Standort Deutschland in the globalising economy: An end to the economic miracle?

This article reviews the economic position of Germany in an era of increased internationalisation of economic activity. Since unification there have been worrying trends in the German economy: in particular, high unemployment, increasing government debt and a substantial increase in the overseas activities of Germany's major companies. However, this article argues that the micro‐economy in general, and the institutional structures inherent to the social market economy of post‐war Germany in particular, are strong. Indeed, only by understanding the historical interrelationships between the individual structures of the German social market economy is it possible to appreciate the continued strength of the German economy.     

East German Intelligence and Ireland, 1949–90: Espionage,Terrorism and Diplomacy

This article analyses the writings of a prominent German social and political theorist ‐ Jürgen Habermas ‐ on the process of (reunification in Germany and examines responses to his interventions by right‐wing thinkers opposed to his views. (Re)unification is a setting of rapidly developing and changing events which present a challenge to Habermas’ thinking. Put simply, Habermas is highly critical of the ‘rush towards (re)unification’ and the process which has followed it. In particular, he objects to attempts by right‐wing thinkers, predominantly historians, to rewrite German history and which elude German responsibility in respect of the horrors of the Holocaust. Equally, he has explicitly shown the links between questions of German identity and the rewriting of German history and argues that the only viable identity for Germany post‐(re)Unification is that of ‘constitutional identity’ and not national identity. His writings have, however, been the subject of sometimes vehement and vitriolic critiques and this article seeks not only to engage with these but also to examine the interventions of Habermas in relation to his earlier more theoretical writings.     

East Germany in 1956: Walter Ulbricht's Tenacity in the Face of Opposition

Why did East German leader Walter Ulbricht outlast other Stalin‐era Soviet allies in Central and Eastern Europe? This article considers this question, comparing Ulbricht's situation with that of the Hungarian communist leadership in 1956. The article examines different aspects of the question, from relations with the Soviet Union to the archival evidence for popular opinion in East Germany in the crisis year of 1956. It concludes that Ulbricht's relative longevity in power was due to a combination of factors, from the exposed position of the German Democratic Republic in the Cold War, and the support this elicited from the Soviet Union, to the legacy of the unsuccessful workers' uprising of 1956 and the weakness of Ulbricht's internal opposition.     

Latvia, 1918–1920: A Civil War?

The post–World War I conflict that took place in Latvia between 1918 and 1920 was variously described as “struggle for freedom,” “war for liberty,” “independence war,” “civil war,” and so on. This article reviews the various concepts by discussing alternatives of statehood in Latvia. Its primary objective is to provide more evidence to the argument that the postwar conflict that took place in Latvia between 1918 and 1920 may be considered “a civil war.” By focusing on the Red and White terror campaigns, the author suggests that terror is one of the most overlooked aspects of the conflict that provides significant evidence for the perspective of “civil war.” He claims that the war was not “a class struggle,” as argued by Soviet historians, and calls for alternative explanations that would include the discussion of moral crisis, ideological conflict, ethnic and social hatred, clash of values, and the explosion of terror in Latvia.     

The Missing Fifth Dimension: The Writing of Australian History in Germany*

German historical writing about Australia can be traced back to the early periods of European exploration of Terra incognita. A corpus of German‐Australian literature exists in the historical notes that were part of early travel books, geographic sketches and emigrant guides. Historical fiction provides another element. However an empirical historiography which elevated Australian history from footnotes and established it as the focus of a professional discipline did not develop until later. Australia was too often wrongly viewed as a space without history. This article examines the professional treatment of Australian history in Germany and the difficult path which faced those who sought to establish the history of Australia as an independent research field. It focuses upon three aspects: (a) the historical background of German Overseas Studies; (b) Australian history as topic in Germany's historiography; and (c) the post‐war situation of Australian historical studies in Germany.     

Looking on: France and the new Germany

Franco‐German reconciliation lies at the root of post‐war European co‐operation. The Franco‐German alliance, formalised in 1963, has become a powerful axis with which all other European powers have had to deal. It is contended in this article that the main French fears over German unification were those of a nation discovering itself to be a junior partner in a relationship within which it had long pretended to seniority. This article retraces French reactions to German unification during 1989–90, and reviews the state of contemporary Franco‐German relations with regard to personal relationships, changing perceptions of the equilibrium of the Franco‐German alliance, foreign policy, relations with central and eastern Europe, and European integration.     

Forgetting the Führer: the Recent History of the Holocaust Denial Movement in Germany

The crimes committed by National Socialist Germany during the Second World War place Germany in a unique position for the Holocaust denial movement, and combine its so-called "academic" aspect with its political core. In no other country has the movement attracted so much publicity for its pernicious mixture of lies, distortions and half-truths as it has in Germany since the late 1980s. The introduction of laws in 1985 and 1994 that target " die Auschwitzlüge " (Auschwitz-Lie) changed the frequency of Holocaust denial in German public life, if not its nature. This article is an analysis of the German Holocaust denial movement since 1988, with an emphasis on the most important individuals and events that have influenced the movement's direction in this period. It also includes an examination of the laws that seek to stop its spread.     

Notes on contributors

In the Kosovo crisis, Germany for the first time since 1955 joined NATO military combat operations in a major way. While this has often been interpreted as a fundamental major departure ('normalisation') in Germany's post‐war foreign policy, this article argues that Germany's willingness to contemplate joining a NATO war even without a mandate by the UN Security Council represents an evolution, rather than a fundamental change in Germany's foreign policy orientation. This evolution can be explained best as a logical and consistent response of Germany's foreign policy identity which reconciled, through modification, its traditional post war foreign policy identity as a ‘civilian power’ to a radically different security environment.     

J.B. Chifley and the Indonesian Revolution, 1945–1949

This article traces the role of the Prime Minister, Joseph Benedict Chifley, in Australia's response to the Dutch‐Indonesian colonial conflict. It argues for Chifley's centrality to the formation of Australia's eventual policy to support Indonesian nationalist aspirations, a policy often in antithesis to the views of H.V. Evatt. This is significant because a focus on Evatt has distracted historians from ascertaining the causes of Australia's policy. Examining Chifley's attitude and role reveals that Australia's response to revolutionary Indonesia stemmed from an application to the Southeast Asian colonial question of a labourist and post‐war reconstructionist ethos, an idea of sweeping reform to rectify deep economic and social grievances.     

The federal republic and the future of Europe: A reassessment

Speculation concerning a dominant or hegemonic role to be played by a unified Germany in a post‐cold war Europe is misplaced. The extent to which the Federal Republic of 1949–89 has been caricatured as an economic giant but a political dwarf has undermined an appreciation of the manner in which successive Bonn governments have used multilateralism in foreign policy to further Germany's political influence in Europe long before national reunification. At the same time, it is unlikely that reunification will bring a dramatic change in German foreign policy. The nature of the Federal Republic's domestic politics, as well as the relationship with the European Community, apply substantial constraints on the ability, or the desire, to bring about a radical reorientation. The principal architect of change in Germany's relationship with its neighbours will be the country's expansive corporate sector. The gap between the restrained nature of Germany's diplomacy and the extrovert dynamism of its industry, furthermore, promises to make the Federal Republic's adjustment to a new international role awkward.     

Agency and Terror: Evdokimov and Mass Killing in Stalin's Great Terror

This article presents an account of the history of Soviet repression, which integrates our current understanding of the scale and nature of repression with a history of the agents responsible for carrying out these operations. It notes that the major shifts in the nature of repression were accompanied by shifts in the operational leadership within the security forces, and that it was largely the same groups of individuals who were responsible for the mass killing operations during the civil war, collectivization and the Great Terror. These were the groups associated with Efim Georgievich Evdokimov, which operated in Ukraine during the Civil War, in the North Caucasus in the 1920s, and in the Secret Operational Division within OGPU in 1929‐1931. Evdokimov transferred into party administration in 1934 when he became party secretary for North Caucasus Krai. But he appears to have continued advising Stalin and Yezhov on Security matters, and the latter relied upon Evdokimov's former colleagues to carry out the mass killing operations that are known as “The Great Terror” in 1937‐1938.     

Targeting the Motivated? Ethnicity and the Pre‐emptive Use of Government Repression

Research on government repression often focuses on the comparison between states over time and provides little insight about the targets of repression within a state. This article unpacks government repression against different ethnic groups. It argues that non‐democratic governments use pre‐emptive and targeted repression against ethnic groups that are discriminated, strong, or have a history of protest or rebellion in order to prevent future ethnic rebellions. For democratic governments, on the other hand, the cost of pre‐emptive repression is too high. The article tests this argument in a quantitative analysis of government‐group dyads. It finds at least partial support for some implications of the argument: Autocratic governments use more repression than democracies against discriminated groups, but only when they are also weak, and against groups with a history of protest. There is little evidence that regimes of either type respond to previous violent mobilization or group strength with repression.     

Attitudes towards German Immigration in South Australia in the post-Second World War Period, 1947-60

Considering the reaction against Germans in Australia during and after the First World War, it is surprising that German immigration to Australia was permitted again soon after the Second World War and even subsidised by the Australian government. Just seven years after the second war fought with Germany within a generation, Australia signed a five-year agreement to permit Germans to immigrate. This article examines the extent of the Australian public's acceptance of this policy during the period from 1947 to 1960. It concentrates on the state of South Australia where some of the earliest settlers in the colony had been of German origin, where their behaviour and achievements had been praised in historical writings about the colony, and where German immigrants may, therefore, have been viewed more positively. Yet there was some suspicion towards and discrimination against Germans in South Australia after 1945. Negative stereotypes of Germans were apparent in comments made by politicians and in press reports. However, these fears were minor and faded even further when more Germans arrived in Australia.     

The rise of Femi‐Nazis? Female participation in right‐extremist movements in unified Germany

German feminist scholars have recently come to argue that female involvement in right‐extremist causes is grounded in gender‐specific motives. They have also begun to uncover a troubling link between new patterns of female political engagement (ranging from electoral mobilisation to violent streetfighting) and their own efforts to promote an independent women's consciousness since the 1960s. This article develops a typology of New Right women, characterised here as Femi‐Nazis, evincing different levels of sympathy for, identification with, and participation in radical and extremist movements. It then explores five issue orientations distinguishing New Right women of the 1990s from the Old and New Right men of the 1940s and 1990s, suggesting that these women have developed an independent, self‐assertive political consciousness without internalising feminism's broader aims of diversity and inclusion. The article concludes with reflections on the interplay of ‘feminist’ consciousness and ultra‐nationalist qua xenophobic attitudes, and on the dilemmas Femi‐Nazi thinking poses for feminist identity in united Germany.     

“We are Human Beings,and have a Past”: The “Adjustment” of Migrants and the Australian Assimilation Policies of the 1950s

This article argues that the assimilation policy adopted by the Australian government during the 1950s was based on a denial of a migrant's past. The assumption that the migrant would readily merge into Australian cultural life ignored the ways in which past stories and memories shape the self. Through an analysis of the Good Neighbour Councils I explore the nature of assimilation that was based on a neglect of collective war memories of immigrant groups. This perspective is distinguished from that adopted by several theorists of the day such as W.D. Borrie and Jean Martin whose studies were less crude and one‐dimensional. The experiences of Greek migrants are examined to consider how Greek war stories could not often find expression or recognition in the assimilationist climate of the post‐war period.     

Franz Josef Strauß ‐ lasting legacy or transitory phenomenon?

Franz Josef Strauβ died in October 1988, exactly two years before German unity. He was undoubtedly one of Germany's most dynamic and controversial post‐war politicians, who aroused very strong emotions in the electorate, ranging from great support to condemnation. During his political career Strauβ had tremendous power and influence. As the tenth anniversay of his death approaches, this article sets out to assess his contribution to both Bavarian and German politics. Did he represent a transitory phenomenon or did he leave behind a lasting legacy?     

CDU refugee policies and the landesverband oder/neiße: Electoral tool or instrument of integration?

Despite the recognition that the integration of refugees and expellees into west Germany has been one of the success stories of the post‐war period, little light has been shed on the process of political integration of this group into the political system of the nascent Federal Republic. As the ‘newcomers’ were prevented from organising themselves in political or cultural organisations, the only legitimate way of exercising political influence was the way through the licensed parties. The CDU/CSU as a conglomerate of liberal and conservative traditions made use of its historic opportunity to adapt its flexible party apparatus and encourage refugee participation. Thereby, it made an important contribution to the political representation of refugee demands as well as attracting a large proportion of the newcomers’ votes.     

Russia's Twentieth Century in History and Historiography

Discussions of Russian history have frequently been marked by a preoccupation with the question of Russian 'backwardness', or, during the Soviet period from 1917 to 1991, with its obverse: the claim of the Soviet Union to play a vanguard role in world history. This paper offers a critical survey of twentieth-century Russian and Soviet history, and of its often highly politicised historiography, in the light of these debates. The extent to which the Soviet 'building of socialism' represented a project of modernisation will be considered, along with differing interpretations of this project by both Western and post-Soviet Russian historians. While the work of the new generation of post-Soviet historians promises substantive advances in our knowledge of the Soviet past, it is suggested here that debates on Russia's past are once again being overshadowed by old concerns about Russia's backwardness vis-à-vis the West.     

History writing as agitation and propaganda: the Kazakh history book of 1943

The reconstruction of the Soviet recent past is a controversial issue in the post-Soviet republics. In Kazakhstan, the reconstruction of the past has gradually rehabilitated leading Kazakh communists, such as Zhumabai Shaiakhmetov. One of the main rationales of this rehabilitation is his support for Kazakh historical writing, which resulted in a textbook published in 1943. This work has been seen as an endeavor by ‘patriotic’ Kazakh officials and historians to defend Kazakh national heritage against the ‘Soviet colonial empire’. By presenting a broader view of the war period in Kazakhstan from the archives, this article argues that this history textbook was in fact merely an agitation-propaganda product of the Communist Party of Kazakhstan. Shaiakhmetov and others had mostly secured their career by remaining loyal to the Soviet system during the collectivization, the Great Famine and the Great Terror. Therefore, their encouragement of the publication of a national history in 1943 for propaganda purposes does not qualify them as suitable predecessors of the current generation of Kazakh rulers.     

The sirens of power and German foreign policy: Who is listening?

The unification of Germany has, unsurprisingly, provoked much speculation as to the future foreign policy of the country. Two images ‐ Germany as Gulliver and Germany as Ulysses ‐ have dominated the debate, each coming in a popular and an academic version. This article analyses German foreign policy behaviour and discourse in order to determine which one is more accurate. As to behaviour, the article examines two examples from the core sector of national security policy as well as how Germany's relations developed with France, the United States, Russia and Poland. As to discourse, five ‘schools of thought’ in the current debate about German foreign policy are related to a set of five grand strategies that are suggested either in the literature or in public debate. In both words and deeds the analysis shows that united Germany continues to stick to the course of multilateralism and integration.