Societies define themselves through the use of their past in different ways, engaging in practices of both remembering and forgetting it based on the conditions of their present, to shape their national identities. Germany is a prominent example of a European nation that is known for its engagement with its past, specifically, their efforts to confront and atone for the atrocities of the Holocaust. At the same time, there are voices that criticise Germany for forgetting and ignoring some of their past, particularly Germany’s colonial history, including atrocities like the Herero and Nama genocide in German South-West Africa (present-day Namibia), its brutal suppression of uprisings and resistance movements across its colonies, their forced labour and exploitation of Indigenous peoples, etc. This blog article will further examine how Germany defines itself using its past by employing Jennifer Lind’s typology of remembrance to compare Germany’s ‘apologetic remembrance’ of the Holocaust and simultaneous ‘unapologetic’/‘somewhat’ remembrance of the Herero and Nama genocide.
Lind’s typology classifies ‘apologetic remembrance,’ as policies (statements, reparations, commemorations, etc.) with societal statements and actions reflecting remorse, ‘somewhat apologetic’ remembrance, as a government admitting to and denouncing violence it has committed in the past through some policies like a major treaty or apology, and finally, ‘unapologetic remembrance,’ as forgetting, denying or even glorifying atrocities. Ultimately, the paper will depict how societies use their past, sometimes in contrasting ways, to define themselves, and that this changes over time based on present-day political, social, and cultural conditions.
To begin, Germany’s current definitions of its national identity have been most prominently shaped by its engagement with the memory of the Holocaust. Germany is internationally recognized and commended for the exemplary way in which it acknowledges, commemorates and educates its people about the atrocities that were committed during the Nazi era, but this was not always the case and this remembrance has evolved over time. In the immediate aftermath of World War Two, Germany practised ‘unapologetic remembrance,’ reflected in their reluctance to confront the atrocities of the Holocaust directly. This was also influenced by political conditions in the two divided German states, with East Germany characterised by Cold War anti-western sentiments overlapping with older resentments of nationalism, which reinforced the existing marginalisation of the Holocaust within the official memory of Communists, who emphasised class struggles over other forms of marginalisation based on identity (including ethnicity/religion).
In fact, they brought forth a new wave of government-initiated anti-Semitism to consolidate an ‘anti-fascist’ dictatorship in East Berlin. A notable part of accountability for Nazi crimes came in the form of the Nuremberg Trials between 1945 and 1949, which raised international awareness about the atrocities within the Holocaust and set forth legal precedents for how to prosecute these crimes. However, Germans had built what Paul Connerton has theorised as a ‘wall’ between them and their recent past, and essentially forgot about the atrocities of the Holocaust. In West Germany, this led to a culture of silence around the Holocaust throughout the 1950s and 1960s, as they focused instead on recovering economically and establishing democratic institutions, while hesitating to confront the atrocities of the Holocaust and forgetting the existence of its realities, like concentration camps.
Germany reached a state of ‘somewhat remembrance’ in the 1960s and 1970s, driven by multiple factors. Primarily, the trial of Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann in 1961 and the trials of concentration camp commandments brought attention to the Holocaust again and formed public debates throughout the 1960s. In addition to the trials, media including Alain Renais’ Nuit et Brouillard and The Diary of Anne Frank brought back the public’s consciousness around the Holocaust, and the student movement in the late 1960s ended the silence, as they questioned the actions of their parent’s generation, and subsequently, advocated for the need to acknowledge responsibility for and make amends for this past. The ‘isolated policies’ that lead this period to be classified as ‘somewhat remembrance’ were seen in the commemorations that began in West Germany, such as the Dachau concentration camp memorial reopening in 1968 and the start of memorials at Bergen-Belsen and Neuengamme.
The state of ‘apologetic remembrance’ was reached during and beyond the 1980s, when these shifting attitudes among the public began to form government policy, and resulted in official recognition and commemoration of the victims of the Holocaust, and the construction of multiple memorials, museums, and educational initiatives to remember and address it. This was first solidified in West Germany and spread to East Germany after reunification in 1990. Official apologies, efforts to preserve the memory of the Holocaust, laws condemning Holocaust denial, and memorial days such as Holocaust Memorial Day on January 27th, are all examples of efforts that Germany has made to take accountability/responsibility for past atrocities, and the work they are doing to ensure they are not repeated. These efforts also propelled Germany’s identity as a newly unified nation that values democracy and is a global model for dealing with past atrocities.
Germany’s process of ‘apologetic remembrance’ continues to this day, with shifts being made over time to meet the needs of the present. Museums for example, are part of Germany’s efforts to memorialise the Holocaust, its institutionalisation of the moral lessons the Holocaust can teach, and to ensure that it is remembered and not forgotten in the present. In efforts to do so effectively, the methodology of museum curatorship in Germany has also changed over the years, from presenting an overarching narrative of the Holocaust through text, to trying to bring in individuality and the stories of survivors to prevent it from being overwhelming to audiences in the present. Contemporary understandings of how architecture can be used to convey meaning and reflections on historical events, have also been helpful in building connections with modern audiences, by influencing the construction of recent Holocaust museums and using architecture to make statements about the Holocaust in addition to the exhibits that fill them. An example of this is the architecture of the Jewish Museum building in Berlin, whose structure depicts the disorientation that the Holocaust left behind, through many twists and turns and a distorted shape.
Figure 1. Schneider, Günter, ‘Aerial view of the Jewish Museum complex.’
These changes in museums over time reveal how memory culture changes, with things becoming individualised intertwining with the goal of being anchored in the past, to prevent past memories from being dissipated in the fast-paced present. This plays out within the example of museums because over time, there has been a recognition that museums are not representing a ‘dead past’ to educate people about, but they are sites where the cultural contestations and negotiations of the present converge with memories of the past. Societies therefore, define themselves through the use of their past, based on the present-day conditions that shape interpretations of that past. Overall, although Holocaust remembrance and responsibility has grown to be a critical part of Germany’s post-war identity, this was not always the case, and how it is remembered has shifted, based on the political and cultural conditions of Germany’s present over time and changes in people’s understanding of how the past can be remembered.
By contrast, Germany’s engagement with its colonial history, can be characterized by ‘somewhat remembrance’ at best, as seen in the case of the Herero and Nama genocide in modern-day Namibia. German colonial rule over Namibia was very violent and warfare was used regularly, with the most tragic years being the Namibian war of 1904-1908. During this period, uprisings from local tribes against German colonizers and were met with violent suppression (military action and massacres), extermination orders (which marked the start of the genocidal period in 1905), concentration camps (with prisoners enduring forced labor, rape, limited food and no medical attention), human remains being stolen and transferred to Germany for ‘medical experiments’, and Native Ordinances (which stripped the African peoples of their land and livestock, and reduced their movement). In addition to this, the colonial period commercially reorganized Namibia and removed its native population, which contributes to inequalities within Namibian society to this day and demonstrates the long-term impacts of German colonialism and genocide in Namibia. Boehme’s analysis divides Germany’s remembrance of their colonial and genocidal past in Namibia into four periods, and to characterise the politics of memory in Germany, analyses phases of engagement between Germany and Namibia by accounting for action by the German Parliament, official government statements, visits, and publications. Each of these periods reveals how different actors within and outside a country shape the political, social, and cultural conditions of the present that form a nation’s negotiations with the past, and subsequently usage of it to define themselves.
The first period, from 1908-2004, is marked by ‘unapologetic’ remembrance. The genocide was not being explicitly denied nor were the atrocities celebrated, but it was not acknowledged either, evident in limited articles on the subject, occasional visits to Namibia, and no parliamentary action on the subject except for a failed resolution. In this time therefore, limited public and government engagement with the subject inside Germany, despite efforts from activists and Namibians to acknowledge the genocide, contributed to the overall ‘amnesia’ towards the atrocity. The second period, from 2004 to 2011 reflected a slight shift towards ‘somewhat’ remembrance, with a half-apology, more visits from Germany to Namibia, more media attention on the subject, and parliamentary actions. The public, especially descendents and activists, were paying more attention to the subject and actively seeking redress for these atrocities due to the convergence of the 100th anniversary of the start of the Herero and Nama genocide, and the 120th anniversary of the 1884 Berlin Africa conference in which European colonizers divided Africa among themselves.
The Bundestag passed a second resolution on the subject of the genocide during its centenery year, which yielded disappointing results for Namibian groups, because they not openly address the genocide. Specifically, they said, ‘the German Bundestag expresses its deep regret and grief toward the repressed African peoples. We want to contribute to help restore dignity and honor to the ten thousands of victims…[of our] bloody suppression of uprisings.’ Development Minister Hiedemarie Wieczorek-Zeul made a speech two months afterwards categorizing it as a genocide, which had an immense impact in Namibia, but was classified as a private opinion rather than official government policy shortly thereafter. Political conditions in Namibia shaped the country’s relationship and pressures on the German government, as the Namibian National Assembly asked the Namibian government to pressure Germany for both an acknowledgement of genocide and reparations in 2006. Although this led to the ‘German–Namibian Special Initiative for Reconciliation’ in 2007, civil society groups criticised the fund for not including the descendents of survivors.
The next period, was notably marked by a diplomatic scandal, in which a Namibian delegation had arrived to Germany for a ceremony for the repatriation of twenty Herero skulls, but faced multiple snubs by German officials, including not receiving an official reception, no high-ranking German officials attending a memorial service in Berlin, German Minister of State in the Foreign Ministry Cornelia Piper attending the skull exchange ceremony, but refusing to apologize or use the word genocide and leaving before the Namibian minister’s speech, etc. This scandal led to an increase in parliamentary inquiries by opposition parties, and motions surrounding reconciliation and apology efforts, marking a notable shift as the Social Democratic Party and Green party (who had distanced themselves from Minister Wieczorek-Zeul’s speech in 2004) were now pushing for these atrocities to be recognized as genocide, and pressuring their own government.
The final period, depicts Germany’s complete transition into ‘somewhat apologetic’ remembrance, which has been marked by official recognition of German atrocities in German Southwest Africa as genocide, and the start of an official bilateral dialogue in 2015, increasing public attention to the genocide, especially after Herero and Nama representatives filed a class action lawsuit in US courts in 2017. On May 28th, 2021, the slow bilateral negotiations culminated, and the German government officially apologized for its role in the genocide, and agreed to fund projects worth over one billion euros for reconstruction and development projects for the communities that were impacted, which was accepted by the Namibian government. This has been met by criticism by activists, and Herero and Nama communities however, who were largely excluded from the negotiations, and felt that the apology was incomplete and insulting as a result, as it did not meet their demands and did little for the descendents of survivors of the genocide, who still suffer the consequences of Germany’s atrocities.
This demonstrates that over time, Germany has been reluctant to fully acknowledge and take accountability for its colonial past and make efforts to repair its relationship with the communities it perpetuated these historical injustices to, undermining the efforts it makes at any kind of reconciliation, especially for the affected communities. As seen in the aforementioned periods, the changes in the discourse around and Germany’s memory of atrocities like the Herero and Nama genocide, has been shaped considerably by the political, social, and cultural realities of the present, both within Germany’s own population and the government’s foreign policy and relationship with the modern-day government of Namibia. It can be concluded therefore that any progress or shifts in Germany’s remembrance of the Herero and Nama genocide, has been a result of important diplomatic events over time, which have been influenced by public opinion and discourse. This reveals that the shifting ‘present’ that formulates a country’s negotiations with its past and leads to redefinitions of its identity, is shaped not only by the ‘present’ within its own borders or within its own society, but it is often guided by interactions across borders and pressures from the international arena too. Germany’s slow transition from ‘unapologetic’ to ‘somewhat apologetic’ remembrance of its colonial past in Namibia presents a sharp contrast to the ‘apologetic’ remembrance of the Holocaust it achieved relatively quickly, and reflects the complex, and sometimes contradictory ways in which societies define themselves using their past.
By reaching a stage of ‘apologetic’ remembrance towards the Holocaust and simultaneously employing strategies of ‘unapologetic’ and eventually ‘somewhat-apologetic’ remembrance of its genocide in Namibia, Germany has trivialized its own identity as a model for taking accountability for the past. In German society, this has further alienated migrant communities from former colonies within Germany, and strains its foreign relations with nations like Namibia, instead of serving as a positive example like Germany’s engagement with the Holocaust does.
Ultimately, the different ways of remembrance, or remembering and forgetting the past, and how this changes over time, demonstrate how memory of the past is constantly negotiated by the conditions of the present, and that society’s definition of themselves using the past is bound to change as a result.
The example of Germany, and the contrasting way it apologetically remembers the Holocaust while simultaneously ‘somewhat’ remembering the Herero and Nama genocide, reveals the complexities of how societies use the past to define themselves, and how political, social, and cultural changes in the present can influence this process over time. To support these conclusions, future research can examine additional examples of how Germany uses its past to define itself, or even apply it to other societies from modern European History such as France and England who have comparable colonial pasts and modern governance structures.
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