Germany: Phoenix in Trouble?

Edelgard E. Mahant is a professor of political science at York
University and the co-author of An Introduction to Canadian–American
Relations.

Most books about the politics of reunified Germany cover the same old
ground: the effects on political parties, the economic problems, and the
differing political cultures of the two former Germanies. This book of
10 essays includes some of these topics, but it also breaks new ground.
Matthias Zimmer, the editor, contributes an essay that reviews
much-discussed issues, ranging from Adenauer’s Westpolitik to
Brandt’s Ostpolitik to Kohl’s unification policies, while providing
fresh insights along the way and coming to the probably accurate but
astounding conclusion that it was the lack of a unification policy that
made unification possible. Thomas von Winter’s lengthy and sometimes
repetitive piece provides a great deal of useful information about the
rapidly changing German system of industrial relations, a topic about
which little has been written in English. Essays by Walter Heinz (on
youth) and Katherine Nash (on women) also address topics ignored by most
other books.

The other essays are not quite as useful or accessible. Dieter
Haselbach’s piece on the social market economy as an aspect of German
identity is marred by an excess of academic jargon. Thomas Hueglin’s
essay on the relationship between German political culture and
right-wing extremism contains some useful insights but is bogged down by
barely relevant statistics introduced from other political systems.

What the book lacks is strong editing. Zimmer’s introduction is full
of mistakes in English composition. Hans Michelmann confuses two French
foreign ministers, Robert Schuman and Maurice Schumann, who are rolled
into a composite, Maurice Schuman. In addition, Michelmann accepts the
facile distinction between de Gaulle’s policy of an independent Europe
and Adenauer’s vision of a Germany tied to the West (Adenauer, in
fact, distrusted American policy), and is misleading in his discussion
of foreign policy and the Basic Law.

In short, this is a useful but poorly edited book. A map depicting the
1945–47 division of Germany would have been welcome.