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The Week in Germany: Culture February 9, 2007 TWIG Exclusive: Five Questions for Fritz Stern, Historian and Author of Five Germanys I have Known
Fritz Stern’s biography could hardly be more American. Fleeing persecution in Nazi Germany, his family landed in New York, where Stern became one of the nation’s most prominent historians. Yet, his work as a historian brought him full circle, integrating him into the intellectual life of his native Germany as firmly as if he had never left. He has won the Peace Price of the German Book Trade, the Federal Cross of Merit, and addressed the German Parliament on the anniversary of the 17th of June uprisings in East Berlin. When he won the Leo Baeck prize in 2004, then Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer delivered a speech in his honor.
In his recent book, Five Germanys I have Known, a mélange of history and memoir, Stern reflects on a life spent investigating the history of Germany as it underwent massive transformations: from the Weimar Republic into which he was born, to the Nazi period, from which he escaped, to the two Germany’s on either side of the iron curtain, to today’s reunified Germany. Stern was born in Breslau (now Wroclaw) in 1926. His father, a physician, and his mother, who had earned a PhD in physics, came from an educated milieu of assimilated Jews who had converted to Christianity. As the Weimar Republic crumbled and eventually collapsed under attacks on the constitutional democracy from right-wing radicals, his family faced an increasing threat as “non-Aryans” and escaped in 1938. While a student at Columbia University, Stern disregarded the advice of none other than Albert Einstein, who had told Stern that he should study medicine, rather than history. Thus began the career of a transatlantic public intellectual. In his early works, he disputed the notion that German history had led inevitably to National Socialism. Refusing to accept that the ascendance of the Nazi’s had been either accidental or inevitable, he looked for the roots of the breakdown in anti-liberal and anti-modern ideologies that he termed “the politics of cultural despair.” Always conscious of his right and duty to be a citizen of his own times, Stern has consistently weighed in on the events of the day, with his incisive investigations into the tragic collapse of liberal democracy in Germany as a foundation for his positions. At a recent symposium sponsored by the American Institute on Contemporary German Studies (AICGS) at Johns Hopkins University, the BMW Center for German and European Studies (Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University), the German Historical Institute Washington, The German Marshall Fund of the United States, the Goethe-Institut Washington, and Farrar, Straus and Giroux, generations of historians, including many of Stern's own intellectual progeny, paid tribute to his accomplishments as a historian, citizen, and author. The Week in Germany Editor David Brown and Gerald Livingston, Senior Visiting Fellow at the German Historical Institute (who also presented at the symposium) caught up with Stern and asked him about Chancellor Merkel’s approach to the US, a European constitution, and his call for a monument to “active decency” during the reign of National Socialism. (Look for Gerald Livingston's upcoming piece about Stern in The Atlantic Times) Fritz Stern on Transatlantic Relations 1.) TWIG: How would you characterize the current state of transatlantic relations? I welcome Chancellor Merkel’s efforts to improve the atmospherics of the relationship, even without changing the basic conditions. If Merkel had been in power in 2002-2003, when the issue was whether the US should go to war in Iraq, I think she would have taken the same positions, but almost certainly she would have worded it differently. In any case, the German electorate is not now in favor of the Iraq war, and on that there will be very little change. On the other hand, there are many things that the US and Germany can and should work together on, so I welcome the change atmospherics, which are not unimportant in politics. I also commend Chancellor Merkel for trying to maintain good relations with Russia at the same time she is trying to maintain good relations with the United States. 2.) TWIG: What are the specific areas where the US and Germany can cooperate? The first thing that comes to mind is Afghanistan. German troops are already present as part of the NATO mission there. There is much criticism of actual German participation. For the moment, this seems to be a deteriorating situation, so there is much to be done. Germany is a key player, not just because it has the current EU Council presidency, but also because it is the largest and most powerful country in continental Europe. I think that Chancellor Merkel can give counsel to an American government that is still very much stamped by unilateralism, particularly in the Middle East. Having established a good relationship with the US government, what Chancellor Merkel must now do is assemble a European view. The EU is an immensely important economic, political, and cultural partner for the US. Fritz Stern on Europe: 3.) Gerald Livingston: Does Europe need a constitution? Presumably it will be a useful thing to have, provided it has a wide popular basis. An instrument that is simply signed, however intelligent but without a genuine civic, citizen basis strikes me as less than useful. The history of everything that has happened since the Treaty of Rome suggests you can achieve a great deal without a constitution. I would not say the need is an immediate one. If it can be achieved with a good degree of clear popular consensus, it would be better than not having it. What I really had in mind, though, was a genuine civic engagement. I could imagine, in American terms, town meetings that would discuss such things. What you need is a growing civic awareness of how important the EU is, why it has become so important, and that it consists of far, far more than the endless paragraphs of Brussels. Fritz Stern on National Socialism 4.) Gerald Livingston: Have the Germans done a good job in coming to terms with their past? You don’t ever come to terms with the Nazi past or with any criminal past but particularly the Nazi past. There are ups and downs. There are new interpretations. There are new moments when the past returns to major consciousness or to major controversy. Speaking of the last 40 years or so, I think the West Germans (as they once were called) did very well. Many liberal historians have done a remarkable job both of researching the Nazi past but also of trying to explicate how it happened, what had happened. On the whole, I think, they have been successful, but it is never a process that is finished. It is obviously affected by current politics and the current cultural scene. There are regrettable signs even now that the past is always with us. This was manifest by Günter Grass’ confession, as well as by the response to it. On the whole, I can only repeat that, by and large, they have done well and in comparative terms very well. I draw only a few fundamental lessons from National Socialism, and let me spell those out. First of all, all liberal democracies are fragile. The fundaments may be weak or weakened when a democracy is faced with new challenges, whether that is a worldwide depression or the threat of international terrorism. Secondly, and above all, there is a process of slow erosion of democratic institutions and practices that Germany, and many other countries, experienced. Here, I am talking about 1930 to 1933 in Germany, and not National Socialism. The Nazis only rose to power following a subversion of the constitutional democracy in Germany. The lesson to be learned, and this sounds terribly trite, but I feel it passionately, is that we must guard against any subversion of constitutional rights and practices and values, and against any subversion of what I would call a liberal political culture.5.) You have called for a permanent European monument to the active resistance against the Nazis. Why is that important? How do you imagine it? What types of resistance should be honored? I think that I have been misunderstood in that respect. I think that in the earliest formulations of it I have always talked about “active decency” (aktiver Anstand), in other words not simply resistance in the sense of the 20th of July. In many cases we don’t know the people; we do know some people, obviously, the von Dohnanyis and many others; and the many people that we should know who gave the extra piece of bread, who hid Jews or political fugitives. It seems to me terribly important from a moral and pedagogical point of view that the next generation and the next generations after that not be only told of the immense cruelty, of the unspeakable cruelties that the Germans and their accomplices were capable of, but that there were even under those circumstances people who, as I say, actively proved their decency and their humanity. I am very well aware that in most cases it is hard to document. Let it be enough to have a few where it can be documented as representative. My notion is that such a European memorial should not be placed necessarily in Germany but maybe in a place like Strasbourg or some international city that has some degree of German identity but represents all of Europe. |
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