German Politics and Society

Germany's role in Europe and the world is changing fundamentally. For about five decades West Germany's and reunited Germany's position was very much aligned with the European integration project.

Despite its hegemonic potential, Germany defined its role as a partner of the other EU member states. Within the EU framework and globally, it mostly acted jointly with European partners, particularly France. Although Germany's situation altered significantly after unification, it still refrained from exercising its increased power and was rather seeking the role of a “gentle giant.” This was largely the case despite some exceptions, such as the unilateral recognition of Croatian and Slovenian independence in the early 1990s, and criticism that Germany might tend to single-handed foreign policy—the “Alleingang.”

This article examines perceptions of Germany in Ireland during the Euro crisis. It explores debates about a “normalization” of Germany's role in Europe and its European identity, calling for a focus on external perceptions of Germany as key to understanding the extent to which Germany is viewed as “normal” from the outside. Through a presentation of findings from qualitative analysis of political speeches and newspaper articles, it shows that perceptions of Germany are filtered through discourses on Irish national identity that place Irish economic interests and national sovereignty at the heart of Irish engagement in the EU. Whereas Irish leaders argue in favor of further integration as a means to regain economic sovereignty, opposition actors and the conservative press see Germany as exercising economic control of Europe. The Irish case demonstrates that Germany's past continues to shape the way in which its leadership in Europe is perceived from the outside.

In times of crisis, the attribution of responsibility is at the core of public debates. Next to the question of blame, collective interpretations of who should impose remedies are contested. In the Eurozone crisis, Germany was an obvious addressee for this attribution of “treatment responsibility.” After years of relative reluctance, Germany had occupied a new role as it strongly pressured for harsh austerity in Greece and other crisis-hit countries. This article explores the public attribution of treatment responsibility among Greek and German actors in the Eurozone crisis debate. Based on a systematic content analysis of German and Greek newspapers as well as Reuters news reports between 2009 to 2016, we find a surprising absence of German actors as attribution addressees in Greece. Despite Germany's dominant role in the Eurozone crisis, Greek actors stress the responsibility of their own government (and that of eu actors) to act upon the crisis. In the German debate, Greek addressees are one category among many in a strongly Europeanized debate.

The article explores German leadership in Europe as mirrored in national-populist media discourses in Britain, Greece, and Poland. In an effort to discredit the eu as another attempt at German imperialism, accusations of eu institutions being modeled after German blueprints constrain Berlin's ability to achieve effective and legitimate European leadership. By applying role theory, the argument investigates why these ideas and images resonate so well. The article presents three supportive contexts of a German leadership paradox that—together with painful World War II memories—lead to the persistence of certain national-populist discourses. These include (1) Germany's Nazi past; (2) German nation-building, which partly resembles European integration processes; and (3) like the eu, Germany's projection of its interests in terms of normative power (or Zivilmacht), thereby constructing and recognizing respective selfs in “civilizing missions.” This article does not aim to strengthen such populist readings but instead advocates addressing them more openly.

In the political science literature, we can find various approaches to Germany's “alleged” hegemony. In the article we examine the images of Germany among the Polish political parties between 2014 and 2017 to better understand their different attitudes toward Germany in the context of Polish foreign policy. We distinguish four types of images of Germany: benevolent hegemon, malicious hegemon, tamed hegemon, and non-hegemon. The left and center parties (the Nowoczesna, the po, the sld) viewed Germany as a benevolent hegemon, strengthening Poland's position at the international level, and also as a tamed hegemon (restricted by the eu and nato). The right-wing and nationalist parties (the Kukiz 15, the PiS, the sp) perceived Germany as a malicious hegemon that conducts hostile foreign policy against Poland. Two remaining parties adopted “peculiar” approaches toward Germany: the psl treated Germany simultaneously as a benevolent and malicious hegemon, whereas tr treated Germany only as a tamed one.

In the past, Russians have often seen Germany as European—positively connoted—but not as Western—a negatively connoted concept. Recent developments including the Ukraine crisis have put the special partnership between Germany and Russia into question, and Russian perceptions of Germany have become more negative. Have these developments shifted narratives so that Russians now see Germany as part of the West? This article presents results of interviews conducted with Russian students on their perceptions of Germany. While they describe Germany and Europe as dominated by the West, interview participants also narrate Germany as naturally connected with Russia: they expect it to shake off the influence of the West and return to its former close relationship. Thus, recent developments have indeed changed Russian perceptions. Germany is seen as Western in spite of itself, unable to follow its own interests, which are assumed to lie in closer cooperation with Russia.

This article explores interpretive practices and discursive arguments that mediate transnational influences. In South Korea, a growth-oriented economy, competitive democracy, and an antagonistic relationship with North Korea developed during the Cold War era under the strong influence of the U.S. and Japan. This study analyzes how Germany—a country that is regarded as an exemplary case for a social market economy, consensus democracy, and successful national reunification—was imagined as a model for reform. By analyzing editorials and opinion articles published in major Korean newspapers, this article investigates the aspects of Germany that Korean elites paid attention to and the narratives that they constructed about Germany. The results show that competing Korean elites produced different German narratives and “German models,” leading to the integration of these competing models into conflicts surrounding South Korea's future.