are two sides of the same coin’ (DP, 16 October 2006). The patriotism propounded seems just a small step away from the economic identity established by the economic miracle: a way of encouraging pride in the nation through post-war achievements rather than through reference to history. The most controversial of the new publications was Matthias Matussek’s Die Deutschen. Warum die anderen uns gern haben können (The Germans. Why the others can like us) precisely because it critically addresses attitudes to the Nazi legacy. Matussek also argues that Germans must identify with the nation as a necessary response to globalisation. However, he backs up his viewpoint by arguing that there is too much focus on the Holocaust in Germany, which poses an obstacle to national identity. He flippantly suggests that Hitler was a ‘freak accident of German history’ and rejects the notion of Auschwitz as a foundation myth of the nation (Matussek 2006: 14). The book marks a shift in opinion for Matussek, a former left-winger, who now criticises left-liberals such as Joschka Fischer as ‘historical knowalls’ who focus excessively on the Holocaust and have allowed a politically correct, bureaucratic notion of ‘Germanness’ (Matussek 2006: 32, 156). Matussek’s call for Germans to acknowledge that ‘the post-war period is finally over’ (Spiegel, 1 June 2006) is indicative of the Phantomschmerz that Germans are still being unfairly punished for the past. Moreover, whilst he criticises Verfassungspatriotismus as an empty concept, it is uncertain whether his view of national pride really has anything more progressive to offer. Henryk Broder remarks on a talk show where Matussek and other guests summed up their version of patriotism with clichés such as ‘German forests, the Loreley and roast pork’ (Spiegel, 1 June 2006). Matussek’s smug and prescriptive view of patriotism is certainly at odds with its popular demonstration during the World Cup, which showed that a line does not have to be drawn under the past in order for Germans to forge a positive sense of national identity and to look forward. Christian Schlüter interprets the new wave of publications as an attempt to instrumentalise German history. Hence, whilst the SPD-Green coalition tried to find legitimation by using Auschwitz as a cornerstone of its policies, the view now was: ‘We have reached a dead end, so let’s start history


over again’ (FR, 19 June 2006). The above publications wrongly treat patriotism as if it were a new concept in Germany and one that can be enforced. Moreover, surely a lot more than patriotism is needed to address the challenges of globalisation. The wave of patriotism in Germany was not completely dampened following the country’s defeat by Italy in the semi-finals of the World Cup. Upon winning third place the team were feted as if they had actually won the tournament. The question was whether the new patriotism was transitory or proof of a genuine sea change – the realisation of a neue Unbefangenheit post-Schröder. The answer seemed to come in the negative just one month after the end of the World Cup with a new controversy which indicated the persistence of the Nazi legacy in contemporary German political culture. Prior to the publication of his 2006 autobiography Beim Häuten der Zwiebel (Peeling the Onion) Günter Grass revealed in an interview with the FAZ (11 August 2006) that he had voluntarily served in the Waffen-SS as a 17 year-old towards the end of the Second World War, details which are recounted in the book. He had previously claimed that he had been conscripted and was therefore viewed as an unwilling participant in the German war effort. Grass’s comments unleashed a media furore that also reached the international press. There were a number of parallels with the controversy on Walser’s Tod eines Kritikers. The Grass debate commenced before the novel’s release date, which was subsequently brought forward, and one has the strong impression that both the media and the author were seeking to boost sales. Interestingly, the debate was initiated by Grass himself with his comments during the interview: preview copies had been sent out to critics but the chapter on his time with the SS had apparently escaped their attention. Grass was as deliberately naïve as Walser in declaring himself surprised and hurt by the controversy (Zeit, 17 August 2006). He maintained that he had made the confession because that part of his life weighed on him and he had felt a growing sense of shame. Grass perhaps wanted to dictate the terms of the debate rather than wait until commentators spotted the problematic detail about his past for themselves. However, like Walser, his revelations could also reflect a need to come to terms with his personal memories as he approached his 80th birthday and to deal with feelings that he had perhaps formerly projected onto the national level. As another parallel with Walser, there was a conflict between the author’s private persona and the public expectation of him as a ‘voice of the nation’. Unlike the controversy on Tod eines Kritikers, however, Grass’s revelations did not channel into a discussion of failed Vergangenheitsbewältigung. This could be because Grass’s affiliation with the SS is viewed as history, whereas Walser’s alleged anti-semitism could be associated with contemporary political and cultural developments as well as attitudes towards former victims of National Socialism. The Grass debate centred on the morals of


the author himself rather than those of the nation. The focus was less on what he had done as a 17 year-old than his apparent hypocrisy in having repeatedly criticised Germany’s apparent failure to come to terms with the Nazi past in the post-war period. Whilst some critics defended Grass and did not consider his brief SS membership to be a significant detail, others were of the view that his decades of silence had fully discredited his role as a moral commentator on the German nation (on reactions to the affair, see Spiegel, 21 August 2006). There were calls for Grass to return his 1999 Nobel Prize for Literature, which he had received for having addressed the difficult sides of German history in his fiction. Lech Walesa suggested that Grass should renounce his honorary citizenship of Gdansk (Handelsblatt, 22 August 2006) and there were doubts over whether to go ahead with plans to award the author the Brücke prize for promoting European relations. Grass’s revelations undoubtedly coloured subsequent reviews of his autobiography: the Neue Zürcher Zeitung, for example, found it ‘persistently relativist’ in part (19 August 2006). Grass’s decades of silence on his past are hard to defend bearing in mind his unforgiving stance towards the repression of guilt for the Nazi past. Yet at the same time there was a degree of hypocrisy or over-exaggeration amongst his critics. Although Grass’s SS unit fought at the Battle of Berlin, it is, for example, stretching the truth to assert that ‘he nearly died trying to save Hitler’s life’ (Times 2, 15 August 2006); Grass was in fact in the Lausitz region at this time. Erika Steinbach unfairly made Grass a scapegoat for Nazi atrocities in stating that he should donate the profits from his book to Polish victims of National Socialism (Spiegel Online, 18 August 2006). Most importantly, Grass has never denied that he used to support the Nazi party, admired Hitler and had been convinced that Germany would win the war (Tagesschau (ARD), 5 August 2006). His previous mindset and how this changed post-war surely provide more substance for a debate than his service in the SS, especially as he had originally been conscripted to the Wehrmacht and found himself instead enlisted in the Waffen-SS. Finally, it seemed hypocritical of the media to try and destroy Grass’s reputation whilst claiming the moral high ground for itself when it was the media which had built up Grass as a ‘moral instance’ in the first place. Grass’s case is not unique: many Germans suppressed details of their biographies after the war. Perhaps unwittingly, the author had addressed the implicit taboo of the implication of ‘ordinary Germans’ in the crimes of Nazism. His revelations were also indicative of the new trend in writing about the Nazi legacy, mentioned in Chapter 5, that is concerned with the motivation of the perpetrators but also the notion of ‘breaking silence’ and confronting wartime suffering. Arnulf Baring considered that the Grass controversy could lead to a calm and reasoned appraisal of the involvement of many Germans in the Nazi regime (SZ, 15 August 2006). However,


as also signalled by the debate on German victimhood, the risk of such an approach is that the severity of the crimes committed by the Waffen-SS and other groups could be downplayed and that there could be too much empathy with the seemingly ‘impossible’ or ‘enforced’ choices made at the time. The details of Grass’s service with the Waffen-SS do not make his subsequent critique of developments in the Federal Republic any less pertinent or relevant. The change is that Grass has now included himself in this critique by association. One could say that he has, symbolically if not deliberately, stepped down from his ‘moral pedestal’, just as Walser said that he wished to do during his Peace Prize speech. Grass’s media-directed fall from grace could also symbolise another development: the attempt to end the alleged left-liberal monopoly on interpreting the Nazi past. Christian Schlüter noted that, as if to demonstrate the point, the FAZ printed a 1979 article by Grass condemning the Bitburg affair alongside Kohl’s memoirs on this event (FR, 21 August 2006). The implication was that if Grass had been discredited as a moral voice then Kohl’s right-wing view of history could be rehabilitated. The Meinungssoldaten leading this debate did not criticise German Vergangenheitsbewältigung but rather Grass as someone who has pointed to the inadequacies in this process. In this sense, the Grass controversy could be said to form a postscript to Walser’s Peace Prize speech in damaging the moral authority of one of the leftliberals who Walser considered to be blocking German normality. The controversy also raises issues related to the conflicting left- and right-wing perspectives on the role of the intellectual within German political culture since unification. If the Grass controversy was less about examining Germany’s relations to its Nazi past than toppling a moral instance, it may represent the right-wing aim to liberate German culture from a political or moral agenda, along with the inherent danger that the Nazi past may be relativised. This being said, it is debatable whether the debate had long-lasting relevance beyond the Feuilletons. In a highly critical article, Eva Menasse and Michael Kumpfmüller remarked that German intellectuals had commented more on the Grass affair than the crisis in the Middle East at the time. In their view, the protagonists of the Grass debate continued to tread a tired path of moral indignation whilst ignoring the real issues of the day: Given these same old reflexes, same old debates and protagonists, there is no room in this country for youth. The elders who lived through the Nazi era distort the perspective with their endless moral flutter (SZ, 16 August 2006). The public at large did not seem to share the outrage of Grass’s detractors in the media. According to surveys commissioned for Focus and Stern maga-


zines, 54 per cent sympathised with Grass’s decision to wait so long before revealing details about his past and 87 per cent did not think that he should return his Nobel Prize (reported in MM, 19 August 2006). Either the public is more forgiving or Grass is simply not viewed as the moral institution he was made out to be in the media. To echo the title of Grass’s novel, the contrast between the Patriotism Debate and the Grass debate shows the Krebsgang (Crab Walk) between a focus on the abnormal past and present-day normality in contemporary Germany. In an article about Germany’s ‘new’ patriotism, Hilal Sezgin expressed the concern that this would lead to historical revisionism, the view that Germans are ‘finally’ allowed to be proud after suffering for a ‘small mistake’ in the past (taz, 12 July 2006). However, the Grass debate certainly indicated that a sensitivity towards the past still remains, even if it does not dominate contemporary political culture.

Conclusion

In this book I have described the increasing layers of interpretation related to the Nazi past in Germany resulting from the passage of time and the transition from communicative to cultural memory. We have seen that these layers are constructed at different levels, for example at international, national or regional level, and by different groupings or communities of memory within society. Two points should be restated in this context. First, with the transition to cultural memory the boundaries of remembrance have become more fluid. Like-minded groupings representing a certain viewpoint, ideology or tendency reflect a cross-section of communities of memory. These ‘communities of interpretation’ operate within a discourse that has become increasingly media-led and inclusive. Second, despite the transition to cultural memory the Nazi past has not become ‘history’. Importantly, remembrance of this past does not just comprise static commemoration but also active initiatives and public debate. It thus appears to be a willed as much as a ‘forced’ phenomenon. The main groupings I have identified operate at the political, generational, intellectual and media levels, each having a certain influence on the discourse. One can also add interest groups, for example the foundation behind the Holocaust memorial or the League of Expellees. Political interpretations of the Nazi past are still associated with agendas, obligations and obstacles, but the parameters between left- and right-wing versions of Geschichtspolitik have become blurred: hence, Schröder referred to national pride just as Merkel has stressed the importance of remembering the Holocaust. Generational interpretations of the Nazi legacy are determined by the dominant experience of that generation and influenced by the (non)transmission of communicative memory from one generation to the next. It is interesting to note the evolution of generational narratives on the Nazi past. The generation of 1968 introduced the narrative of Vergangenheitsbewältigung in the 1960s as a critical response to the atrocities of Nazism. However, the members of this generation within Schröder’s SPDGreen government adopted a more moderate approach, influenced by the 228

Conclusion 229

impact and experience of events such as unification, political necessity, and perhaps the feeling of having engaged sufficiently with the Nazi past. Nonetheless, this government’s foreign policy in particular was marked by bold references to past crimes as a legitimation for action in the present. Early indications suggest that the Grand Coalition under Angela Merkel has shifted away from the focus on Auschwitz as a cornerstone of political culture, which confirms that differences in perspective occur within generations and, bearing in mind Merkel’s background, between the old and new Bundesländer. Yet at the same time, there is no sign of a shift away from the basic premises of democracy, human rights and tolerance at the heart of the Federal Republic, in short the ‘lessons learnt’ from the Nazi past. I have also attempted to demonstrate the influence of intellectual groupings on public interpretations of the Nazi legacy. The debate on Martin Walser’s Peace Prize speech in particular showed the frequent conflict between these groupings in terms of generation or ideology. Intellectual and political interpretations of the Nazi past are largely channelled through the media, which has been shown to select a certain narrative voice for debates on this past both through its commentaries and the information it relays. Indeed, the role and influence of Meinungssoldaten within the media appears to be crucial in the creation and shaping of the German national memory narrative. We have seen, for example, how the media created the Nationalstolz and Leitkultur debates from two single comments. The media may court controversy with relation to the Nazi past, but it also prevents a line from being drawn under this past by keeping the debate on it alive. Different groups of Meinungssoldaten propound at times conflicting approaches towards the Nazi legacy according to age, ideology and views on German Vergangenheitsbewältigung. It is thus important to distinguish between what is said and how it is interpreted by each community of memory. This plurality of perspectives serves to uphold the dialectic of normality. This dialectic is a partly willed phenomenon. In underlining the atrocities of the Nazi past the dialectic of normality serves to maintain the checks and balances embedded in post-war German political culture. It does not block normality, but rather serves as a reminder of the importance of maintaining the values of the Federal Republic, which stand in such sharp contrast to the atrocities of the past. As well as outlining the varying perceptions on the Nazi past, I have demonstrated the tendency to instrumentalise this past for any number of purposes. Instrumentalisation of any past is a given, but not always negative, phenomenon. With relation to the Nazi past, I have shown that instrumentalisation can have a productive effect, for example in the growing number of active memory initiatives in Germany, which complement ritual commemoration. On the other hand, we have seen that instrumentalisation can also polarise the legacy of Auschwitz into a soundbite that has increasingly less to do with actual historical circumstances.


Hence, the anti-fur organisation PETA planned to use the slogan ‘Holocaust on your plate’ in a 2004 campaign, juxtaposing images of slaughtered animals with images of Holocaust victims. The Nazi past is instrumentalised as a political tool in Germany both to legitimise actions in the present and to criticise the opposition. However, the pretext is increasingly the Nazi legacy within the context of the Federal Republic – for example perceptions of national identity – rather than direct reference to the history of the Third Reich. As different vehicles for instrumentalisation, Leitverantwortung and Leidkultur have established but distinct roles in contemporary German political culture. They can be said to strike a balance between global and national interpretations of the Nazi legacy. Leitverantwortung tends to evoke this legacy in a fairly abstract form to emphasise positive political developments in the post-war Federal Republic and to enhance Germany’s image, especially at international level. In doing so, it ties in with the global narrative attached to the legacy of Auschwitz. Leitverantwortung is followed and steered by political leaders, but it also manifests itself in the wide range of public initiatives to keep remembrance of the Nazi past alive and to preserve values such as democracy and tolerance. The principles of Leitverantwortung have aided Germany’s rehabilitation at international level, as demonstrated, for example, by Germany’s participation in the events commemorating the 60th anniversary of the end of the Second World War alongside its former enemies. Leitverantwortung can be described as a welcome manifestation of the neue Unbefangenheit in the discourse on the Nazi legacy in that it loosens the negative monopoly of the Nazi past without attempting to ignore it. Yet whilst Leitverantwortung may enhance Germany’s international role, Leidkultur is frequently applied within the German national discourse with more direct reference to the Nazi past and the Holocaust together with the associated questions of German guilt and complicity. Leidkultur can be said to reflect an introspective national narrative that is both a throwback to the discourse on Vergangenheitsbewältigung and a reaction against it. One tendency is the seemingly self-imposed nature of Leidkultur within the German discourse, which both reveals traces of Phantomschmerz, that is the assumption that Germans are constantly being punished for the Nazi past, and serves to protect the principles of Leitverantwortung by evoking the negative narrative on this past. The German debate on Normal Finkelstein’s The Holocaust Industry was a good example of how interpretations of the Nazi past continues to be dominated by national questions such as the nature of guilt and responsibility. However, recent discussions of German wartime suffering in particular have provided an outlet for the view that Germany’s Nazi past should be seen in the context of modern European history. In this context, it is useful to consider potential changes to national and global narratives on the Nazi

Conclusion 231

legacy. We have established that the Holocaust has become a universal symbol of evil within a global narrative. Hence, the Holocaust can be evoked whenever there are instances of human rights violations – although of course rhetoric does not always lead to direct action. The commemorations marking the 60th anniversary of the end of the Second World War, as well as the international condemnation of Iranian cartoons of the Holocaust and a Tehran conference of Holocaust deniers in 2006, are a demonstration that the world is still sensitive to the genocide of European Jews. However, the narrative of the Holocaust has been abstracted to such an extent that it no longer requires or displays a specifically German core. Outside Germany, this global narrative does not necessarily require direct reference to the Nazi past but can be viewed through the prism of national priorities. In other words, it has largely become a debate on human values, for example, four years after the International Holocaust Forum, the 2004 ‘Stockholm International Forum on Preventing Genocide: Threats and Responsibilities’ was very much focused on future action rather than the impact of the past; the Holocaust was an implied but non-stated point of reference. The 2004 Holocaust Memorial Day in the UK had racism as its theme and the ceremony in Belfast followed a spate of attacks on immigrant communities in the city. In other countries, Holocaust Memorial Day was bound up with concerns about increased anti-semitism throughout Europe, particularly in the wake of an EU-commissioned study on the problem (EUMC 2002–03). Whilst anti-semitism is an integral part of the German discourse on the Nazi legacy, at international level the problem does not require reference to Germany or the Nazi past but stems instead from developments such as the conflict in the Middle East. The question remains as to how far the global narrative on the Holocaust is sustainable; in other words how long the Holocaust will remain a dominant or apparently necessary paradigm for evil, and what might otherwise replace it. With the emergence of new forms of international terrorism and atrocities that bear no discernible link to the Holocaust, the crimes of Nazism no longer have the ‘monopoly’ on evil. The interest in the Holocaust as a subject for books and films is unlikely to wane: the images and facts inevitably provoke an emotional reaction as well as a kind of fascination. However, the focus on the Holocaust as the ultimate paradigm of politically or ideologically inspired evil may fade at international level, marking a return to a predominantly German national discourse on this period of history. With increased distance from the Nazi past, the Holocaust does not, however, have to be the defining narrative in contemporary Germany, which can also draw on a more positive history of German and European unification and commitment to democracy and international law. The Nazi legacy is coming to exist as a parallel rather than a central discourse and the impact of ritual commemoration increasingly depends on rhetorical


links with present-day events, for example references to the campaign against the far right or terrorism. However, the continued succession of debates on the Nazi past show that the country is far from drawing a line under that past. Hence, whilst the prominence of aspects of the German narrative on the Nazi legacy may change there are no signs of the narrative fading, particularly given the potential for further layers of interpretation. A snapshot of examples from 2006 demonstrates the interplay of these layers of interpretation as well as the paradoxes in the narrative on the Nazi legacy that point to the dialectic of normality. The first ordination of rabbis in Germany since 1945 and the inauguration of the new main synagogue in Munich gave hope of a ‘normality’ in German-Jewish relations. On the other hand, the President of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution reported on growing cooperation between Islamic extremists and the German far right. The NPD succeeded in entering parliament in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and figures were released showing a further increase in far right violence. Yet as evidence of public opposition to such developments, the citizens of Delmenhorst, a town in Lower Saxony, clubbed together to buy a hotel that a far right judge, Jürgen Rieger, hoped to purchase for use as a training centre for the NPD. Payments to former forced labourers via the ‘Memory, Responsibility and Future’ foundation came to an end, but the government was involved in negotiations with the Jewish Claims Conference on the restitution of pieces of art appropriated by the Nazis. Debates on German wartime suffering continued, but the House of the Wannsee Conference opened its new permanent exhibition, which focuses on the role of perpetrators in detailing the administrative process leading to the Final Solution. The greatest paradox perhaps was that detailed in Chapter 6: on the one hand, Germans ‘rediscovered’ national pride during the World Cup, but on the other hand Günter Grass’s revelations about his membership of the Waffen-SS not only brought the Nazi past to bear but also challenged the legitimacy of those who had shaped the critical discourse of Vergangenheitsbewältigung. One reason for the continued occurrence of German debates on the Nazi legacy is that suggested in Chapter 1: the concern that civil society might revert to a state of barbarism, coupled with uncertainty as to what would dominate the discourse or be used as a negative yardstick otherwise. Unanswered questions related to the Holocaust and the question of German guilt are confronted by each generation anew. Younger generations then continue to interpret the negative narrative of the Nazi past and to perpetuate a critical discourse on this past even though their main point of reference is post-war developments within a democratic political culture and they have no direct links to the Nazi past. It will be interesting to see whether the consequences of confrontation with this past will change with successive generations, especially if global interest wanes or if discussions of the GDR past or German victimhood gain in profile. Another point to con-

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sider is how the nature of the narrative will change once commemorations no longer involve people with direct experience of the Third Reich. The ‘wars of memory’ and the dangers of conflating different layers of memory are likely to increase with the passage of time. Yet public reaction to these debates indicates that the German national narrative on the Nazi legacy retains certain core features and points to the importance of maintaining key values. Critical assessments of the discourse are not only an important characteristic of contemporary German political culture, but they also serve to keep alive awareness of both the crimes of National Socialism and the democratic values established in the Federal Republic. Media coverage may establish alarming currents in the German discourse, for example a shift to the right, but in doing it also demonstrates the strength of opinion against such tendencies. Whilst the German discourse has become more open and less wary of taboos, a ‘brake’ continues to be applied to prevent it from shifting too much away from the parameters of Vergangenheitsbewältigung. As long as this brake continues to be applied the dialectic of normality resulting from the Nazi legacy represents a productive feature of the political culture of the Federal Republic.

Notes Introduction 1 Following Adorno, the term Auschwitz is not taken to refer to the actual extermination camp but rather as ‘a shorthand for the caesura of Western culture as well as for the deep wound in the body of the Jewish people’. Cited in Efraim Sicher (ed.) (1998) Writing and Memory after Auschwitz, Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 14.

Chapter 1 Nazi Past

German, European and Global Recollection of the

1 See Maurice Halbwachs (1968) La mémoire collective (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France). On collective memory, also see Jan Assmann (1999b) Das kulturelle Gedächtnis. Schrift, Erinnerung und politische Identität in frühen Hochkulturen (München: Verlag C.H. Beck); Paul Connerton (1989) How Societies Remember (Cambridge-New York-Melbourne: Cambridge University Press); David Sutton (1998) Memories cast in stone. The relevance of the past in everyday life (Oxford: Berg); Harald Welzer (2001) Das soziale Gedächtnis. Geschichte, Erinnerung, Tradierung (Hamburg: Hamburger Edition); and James Fentress and Chris Wickham (1992) Social Memory. New Perspectives on the Past (Oxford UK-Cambridge USA: Blackwell). 2 The concept of ‘willing executioners’ refers to Daniel Goldhagen’s controversial thesis that ‘eliminationary anti-semitism’ led Germans to support and perpetrate crimes against the Jews. See Daniel Jonah Goldhagen (1996) Hitler’s Willing Executioners. Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust (London: Little, Brown). 3 Karl Jaspers drew the distinction between criminal, political, moral and metaphysical guilt. In his view, all Germans were politically guilty as members of a nation in whose name the atrocities of the Second World War had been committed, and criminally guilty if responsible in legal terms. Moral guilt was however a matter for the individual conscience, the individual being responsible for his own actions. Metaphysical guilt concerned non-action, that is, a failure to try and stop the atrocities of the Third Reich or to show solidarity with the victims. See Karl Jaspers (1974) Die Schuldfrage. Von der politischen Haftung Deutschlands [originally published in 1946] (München: Piper Verlag), especially 42–7. 4 German citizenship was formerly based on blood according to the ius sanguinis principle. However, new citizenship laws introduced in 1999 mean that citizenship relates instead to the ius soli (territorial) principle, whereby nationality can be granted according to where someone is born. German citizens thus do not necessarily have blood links to the Third Reich. Viola Georgi has conducted an interesting study into attitudes towards the Holocaust and the Third Reich amongst children of ethnic minorities in Germany. Some identify themselves with the Jews, feeling discriminated against on account of their skin colour or religion. Others, however, express a sense of association with German history. 234

Notes 235

5

6

7

8

9 10

11

12 13

14

15 16 17 18 19 20 21

See Viola B. Georgi (2003) Entliehene Erinnerung. Geschichtsbilder junger Migranten in Deutschland (Hamburg: Hamburger Edition). The term Stunde Null denotes the idea that 1945 represented a new beginning for Germany. It encapsulates both the desire to forget the twelve years of National Socialism and the hope of a better future, although in practice it was impossible to achieve such a clean break with the past. Adenauer also had to deal with the millions of ethnic Germans expelled from Central and Eastern Europe after the war. By 1950, some eight million expellees had settled in West Germany, comprising approximately 16.5 per cent of the West German population. Another four million had settled in East Germany. Although integration did happen, many expellees remained bitter about the loss of their homelands to what became eastern bloc countries. See Bill Niven (2002) Facing the Nazi Past. United Germany and the Legacy of the Third Reich (London: Routledge), 96. In Ancient Greece, the term ethnos defined a loose, rather federal form of social organisation made up of a collection of towns and villages, in contrast to the centralised polis. It is used here in the sense of a society linked together by certain characteristics and common origins, along the lines of the German Volk. The term, usually attributed to Jürgen Habermas, was originally used by Dolf Sternberger. See Heinrich August Winkler (2001) ‘Ende aller Sonderwege’, Die Gegenwart der Vergangenheit: Spiegel Special, Nr.1, 56–62. Adolf Eichmann was one of the architects of the Final Solution, that is, the Nazi plan to implement a systematic genocide of European Jewry. There were three such debates – in 1965, 1969 and 1979 – on whether the 15-year statute of limitations on prosecution for National Socialist crimes should be lifted. In 1979 it was decided that the 15-year period would not apply, so it was not possible for war criminals to escape punishment with the passage of time. See Jeffrey Herf (1997) Divided Memory. The Nazi Past in the Two Germanys (Cambridge Massachusetts-London, England: Harvard University Press), 335–42. The contested term Sonderweg refers to the idea that Germany took a different path to modernity than other European countries. Proponents of the viewpoint consider the Sonderweg to have led to the rise of Nazism. http://www.historikerkommission.gv.at. They are also not restricted to the Holocaust: Robert Hughes, for example, argues that contemporary American culture is being corroded by a ‘culture of therapeutics’ where confessing one’s ‘sins’ is tantamount to redemption. See Robert Hughes (1993) The Culture of Complaint: the fraying of America (New York-Oxford: Oxford University Press). Japan opened a Jewish Holocaust Museum in Fukuyama in 1995, dedicated to the memory of the children who died in the Holocaust, and in the same year an Anne Frank exhibition was shown at Hiroshima. There is a Holocaust Center in Cape Town, South Africa (http://www.ctholocaust.co.za/). The point was made at a lecture by Peter Novick entitled ‘Is the Holocaust an American Memory?’, JFK Institut Berlin, 7 February 2001. Ibid. See http://www.usc.edu/schools/college/vhi/. The Task Force’s website is at: http://www.holocausttaskforce.org. http://www.hmd.org.uk. Ibid. Anne Frank Trust, http://www.annefrank.org.uk.

236 Notes

Chapter 2

Schröder, Walser and the Dialectic of Normality

1 Subsequent references to the speech are given in the text as page numbers in brackets. Walser has previously expressed disillusionment at being forced into a certain role as an intellectual. See, for example, the essay ‘Über freie und unfreie Rede’ (1994), in Martin Walser (1997) Deutsche Sorgen (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp), 468–86. 2 Both Klaus Harpprecht (writing in Die Zeit) and Salomon Korn (writing in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung) mention possible Jewish targets, including the Central Council of Jews in Germany, the World Jewish Congress and ‘international Jewry’, although Korn concedes that the ambiguity of the speech led to these conclusions. See Klaus Harpprecht, ‘Wen meint Martin Walser?’ in Frank Schirrmacher (ed.) (1999) Die Walser-Bubis Debatte. Eine Dokumentation (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp), 51–3; and Salomon Korn, ‘Es ist Zeit. Die andere Seite des Walser-Bubis-Streits’, in ibid, 304–7. The Schirrmacher volume contains a comprehensive selection of newspaper articles relating to the Walser debate. Subsequent references to articles reprinted in this publication will be given in the text as WBD, together with page numbers. 3 On these and other common far right terms, see Stefan Frohloff (ed.) (2001) Gesicht Zeigen! Handbuch für Zivilcourage (Frankfurt-New York: Campus Verlag), 146–50. 4 For a summary of far right reactions to the speech, see Dietzsch et al. (1999) Endlich ein normales Volk? Vom rechten Verständnis der Friedenspreis-Rede Martin Walsers. Eine Dokumentation (Duisburg: DISS); and Joachim Rohloff (1999) Ich bin das Volk. Martin Walser, Auschwitz und die Berliner Republik (Hamburg: Konkret Literatur Verlag), 66–75. Rohloff provides a rather tenuous assessment of alleged far right thinking in Walser’s work based on the essays in Walser’s Deutsche Sorgen (1977). In some cases, Rohloff twists the context of what Walser has written to assert that his views are allied with those of the far right. For example, he sees Walser’s criticism of German division as evidence of nationalist thinking, his comment that one should perhaps not recognise the Federal Republic or the GDR as antiAmericanism, and his wish to see Germany united as a way of drawing a line under the National Socialist past. See Rohloff, 11–56, especially 16–19 and 26–7. 5 Salomon Korn also thought that Walser may have been referring to the compensation debate. See WBD, 445. 6 Bubis was one of the property investors who secured permission from the Frankfurt authorities in the 1970s to destroy certain properties, but rented these out to students prior to demolition. This resulted in student protests and clashes with police. The events are dealt with in Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s play Der Müll, die Stadt und der Tod (1981). 7 This view is held by the German Jewish journalist Henryk Broder. See the section on Leidkultur and the ‘hysterical Republic’ in Chapter 3. 8 Also see Herzog’s speech on the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz in January 1999 in WBD, 596–605. 9 However, Schirrmacher was to withdraw his support for the author following the publication of Walser’s allegedly anti-semitic novel Tod eines Kritikers in 2002. See Chapter Five. 10 On the allegedly far right content of the letters sent to Walser, see Wolf D. Hund, ‘Der scheusslichste aller Verdachte. Martin Walser und der Antisemitismus’, in Johannes Klotz and Gerd Wiegel (2001) Geistige Brandstiftung. Die neue Sprache der Berliner Republik (Berlin: Aufbau Taschenbuch Verlag), 183–282.

Notes 237

Chapter 3

Approaches to the Dialectic of Normality

1 Following a Bundestag decision of 16 October 1998, the Bundeswehr took part in air strikes on the former Yugoslavia as part of the NATO-led ‘Allied Force’ mission from 24 March to 10 June 1999. After the UN passed resolution 1244, on 11 June 1999 the Bundestag agreed to send German troops into Kosovo in the framework of the multinational KFOR peace-keeping force, led by NATO. On the Bundestag deliberations, see Bundestag (1998) 13. Wahlperiode, Drucksache 13/11469, 12 October 1998; and Bundestag (1999) 14. Wahlperiode, Drucksache 14/1133, 11 June 1999. 2 There was concern that the Greens would reject intervention, which would have put the coalition in danger. Schröder ultimately called for a vote of confidence, which he won and with it the agreement to deploy 3900 Bundeswehr soldiers. 3 For an overview of the compensation debate, see Rolf Suhrmann (ed.) (2001) Das Finkelstein-Alibi. ‘Holocaust-Industrie’ und Tätergesellschaft (Köln: Papy Rossa Verlag) and Ernst Piper (ed.) (2001) Gibt es wirklich eine Holocaust-Industrie? (Zürich: Pendo-Verlag). 4 Former forced labourers had to apply for compensation by a certain date and have proof of their former status, which naturally posed some problems. Nonetheless, some 1.8 million people applied for compensation and 1.2 million were considered eligible. For details of the foundation and the law on compensation, see http://www.stiftung-evz.de. 5 See http://www.fonds-ez.de. 6 http://www.verfassungsschutz.de. On the development of the far right in unified Germany, also see Forschungsinstitut der Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (1999) Rechtsextremismus und Fremdenfeindlichkeit im vereinten Deutschland: Erscheinungsformen und Gegenstrategien (Bonn); Armin Pfahl-Traughber (2000) ‘Die Entwicklung des Rechtsextremismus in Ost-und Westdeutschland’, Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte, B39 (22 September), 3–14; Richard Stöss (2000) Rechtsextremismus im vereinten Deutschland (Berlin: Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung); Hajo Funke (2002) Paranoia und Politik. Rechtsextremismus in der Berliner Republik (Berlin: Schiler Verlag); Torud Staud (2005) Moderne Nazis (Köln: Kiepenheuer & Witsch); Armin Pfahl-Traughber (2006) Rechtsextremismus in der Bundesrepublik (München: Beck); and Elmar Brähler and Oliver Decker (2006) Vom Rand zur Mitte (Berlin: Friedrich-EbertStiftung). 7 It is interesting to note how the focus has changed since, despite the fact that the problem of the far right has not disappeared. The 2001 report emphasised the implications of the September 11 terrorist attacks, especially the increased threat from Islamic extremists, and the 2002 report also focused on global terrorism. Both reports are available at http://www.verfassungsschutz.de/de/publikationen/verfassungsschutzbericht. 8 The September 2000 campaign showed train passengers standing up to rightwing extremists who were threatening a foreigner. See Bundesregierung (2000) Bundesregierung fördert Kinospot für Zivilcourage und gegen Rechts, Pressemitteilung Nr. 424/00, 11 September 2000. 9 http://www.buendnis-toleranz.de. 10 A few days later, Rau again indicated the dominance of present concerns in the discourse on the past at the annual Volkstrauertag (People’s Day of Mourning) on 19 November 2000, which for the first time mentioned recent victims of hate and violence against foreigners alongside the victims of the two World Wars and of National Socialism (FAZ, 20 November 2000).

238 Notes 11 For an overview of the teaching of National Socialism and the Holocaust in West Germany, see Falk Pingel (2000) ‘National Socialism and the Holocaust in West German school books’, in Internationale Schulbuchforschung / International Textbook Research, Zeitschrift des Georg-Eckert-Instituts für internationale Schulbuchforschung, 22. Jahrgang, Heft 1, Unterricht über den Holocaust / Teaching the Holocaust, 11–29. 12 Information from an interview with Norbert Kampe, Director of the House of the Wannsee Conference, May 2001. Also see the website at http://www.ghwk.de. 13 Also see http://www.asf-ev.de. 14 Also see http://www.gegen-vergessen.de. 15 Also see Landesjugendring Berlin (brochure, undated) Stadterkundung. Politischhistorische Stadtrundfahrten und Führungen für Jugend- und Schülergruppen, and http://www.ljrberlin.de. Information from an interview with Michel Schmidt of the Berliner Landesjugendring, June 2001. 16 The websites for these organisations are as follows: Aktion Noteingang: http:// www.aktion-noteingang.de; STEP21: http://www.step21.de; Exit Deutschland: http://www.exit-deutschland.de; Mut gegen rechte Gewalt: http://www.mut-gegenrechte-gewalt.de. 17 The organisation was founded by Paul Spiegel, Michel Friedman and Uwe Karsten-Heye, former press spokesman of the SPD-Green government, under the patronage of the late President Johannes Rau. Further details can be found at http://www.gesichtzeigen.de. 18 Interview with Sophia Oppermann, Director of Gesichtzeigen, Berlin, February 2002. 19 Thierse expressed this view in a lecture ‘Politisches Nachtgebet. Welche Kultur leitet uns?’ in the Französiche Kirche, Berlin on 28 February 2001. Biermann was a guest on the Sabine Christiansen show on 5 November 2000. 20 This must have involved compromise from Müller, who had previously opposed the term Leitkultur. Moreover, his references to Germany as an ‘immigration country’ (Einwanderungsland) had been deleted from the paper (see Zeit, 9 November 2000; and BZ, 4–5 November 2000). 21 Trittin perhaps had an axe to grind with Meyer, who had criticised the Greens’ position on the transport of nuclear waste (see taz, 30 May 2001). 22 The case ultimately collapsed in March 2003 after it had emerged that the government’s case against the NPD was based in part on speeches made by police informers (so-called V-Männer).

Chapter 4

The Holocaust Memorial in Berlin

1 On cultural remembrance in post-war Germany, see Peter Reichel (1995) Politik mit der Erinnerung. Gedächtnisorte im Streit um die nationalsozialistische Vergangenheit (München-Wien: Carl Hanser Verlag). For details of individual memorial sites, see Ulrike Puvogel and Martin Stankowski (1995) Gedenkstätten für die Opfer des Nationalsozialismus. Eine Dokumentation, Band I (Bonn: Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung); Stefanie Endlich, Nora Goldenbogen and Beatrix Herlemann (eds.) (1999) Gedenkstätten für die Opfer des Nationalsozialismus. Eine Dokumentation, Band II (Bonn: Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung); and Klaus Siebenhaar (ed.) (2001) Kulturhandbuch Berlin. Geschichte und Gegenwart von A-Z (Berlin: Bostelmann & Siebenhaar Verlag). There is a comprehensive online list of Gedenk-

Notes 239

2 3

4 5

6 7

8 9

10 11

12 13

stätten in Germany and elsewhere in Europe at http://www.gedenkstaettenuebersicht.de. Interview with Günter Morsch, Director of the memorial site at Sachsenhausen, Oranienburg, 21 January 2002. Examples include the former concentration camps at Sachsenhausen, Buchenwald and Ravensbrück, the Topography of Terror, the German Resistance Memorial Centre, the House of the Wannsee Conference and the former Stasi detention centre at Berlin-Hohenschönhausen. Interview with Inge Rocker, assistant on the team which designed the Holocaust monument, Krefeld, 29 July 1999. One of the main criticisms against this design was that it drew no distinction between victims and perpetrators. Moreover, the Jewish community pointed out that Hebrew was not the language of the Nazi murderers (taz, 25 June 1999). English translation from http://www.holocaust-denkmal.de/en/thememorial/ history/resolution. These comments were made at a Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung seminar ‘(Unerwünschte) Monumente, Steine des Anstoßes oder kollektive Sinnstiftung? – Politische Denkmäler als Orte der Erinnerung’, June 2001, Berlin. Rosh’s critics included the American journalist Jane Kramer, who painted a picture of Rosh as someone who would sit in her office receiving guests and chatting about the Holocaust whilst sipping white wine, answering post and signing photos (Zeit, 3 November 1995). Jost Kaiser discusses claims that Rosh changed her name to sound Jewish (SZ, 26 May 1999). These comments were also made during the aforementioned interview with Inge Rocker. The monument to the Sinti and Roma, designed by Dani Karavan, is to be erected south of the Reichstag at a cost of around €2 million, provided by central government. However, there have been problems with the design and the inscription. Romani Rose, chief representative of the Sinti and Roma in Germany, wanted it to equate the genocide of the Sinti and Roma with that of the European Jews, but this provoked criticism from other victim groups (see Spiegel, 3 February 2004). http://www.jmberlin.de. For details, see http://www.topographie.de. The Topography of Terror Foundation runs the online Gedenkstättenforum (http://www.gedenkstaettenforum.de) with news articles and discussion forums on confrontation with the Nazi legacy. The exhibition can be viewed online at http://www.topographie.de/openair/. Interview with Günter Morsch, 21 January 2002.

Chapter 5

The ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’

1 This paraphrases Finkelstein’s comments at his book presentation at the Urania in Berlin, 7 February 2001. 2 Rensmann cited a 1994 US publication according to which 39 per cent of Germans thought that Jews manipulated the Holocaust for their own purposes; a 1999 book on xenophobia which stated that in 1998 up to 50 per cent of Germans thought that Jews were trying to make them pay for the past; and a 1998 Forsa survey according to which 63 per cent of Germans thought a line should be drawn under the debate on Jewish persecution. See Lars Rensmann

240 Notes (2001) ‘Entschädigungspolitik, Erinnerungsabwehr und Motive des sekundären Antisemitismus’, in Petra Steinberger (ed.) Die Finkelstein-Debatte (München: Piper Verlag), 126–54, here 127. 3 Participants in the survey could choose from a scale with seven possible answers ranging from ‘totally disagree’ (1) to ‘totally agree’ (7). Those who chose 5–7 on certain questions were classed as ‘latently anti-semitic’, which suggests that the results were not entirely representative. See ASF (2003) ‘Umfrage zu Judenfeindlichkeit: Jeder fünfte Deutsche latent antisemitisch’, 21 November. 4 A German research project on the transmission of memory of the National Socialist past within families also concluded that at this level Germans are commonly portrayed as victims rather than perpetrators. See Sabine Moller, Karoline Tschuggnall and Harald Welzer (2005) “Opa war kein Nazi”. Nationalsozialismus und Holocaust im Familiengedächtnis (Frankfurt am Main: Fischer). 5 Frahm criticises Aleida Assmann’s article (1999) ‘Ein deutsches Trauma? Die Kollektivschuldthese zwischen Erinnern und Vergessen’ in Merkur, Nr. 608, Jg. 53 (December 1999), 1142–54.

Chapter 6 Sixty Years On: Commemoration and a New Government 1 As further indication that the 1950s are regarded as a ‘golden age’ of post-war history, Konrad Adenauer was voted the ‘top’ German in the 2003 ZDF show Unsere Besten (Germany’s Best). 2 The Foundation for the Centre against Expulsions has distanced itself from this campaign. See ZGVd ‘Zentrum gegen Vertreibungen distanziert sich von Preussischer Treuhand’, 21 March 2004, http://www.z-g-v.de/aktuelles/index. php3?id=141. 3 The site will be replaced with a park until the means can be found to finance the reconstruction of the Prussian Palace (see FAZ, 19 January 2006 and 5 July 2002). 4 Unless stated otherwise, further references to the meeting are from this source. 5 For details of the campaign, see http://www.land-der-ideen.de. 6 For details, see http://www.du-bist-deutschland.de.

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Index

131 Law, 15 1968, impact of on confrontation with Nazi past, 45 also see generation of 1968 27 January (commemoration), xv, 30, 199–203 8 May (commemoration), xvi, 23, 89–90, 124, 163–6, 205–6, 209 9 November (commemoration), xvi, 88, 97–9 11 September 2001, 1, 88, 156, 188, 192, 197 Abram, Ido, 100–1 Action Reconciliation Service for Peace (ASF), 101–2, 188 active memory, 3, 7, 81, 99–100, 101–2 Adenauer, Konrad, xv, 15, 47 Adorno, Theodor W., 20, 51, 75, 100, 187 Afghanistan, 52, 88–9 Against Oblivion, for Democracy (Gegen Vergessen. Für Demokratie), 102 Ahmedinajad, Mahmoud, 207 Alliance for Democracy and Tolerance, 96 Allied bombing raids, 189, 191, 203, 204, 218–19 Allies and confrontation with Nazi past, 14–15, 123 and repression of Nazi past, 16–17, 28 Alltagsgeschichte (everyday history), 22, 124 American Jewish Committee, 166, 177–8 amnesty (in West Germany), 15–16 Annan, Kofi, 200 Anne Frank, 13, 29, 35, 42 Anne Frank Trust, 42 anti-communism (West Germany), 16, 53 anti-fascism (East Germany), 14, 15, 53 and memorialisation, 123 anti-memory narratives, 16

‘anti-monuments’, 124 anti-semitism and book The Holocaust Industry, 166–7, 168, 169 and book Tod eines Kritikers, 181–4, 186 and debate on Walser’s Peace Prize speech, 57, 62–3, 65–6, 68, 69, 74–6, 77, 78 and hostility to Israel, 176–8 compared with far right extremism, 96 compared with secondary anti-semitism, 171 in Europe, 163, 231 Joschka Fischer on, 180, 207 Jürgen Möllemann accused of, 173–4 surveys on, 180–1 also see secondary anti-semitism and ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’ ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’ (Antisemitismusstreit), 171–87 and German foreign policy, 208 and Möllemann debate, 171–81 and Tod eines Kritikers (Martin Walser), 181–7 Apfel, Holger, 203–4 Arendt, Hannah, 18 ASF see Action Reconciliation Service for Peace Assmann, Jan, 11 on communicative and cultural memory, 25–6 Assmann, Aleida, 26, 63 Association [Förderkreis] for the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, 133, 134, 137, 138, 140 Aufarbeitung der Vergangenheit (‘working through the past’), 20 Augstein, Rudolph, 76 Auschwitz, 234 (note to Introduction) and 60th anniversary of liberation of, 196, 199–203

254

Index 255 annual commemoration marking liberation of, 30 as global symbol, 31–5, 41, 87, 187 cited to legitimate German intervention in Kosovo, 84, 86, 87 impact of on Federal Republic, 12, 14, 17 instrumentalisation of, 58, 104, 165, 229 (also see Peace Prize speech) viewed as sum of Second World War, 7, 32, 35, 150 also see Holocaust (remembrance of post-war) Auschwitz Trials (Frankfurt), 18, 58 Austria, 29, 40, 201 Austrian Fund for Reconciliation, Peace and Cooperation, 29 Austrian Historical Commission, 29 ‘banality of evil’, 18 Basic Law (Grundgesetz), 16, 53, 81, 94, 103, 109, 139, 206 Becker, Boris, 206 Belgium, 28–9, 30 Benz, Wolfgang, 20, 42 Berenbaum, Michael, 34 Bergen-Belsen (former concentration camp), 123 Berlin (as capital of unified Germany) active memory initiatives in, 101–3 and dialectic of normality, 52 as planned location for Centre against Expulsions, 210, 211, 213 Gerhard Schröder on, 49, 89, 90 memorialisation in, 127–9, 160, 217 move of government to (1999), 45–6 Berlin Republic, 1, 46 and attitudes towards the Nazi past, 2–3, 4, 44–50, 62 and concern of distancing from Nazi past in, 73, 76–7, 170, 205 and neue Unbefangenheit, 46–7 Gerhard Schröder on role of, 47–9 Holocaust memorial as symbol of, 119, 142 also see SPD-Green government (1998–2005) and Berlin Berlin Underground (Berliner Unterwelten), 221 Berlin Wall, xvi, 49, 97, 142, 157, 160

Berlin Youth Circle (Berliner Landesjugendring), 103 Bernhard, Thomas, 56 Biermann, Wolf, 107–8, 109 Bitburg controversy, 23 Blair, Tony, 41–2, 113 Blüm, Norbert, 177 Blumenthal, Michael, 152, 154, 155, 156 Böll, Heinrich, 18 Bonn (capital of West Germany), 1, 16, 48, 49 compared to Berlin, 45–6 Bosbach, Wolfgang, 109 Boyes, Roger, 206, 219, 220, 222 Der Brand, 189 Brandt, Willy, xv, 21, 117 Broder, Henryk, 98, 223 on ‘Holocaust industry’, 167 on Holocaust memorial, 141, 146, 147, 148 on Leidkultur, 2, 82, 104–5 Brumlik, Micha, 63, 74, 78 Bubis, Ignatz, 62, 145 on normality in Germany, 53 role in debate on Walser’s Peace Prize speech, 64, 65–6, 67–70, 71, 73, 75, 77 Buchenwald (former concentration camp), 123 and Schäfer controversy, 214 as East German memorial, 121, 123 Bude, Heinz, 50 Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz see Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution Bundestag and debate on Holocaust memorial, 138–9, 144–6 and Patriotism Debate (2001), 116–18 Burchardt, Lothar, 112 Bush, George, 89, 118, 194, 197, 199 capitulation of Germany (1945) annual commemoration of (8 May), xvi and 1985 commemoration of, 23, 124 and 2000 commemoration of, 89–90 and 2002 commemoration of, 163–6 and 2005 commemoration of, 196, 205–6, 209

256 Index Carsten-Heye, Uwe, 219–20 Central Council of Jews in Germany (Zentralrat der Juden in Deutschland) and ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’, 172, 174, 175 rejection of 2004 Gedenkstättenkonzept, 217 Central Office of the Judicial Authorities of the Federal States for the Investigation of National Socialist Crimes, 18 Centre against Expulsions (Zentrum gegen Vertreibungen), 209–14 CDU (Christian Democratic Union) and ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’, 179 and Centre against Expulsions, 211–13 and Gedenkstättenkonzept controversy (2004), 217–19 and Leitkultur debate, 108, 109–11 and Martin Hohmann debate, 187–8 and Nationalstolz debate, 111–12, 113, 114–15, 116–17 attitude of towards Nazi past, 13; under Konrad Adenauer, 15–18; under Helmut Kohl, 22–5; under Angela Merkel, 208–9, 228, 229 election defeat (1998), 1 election victory (2005), 207 also see Grand Coalition Chirac, Jacques, 30, 197, 201 Coalition Treaty (2005), 211, 217 Cold War, 24, 25, 36, 49, 123, 165 and repression of Nazi past, 15, 16–17 collective guilt see guilt collective memory, 8–10 Cole, Tim, 35, 167 commemorations related to Nazi past impact of present-day events upon, 34, 99–100 on 27 January, xv, 30, 199–203 on 8 May, xvi, 23, 89–90, 124, 163–6, 205–6, 209 on 9 November, xvi, 88, 97–9 also see sixtieth anniversary of the end of World War Two and D-Day commemorations communicative memory, 25–7, 228 impact of non-transmission of, 19, 190

shift from to cultural memory, 25–7, 44, 47, 121, 228 ‘communities of interpretation’, 26, 62, 228 communities of memory, 8–10, 11, 228 and debate on Walser’s Peace Prize speech, 63, 67, 69–70 and generational change, 18–19, 164 and German victimhood, 191 and globalised remembrance, 27, 32–3 compensation to former forced labourers, 91–3 and dialectic of normality, 51 and Norman Finkelstein debate, 169, 170 raised in debate on Walser’s Peace Prize speech, 67 Connolly, Kate, 113 constitutional patriotism see Verfassungspatriotismus concentration and extermination camps; post-war memorialisation of, 120–2, 123 also see memorials Connerton, Paul, 19 Cook, Robin, 86, 113 Courage against Far Right Violence (Mut gegen rechte Gewalt), 102–3 Cullen, Michael, 162 cultural memory, 25–7, 88, 97, 217 and globalised remembrance, 32–3 shift from communicative memory to, 25–7, 44, 47, 121, 228 cultural remembrance (memorials), 120 ‘culture of contrition’, 43 Czech, Hermann, 162 Czech Republic, 211 Dachau (former concentration camp), 123 Däubler-Gmelin, Herta, 194 Day for Democracy, 206 Day of German Unity (Tag der Deutschen Einheit), xvi, 110 Day of Remembrance for the Victims of National Socialism (27 January), xv, 30, 199–203 D-Day commemorations (2004), 196, 197–8 Degussa (Holocaust memorial), 139

Index 257 democracy and West German identity, 15, 24 as a focus of Leitverantwortung, 80–1 demonstrations against far right on 9 November 2000, 97–9 on 8 May 2005, 206 also see far right denazification, 14, 15 Denkmal (as compared to Mahnmal), 136 also see memorials Denkmal für die ermordeten Juden Europas see Holocaust memorial ‘Deutscher Weg’ (‘German path’), 192–5 dialectic of normality, 2, 4, 50–3, 221, 222, 229 and Berlin, 52, 128 and debates on Nazi legacy, 73, 78–9, 178, 207 and debate on Walser’s Peace Prize speech, 64, 72 and German foreign policy, 192, 193 and generational change, 53, 79 and Holocaust memorial, 119, 132, 142 and Jewish Museum, 157 and Leitkultur debate, 107 Leidkultur and Leitverantwortung as responses to, 80 outside Germany, 51 self-imposed nature of, 2, 53, 74, 166, 193, 229 Diepgen, Eberhard, 136, 150 Diner, Dan, 16 division of Germany impact on confrontation with Nazi legacy, 16–17, 123 viewed as punishment for Auschwitz, 24 Dönhoff, Marion Gräfin, 108 ‘double past’; and memorialisation, 217–19 also see memorials Dresden and film Dresden (2005), 204–5 commemoration of Allied bombings of, 203 Dubiel, Helmut, 30, 37, 43 Du bist Deutschland (You are Germany), 219 DVU (German People’s Union), 203, 204

East Germany see German Democratic Republic Economic Miracle (Wirtschaftswunder), 17, 21 Education after Auschwitz (Erziehung nach Auschwitz), 100–1 Eichmann, Adolf, 52 Eichmann Trial, 18 Eisenman, Peter (Holocaust memorial), 129, 136, 137, 139, 148–9 Elsässer, Jürgen, 193 Emergency Laws (West Germany), 20 ‘Empty Library’ memorial (Berlin), 129 Enquete-Kommission (memorial sites), 125–7, 161 Enzensberger, Hans Magnus, 86 Erinnerungskultur, 125, 218 Erzwungene Wege (exhibition), 213–14 ethnos, 16 Europe; European Union and 2005 commemorations, 200–2 and anti-semitism, 163, 231 and proposed European Union ban of Nazi symbols, 200–1 attitudes towards in Berlin Republic, 47, 89–90 attitudes towards in West Germany, 17 changing attitudes to Nazi past in, 12, 28–31 dispute over resolution on Holocaust remembrance, 201 eastward enlargement of, 89, 197, 198 European Network on Memory and Solidarity, 211 European Parliament resolution on Holocaust remembrance, 201 expellees (Vertriebene) and Centre against Expulsions, 209–14 remembrance of in post-war Germany, 189, 191 EXPO 2000, 90–1 expulsion (and flight) of Germans from eastern Europe see expellees far right, far right extremism, 94–9 and 2005 commemorations, 203–4, 205–6

258 Index far right, far right extremism – continued and anti-semitism, 96 and dialectic of normality, 52 and Germany’s image, 94, 96, 98, 204, 206, 220 and the ‘New Right’, 25 and debate on Walser’s Peace Prize speech, 65–6, 73–4 and World Cup 2006, 219–20 as European phenomenon, 95 compared to Nazis, 77 development of since unification, 94–5 election successes, 203, 232 political and public initiatives against, 94, 96–9, 101–3, 206 also see NPD FDP (Free Democratic Party), 1, 116, 174, 179, 198 Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz), 94 Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) and the European Union, 17, 47 and Western integration, 15 attitude of towards German Democratic Republic, 17 attitude of towards Nazi past post-unification, 24–5 (also see Berlin Republic) attitude of towards Nazi past pre-unification, 14–24 national identity in, 14, 17 national memory in, 11–12, 14 The Final Solution (genocide), 39, 40, 86, 101, 232 Finkelstein, Norman, 31, 35 and debate on book The Holocaust Industry, 166–71 Fischer, Joschka as member of generation of 1968, 45 on European enlargement, 89 on German foreign policy, 46 on German victimhood, 210 on legacy of Nazi past, 200, 207 on military intervention in Kosovo, 86, 87 on relations with Israel, 179–80 Flick, Friedrich Christian, 205 ‘Flight, Expulsion, Integration’ (exhibition), 212–13

forced labourers see compensation to former forced labourers Förderkreis (Holocaust memorial) see Association [Förderkreis] for the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe Foundation against Expulsions (Stiftung gegen Vertreibungen), 210 also see Centre against Expulsions Frahm, Ole, 191 France, xvi, 28 Frei, Norbert, 16, 190–1, 198 Freudenheim, Tom, 157 Frevert, Ute, 26, 63 Friedenspreisrede see Peace Prize speech Friedländer, Saul, 51, 120 Friedman, Michel, 98, 172, 173, 175, 176, 179 Friedrich, Jörg, 189, 190 Funke, Hajo, 63, 74, 76, 77, 78, 176 Galinski, Heinz, 147 Gauck, Joachim, 215, 218 Gedenkstätten (memorial sites); definition of, 121 also see memorials, memorial sites Gedenkstättenkonzept (memorial sites), 125–7 controversy over 2004 Gedenkstättenkonzept, 217–19 generational change and Berlin Republic, 2, 45 and dialectic of normality, 53 and remembrance of Nazi past, 9–10, 18–20 generation of 1968, 2, 20, 89 members of in Schröder government, 2, 45 ‘generation of 89’, 50 German Democratic Republic (GDR) attitude of towards Nazi past, 14, 17 attitude of towards West Germany, 17 comparison with Third Reich, 25 memorial sites in, 121, 123 remembrance of since unification, 25, 102, 214–19 German Historical Museum, 209, 212 German-Jewish relations (post-war), 76, 174–6, 179–80, 188, 232

Index 259 German Research Foundation, 52 Germany – Land of Ideas, 219 Gerz, Jochen, 124, 136; and Shalev-Gerz, Esther, 124 Geschichtskultur, 124–5 Geschichtspolitik, 13, 22, 24, 25, 30, 62, 142, 196–7, 208, 209, 228 Gesichtzeigen, 103 Gibowski, Wolfgang, 93 globalisation (of Holocaust remembrance), 31–5 Globke, Hans, 15 ‘Gnade der späten Geburt’ (grace of late birth), 23, 48 Goebbels, Joseph, 50, 52, 184 Goethe-Institut, 91, 94 Goldhagen, Daniel J., 25, 168 Goran Eriksson, Sven, 202 Gorbey, Ken, 154 Grand Coalition (elected in 2005) and attitudes to Nazi past, 207–9, 229 and debate on German victimhood, 209–10 foreign policy of, 206–7 also see Merkel, Angela Grass, Günter, 18, 24, 133, 163, 190 and novel Im Krebsgang, 189 as possible target of Peace Prize speech, 58 controversy surrounding wartime SS involvement, 224–7 Great Britain, xv, 29 and Holocaust Memorial Day, 30, 40–2, 202 and patriotism, 113 Greece, 93–4 Green Card initiative, 51–2 Green Party (Die Grünen/Bündnis 90), 1, 218 and debate on intervention in Afghanistan, 88 and debate on intervention in Kosovo, 36 and Nationalstolz debate, 110, 115 Grimond, John, 44, 50, 53 Grosser, Alfred, 9, 13 Grundgesetz see Basic Law Gruppe 47, 15 guilt; collective guilt (Karl Jaspers on), 10, 20, 234 (note 3)

Günzel, Reinhard, 188 Gysi, Gregor, 25 Haacke, Hans, 124 Habermas, Jürgen, 63 as possible target of Peace Prize speech, 56 on ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’, 185 on Holocaust memorial, 142, 146 role in Historians’ Dispute, 24 Haider, Jörg, 39 Halbwachs, Maurice, 8–10, 18–19 Haury, Thomas, 175–7 Beim Häuten der Zwiebel (Peeling the Onion), 224 Herbert, Ulrich, 22, 39, 215 Herf, Jeffrey, 15, 16, 21, 52 Herzinger, Richard, 87, 175, 176, 190 Herzog, Roman, xv, 61, 70 Heyl, Matthias, 100–1 Historians’ Dispute (Historikerstreit), 23–4 Historical Association to Reappraise SED Injustice (Geschichtsverbund zur Aufarbeitung des SED-Unrechts), 215–16 Hochhuth, Rolf, 18 Hoffmann, Christa, 20 Hohmann, Martin and allegations of anti-semitism, 187–8 on Holocaust memorial, 145 Holocaust (remembrance of post-war) absence from discourse in early post-war years, 10, 15 and dialectic of normality, 2, 51 and Holocaust (TV series), 13, 22, 36 as barrier to understanding, 6–7 emergence of discourse on in West Germany, 20–2 instrumentalisation of, 58, 104, 165, 229 (also see Peace Prize speech) media representation of, 53, 57–8, 76, 82, 166, 167 uniqueness or comparability of, 24, 34, 168–9 use of word, 15, 22 viewed as sum of Second World War, 7, 32, 35, 150 Holocaust denial, 40, 231 Holocaust education, 100

260 Index The Holocaust Industry (book by Norman Finkelstein and subsequent debate), 166–71, 230 compared to Walser’s Peace Prize speech, 167–8 Holocaust memorial (Berlin), 129–51 and dialectic of normality, 52 Holocaust Memorial Day, xv, 30, 201, 231 in Great Britain, 29, 40–2, 202, 231 Holocaust Memorial Museum (Washington), 36 homosexuals (remembrance of Nazi victims of), 93, 124, 150 Honderich, Ted, 188 House of the Wannsee Conference (Berlin), 101, 123, 232 Hungary, 201 identity see national identity Institute for Contemporary History (Munich), 18, 216 instrumentalisation (of Nazi past), 13–14, 104, 165, 229 as theme of Walser’s Peace Prize speech, 58 during Cold War, 17 positive and negative impact of, 229–30 intellectual arson (geistige Brandstiftung) (Peace Prize speech), 64, 65 intellectuals criticism of in Peace Prize debate, 55–7 role of in remembrance of Nazi past, 15, 18 International Auschwitz Committee, 202 Iran, 231 Iraq (war in Iraq), 192, 193, 194, 197 Irving, David, 40 Israel, 33, 67, 120, 188, 199, 200, 203 and Anti-Semitism debate, 163, 171–8, 180–1 German relations with, 180, 203, 208 Italy, xv, 30 Jäckel, Eberhard, 132 Jäger, Lorenz, 170 Jakob-Marks, Christine, 134

Jaspers, Karl, 10, 15, 16, 20, 71, 82 Jeismann, Michael, 30, 31, 32, 50, 59, 70 Jenninger, Philip, 23 Jewish Claims Conference, 166, 232 Jewish Museum (Berlin), 132, 151–7 Jörges, Hans-Ulrich, 186–7, 205 ‘Joseph affair’, 105–6 Jung, Franz Josef, 208 Kaczynski, Jaroslaw, 213, 214 Kaiser Wilhelm Society, 52 Karsli, Jamal, 172 Kiesinger, Kurt Georg, xv, 20 Klinsmann, Jürgen, 221 Klotz, Gerd, 76–7 Knabe, Hubertus, 216, 218 Kohl, Helmut, 87 and attitudes to Europe, 47 and Bitburg controversy, 23 and Holocaust memorial, 60, 76, 143 and Neue Wache, 142–3 and ‘normalisation’, 22–3 Köhler, Horst, xv, 199, 202–3, 206, 209, 214, 219, 221 Korn, Salomon, 68 Koselleck, Reinhard, 27 Kosovo; German military intervention in, 52, 83–8 ‘Kosovocaust’, 86 Im Krebsgang, 189, 227 Kristallnacht (Night of Broken Glass), xvi, 97, 98, 124 Küntzel, Matthias, 87 Kwasniewski, Aleksander, 211 Lagrou, Pieter, 28–9 Lammert, Norbert, 207 Langenscheidt, Florian, 223 Lebanon, 208 Leggewie, Claus, 20 Legitimationskultur (culture of legitimation), 30–1, 32, 37, 43, 191, 200 Leidkultur, 2, 82–3, 230 and Holocaust memorial, 146–8 and ‘Joseph affair’, 105 and Leitkultur debate, 107 and Nationalstolz debate, 111 compared to Leitverantwortung, 83, 105 Henryk Broder on, 82, 103–5

Index 261 Leitkultur debate (2000), 80, 105–11 and Leidkultur, 107 and Leitverantwortung, 107, 109 Leitverantwortung, 2, 80–1, 230 and attitudes to Europe, 84–5, 89–90 and compensation to forced labourers, 91–4 and GDR past, 85 and Germany’s image, 89–91 and initiatives against the far right, 94–9 and instrumentalisation, 81–2, 86 and Jewish Museum, 155–7 and military intervention in Kosovo, 83–9 and political education, 99–101 compared to Leidkultur, 83, 105 Lejeune, Erich J., 222–3 Levy, Daniel, 31–3, 36, 39, 86, 87 Levy, Daniel (film-maker), 50 liberation (1945) see capitulation Libeskind, Daniel, 136 and design for SS-Truppenlager site, 162 and Jewish Museum, 152, 154, 155 on the new Berlin, 128 lieux de mémoire, 120–1, 122, 124–5, 126, 160 Linenthal, Edward, 35, 36 Lipstadt, Deborah, 40 Livingstone, Ken, 202 Luftkrieg und Literatur, 189 Maffay, Peter, 112 Mahnmal (as compared to Denkmal), 136 also see memorials Maron, Monika, 71 Matussek, Matthias, 223 Max Planck Society, 52 media; role of in remembrance of Nazi past, 11, 76, 78–9, 82, 166, 229 and cultural memory, 26 and Nationalstolz debate, 112–14 criticism of in Peace Prize speech, 56–8 Meinecke, Friedrich, 15 Meinungssoldaten (opinion soldiers) (Peace Prize speech), 56, 59, 72, 75, 146 and ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’, 185–7 Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, see Holocaust memorial

memorials, memorial sites and ‘anti-monuments’, 124 and Berlin, 127–9 and cultural remembrance, 120–3 and dialectic of normality, 128–9 and Gedenkstättenkonzept, 125–7, 217–19 and Leitverantwortung, 125 as authentic or constructed sites, 120–2 challenges for in unified Germany, 125, 217–19 definition of Gedenkstätten (memorial sites), 121 development of in East Germany, 121, 123 development of in West Germany, 123–4 distinction between Denkmal and Mahnmal, 136 to homosexual victims of Nazism, 124, 150 to Sinti and Roma, 124, 150, 239 (note 9) also see Holocaust memorial (Berlin) and under individual names memory (of Nazi past) active, 3, 7, 81, 99–100, 101–2 Americanised, 34, 35–7 and communities of memory, 8–10, 11, 18–19, 228 as interpretation, 6, 26 as narrative, 7–8, 9, 11, 14 collective, 8–10 communicative, 25–7, 228 cultural, 25–7, 88, 97, 217 ‘de-Germanised’, 14, 31, 32 globalisation of, 27, 31–5 individual, 10–11, 42 in East Germany, 14, 15 in West Germany, 14–24 in post-war Europe, 12, 28–31 (also see under individual countries) layering of, 3, 12–13 non-transmission of, 9, 19 national, 10–12 repression of, 15, 16, 17, 19, 20, 21, 28, 55, 145, 156 ritual, 3, 6, 7 memorial site concept see Gedenkstättenkonzept

262 Index Mengele, Joseph, 93 Menzel, Klaus-Jürgen, 203 Merkel, Angela, xv and debate on German victimhood, 209–10 attitude to Nazi past, 208–9, 228, 229 election victory (2005), 207 on German foreign policy, 208 on Leitkultur, 106, 109, 110 on national pride, 3, 115, 221, 223 also see Grand Coalition (elected 2005) Merz, Friedrich, 106, 110, 114, 117 Meyer, Laurenz, 111–12, 113 milieux de mémoire, 120–1, 124–5, 126, 158, 160 Milosˇevic´, Slobodan, 83, 86 Mitscherlich, Alexander, 19, 21, 114 Mitscherlich, Margarete, 21 Moeller, Robert G., 16 Möller, Horst, 216 Mohler, Armin, 19 Mohr, Reinhard, 46, 64, 221 Möllemann, Jürgen and allegations of anti-semitism (‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’), 171–6 and flyer controversy, 179 parallels with Martin Walser, 172, 180, 184–7 Mölzer, Andreas, 201 Morsch, Günter, 126, 161 monuments see memorials Müller, Henrik, 223 Müller, Kirsten, 117 Müller, Peter, 109 Müntefering, Franz, 110, 192 Muslim Council of Britain, 202 myths; and national memory, 11–12 Nachama, Andreas, 140 national identity (in post-war Germany) constructions of in East Germany, 16–17 constructions of in West Germany, 16–17, 22 impact of unification on, 24–5 problems of post-war, 12, 14, 43 also see Leitkultur debate, Nationalstolz debate and Patriotism debate (2006)

national myths see myths, and national memory national pride Gerhard Schröder on, 116, 164, 166 Horst Köhler on, 221 in Great Britain, 113 Johannes Rau on, 116 also see Leitkultur debate, Nationalstolz debate and Patriotism debate (2006) Nationalstolz debate (2001), 111–18 also see Patriotism debate (2006) nativization (of memory), 34 Naumann, Michael, 38, 108, 136–7, 138 Nazi past, confrontation with and generational change, 2, 9–10, 18–20, 45, 53 and unification, 24–5 as global phenomenon, 31–5 in East Germany, 14, 15, 17 in Europe, 12, 28–31 in the United States, 34, 35–7 in West Germany, 14–24 legacy of in post-war Germany, 6 under SPD-Green government (1998–2005), 44–50 under Grand Coalition (since 2005), 207–9, 229 also see memory Nazis, former members of in West German government, 15 ‘negative nationalism’, 60, 82, 146 Neo-Nazis see far-right extremism The Netherlands, 28, 29, 30, 42, 66 neue Unbefangenheit, 46, 50, 54, 77, 166, 170, 175, 185, 187, 192, 207, 224, 230 Neue Wache (New Guardhouse) memorial (Berlin), 127, 138, 142–3 Neumann, Bernd, 212–13, 216 New Right (Neue Rechte), 25, 73, 179 Niethammer, Lutz, 18 Niven, Bill, 15, 21, 25, 54, 56, 61, 81, 96, 124, 198, 217 Nolte, Ernst, 23–4 Nooke, Günter, 144–5 Nora, Pierre, 27, 120–1 normalisation, 18, 22, 45, 48, 73, 75, 117, 203, 205 Novick, Peter, 32, 34, 35–6, 39, 167, 169

Index 263 NPD (National Democratic Party), 94, 115, 141, 203–4, 205–6, 219, 232 proposed ban of, 52, 99, 117 also see far right Nuremberg Trials, 14

Prussian Claims Society (Preussischer Treuhand), 211 Prussian Palace (Berlin), 86, 217 Putin, Vladimir, 199 Queen Elizabeth II, 202, 204

Olendzki, Krysztof, 213 OMGUS (US Office of the Military Government), 16 Opperman, Sophia, 103 Oranienburg see Sachsenhausen Ort der Information (Information Centre) (Holocaust memorial), 129, 139, 143, 150 Ostpolitik, 21 ‘Our 1950s’ (ARD series), 209 Palast der Republik (Berlin) see People’s Palace Patriotism debate (2001) see Nationalstolz debate Patriotism debate (2006), 220–2 PDS (Party of Democratic Socialism), 110, 115 Peace Prize speech (Friedenspreisrede) (October 1998), 54–79 ambiguity in, 70–2 and allegations of anti-semitism, 57, 62, 63, 65, 74–5 and breaking of taboos, 63, 73 and dialectic of normality, 64, 72 and shift to right, 73–4 impact on discourse on Nazi past, 64, 73–9 likely targets of, 56, 57, 59, 61, 62 reaction of far right to, 73 also see Walser, Martin People’s Day of Mourning, xvi, 237 (note 10) People’s Palace (Berlin), 217 Persson, Goran, 37 PETA, 230 Pfahl-Traughber, Armin, 95 Phantomschmerz, 205, 223, 230 The Pianist, 37 Plötzensee memorial (Berlin), 123 Poland, 93, 198, 201, 211, 213, 214 Postone, Moische, 25 Prantl, Heribert, 114, 117 Prince Harry, 201, 202

Rau, Johannes, xv, 88, 97, 98, 116, 155–6, 210–11 Reagan, Ronald, 23 re-education (West Germany), 14–15 Reich-Ranicki, Marcel and debate on Walser’s Peace Prize speech, 59, 62, 72 and debate on Tod eines Kritikers, 181–2, 184, 186 Reichstag, as symbol of new capital, 49, 124 remembrance see memory Rensmann, Lars, 63, 68, 74–5, 78, 144–6, 150, 170, 176 repression (of Nazi past), 15, 16, 17, 19, 20, 21, 28, 55, 145, 156 resistance (to National Socialist regime), 15, 28 ‘Revolt of the Decent People’, 94 right-wing extremism see far right Roeder, Manfred, 141 Rohloff, Joachim, 63, 76 Roseman, Mark, 39 Roth, Claudia, 115, 179 Rosh, Lea, 132–3, 134, 136, 137, 138, 139, 140–1, 147, 221 Ross, Jan, 45, 50, 64 Der Ruf (newspaper), 15 Rupp, Rainer, 55, 61 Rürup, Reinhard, 158–9 Rüsen, Jörn, 125 Sachsenhausen (former concentration camp), 121, 123, 216 planned redevelopment of SS-Truppenlager on site, 161–2 Saxony Memorial Site Foundation, 217 Schäfer, Hermann, 214, 219 Scharping, Rudolf, 84, 87 Schiffer, Claudia, 141, 219 Schill, Ronald, 95–6 Schily, Otto, 2, 133, 206

264 Index Schindler’s List, 25, 37 Schirrmacher, Frank, 68, 72, 86, 181–2, 186 Schlußstrich (line drawn under the past), 64, 74, 77, 168, 185, 188, 205 Schmidt, Helmut, xv, 21 Schönbohm, Jörg, 216–17 Schöneberg memorial (Berlin), 128–9 Schröder, Gerhard, 44, 60 and ‘Deutscher Weg’, 192–5 and neue Unbefangenheit, 46 attitude to Nazi past, 46–9, 62 debate with Martin Walser (2002), 163–6 inaugural policy statement, 46–7, 48 on Berlin as new capital, 48, 49, 89, 90 on compensation to former forced labourers, 92–3 on far right, 94, 96, 100, 203 on German foreign policy, 83–5, 88–9, 192 on Germany’s role in Europe, 47, 89–90, 164 on Holocaust memorial, 143–4 on Leitkultur debate, 110 on national pride, 116, 164, 166 on normality, 48, 50 on role of Berlin Republic, 47–9 presence at 2004 D-Day commemorations, 197–8 speech at Stockholm conference, 38–9 speeches at 2005 commemorations, 202, 206 also see SPD-Green government (1998–2005) and Berlin Republic Schröder, Richard, 137, 216 Die Schuldfrage, 10, 15 Schulz, Martin, 201 Schumacher, Michael, 112 Sebald, Winfried G., 189 secondary anti-semitism, 4, 75, 104, 173–4 and The Holocaust Industry, 170 compared with anti-semitism, 171 also see anti-semitism SED (Socialist Unity Party), 110, 125, 127 memorialisation of victims of, 215–19 Serra, Richard, 136

shame (Scham); reference to in debate on Walser’s Peace Prize speech, 71 Sharon, Ariel, 163, 172, 173, 174–5, 178 Shoah Visual History Foundation, 37 Sinti and Roma (remembrance of Nazi victims), 124, 143, 150 Six-Day War, 20 sixtieth anniversary of the end of World War Two (commemorations), 196–206 Sonderweg (‘special path’), 24, 47, 85, 235 (note 11) discussions of during 2002 elections, 192–5 SPD (Social Democratic Party); and attitudes to Nazi past, 13; under Willy Brandt, 21; under Gerhard Schröder, 46–9, 62 SPD-Green government (1998–2005) and attitudes to Nazi past, 44–50 and compensation to former forced labourers, 91–4 and generational change, 45 campaign against far right, 94, 96, 100, 203 election victory in 1998, 1 election victory in 2002, 193 foreign policy in, 83–9 also see Berlin Republic and Schröder, Gerhard ‘society without a father’ see vaterlose Gesellschaft Spiegel, Paul, 96, 97, 98, 108–9, 141, 173 Spielberg, Steven, 37 Ein springender Brunnen, 59, 192 Stadtschloss (Berlin) see Prussian Palace Stasi (East German secret police), 216 Steinbach, Erika, 210, 212, 213, 214, 225 Steinbach, Peter, 16, 170, 171, 187 Stockholm International Forum on the Holocaust, 37–9 Straw, Jack, 197 Strieder, Peter, 148 Stunde Null (Zero Hour), 14, 16, 48, 109, 235 (note 5) Sweden, xv, 30 Sznaider, Natan, 31–4, 36, 37, 39, 86, 87, 187

Index 265 taboos (related to Nazi legacy), 3 in Berlin Republic, 170 discussion of during Anti-Semitism Dispute, 174–6 discussion of in relation to The Holocaust Industry, 166, 170–1 discussion of in relation to Walser’s Peace Prize speech, 63 on German wartime suffering, 189 Taking a Stance for Humanity and Tolerance (demonstration), 97–9 Task Force for International Cooperation on Holocaust Education, Remembrance and Research, 37 Thierse, Wolfgang, 107, 111, 139, 145, 146, 204 Tibi, Bassam, 106 Tod eines Kritikers (and Anti-Semitism Dispute), 181–7 Topography of Terror (Topographie des Terrors) (Berlin), 129, 132, 133, 151, 157–61 ‘triangle of memory’ (Berlin), 129–30, 151 Trittin, Jürgen, 111–12, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117 Ulrich, Bernd, 89, 197, 203 Die Unfähigkeit zu trauern, 21 unification of Germany (1990); and impact on confrontation with the Nazi past, 1, 24–5 United Nations (UN), xv, 31, 197 and Resolution on Holocaust remembrance, 200 United States and debate on compensation to former forced labourers, 91, 93 Holocaust remembrance in, 34, 35–7 ‘usable past’, 11 van der Will, Wilfried, 51, 53, 56 vaterlose Gesellschaft (‘society without a father’), 19, 61 Vergangenheitsbewältigung (mastering the past), 20–2, 23, 45 conservative attempts to lessen impact of, 22 emergence of in West German discourse, 20–1

in Europe, 29 and Nationalstolz debate, 116–17 also see Nazi past, confrontation with Verfassungspatriotismus (constitutional patriotism), 17, 106, 109, 115, 164, 198, 221, 223 Verfassungsschutzbericht, 94, 95, 96 Vergangenheitspolitik, 16, 20, 37, 73 Verjährungsdebatten (debates on the statute of limitations for Nazi crimes), 18, 235 (note 10) Versammlungsrecht (right of assembly), 206 Volkstrauertag see People’s Day of Mourning Vertriebene see expellees victimhood; German debate on, 188–92 and 2005 commemorations, 203–5 and remembrance of the GDR, 214–16, 217–18 focus on in early post-war years, 16, 189 re-emergence of since unification, 189–91 also see expellees and Centre against Expulsions ‘voids’ (Jewish Museum), 154–5 Vollmer, Antje, 145 von Dohnanyi, Klaus, 64, 66–8 von Weizsäcker, Richard, xv, 23 von Wilcken, Dagmar, 129 Waldheim, Kurt, 29 Walesa, Lech, 225 Walser, Martin, 104 accused of wishing to forget the Nazi past, 57–8, 61, 64, 68 and alleged anti-semitism, 57, 62, 63, 65 attitude of far right to, 66, 73 compared to Jürgen Möllemann, 171–2, 186–7 debate with Gerhard Schröder, 163–6 explains Peace Prize speech terminology, 71–2 Geschichte als Zeughaus (essay), 58 novel Ein Springender Brunnen, 59 novel Tod eines Kritikers, and subsequent debate, 181–8 on Auschwitz Trials, 58

266 Index Walser, Martin – continued on Holocaust memorial, 60 Peace Prize speech (October 1998), and subsequent debate, 54–79 ‘Über Deutschland reden’ (essay), 59–60 ‘Über freie und unfreie Rede’ (essay), 55–6, 58 ‘Unser Auschwitz’ (essay), 58 also see Peace Prize speech Walser debate; Walser-Bubis debate (October 1998 Peace Prize speech), 54–79 also see Peace Prize speech ‘war on terror’, 1, 88, 197, 199 ‘wars of memory’, 34, 63, 82, 104, 119, 160, 201, 202, 214, 216, 233 Wehrmachtausstellung (exhibition on the crimes of the Wehrmacht), 25 Weinmiller, Gesine, 136 Weiss, Christina, 211, 215 Weiss, Peter, 18 Weissberg-Bob, Nea, 173, 178 Westerwelle, Guido and ‘Anti-Semitism Dispute’, 172–3, 179 and Nationalstolz debate, 112, 115–16 West Germany see Federal Republic

Wiegel, Gerd, 74, 75, 76, 77 Wiesel, Elie, 34, 66, 71 Wilds, Karl, 43 Winkler, Heinrich August, 17, 82 Winkler, Ulrike, 169 Wirtschaftswunder see Economic Miracle Wittenbergplatz memorial (Berlin), 128 Wolffsohn, Michael, 20 Wolfrum, Edgar, 13, 22 Wollaston, Isabel, 34 Woods, Roger, 25 World Cup (2006), 219–24 Wowereit, Klaus, 140, 150 Young, James on Holocaust memorial, 134, 135, 137, 148, 149–50 on memorialisation, 120, 121, 124 on Topography of Terror, 160–1 Zentrum gegen Vertreibungen see Centre against Expulsions Zero Hour see Stunde Null Zivilcourage (the courage of one’s convictions), 98, 99 Zivilisationsbruch (breakdown in civilisation), 6, 90 Zumthor, Peter, 158

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