German Politics and Society

This special issue sets out to examine aspects of German politics, philosophy,

and society through the multifaceted lens of cosmopolitanism. A complex

and contested concept, cosmopolitanism has particularly important

implications for the study of contemporary nation-states, as conventional

understandings of bounded territory and sovereignty are reassessed in the

context of globalization, migration and transnationalism. Accordingly, this

introduction aims to outline several key strands of cosmopolitan thought

with reference both to contemporary Germany and the wider global conjuncture,

in order to provide a conceptual framework for the articles that

follow. It begins by briefly placing cosmopolitanism in the context of the

evolving concepts of German Heimat (homeland) and nation, because contemporary

cosmopolitanism can only be fully understood in relation to

nationalism. It then looks at the relevance of methodological, political and

ethical cosmopolitanism for the study of nation-states today, before introducing

the five articles in the special issue.

The notion of cultural plurality and the idea of intercultural dialogue have been central to the discussion of cosmopolitanism in both political philosophy and social theory. This point is developed in an exposition of the arguments put forward by Immanuel Kant and Hannah Arendt and through a critical engagement with Ulrich Beck's social theory of cosmopolitanism as a “social reality.“ It is argued that Beck's analysis fails to convince as a sociological extension of a long philosophical tradition and that instead of Beck's macrostructural analysis it is more promising to formulate an actor-centred sociological theory on the transnationalization of social spaces and the formation of a “cosmopolitan“ consciousness or awareness of transnational actors.

The aim of this paper is to offer a critique of the proposal of “methodological cosmopolitanism“ in theoretical terms and to substantiate this critique by providing an account of the dynamics of collective memory and identity in postunification Germany. In the first part, we look at the arguments about methodological cosmopolitanism and their derivative, the idea of cosmopolitan memory, illustrated by the case of Holocaust memory. In the second part we look at the case of Germany: firstly at its postwar experience of the attempted construction of “postnational“ identity, and then at more recent trends, contemporaneous with the Berlin Republic, towards a “normalization“ of national identity in Germany. The Holocaust plays a crucial, but different, role in each phase, we suggest. In the conclusion we return to more general themes, asking what the German case tells us about the cosmopolitanization thesis more generally.

This article considers Germans' relationships with other nations from a perspective of methodological cosmopolitanism. It examines the claim that everincreasing contacts with members of different nations can bring about a sense of trust in these nations. Using data from a 2006 opinion poll, it analyzes Germans' contact with and trust in six other nations. The study suggests that Germany as a whole is too large as a level of analysis. Germans' transnational relationships are better examined at a subnational level such as political districts. It is shown that transnational contact is particularly likely to occur in border regions and in parts of Germany with a high proportion of foreign residents. The two types of contact, however, have a differential effect on Germans' trust in other nations. Cross-border contact appears to be influenced by Germany's long-standing relationships with its western allies, since such contact has a positive effect on trust in western nations but not eastern ones. Conversely, multicultural contact with immigrant communities has a generally positive effect on levels of trust in other nations.

This article analyzes the differences in U.S., EU, and German perceptions of threat. The secularist and cosmopolitan turns in EU European identity formation have had a tremendous impact on how security issues are interpreted, especially in Germany. The traditional conception of threat has been re-defined. Yet, recent events are threatening the success forged through a half century of EU elite-driven culture change. Renationalization and a return to defining threat as fear of strangers have emerged across the EU.

While Ulrich Beck and Natan Sznaider advocate cosmopolitanism as a way of freeing ourselves from grand narratives and putting the subject back on the agenda of research, this article illustrates that such uses of cosmopolitanism can create more problems than they propose to solve. In the case of the Romanian Banat, the recent revival of a cosmopolitan past based on the legacy of the German and other minorities has been intricately tied up with existing cultural hierarchies. Romania has therefore utilized this past as a way of showing its “western face.“ In the Serbian Banat, by contrast, such a development has not taken place due to the absence of a dialogue with the West. As such, this article demonstrates that cosmopolitanism has become normative in its use and has created problems for both Romanian and Serbian societies.